Tom Clancy's Rainbow Six Vegas Review

After a few pedestrian efforts the Rainbow Six series brings us Rainbow Six: Vegas, a game worthy of rubbing shoulders with the series’ best. Rainbow Six: Vegas is tense, exciting, and downright difficult, which are the aspects of the original game that made its fans fall in love with it in the first place. Rainbow Six: Vegas isn’t for everyone, but if it’s for you … it’s really, really for you.

If you’re not familiar with the Rainbow Six squad, it is a multinational elite counter-terrorism unit whose primary specialty is hostage rescue. While in many special forces games you’re supposed to kill anything that moves, in Rainbow Six you need to protect the civilians first and take out the terrorists second. This is especially so when you operate in a place like Las Vegas, which a bajillion or so tourists visit on any given day.

Rainbow Six: Vegas is a realistic tactical shooter. What this means is that if you screw up, you’ll die. If you fail to utilize teamwork, you’ll die. If you try to run and gun your way through any stretch of a mission, you’ll die. I’m sure that you get the picture – only sound tactics will get you through the game alive.

Your first friend is cover. Concrete blocks, walls, nooks, cars, … anything that you can put between your body and the enemy’s bullets can save your life. The game has an excellent cover system which is relatively easy to use and will get you through a mission alive. Whenever you run up to any type of cover like the aforementioned objects, you can give the left trigger a squeeze and you’ll take cover behind the object. The camera will then switch to a third person, behind-the-back view that will allow you to see where the enemies are without the need to put your body out into the open. From behind cover you can simply pull the right trigger and blind fire, or you can use the directional stick to lean around or over and take a shot. It’s quite satisfying to keep crouched down while a terrorist empties a clip into your cover and then pop-up and kill him with a quick burst when stops to reload.

Cover is good, but your best asset is your team. You’re the team leader in the game, which means that you can order the other squad members to do the dangerous work. Giving orders is easy with the game’s context sensitive interface. Simply point at an object such as a door or wall and the A button can then be used to issue the appropriate order such as a breach and clear command. The AI of your team is excellent and they are both coldly efficient in killing terrorists and adept at not getting lost. Don’t laugh, wandering or lost squadmates are the bane of many a video game squad leader, but thankfully not here.

To succeed in the campaign you’ll need to rely heavily on your team to the point where you’ll have them do most of the dirty work. Every time you come up to a closed door you’ll slip your snake cam under the door to look for terrorists. If you see any you’ll also need to look for additional doors into the room and then order your team to clear the room by going in through that door. Once the shooting starts (or after it has ended) you then burst in to hit the enemies from behind and help mop things up. Your team is pretty efficient but they can be injured. When they’re down thought the game gives you a chance to heal them yourself and patch them up for more action.

Using your men in this way is critical because you simply can’t take too much damage from enemy fire. Even with judicious use of cover and methodical play, the odds are stacked against you and it is not too difficult to find yourself on the ground after taking a few hits. Speaking of taking fire, the game dispenses with the whole health meter system in favor of turning the screen progressively darker as you take fire. If you can get out of harm’s way for a few seconds the screen will return to normal and you’ll be back to full strength again. If you don’t, then the screen will quickly become very dark and you’ll find yourself a casualty of war. While I’m on the subject of death I should mention that the game uses a checkpoint save system. The checkpoints can sometimes feel a little far apart though, and it can be frustrating to have to replay the same stretch of game a few times while you figure out how to get past a particularly difficult point.

The game’s setting in Vegas makes for some great looking levels. Battling among slot machines with coins flying everywhere is certainly a unique experience in the world of shooters. The graphics are detailed and do a great job of bringing the various casinos to life, which is important when you set your game in a location known for its gaudy glitz.

The game supports multiplayer gaming in a number of modes. First there is full support of co-op play in any of the game’s missions. Co-op play actually lets you bring more firepower to bear as the Rainbow Six team is a three man squad but you can play with four gamers online. The other online game modes feature a persistent character system that allows for a great deal of customization. You’ll have a limited number of options when you first create your character, but as you play online you’ll be able to unlock new items that will allow you to further customize your look and even get access to upgrades such as new weapons and body armor. There are an extensive number of modes that can be enjoyed in both ranked and unranked play with support for up to 16 players per game. The action is a lot of fun and the cover mechanism sets the multiplayer action apart from just about all other online shooters. About the only negative thing that I can say about the multiplayer gaming is that the graphics don’t look quite as good as they do in the single player game. Once you get past the surprise of seeing the graphics downgrade in your first online game you’ll quickly be having too much fun to notice any more.

About the only shooter fans who wouldn’t enjoy Rainbow Six Vegas are the run and gun, bunny-hopping crowd. Fans of tactical shooters or those who enjoy some challenging and enjoyable gameplay should definitely take a trip to Vegas.

In The End, This Game Hath Been Rated: 94%. Viva Rainbow Six Vegas.