Let me start off by saying that I do not own this game but rather, I rented it from Blockbuster (they do 7 day rentals now). Now that’s out of the way, let me reassure you that I have completed the Single Player story mode (albeit coop with a friend) and I have played a few terrorist hunts with a friend also. So back on topic, this is a review of the sequel to the immensely successful and immensely awesome Rainbow Six Vegas.

In Vegas 2 you play the role of an operative within Rainbow Six (a top secret special operations unit set through collaboration between NATO states) called Bishop. Bishop looks like… well, the thing is you decide. Yes, unlike the original there is character customisation, and apart from facial features it’s surprisingly deep. The first thing you’re greeted with when you boot up the game is a character creation screen, where you get to choose uniform (with some armour choices affecting game-play e.g. heavy armour will make you slower but able to absorb more lead), clothing, camouflage, choice of weapons and facial features - All of which can be changed at multiple occasions

This becomes your avatar throughout the game, for single and multiplayer modes. What you may have expected even less is that not only does your avatars appearance follow you throughout the game but there is also an experience system in place, which records statistics about everything you do in the game. you get experience for killing enemies and you get an increased amount if you put your experience and known tactics to use when confronting a bad guy (such as long range kills, shooting through cover or close quarters. More experience unlocks new weapons, armour and clothing to give your character.

Combat in Rainbow Six Vegas 2 is one of the most prominent aspects of the game. When the first game came out the intuitive cover system was praised for its originality, ease of use and fun it added to the game-play and, while the latter two points still stand this game doesn’t add anything new to the genre (especially now that every 3rd Person Shooter and it’s dog incorporate the cover system). The game is a joy to play and, while feeling distinctly like a cash-in sequel is a lot of fun.

There is a large amount of weapons to choose from and because of the narrative context of the game you have a choice from many country’s arsenals. You really get a feeling that you are choosing weapons specifically for you, weapons which you are most effective at largely owing the great balance between weapons, which brings me onto my next point. Like in the original, Rainbow Six Vegas 2 allows you to carry 3 firearms at a time… A Primary Weapon (be it an assault rifle, sub-machine gun, shotgun or whatever you choose), A Secondary Weapon (chosen from the same selection described for the Primary) and a Pistol, which is pretty self-explanatory.

I played through the game myself in cooperative mode split-screen with a buddy on a monitor and it was a lot of fun. Unfortunately there were a couple of frame-rate drops but that issue only cropped up twice for us, an issue which was amplifies multiple times by the fact that there was a frame-rate drop on the very last level, making it very difficult to aim and shoot. This was only a minor complaint but it is something which should not have been overlooked in the testing process, especially from such an experienced developer such as Ubisoft Montreal.

The Single-Player campaign is a lot of fun and clocks in at what is the modern average playtime of about 6 hours. Single player and coop are completely different experiences. In single player mode you make better use of tactics and you have a motivation to stay hidden and keep your silencer on. You are the most effective member of your team and it is overall a pretty immersive experience which I would recommend. Cooperative story mode, on the other hand still has a focus on tactics but as you’re playing with a buddy you are a bit more competitive and your play-style becomes more offensive as you try to score more than your friend and that means going out to rack up as much experience as possible to try and gain as higher rank as possible to unlock further accessories to your soldier. It is not so immersive, but on the other hand it’s a very different game. Regularly, in Single Player mode when you die you are returned to a checkpoint whereas, in cooperative mode if one of you dies then you’d just have to wait 10 seconds to respawn. This may seem a lot easier and in some ways it is, but when you’re playing more offensively and you’re in the think of it, a friend dying is the last thing you want to happen… you end up hiding in a corner hoping nobody betters you before your friend respawns.

There is a lot more other than the so-called story mode (that is to say that the story is rubbish to say the least - as is much of the voice acting. One notable is Michael, the token black guy in the team who is - guess what? A Demolitions expert who, in this case, sports an unconvincing British accent). In Rainbow Six Vegas 2 you’re offered a myriad of game-play types and options. You can play story mode - single player or coop (both of which have individual play-styles and encourage multiple completions), Terrorist Hunt (Which is like a multiplayer match with challenging bots, great fun in coop) and there are multiple multiplayer games which you can play (none of which I had time to try). All of this adds up to a great value game with great replay value (and pretty graphics to boot).

TOTALS

• Playability - 2.0
• Addictiveness - 2.0
• Value - 2.0
• Opinion - 2.0
  

Overall - 8.0/10

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