Best Tactical FPS for the PS3 available, multi-player saves this from being a B game.
For those of you who may not be familiar with Rainbow Six, it is a FPS shooter oriented more for strategy lovers. The Vegas series focuses more on a more action, in-your-face style but strategy is still recommended, just not as necessary than former original Rainbow Six serie.
Still it possesses some elements that more cerebral FPS players will get off on.
I ran-through the main-story both in SP mode and split-screen mode with my squad buddy and of course played multi-player before reviewing this game. Without a doubt the most enjoyble aspect is multi-player, but I will start with SP mode.
Let me say first that the SP experience is a frustrating one, but the game does manage to keep you sucked in and seem to grow on you even through all the frustrations because your gameplay isn't the problem.
It could have been awesome but it rests between good and great...
Let me explain : in the first Vegas game, the squad would respond to your orders precisely and would end up saving your butt half of the time when some guy you didn't see snuck up on you without you having to say a thing, like buddies do in real life. Ya know when you're assaulting a facility and 3 guys pop behind you, you shouldn't have to SPECIFY to your squad to take new cover and shield fire while you move.
In this new Vegas game maybe they are down to recruiting the slow & inbred in the Rainbow Six Squad. Hey I'm all for equal-opportunity employment, but you know when you've pinned down a bunch of seven tangos down the hall and you are slowly advancing it really sucks to get shot by an ennemy standing right between 3 of your squaddies who are just staring at you and your newly created bullet-holes.
And this will happen to you often in Single Player mode ; I usually end up sending the guys in a corner and lone wolf the map.
Between the way they just HAVE to stand an inch behind you all the time, preventing you retreat or cover, and how they are completely useless in covering your back or any side for that matter when things get loud, they are more useful somewhere far back where they cannot get shot.
Because not only are they completely useless, but you have to keep the retards alive too. If you or the ennemy bangs them up, you have to heal them or you restart. Not that they can heal you or protect you themselves. It ends up being more of a babysitting chore than anything else...
Too bad the AI is this bad on that one, the first Vegas was a lot better.
Since this game is using the Unreal engine, the only good thing Ubi did in this game are the player and weapon skins. The weapons are well balanced too which count for something, but I'm really not impressed with their job since they already had a solid engine & AI to start with. The maps are really nothing special, they do the job. Most annoying is the fact that ennemies seem to spawn when you reach a certain range, you could throw a grenade not killing anyone, rush in and a brand new guy would be staring at you, gun blazing.
This is silly and unforgivable for a strategic shooter...
But when you go throught the SP game with a buddy with SplitScreen, you start to enjoy this game. Like how you can sync an attack through two doors at the same time, tag baddies and clean a room of 6 in an instant if you play with someone who knows how to BOOSH.
Some stupid details, like how only two tangos can be tagged at any time is dumb. I would have liked different tag colors for my buddy and at least 2 independant tags for him to put on tangos too...
The way you can get through any map if just one of you stays alive while the other respawns makes the game a lot easier than just the checkpoint system in SP mode, unless you're playing with a more Rambo-type buddy, then you get the job to sit his respawns until he understands this isn't Quake and you advance slowly in RB6V2, using shielding fire to force tangos to seek cover or either take out the ones sticking out easily...
When a good chemistry between two players is reached, the Split-Screen mode Story can get very, very much entertaining.
You get nights of screaming directions and orders at each other, bullet impacts and explosions, calling out any tango that just popped up or the ones you succesfully took care of. The game really succeeds at recreating a war in your living room.
The only thing preventing almost complete sync in Split-Screen mode is the fact you have to babysit the squaddies and how sometimes the entire ennemy force will suddenly seemingly only target the first or second player...
What happens is a bunch of ennemies you haven't reached yet see you through miles away and all start shooting at you, effectively pinning you down under cover if you are lucky enough to find some.
No matter how hard you try to shoot off those six guys, it's almost impossible they all seem to have an angle and no matter where you run, they see you like you were incandescent...
Now right at that same time, the other player can walk right out of cover and kill at least 3 before the AI realize this isn't a single-player game and turn its attention to the other player. Now he's pinned down, you come out and clean the rest. Stupid, stupid AI...
Another thing that can happen in that scenario is they kill the first player, in that case, they all immediately get aware of the position of the other player, wherever he is, and all rush him... This rarely doesn't get ugly in a hurry.
I did however immensely enjoy how the game unlocks new gear, camos, armors and guns. I particularly like to make my guy an hommage to G.I. Joe's Snake Eyes heheh. Every kill nets you XP in one of 3 categories, and every category unlock different gun categories (for example, more sniper guns will be unlocked as you increase in Marksmanship level). You also have an overall Rank (like say First-Sergant), calulated with the sum of all these categories' XP, it act as a way to unlock new camos & armor. In each category, when you reach an uneven level you'll get gear and every even level you get bonus XP, which means it will take a while to build a well rounded armory, not to mention varying your playing style.
If you are more of shotgun kinda guy, you'll get assault weapons fast, but will be wondering where all the sniper rifles are... Ditto for Snipers, if you go through the SP sniping everything, you'll be staring at a pretty bland equipment screen. You can still get pretty much everything at the same time using C4, pineapple grenades and just a FAMAS picked up on the ground early on, you just add a 6x scope as soon as you can to it. That's the cool thing : Maybe you didn't unlock the weapon yet, but if an ennemy dropped it, you can pick it up AND it will be there next stage -- next game -- any gametype -- next time you boot the PS3 -- as long as you don't change it for one you already have in the equipment screen. This really means you can get any gun you want without having to unlock it in SP.
Now for the best part, the multi-player online, just forget about the buggy AI. Forget about stumbling over squaddies while backing up and getting shot because they are an inch behind you every step. Forget about annoying ennemies seeing you through walls, rushing you down for no reason and spawning in rooms you knew you just checked out.
Forget everything bad about this game.
The multi-player is awesome.
Without it and the split-screen mode this game would be a broken down piece. Luckily it completely redeems it and turns a really frustrating single player experience into a very satisfying cooperative shooter.
There is no need to describe a good online FPS, people who know what I'm talking about don't need me babbling about it. But there are different breeds of FPS. If you like to play a FPS where you have to position and use team tactics to be the most succesful as opposed to a game where you simply are succesfull running & gunning, this one will be entertaining for you as well.
Since it aims at being realistic and tactical, it tries to (and succesfully) penalize players who do not play realisticaly, it also advantages players who use real-life military formations and encourages advanced tactics instead of simply basing the action on continuous everything-is-blowing-up action.
I get a lot more satisfaction from being defeated by a well-coordinated twenty minute team effort than winning a game just plucking running ducks. And since running ducks don't play this game for long, we have a great RB6V2 community who is developping.
So if you are looking for the best military single-Player FPS, get CoD4. But if you are looking to play something else because you don't like CoD4 MultiPlayer (like me), you should try RainbowSix Vegas 2. You can probably find it for cheap and it really deserves a go with a buddy you can game with. Now get some C4 and BOOSH that door!