Seems today everyone wants to shoot at the Russians and again you see this apparent in this ultra realistic War Sim from Bohemia Interactive Studio, the guys that brought you the first Operation Flashpoint. You’re stuck somewhere between Yugoslavia and Georgia in some of the most realistic settings a game has ever introduced to a gamers eyes.

The Marine

You have the choice to make a custom US Marine soldier. You have a team of men that you can give various commands to. One minute you can be in open farm land near small Towns the next your racing down a hillside threw the tree’s grass and twigs breaking under your feet. You see the enemy moving in and out of the cover in the distance. Then you hear the crack of gunfire you hit the ground the grass flattens as you take cover. Your sights are on but the light is fading, you can hear your teammates yelling enemy spotted etc your adrenaline is up. You switch to night vision the whistle of gunfire is flying over your head while strays break up the ground in front of you.

That’s just one example of how you will be using laser designators to mark out areas in town from the side of a mountain and watch from a far while missiles rain down. This game is without a doubt the most realistic military combat game out today, but because of this you lose that arcade; “you can live forever” feeling you get with the COD/ Battlefield range. Here one foot wrong means the end of you and your team. You can be downed laying for ages waiting for a medic to come help but slowly you’re fading away from the injuries that you have received. It’s visceral and straight to the point.

Diversity

Options wise, the game has plenty. You can play single player either on your own, or co op over LAN/online. Multiplayer is rich and diverse with the same intense feeling from single player being banged at you with 50 player modes. Stand out moments for me include rushing in and dragging a team mate out of trouble by the foot while still having an arm free to spray hot lead at my oppressors.. Also to top the multiplayer off there’s a mission editor where you can make and set your own parameters to the battle you want to fight. It’s very much in the vein of the mission editors that have followed this series, it’s a bit easier for the layman to navigate but end results can be stunning.

Weapons/vehicles

Well this says it all. Sixty weapons, one hundred and twenty air, land and sea vehicles, everything from the XM8 to the F-35 lighting Fighter plane. Boats Tanks Helicopters the list goes on and that’s just the military you have civilian cars buses etc. The game is a mass of detail. Lovely put together by people that are sick on war.

Gameplay

This is not for the gamer that wants fast action paced, respawn all over the show gaming. This game is as close as your likely to get with a Keyboard and mouse to real combat. Everything has been lovely rendered down to the last detail. The game will give you a range of missions from hostage extraction to blowing the hell out of targets. The maps you play on is absolutely massive the missions can also change on the fly. You can run in to a town to blow up a target, and next thing you know, your being pulled into a hostage extraction and finding details on a mass grave of civilians that you will have to go and get Intel on. The game has enough content to keep you going for months. Then the editor will expand this by making it possible to create your own missions. If you like your war in the style of the original Operation Flashpoint this is your game. All of what made the original Flashpoint the game of the year when it was released is back 10x.

Graphics

God, where do i start? First up I’m going to mention the game’s bugs. It will require some patches before it reaches its full potential. But for what does work, it looks completely amazing. Day to night cycles shadows that cross valleys and explosions that will light up the night sky. The attention to detail is quite astounding. You just have to take a walk through a forest, and the terrain, insects, wildlife are all lovely recreated. Trees that will break away as a Tank plummets through the thickness of the forest. Houses that will disintegrate when missiles rain down on them. It’s something to behold. However, those bugs do keep creeping up watching trees next to you turn into brown boxes and detail breaking up in the distance does really need attending too. But again this is to be expected most of the time with PC titles and we know most of the time they will be addressed over time. In my honest opinion this is the next game to Crysis graphic ways.

Final thought

This game is as real as real can get. If that bores you then stay away, but if you are the type of gamer that detail makes you have a semi then this game is for you. It’s not easy; it’s more frustrating at times than fun. But what they do right they do amazing if a ArmA 3 can approach the issues that are well apparent from the get go in this game, then this will be something extremely more special than it is now in its current state. But to its shortcomings this game is the most realistic Military Sim on PC, and to that it will be rated.

8/10

buggy
beautiful
Intense

Developers: Bohemia Interactive.
Publisher: SOS GAMES
Genre: Military Sim/FPS
Platform: PC
Release date: 19th June 2009
Reviewer: Trevor(Ninjagoat79)