Tom Clancy's: Rainbow Six Vegas 2 Review

TC:RSV2 as it is unoriginaly called is a sequel to TC:RSV which is a tactical shooter based in Las Vegas New Mexico... I mean Nevada. When I got this game I had no idea what it was going to be like, since my only previous experience with Tom Clancy is his Splinter Cell games which I must say is a good series and I hope they don't fuck it up with bad story like Metal Gear.

Now, I managed to sneak into the TARDIS for a few seconds while the Doctor was getting aquainted with his new robotic friend and I had a spin with it.

To my surprise it took me back to my Counter-Strike days when I used only two types of weapons: the ones that are practical and money efficient and the ones that just look freaking cool. What made this even better is when I found out about skins, so all of my practical weapons became even more freaking cool.

To my surprise, Vegas 2 was the same experience for me. It needed skill and a really itchy trigger finger to get everyone without dying and a really good eye if you're a sniper as I am. Now, the main reason I bought this game is for the co-op, and when I looked at the back of the box and saw the blind-firing-wall-hugging style game play I thought "Dear Lord, is this going to be another shitty Gears of War rip-off?" and when I looked at the first menu screen I was glad that I was wrong. I found out that you could customise your character from a wide range of stuff even from the beginning and it could only get better from there. What is also a good feature is being able to choose your starting weapons, armour and explosives and because I'm such a sniping bastard I chose a scout sniper and an mp9, which I first thought was mp7 because my TV is so shit and was kind of disappointed with it, and a pistol but at the time I didn't know how to select the pistol so I just left it with a p99 with a laser. The first thing you do with a new game is bitch-slap the controller to see what each button does. And no sooner did I do this I found the controls to be perfect with the flow of the game. Well almost perfect. Doesn't it suck when you think something in a game is "The Shit" and makes it seem like the high point of a game then it starts nibbling on your shoulder like a suger-crazed friend after you tank through him in rugby? the way to select the pistol is un-intuitive at best and could be significantly improved. You have to hold the Y button and move the left analog stick to it to select it and it is kind of annoying when cocky American terrorists are swearing and blind firing their way up your ASS. It would have been much better to tap Y to switch between main weapons and old it down for like 1 second to go to the pistol. And it would have been better to hold or even better double tap B to switch between explosives, because if you want to cook a grenade, which is a phrase I found very weird because if you were to "cook" a grenade it would surely blow up in your face. Anyway, back on target, the laser pointer on the pistols I find very annoying because the laser immediately want to align where the barrel is pointing and for appearances sake that is different to the actual crosshair and so whenever you shoot the laser goes wherever it fucking wants then snaps back into place where the crosshair is and it's a bitch when moving and firing because you no longer have the ability to shoot where you want and get blasted in the face by a camper with a shot gun. Another point is the lack of a melee attack, so if a testosterone filled prick runs around the corner while you're reloading you're FUCKED. Also, in the first Vegas game there was 4 player co-op but now it's only 2 which is better in a way that the screen isn't cluttered but the split is vertical not horizontal and how can you scan a room for enemies while all you can see the the ceiling, floor and door frame. The "Thermal Scan" is a vertical thermal map of your area which is very useful but you only get once every few minutes and is horrible when playing split-screen because It takes up about a third of player ones screen space.

But defenitaly this game's two shining lights are the unlockables and the quality of the co-op. For instance I like to play as a sniper. You get markmanship points by killing people in a specific way, such as from a long distance, headshot etc and they get you more points. the more points you get the higher level in that aspect you go in either Markmanship, CQB or Assault. Personally I think markmanship is piss easy and Could be gotten with a motherfucking shotgun but it wouldn't be as satisfying as sniping a guard off a ledge to hide the body or pistol-ing someone from across the map. Also the more people you kill the more experience you get and the higher rank you achieve. Such as the first rank requires 500 XP which would mean killing 50 enemies on the hardest difficulty and achieving new ranks unlocks new armor, cosmetic armor and different types of camoflauge. All this is is purely for looks besides the ammount of protection you have but I don't see any noticable difference when an enemy sniper decides to shoot one into your bollocks, you die in one hit if your hit in the torso, head, legs, etc except if it clips you and that makes you as week as hell for about 20 seconds which is a bitch when Jung runs out and gets sniped in the head and you have to save him.

Personally I can handle the snipers no problem it's the fact that they pin my teamates to the floor is the hard part there. If you take a shot at them and you miss theres a 50/50 chance that they'll hit you unless you time it right and bait their shots. Also I never understood why in a team based games enemies always shoot YOU even though your friends are sleeping out in the open and you're inside a bunker with 1 small hole to shoot through, the enemies in Vegas almost always shout "Aim for their leader" which is an attempt to cover up the fact that the developers couldn't share the shots out equally.

My last point is the AI chat system which in some places is plainly scripted but in battle they actually give orders and reply to them depending on the situation. Once I was sniping down a hall and one guys shouts "Cover me!" and looks out to see where I am. I shoot his friend in the leg because by the time I saw him look up I shot another guy, and the first guy's friend just shouts "Fuck you asshole, cover me!" Which I think is a very good touch. Another example went like this:

Enemy 1: Throw a flashbang!
Enemy 2: Watch your eyes!
Enemy 3: Shut up, just throw it!

All in all this is a very good game and even after completing it once you want to do it again for the higher ranks, new clothes, armour and guns. Incedentaly I have all the weapons I want, a P90, a sniper, C4 which I use for traps, opening doors and as grenades, and frag grenades. This is also amazing for co-op except maybe for the annoying objective update video box on Players 2 screen for a short while and the Thermal Scan on Player 1 but it is thoroughly enjoyable if not a bit short on the story aspect. I won't use numbers to category this game so I'll just say it's a "Very good buy"