Tom Clancy's Rainbow Six: Vegas Comments by Kieron Gillen

Aw, kosovo :(

I always skipped past planning in Rogue Spear/Raven Shield, but perhaps when the devs implemented planning... it was part of a certain mindset that led to both games being great tactical shooters - sorry, cant phrase it any better!

Raven Shields maps were all massively open and non linear which led to really good co-op and adversarial play, perhaps these maps were as a result of planning needing complicated maps with many choices? :p

I think my favourite raven shield map was Island, and favourite custom was Village(if you havent played Village, download it and try it offline. You owe it to yourself).

Kosovo was simply superb. First time I've ever felt what it must be like to be pinned down by a sniper with no clue where he was shooting from. In hindsight it was obvious, but in those days, someone that high up on a different level to your own was quite rare. Then the rescuse of the pilot, having to use flashbangs and get in there quick to prevent him taking a bullet. Awesome stuff.

That and the Flashpoint "alone in the forest" level are my two favourite FPS levels ever.

One thing I really noticed while playing this through was that I was generally able to trust my team not to royally screw up. There's the traditional 'throwing a grenade into a doorframe' feature that's been in every tactical shooter since keyboards were invented, but generally they're a capable duo. Coupled with there not being any penalty for them being wounded (sensible, since it's for all intents impossible anyhow) it really added to my enjoyment of the game. Even in SWAT 4 your team was more than capable of screwing up a simple flash and clear and getting themselves killed more often than was acceptable, so it's refreshing to feel that someone's finally got the balance right.

I don't miss the planning, really. I'm also happy to suspend my disbelief for the huge gunfights and more 'traditional' FPS style. What I really didn't like at all was the numerous 'defend' sections which are completely at odds with the more realistic parts of the game mechanics. They're utterly unenjoyable additions, and the game would have been far better with their removal. That and the stupid, ugly glow that you can't turn off and makes everything look as if you've been swimming in a pool with too much chlorine in, but that's another issue. I'm not impressed with the quality of the actual conversion from the 360 at all, really.

Still, I enjoyed it quite a bit. Which probably makes its faults glare even more brightly to me, but hey. If they get rid of the defend sections and tone down the spawn, I'll happily play the inevitable sequel.

What's with the special died rice caption?

Furbs, sure, if Ubisoft doesn't want to provide good alternative keyboard controls or is only interested in tailoring the control scheme around a controller, then that's their good right but RS doesn't seem like a PC game anymore in that way at all.

2006 is a weak year for PC shooters if a rehash à la HL2: Episode One is getting all the honours but then again every genre has its dip once in a while.

"Well, there must be a whole lot of insane people out there."

Well, yeah. :) I don't mind that there are crossovers, that people don't want to upgrade constantly, and that big companies try to bring FPS's more to forefront of consoles but as it is now, the multiplatforming doesn't exactly turn out positive for the PC versions (in terms of interface-/controls and polishing). And that's something which isn't even confined to the FPS genre.

I could not disagree more with this review.

Regardless of the differences between this and previous R6 games (up to Raven Shield), I think Vegas is just a damn fine game, and even when played on Realistic (the only way to play it imo) it never gets frustrating really, because when you die, 99% of the time it's YOUR fault for not being careful enough and playing it too much like any other random shooter. And the artifacts from this being a console game are overstated. The D-pad thing he mentioned is really the only thing, bar the save system which is more of a design decision, and it really doesn't grate if you can remember 3 sodding buttons.

That's just my $0,02.

The thing that's always gotten on my nerves with R6 was the way it expected you to be both the planner/commander AND the grunt on the ground. If the game let you plan more effectively and with greater specificity and flexibility without actually leading the assault yourself, that would have made a better game. Alternatively, if the game let you play as an assaulter and expected you to follow a plan, be that one you'd created or a premade one, without having to guard and synchronise the entire team yourself, that would also be a better game. Essentially, a few small additions would make the "classic R6" style suit both shooter fans and planners. I don't know to what degree this accommodates planners but it seems to me (although I've not played any version yet) to be a little more capable of the action of which I always wanted R6 to be able to pull off, that's a good thing. The perfect R6 game surely would be one that planners could have as much fun with as shooter fans could.

Although great graphics and quite nice gameplay this is still just a lousy port. The patch even added the fantastic option of using an xbox controller ffs! But the piece de resistance is the coop mp... FOUR FUCKING PLAYERS! Fuck you UBI! I was so planning on paying for that game but alas no chance in hell.

GRAW I own and sadly despite valiant efforts of GRIN - no more than 4 coop there as well.

modders - do your thing!

"The patch even added the fantastic option of using an xbox controller ffs!"

You seem angry that an extra feature was provided, a feature that you personally don't plan on using. Reminds of people getting all irate because of the optional 3rd person view in Thief 3. I didn't really understand that either.

The four player limit is just for co-op missions right? Its not for all netplay. I would imagine that was a design choice, addressing the issue of difficulty scaling levels for 1-16 players.

Besides, you show me any FPS that allows 16 player story co-op.

GRAW actually allows 16+ player coop - I stand corrected. Thank you GRIN!

As for the XBox 360 controller - who in his right mind would use that on a PC?

Just goes to prove that it is lousy lazy port.

Fair enough on the 16 co-op front, I stand corrected. Fair play to GRAW for that one.

"As for the XBox 360 controller - who in his right mind would use that on a PC?"

People that own both and prefer using a controller? I know some of them. I know someone who played Halo on PC using a PS2 controller. The choice takes nothing from you if it is a choice.

This game is a big letdown for tactical shooter die hards and I totally agree that SWAT 4 walks all over this game. It's not that this game has bad squad control elements; I actually liked how the streamlined squad control mechanics here work -- it's just that the levels play more like Halo/Gears than they do Rainbow or SWAT.

Overall I thoroughly enjoyed the game but I am wondering what difficulty the reviewer was talking about bordering on frustrating; I actually run and gunned the thing without much hassle. I know you can't do this in the 360 version thanks to control issues but it was a simple cakewalk here to head shot/body shot everything that came in sight in seconds, if you're a decent FPS player. It didn't help that you have tons of ammo to begin with -- I think you're lugging like 20 clips of 9mm parabellum with you AND two other weapons to boot? And you can pick up any weapon the enemy drops for that matter. Let's not even get to the regenerating health ala Call of Duty 2.

Sure the enemy could catch you with your pants down every now and then but most decent (when I say decent I mean "not Godly") FPS players don't finish shooters with no deaths ala Contra without 30 lives. Is this frustrating? Not really, Rouge Spear was far more frustrating and that had no save points or save games.

This game is a cakewalk but I have not finished it in "realistic" difficulty yet.