The Just Win Clan

Tom Clancy’s Rainbow Six Vegas 2 Reviewed

By Bill Tomer

Ahh, Vegas.  Sin City.  What happens in Vegas, stays in Vegas, and terrorists are screwing it all up!  It’s up to you, or you and your buddy, as elite forces members, to stop the terrorists from ruining our adult playground.  You won’t have time to stop for a game of blackjack here, you’re job is to save civilians’ lives, and you won’t always get the job done.

Let’s get one thing straight before I go on.  I never played the original Rainbow Six Vegas.  I never even saw it.  So, before you start complaining about how the second incarnation of the game is more of the same, don’t blame me.  This was my first venture into Ubisoft’s RSV world.  Because of this, I get a chance to write this review with a clean Rainbow Six slate.  However, from what I’ve heard, it truly doesn’t matter whether or not you played the first Rainbow Six Vegas, Rainbow Six Vegas 2 kicks some serious tail.  Ubisoft made it that much better.

Graphics – 9.0

Fantastic comes to mind.  It’s not the prettiest game I’ve ever seen, but it’s no slouch either.  It pumps out a picture at a max of 720p, which isn’t the best resolution around, but when you hook your system up to the HDTV you still get the “awe” factor.  Bullets whiz by your head at a maddening rate at times and they look great.  Explosions are good, including the incendiary grenades that leave behind a phosphorous cloud that looks very cool.  Flashbang grenades can make you sick with their effects in-game, and the enemy is not shy about lobbing them at you at a high rate.

RSV2 possesses something that all shooter games should.  You have the ability to change the color and style of the clothing your character is wearing.  This is probably the coolest thing in character customization I have ever seen.  It’s not a big deal until you get online and see that everyone does it and everyone looks different.  I think it’s a very good edition to the game.

Sound – 9.0

I wouldn’t say that the sound is that exciting in RSV2, but there are things that are very good, that the developers deserve kudos for.  Most shooter games don’t pay that much detailed attention to the sound.  Yes, most of them pay attention to ambient sound and all of them make sure that the guns sound like the guns should sound.  RSV2 does all of this and more.  For the first time I can recall, a game pays attention to where a sound takes place in relation to your character.  That means if a grenade goes off inside a building, it’s nowhere near as loud as it would be if it went off in a field at the same distance.  Also, in most games frag grenades, which are your basic assault grenade in most shooters, don’t affect the sound of the game.  The grenade explodes and might damage your character, but it just makes a huge boom and you go about your merry way with no other changes to the sound whatsoever.  Sit and think about it, if a frag grenade blew up close enough to you to hit you with shrapnel, wouldn’t that hurt your ears?  Yeah, and Ubisoft thinks so too.  Unfortunately, this is something overlooked so often in shooters that at first it seems like a problem within the game.  After a while, you realize what is actually happening, and realize that it’s the frag grenades that are causing your sound to turn down.  This helps the game achieve higher marks in the sound department.

Other than that, the guns all sound good and the terrorists jabber back and forth during the fight, which all sounds good.

Playability – 9.5

RSV2 is fun.  It’s a lot of fun, and it has a lot to do with its solid control system. Controls feel spot on, intuitive and smooth.  It’s a game of duck and cover, but if you’re good, real good, it can be run ‘n gun too.  However, I wouldn’t do too much run ‘n gunning because the terrorist are deadly with their weapons.  They’ll shoot at you all day and miss but if you poke your head out before they’ve stopped shooting or when they aren’t reloading, you’re dead.  That’s good.  Nobody likes a dumb enemy and these guys aren’t dumb.  They’ll flank, take cover, lob flash bang after flash bang, and work together to take you out.  You will die time after time and when you do finish a map or a round of terrorist hunt, you’ll feel good about it.

The only issue I have with the controls, and it’s a small issue, is that sometimes the cover feature can screw with your camera view.  RSV2 is a first person shooter, but when you use the specified button to take cover behind a wall or an object, it switches to a third person view.  This makes sense because if it didn’t switch, you’d be looking in the wrong direction.  You can poke your head out from any of your cover locations and look around a corner.  However, as you turn to look around the corner or box, at some point the game decides that you’ve looked far enough and instead of just stopping it jumps back to the first person view, where you’ll find yourself staring at the wall or box you’re hiding behind.  This can be a little disconcerting when you’re in the middle of a firefight.  It’s not a BIG deal because you can learn to live with it, but it’s something that can and will get you killed on occasion.

Fun Factor – 9.5

It’s all there.  The story mode is great, but a tick short.  I would have liked to play the story mode a little longer, and that’s a good thing.  There are instances during the story mode that will shock you.  As I mentioned before, you won’t always be successful in saving everyone you need to and that helps to gain disdain against your enemy.  You’ll have fun clearing maps and you won’t be successful on your first try.  Killing terrorists is always a good time and in RSV2, there are plenty to kill time and time again.  Not only that, but RSV2 has a co-op mode to add to your enjoyment.  It’s a blast to roll through the maps with a buddy, working as a team and finishing the story.  There are scenes when you’re flying in a chopper over Las Vegas, and for some reason, those are fun too.

Replay Value – 10.0

To give this game anything less than a perfect score would be a crime.  It’s a game that will always be in my game library, at least until Rainbow Six Vegas 3 is released.  You’ve got so many game options that it will keep you playing for a long time.  In fact, the reason it took me so long to write this review is because I’ve been spending my free time having fun playing this game.  After you’ve completed the story mode, you’ve got Terrorist Hunt to tickle your fancy.  If you’re not familiar with this, basically all you do in this mode is run around shooting computer controlled bad guys on the game’s online maps.  It truly is a blast, and at the hardest setting, it’s very hard.  Terrorist Hunt offers single player, co-op and online co-op modes with up to 4 player action.  After that you’ve got an 8v8 online mode that can be fun.  It’s not as good as some other games online features, but it’s passable.  You’ll also find yourself spending time customizing your character.  With so many choices of armor, weapons, accessories and camouflage colors available, you’ll take plenty of time individualizing your soldier.  All of this adds to the game’s replay value.

Bottom Line (average) – 9.4

The game has a lot of content wrapped in its little package.  I have to admit, when I first played this game, I had a lot of online connectivity issues with the game that made me want to toss it into the yard.  Then I realized that the issues were my own fault, so I fixed them and the game quickly vaulted to the top tier of my favorite games list.  There are so many options, so much customization and such good gameplay that it couldn’t be any other way.  If you like shooters, or good games for that matter, do yourself a favor and go buy this game.