It's here, at last!

Never let it be said that I'm not a big fan of the Rainbow 6 series of games. I love 'em. Always have ever since that day all those years ago, when I first installed R6 on my Celeron 300 and saw that it was good. I've been looking forward to the release of Ghost Recon for many, many moons... Ever since the screenshots, preview and teasers started coming out. It's finally here, and in some ways it lives up to my expectations, in
other ways it doesn't. Let's get to it.

Backstory

Pretty simple story here. Unlike the previous games, you are not a CT. Instead you're taking command of an elite squad of US Green Berets, the Ghosts. Some nasty ultranationalistic politicians have taken control of the Russian government, and they seem determined to set the USSR back up. You and your troops are stuck on the front lines. It's time to kick some Russian Bootay, and you're just the people to do it.

Graphics

Finally, a somewhat newer graphics engine from Red Storm! After all these years, they've pretty much beaten the R6/Rogue Spear engine into the ground, and the graphics were never all that impressive on it to start with. The Ghost Recon engine definitely looks better than it's predecessors, with grass, tons more cover, lots of details around. (Ex. bricks lying around on the ground from destroyed buildings, beer bottles, trash and newspapers scattered around alleyways. Levels range from forests and ruined medieval castles to cities and even a naval destroyer. Maps are for the most part realistic and believable. Very nice work. Trees and bushes even sway in the breeze, which makes spotting enemies quite a task... You can't just look for movement like in Delta Force or R6... Because there's so much stuff out there moving. Optimally you have to really look for people and rough non-repetative movement.

All that being said, I find the fog in the game quite annoying. It's a gorgeous sunny day, yet there's distance fog.... Quite close as well... and you get objects and players "popping" out of the fog.... The game still looks very good... But it really cuts into a realism quite a bit. I know it's needed for frame rates... But it just seems a little close to me.. Really cuts down the possible range on the ol' m82 sniper rifle. :) I do like the rain effects, and the fog DOES look good on certain maps. (Battlefield for instance.)

The other annoying thing I've found with the graphics is the blockiness of some objects. Player models and buildings look excellent, but I do find that some things (ex. rocks) just don't look right for some reason... not sure why, too angular and regular perhaps? I have to keep the graphics toned down a little bit to keep my frames up as well, and even at 1024x768x16 bit things sometimes get a little stuttery for brief periods of time.

Overall the graphics are very well done, and yet.... I'd just like to be able to see a little further.... Spoiled by Land Warrior I guess.

Sound

Ahh... An area of the game where GR definitely shines. Birds chirp in the woods, the wind whistles over the cliffs. Trees and buildings creak in the breeze. Footsteps crunch on gravel and echo on metal catwalks. Music is rousing and inspiring, as we've come to expect from the Red Storm team. There's even music on the load screens, which I just love in a game. :)

Controls

Pretty much typical shooter controls, with a few extra command keys throw in for map and squad command. Easily remappable, although I found the default configuration is working very well for me.