Xenus 2. White gold.

I enjoyed my time with the game. It feels like Stalker set in the Just Cause or Far Cry 1 universe. The game can be a lot of fun. Unfortunately, the game can be unstable on Steam for some reason. There is a bit of troubleshooting to do before you can run the game, (via community patches and special settings). Despite these shortcomings, I think this is a great game.

Despite some bugs and rough edges, I had a tremendous time with this. I also loved its predecessor (Boiling Point - the road to hell).

A word of warning. It's not for everyone. You have to be the sort of person who is happy to download and install patches and go into a few configuration files - rather than have everything 'spoon fed' to them by (e.g.) Steam. You also have to have a little patience (the first few hours are a little slow I'd say) and be able to see past (e.g.) the less than perfect visuals and animations (that said, it can look pretty gorgeous played at 4k resolution with HDR etc. - the gorgeous tropical locations help in that regard of course).
You also have to be able to tolerate 'some' bugs and occasional crashes. I advise you to save often if you give it a go. The 'save game bug' is the worst, However, it is fairly rare (I only had this issue 3 or 4 times in the entire playthrough) and when you hit this issue, just drive, fly, sail or whatever until you are about 4k away from where the issue occurs and then go back and try to save again. Usually it sorts the problem (also, remember that the save you were doing when it crashed is corrupted - so don't try to load it lol) .

If I haven't already put you off by now, then you might be interested to learn that, despite my many words of warning, I actually love this game!

I am a very experienced gamer, and have played a great many of the 'critically acclaimed' big games of the last 20 - 30 years. However (weird as this may seem), I can honestly say that this is now definitely one of the most memorable (and yes, enjoyable) games I have ever played. I only just played it (in 2024), having owned a copy for a very long time, but initially giving up after being put off by a relatively dull first few hours on my first attempted play through (a good few years back now - I got a copy from a Russian site back in the day, after loving Boiling Point so much). I'm certainly glad I gave it chance in the end, as it just gets more and more enjoyable to the point were I've been completely hooked for the last 3 or 4 weeks. I finally 'finished' it today (well, the final cut scene crashed lol) after (what Steam claims) is 89 hours (I am something of a 'completionist').

Although superficially similar to the Far Cry games, this game feels far more open and ambitious.
It is also far less 'generic', is more varied and just altogether more compelling for me.
For example, I recently bought Far Cry 6 and MUCH prefer Xenus 2.
It also (importantly) remembers that it's a video game and concentrates on the fun rather than taking itself too seriously. Perhaps some of the badly translated (from Russian) dialogue added to the comedy and fun at times. Again, if you take life too seriously, then this probably isn't for you.......

In my opinion, It's bugs are just an inevitable consequence of the size of its ambition relative to the budget available to the studio that developed it. I would very excited to see what they could have produced if they had the budget available to them that major studios (e.g. Ubisoft) generally have.
Personally, I think too much is made of bugs and would rather play ambitious, fun and unique (apart from it's predecessor at least!) titles like this than much of the generic (relatively) bug free (but bland) drivel that is put out these days.

One of the things I love most about this game is the faction system, and playing all sides in such a way as to keep as much 'balance' as possible so that you minimise the time that any particular faction is your enemy. This (to me at least) is a very enjoyable mechanic and makes you carefully consider the order in which you do missions. Also, playing in this way ensures that you get to enjoy the maximum number of missions.
The gunplay (and game in general of course) is certainly not as polished as (e.g.) Far Cry but I find it very enjoyable nonetheless. Playing on Hard difficulty (as I did) is certainly challenging at times....

Overall, heartily recommended (subject to the caveats I have already explained of course!).

Rare RPG/Action game as if stalker was made in far cry setting. Many fun quests, beautiful sunsets, seashores. A lot of weapons to customize. Alcohol and drugs, various addictions side effects, leveling, perks and outstanding atmoshphere..It's a pity that such games are no longer made.

its like some one mixed Far Cry and Elder Scrolls the game is not all that fun.i did not like the game (so far)..you might but i haven so far.has some issues but it is an older game so im not lookin for much when i got it.looks okesh game needs to be cheeper

Never gave this game a chance even after Boiling Point in the past and it's actually really good. It is still janky and what not but it does improve over Boiling Point and is just as hilarious as the last. It has allot of busy work and this is appreciated and not just the main quest.

This game FINALLY gave an answer to my years-long paranoia that someone had access to my account without my express permission (even though I have taken means of securing my account further a long while back).

I have N E V E R played Xenus 2: White Gold. Yet the game tells me that someone did play it for SEVEN hours 5 years ago.,,
What a trip

бесконечные вылеты на win11. ломаются сохранения. иногда помогает полностью снизить графику, минимальное разрешение и минималбные настройки. тогда бывает повезет и сохранение пройдет успешно

To put things into perspective this game is originally from 2008 (something i wish Steam corrected as saying this game was released in 2016 is not only factually incorrect but it also undermines this games achievements for it's era) and it got released the same day as Far Cry 2 was released in EU, many of the things in Xenus II White Gold are things that later on Far Cry would implement and in some cases remove or never even try to have in their games, all of which was made by a small Russian developer with probably not even half the budget Ubisoft had for Far Cry 2, yet it feels like what Far Cry was supposed to be (at least the first one).

Now don't take the game for granted, it's eurojank and requires patches that are available in ModDB but many of the problems I've seen other reviewers complain about (like crashes on quitting the game) never happen to me, in 6 hours of play i only had 1 crash after leaving the game for a while in the background from alt tabbing other than that the game runs smooth as butter on my system on default high settings.

To keep in short what to really expect from the game
>Open world
>Basic skill tree
>Driving land, air and naval vehicles including assault helicopters and tanks
>Many sidequests
>Multiple factions to work for with a deep relationship system meaning that working for some will anger others but you could still patch up those relationships through certain NPC's

If you have doubts i would recommend watching the video on it by Tehsnakerer (tho some of the issues he talks about in his video weren't present to me specially the ones around patching the game).

Ayyy Gringo!!
spent many hours back in the day on this game..
Yeah now i have a much better pc its like you can see the optimization struggles with it and being dx9 its like it was trying to do more than the old ass api could handle, like crysis for example. (but then again planetside 2 was on directx9 and had tons of stuff going on so idk).
This game is surprisingly good you just need the unofficial patch then the sound fix to sort it then the game is all good..
Imagine doing coke getting high having the psychadelic colours going on and then going swimming in a cave.. Its epic.. Act like a tourist, do gang shit.. Its like GTA on vacation but more funny quirky and unique. This has personality and the water is amazing for dx9

What a buggy mess! Avoid like the pest

(be prepared to restart your game rig in order to quit this game)

the graphic, the story, the characters, the voice acting is a lot better than CyberJunk2077 and Last of uranus 2 combine 10/10

Before you play - Essential Fixes

Recommended, but not Essential

Save often!

If you are interested only in the game itself, I recommend scrolling down to the end of the review, because the main part mostly consists of my own thoughts on the whole Boiling Point (aka Xenus) series.

Recently I was cleaning up the mess in the closet and while going through various old garbage I found the original CD for good old Boiling Point: Road To Hell (or Xenus: Boiling Point). And though I played this game years ago in my childhood, when I did not really "play through" games but just free roamed and "explored" them, I still remembered it as a very nice and complex game, which for some reason went mostly unknown to the large public; so, I decided to replay it after all this time and actually complete it. I would say that making it run was not an easy task, but using some… let's say tweaks, I managed to do it.

And, you know, Xenus is one of the series that is painful to look at. No, not because it's bad, but because you see that it could be wonderful, but turned out mediocre. This game is an excellent example of great ambitions, good ideas, low budget and weak performance. By the gameplay the game was great ahead of its time. 8 different factions conflicting with each other, which you can work for, decent RPG system with NPC conversations and interesting leveling system, great shooting gameplay, which doesn’t let you be one man army and implies tactical approach, plus open world 20x20 km of South American jungles, several types of firearms and nearly all kinds of military vehicles. And all of this from a small Ukraine indie studio!

But what's wrong then? Well, first of all, some gameplay solutions are questionable, guns perform quite the same, a lot of same assets on the map and transport physics is mediocre but the main big damn problem is bugs. Lots and lots and lots of bugs and glitches of all kinds. Graphical, physical, gameplay, mission and many many more. For some quests NPCs just didn’t spawn, for some I had to reload several times, some just had very vague description, sometimes cars just got soaked into the ground or stuck seemingly in nothing and in the middle of the game for some reason I lost the ability to crouch and crawl – the buttons just stopped responding exactly in my save file. Add up that 95% information on the game in the internet is in Russian and you will get a very painful experience. Oh, and judging by old reviews from the internet, when the game only came out it was even worse.

Nevertheless, I didn’t stop playing and despite all the bugs I managed to really like the game. Many people consider it mediocre Far Cry copy, but if you look closer it's actually better than Far Cry. When latter one is just a Rambo-shooter where you are eliminating hordes of enemies, Boiling Point has a more realistic: you cannot just go into field and shoot everything – you will quickly receive a decent amount of lead. So, you have to do a tactical approach, trying to get a good position and make out enemies in the distance, which is very challenging. But at the same time, it's also not Arma, so you usually cannot die by catching one lucky bullet. Remember, that game also has faction RPG system, different means of transport and some story and you will get what I mean.

But ok, this all is about first Xenus, but what about the Xenus 2 (also known as White Gold: War In Paradise)? After finishing Boiling Point I decided to search for second title (I knew it existed, but never looked into) and found out that it's on Steam, so I decided why not to try it too. And you know, nearly everything written above is true for Xenus 2, with minor tweaks. Now, instead of jungles we have ocean to traverse, transport physics was simplified, perk system added, some guns changed, but the core gameplay is still the same. However, I did not finish it: no, not because I got tired, or hated the game – exactly the opposite. I really-really tried to love it and finish as much as I could but at one moment each time I went 2-3km from the land into the sea the game crashed with some VehicleOverflood error, which I could not find the solution for, so I just watched the rest of the game on Youtube (turned out I was only about 1.5-2 hours from the end). In addition to it, I also got a large bouquet of various other glitches and errors during playthrough, whole list of which won't fit even on the toilet paper roll, but most memorable were: corrupted saves, broken quests, special conditions which screw up whole quest line, inability of the game to clear cash and crashes as a result.

And the sad thing is, if we leave bugs behind, it's a nice game, even though most of it is made on pure ideas and enthusiasm. Missions are interesting, story is fine, gameplay is fun and challenging, perk system and transport physics are questionable, but they are not that bad.
But, unfortunately, you can't just leave them behind…

In the end, I really don't know who to recommend Xenus to… I mean, if you are fun of Far Cry, peculiar games or forgotten gems of industry, I would really like to encourage you to try it, but this whole mess with bugs makes it a very painful experience. So, I think I will say it like that: if play the games not just for fun or relax, but love to dive into and "explore" them, and\or ready to get along with some bugs, search and install fan made patches and browse Russian sites with google translate, I really recommend giving it a try. If you really manage to see through this dark veil of bugs and glitches you will get why it's a hidden gem of gaming. This is one of few games that really deserve a remake-remaster, which would fix and enhance it to the maximum, reaching the original ambitions and ideas of the developers. But it seems it will never happen: though developer is technically alive, after 2010's they went into low-budget mobile gaming and you can't even find any official contacts of them now.

P.S. Also, you know, fun fact: after playing such games you start to look quite differently at new games. You see people complaining about recent titles, saying they got several graphical glitches, slight physics bugs and one crash in 10 hours, like this is an ultimate buggy mess and the worst game of the century, which was not tested at all. And you understand that it's all light troubles, and they just don’t know what "not tested" and "buggy mess" really means: a whole quest line can be screwed up by activating wrong trigger or an important feature can break seemingly because of nothing, and, moreover, no hotfix will come and there is no known solution for it in the whole internet.

If you like open world shooters with a lot of freedom this is a must play. For some reason it reminds me of Gothic (quirky characters, weird humor, immersive world to explore, somewhat different).

What a strange yet engaging gem of a game. It's like a really good bad movie. You know the kind that are over the top, weird and with cheezy production value but all comes together to create a unique and entertaining cult classic. Basic economy, weapon upgrading, questing and exploration give plenty to do. The game is janky and the story doesn't make that much sense with broken translations but it's all part of the charm. I got it for $8 on the lunar sale and worth that price for sure

When I saw this was on Steam I was so happy because when I was a kid I used to spend hours on this game. Xenus 2 is easily one of my top 5 games and has a special place in my heart.

You are Saul Meyers, a special agent sent to a troubled region in the Caribbean to investigate and find the source of some poisoned cocaine. The action takes place in a tropical archipelago, full of crystal-clear water, sandy beaches, jungle foliage and of course factions fighting against each other. It's up to the player to decide who to side with. The gameplay is an open-world combo of RPG/FPS which I think works perfectly here. The main story is not that long and one could be done with it in I think about 10 hours but there are lots and lots of various side-quests which help build relations with factions and of course give rewards, but the best thing is that they make you explore the whole beautiful world for which you can use cars, quads, boats, planes and helicopters. It's great fun, I tried to find and finish as many side-quests as I could, and it took me more than 40 hours which were a blast.

I can't leave unmentioned the fact that it takes some patience to get this game running smoothly and play it, since you have to apply a couple of patches to fix some existing bugs, and when you're playing the game some dialogue translations are... well, I could swear some of them were translated from Russian to English using Google Translator. I suppose they didn't really have much time to do proper translations as I think this game was not initially intended for Western players. Either way, the main dialogues are fine and as for side-quest NPCs, 98% of the time you can at least understand what they're talking about. As somebody said, if you think about those bad translations as poor NPC English skills, it only makes sense.

If you are not discouraged by some quality dips here and there, I think you'll like Xenus 2. I know I loved it. Now if only they also brought Boiling Point: Road to Hell to Steam...

I've put more hours into this than i care to admit and in a way i love its charm and creativity despite being a broken mess! it's like the EDF series it oozes charm and character.

For the love of god patch it as hard as you can but just know not even that will save you.

PUT BOILING POINT ON STEAM

BEST FACTION BASED GAME EVER!!! with so many options to do things, my second play through felt like I was playing a whole new game and encountered a lot of things I missed my first play through. There are 8 Factions all together, only one of them not being joinable. Don't recommend joining the bandits on your first play through because they will really make citizens hate you unless you balance out the citizens quest with the bandits. :p The Faction quest and stories are great. I wouldn’t say they are well made as Bethesda stories would be but good enough to the point where it is interesting. There are plenty of npc's in this game to talk to whether they have a side quest or just there to talk to. This game is just as good as playing a Bethesda game (mainly Skyrim and Fallout 4).

This game’s world is separated by strings of islands and just like a Bethesda game the exploration in this game is fantastic because you will never know what you might find on the different islands. With the awesome scenery like seeing exploded helicopters to sunken boats. The scenery isn’t the only thing you find when exploring, you can also hunt down items/goodies to find then sell when you are on your venture but be careful when doing so because there might be paramilitary or an opposing faction that might occupy that island.

The perk system in this game isn’t deep as most rpgs but each and every one of the perks will do something major to help you From say increasing weight limit to damage reduction. There is lock picking in this game and has 3 levels of lock picking (Thief-Burglar-Safecracker) with each of those increasing your percentage of successfully picking a lock. The highest level of lock picking itself is level 5.There are 36 perks in total but once you get to level 18-19 it starts to get harder to actually level up as the experience numbers get ridiculously high so it’s not worth the grind to try and get all the perks in one playthrough.

There are plenty of vehicles in this game that feel great to use but also very slippery as it is sometimes awkward to use but once you get used to it it’s great and you can’t turn off the motion blur that comes with driving the cars but of course still way faster than being on foot.
You can drive Cars, Trucks, Helicopters, ATV Four Wheelers, Jeeps, Boats and Planes. They can also carry up to 300kg of weight.

There are tons of weapons in this game and they are fun to use. All the weapons feel tight and polished. The sniper rifle works great as in some other fps I have played the sniper rifle in the other games can be kind of finicky. The Shotgun and the double barrel works as well as it has a tight spread when firing. The weapons can be upgraded into three categories, Firing rate, Magazine size and Range. You can find upgradables by looting bodies, crates or buying them from shops/merchants. My favorite types of weapons to use in the game are the AK-47, M16, and the Dragonov sniper rifle.

The music in this game is fantastic, I wouldn't say “Skyrim quality of good” but still holds some standards when you are exploring. The day time music gives it that beautiful ambience just like Skyrim when exploring the world. (specifically the soundtrack “from past to present”.) The night time soundtrack is great as well. The combat theme is the best fit of a shooter video game I have ever heard, as it starts off all hardcore then sounding all dramatic in the middle.

When it comes to bugs, I have not really experienced too many bugs that many people claim to have. I only experienced like a 1 or 2 bugs but not as much as people say they have. I have experienced some quest breaking but nothing a reload couldn’t fix. However, I think there are 2 things that would’ve made this game perfect, Which would be a better stealth system, crafting system and a character creator. This Game is what FarCry needs to be like.

i originally bought this game in february 2017 but when i tried to start the game i got an error about a dll file that was missing i could not get the game to work at that time also because the sound files didnt work so i requested a refund and i got the refund then in 2021 i saw the game again and thought maybe the game somehow works now so i bought it on the steam winter sales i am so glad i did. i dont get the missing dll error message anymore and the russian voices arent that bad actually and there is even english subtitles if it was russian subtiutles along with russian voices i would not even be able to get far in the game. here is a link to the russian sound files https://www.moddb.com/games/white-gold-war-in-paradise/addons/xenus-2-white-gold-russian-soundpack-sounds-fix and here is a link to an unofficial patch https://www.moddb.com/mods/white-gold-war-in-paradise-unofficial-patch/downloads/white-gold-unofficial-patch-20 that fixes alot of bugs and so on remember to right click each file and scan for viruses just to be on the safe side

Liked the story line, Disliked the gameplay, seemed confusing and characters had to much interaction to get to the point. Gun shot sounds rarely worked and point blank with starting revolver was no hit. 3-4 shots from 2-3m most away missed. scrolling through weapons was hit or miss. If the play was smoother and sounds worked, also no voices to characters at all, it would be a better game, though right now I would not recommend it.

as someone who bought this from yuplay.ru way back in 2010 and had to ask my credit union to open an 24 hour window to russia, i can happily tell you this:

saul myers doesn't exactly hit BOILING POINT and grit his teeth in a camera close up, but this is close enough.