'Far Cry 5' is "different and unique".
Far Cry 5 screenshot
The fifth instalment of the first-person shooter action-adventure video game series - which is developed and published by Ubisoft - is set to be released in February next year, and sees players navigate the fictional Hope County in Montana, where they must take down a radical preacher forming a militaristic doomsday cult.
Creative director Dan Hay has said the decision to focus the plot in small town America came as the developers believed it was "interesting" to tell stories about people who have "been cut off" from the rest of the world and have started to "make their own rules".
He said: "I think what's interesting about Montana was that it had an interesting flavour of a little bit of both [urban and suburban]. Did we ever have conversations about that? I vaguely remember us talking about different locations. We very quickly stuck with an idea of being in a rural community and making it feel like small town America.
"We wanted to put you in a situation that was different and unique. We've all driven down those dusty roads in wherever it is that we're from. We end up going out in the wilderness, and you feel this sense of 'Okay. I'm shedding the tapestry of urban, and I'm moving into the wilderness.'
"It's really interesting for us to tell the stories of people that have been cut off for a little while and make their own rules."
And the developer hopes people won't use the fast travel option to skip the rural landscape, as he wants people to "feel like a bada**" by driving down dusty roads in a "muscle car".
Speaking to GameSpot.com, he said: "One of the things that we as a team had a conversation about is that when you spend time in the States, there's something magical about getting inside a muscle car and just driving down the road. You feel like a bada**. Something as simple as that or getting into a cult vehicle and hearing the sounds of the station that they play and all the hymns that are playing. It's just something about making the world believable. And so, when I get into a classic car, and I drive down the highway in our version of Montana and I just look at the landscape, it feels very real to me."