While it may not float everyone's boat, those who'll enjoy it will enjoy it a lot.
Being (as far as I know for videogames)(not counting the safari hunting games) a first, Far Cry 2 takes place in Africa. At first you may think, "Africa? Deserts with occasional trees? Sounds BO-RING", but really, the environments are excellent. They are probably the best part of the game. Standing at the top of a mountain overlooking a jungle, you can almost smell the fresh air.
The single-player plot is really crappy, though. It's there at the beginning and end, but the plot's pretty much non-existent throughout the game. You're new in the country, and have one goal: kill The Jackal, an arms dealer supplying both sides in a war between two factions and stop the conflict. There really is nothing special about the single-player missions. They are a repetitive formula of 'go here, kill some guys or sabotage the mission for your own advantage with a friend'. The whole game world itself is huge, and it's nice to drive around and enjoy the view, but every couple minutes you'll come up to some post with guys who'll try to kill you. Scattered around the world are diamonds. You can earn diamonds another way by completing missions. Diamonds can be used to purchase weapons at the weapon shop(which also gives you missions to unlock new weapons). The great thing about the single player is once you load it up initially, there are no loading screens at all, ever. The whole entire thing is also in first-person.
The multiplayer component in pretty strong. Some of the factory maps are alright, but most of the fun comes from playing user-made maps. This is where the game gets excellent.
The map editor in FC2 is incredible. When you first get into it seems complex, but after some practice you'll be totally fluent with it. The different tools are the Terrain Tools(bump, dig, smooth, erode, set to height, noise(randomly generated natural-looking dips and dives in the landscape), the Object Tools(place object, edit object), Collection Tools(paint randomly-generated forests, rocks, bushes, etc), Paint Tool(paint different textures onto the landscape), Road Tool(place different types of roads), Snapshot Tool(take a picture that represents your map), and The Playable Zone tool(place a boundary for which players are restricted within.)
The map editor is so awesome, that I've already dedicated over 100 hours just to making maps. Exchanging maps between friends is a total blast. Your maps that are published have stats such as downloads and rating.
So, if you think that you can handle a game that isn't non-stop action and are interested in expressing your creativity through an online map, Far Cry 2 might just be your cup of tea.