While exploring the big, chaotic world of Far Cry 5, you should keep your eyes peeled for more than just murderous cultists and bloodthirsty turkeys. Scattered around the map there are a number of hidden little references to other games, including earlier entries in the Far Cry series, as well as a few nods to movies and books.
Below we've collected what we and others have found so far. There's sure to be more out there. Here are the Far Cry 5 Easter eggs we're aware of.
Firewatch in Far Cry
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There's a fire tower on the starting island you'll likely run into. Listen to the answering machine at the top and you'll hear the panicked monologue of someone talking to a "Henry". It doesn't get any more detailed than that, but because the player-protagonist of Campo Santo's Firewatch is named Henry, and his job is all about watching for fires in a lookout tower much like this one, it's hard not to read it as an overt reference. I just hope those two made out OK in Montana.
Blood Dragon lives on, sort of
Guy Marvel is a director desperate to make his next hit film, Blood Dragon 3. You'll find him in the Herbane River region just east of the Hope County Jail on the ramshackle set of his film, cursing at his two underpaid employees. Help him out and you'll run through a series of missions that pays homage to the beloved Far Cry spin-off Blood Dragon—and at the end you get to hear him poke fun at critics of the series (like ourselves). While we'd much rather have another playful standalone game like Blood Dragon, the missions are a fun way to remember what once was. Oh, and you get a rad outfit out of the deal.
Just say no for a secret ending
VIDEO: Far Cry 5's secret ending, also available on YouTube
You can avoid the primary conflict of Far Cry 5 entirely, just by refusing to cuff Joseph Seed in the opening moments of the game. Wait long enough, and the scene above plays out. It's nothing special, but the blunt, unceremonious ending is a funny way to deny the Seeds' prophecy altogether.
Ray Bradbury has a farm
There's a callout to late author and screenwriter Ray Bradbury, best known for his dystopian novel Fahrenheit 451 and science-fiction classic The Martian Chronicles. Aptly enough, near Bradbury Farm is a crop circle, which in the real world are thought to be made by alien visitors with nothing better to do or by pranksters with boards tied to their feet with nothing better to do. Either way, a side-mission found in Holland Valley will shed some light on what's going on.
We all float down here
Reddit user Siilkkiapina93 found this lonely red balloon hanging out next to a drainage pipe, a subtle (and very spooky) reference to the clown monster from IT, who hangs out in sewers and haunts the local kids. He'd have to change his motto from "We all float down here," for Far Cry 5 though. Commenter EclecticDarkness knows what we want with their suggestion: "Infinite shovels are down here."
Shovels are the best. I'd leap into that pipe without a second thought.
The definition of insanity
I'll never forget the first time a bad guy gave an impassioned speech directly in my first-person camera face. Now, I can carry that memory with me wherever I drive in Far Cry 5 with my little Vaas bobblehead. You might remember him from Far Cry 3 as the dude that went on big rants about insanity and such. Everyone should have access to the guy by default, too. When selecting a car to drive from your garage, right click to customize it and equip the "Hawaiian Bobblehead." Oh Ubisoft, so coy. We'd recognize that hairdo anywhere.
Far Cry Primal is canon
Screenshot by ProfessionalBox on Reddit
Oros, the location of Far Cry Primal, wasn't some jaunt into alt-history, and this Far Cry 5 Easter egg proves it, as much as a fake book found in a fake place can prove another fake place is real. On bookshelves in a number of locations, you'll find a book titled Oros: A Mesolithic Paradise. In the fiction of Far Cry, at least, Oros and Primal are canon.
Malaria is bad
Another book, found on the floor of the prison in the Henbane River region, notes something that everyone who played Far Cry 2 has been thinking since 2004: malaria sucks. The disease, which you're stricken with for the duration of the Far Cry 2, was annoying, so much so that a book has been written about it. (Malaria is of course much worse than just annoying in the real world, responsible for about a half-million deaths every year.) Also, it made it hard to shoot bad guys.
Hurk's old Far Cry shit
Ah, good old Hurk. A character in Far Cry 3, a playable co-op character in Far Cry 4, he's now a companion in Far Cry 5. He lives with his cranky right-wing dad while attempting to be a bit more progressive himself, and behind Hurk's home in the Whitetail Mountains you'll find some boxes where he's packed up the things he's collected on his travels through the Far Cry-erverse, everything from 'Rook Island shit' to 'Kyrat shit' to, somehow, 'Oros shit.' He does get around. I kicked all the boxes but there was nothing inside, sadly.
PUBG's frying pan
While monkeying around near Raptor Peak with James in co-op, we came across what appears to be a reference to PUBG's famous bullet-proof frying pan. It didn't appear to save this NPC, however. We suppose it could also be a reference to Left 4 Dead 2, which also featured a frying pan weapon, but PUBG seems a bit more likely. Or, who knows, maybe this unlucky guy just got fragged while making some eggs. He didn't leave a note.
Davenport Farm
VIDEO: James gets owned by Ubisoft
James here. Far Cry 5 and I have a strange history, all starting with a fun letter I wrote to Ubisoft asking them to put my dad in the game. Nothing really came of it, but a few months later I got to play a new slice of Far Cry 5, in which I stumbled upon Davenport Farm, a possible homage to the piece (it's my last name). It's still intact in the final release and you can go investigate for yourself, but the video above should get you up to speed.
Alex Jones wouldn't like bliss
At a cabin near the southern edge of the map, you can find this note complaining that the bliss in the water is making all the animals gay. While it sounds like the ramblings of an isolated redneck, a reasonable guess, it's actually a reference to the wacky, out-of-touch host of Infowars' talk show, Alex Jones. The guy rants about all sorts of nonsense, but one of his most infamous monologues was about how chemicals in tap water are turning "the frickin' frogs gay."
The Legend of Zelda
It's definitely difficult to make out, considering the darkened room you wake up in early in the game, but down in Dutch's bunker (and in a few other locations) there's a Post-It Note reading "It's dangerous to go alone. Take this." We can only assume it's in reference to shovels, which as we noted above, are awesome.