Far-Cry 2 remains the most immersive game I’ve ever played. The entire game was constructed to feel as real as possible: maps that you had to look at without pausing, rusty guns that jammed at the worst possible moments, and a huge game world completely bereft of useful fast travel. These elements didn’t necessarily make the game more “fun,” but they combined to engage me in the gameplay, to create real tension and a sense of involvement. All games require some suspension of disbelief, but the level of detail in Far-Cry 2 made its flaws – poor voice acting, endlessly respawning enemy camps – hard to forgive.
Far-Cry 3 abandons most of the attempts at realism of its predecessor to construct a game that is easier to play. It’s undeniably a good (great?) game, but the inclusion of convenient fast travel, or sub-missions where you race to deliver medicine to a camp on time…only to watch them amble around, disinterested, after this desperately-needed shipment arrives. It sacrifices immersion for gameplay. For the most part, this is fine: hunting a boar, or carefully planning your attack on a secluded outpost, remains uniquely thrilling. But sometimes I just wish that my gun would jam.
ccpopculture 
One of the things that really annoyed me about Far Cry 2 was the re spawning enemies.
You finish an epic battle (and sometimes even minor skirmishes felt epic in that game) and 10 minutes alter you are help up by the same checkpoint.
I really don’t know how I feel about Far Cry 2. It was fantastic at immersing you in the story but it was also very frustrating and at times not fun.
I guess I’m glad I got to have that different experience.
Yeah, I’m totally the same on Far Cry 2. It was definitely extremely immersive and engaging but it wasn’t always a good game; it may have been immersive to have to spend 20 minutes scrabbling through foilage to get to the other side of the island avoiding patrols, but it wasn’t always fun when you just wanted to do the next mission. The worst part was definitely the re-spawning enemies …I might have been okay with some respawning, just not in less time than it took you to clear out the outpost in the first place!
Far-Cry 3 seems it’s probably the more entertaining game (I’ve only put in a few hours so far so I can’t judge for certain), but it doesn’t have the feeling of realism that was by far the best part of FC2.