Maybe you already know that the world in which Just Cause plays is immense. Not as huge as in GTA, but many many many times larger than that little dwarf state San Andreas. You get a complete South-American country at your disposal filled with missions, secret hideouts, vehicles on land, sea and air, mountains, rivers, seas, cliffs, roads, villages, cities, and everything you can dream of and blow up. It takes a day (!) to fully walk through it.

On top of that, the makers not only unlock the world piece by piece and keep you by the hand. Of course you get missions but you can also do what you want to from the very first minute on. Whether it's riding around on a bike, shooting innocent South-American women, liberating villages that are terrorised by government troops, parachute diving from a cliff or flying around in a jet. To be honest: while playing I've spent about an hour just flying without doing anything worth naming. So big and interesting is the freedom in this game.

Calling Just Cause a GTA-clone wouldn't be fair. The world is a lot bigger and the possibilities you get are far more over-the-top than in Rockstar's title. Those extra possibilities for mayhem (and some other gameplay elements) reminded me most of Mercenaries but quadrupled. You, as undercover government agent, have to overthrow the tiran dictator of San Esperito along with his corrupt associates. Rivalling drug gangs, revolutionaries and a handful of other vermin don't make things easier for you and you'll have to take into consideration the four factions and their attitude towards you to restore order.

Just like in Mercenaries you'll get assignments from all four sides by which you get a chance to climb up the ladder in their organisations, but that will also make you less loved in the other ones. Another eye-catching gameplay element is the possibility to do some parachute diving. Paragliding behind a car or jumping off an exploding jeep and then gliding from a bridge with it, hijacking helicopters from the ground... spectacle guaranteed!
On top of that, these skills give you the additional advantage that you can move very quickly and that's necessary in such a huge world. In no time airsurfing will be your second nature!

The graphics look mighty fine and although you shouldn't expect detail like in GRAW, the atmosphere of heat and wet banana leaves is more than present. You feel a revolution coming up at every corner and the colors, sun and drips of sweat just jump off your screen. And then I didn't even talk about the impressive explosions and all kinds of visual effects.