Operation Flashpoint: Red River.

Kiith

I'd consider picking this up just for the single player story. It's been a while since i've played a good war game with an well written story.

DarkJager

Kiith wrote: »

I'd consider picking this up just for the single player story. It's been a while since i've played a good war game with an well written story.

I'm the same, really tempted to give it a try after hearing about the story in it but I just know that sense of crushing disapointment and buyers remorse I'll feel if its like Dragon Rising.

PogMoThoin

Sephiroth_dude wrote: »

WTF no multiplayer?

Has 4 plr coop only.

They removed support for multiplayer in the first after only 6 months and one pathetic fix-nothing patch. Without mp they can drop support instantly.

moomooman

Codemasters burned me on DR, so I wont be giving them anymore cash.

I replayed OP:flashpoint while I was waiting for DR to come out, it was great even for an old game, really groundbreaking, after that DR was a crushing dissapointment.

Codies are great for hyping and producing flashy videos, but 20 minutes with the game and you realise you've been had. Like another poster said, the reviews were bought, since then I have only looked at user reviews.

Grayditch

The sense of teamwork added to the difficulty of the last one makes me want to get this.

Retr0gamer

I find eurogamer very lenient on codemasters and other british developed games. I remember buying battle engine aquila on the strength of their review. Heap of ****e. I'd wait a month if you do want to buys it since the online stores will drop the price of this quick.

Oafley Jones

moomooman wrote: »

Codemasters burned me on DR, so I wont be giving them anymore cash.

I replayed OP:flashpoint while I was waiting for DR to come out, it was great even for an old game, really groundbreaking, after that DR was a crushing dissapointment.

Codies are great for hyping and producing flashy videos, but 20 minutes with the game and you realise you've been had. Like another poster said, the reviews were bought, since then I have only looked at user reviews.

Pretty much how i feel. It's the first time I've sworn to boycott a publisher and I'm sticking to it. I've bought bad games before - DR is up there as one of the worst - but the contempt with which they showed their customers was staggering.

PogMoThoin

Here's a reminder to everyone what the true successor to Operation Flashpoint looks like, not this shíte

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EDtbKVOQ2_U

Potential-Monke

Jesus Christ those night missions look intense in Arma II.

PogMoThoin

Potential-Monke wrote: »

Jesus Christ those night missions look intense in Arma II.

Ya, but you get night vision and lasers if the mission has you playing as USMC, insurgents won't have any and have ****ty AK's

This isn't Arma 2, Operation Arrowhead was the expansion pack for Arma 2, this Reinforcements is a combination of 2 Dlc packs released for both. Its still supported, still evolving, still getting patches and beta patches 2 years later unlike anything Conmasters release.

dreamers75

Retr0gamer wrote: »

I find eurogamer very lenient on codemasters and other british developed games. I remember buying battle engine aquila on the strength of their review. Heap of ****e. I'd wait a month if you do want to buys it since the online stores will drop the price of this quick.

They are the Top Gear of games reviews, British is best etc:

Grayditch

Dis game sux its not blackops

Sephiroth_dude

I wish I could have gotten into arma,that video looks awesome.

Genghiz Cohen

Grayditch wrote: »

Dis game sux its not blackops

na man halo reech is da best

PogMoThoin

Good review here, I LOLed
http://www.pcgamer.com/2011/04/21/operation-flashpoint-red-river-review-2/

Operation Flashpoint: Red River tells me that I’m a slick sonofabitch, commanding three other slick sonofabitch marines. It tells me loudly, repeatedly, and gratingly – via the mouth of staff sergeant Shouty McRacist – that I’m a Spartan and a devil dog, and all those other ultramacho things that make me feel terribly uncomfortable because I haven’t seen combat.

ShadowHearth

No tetrus is da bezt!!!

On topic: I was in gamestop today to pick up mortal kombat, and like allways I got a chat with lads in there. Surprisingly enough all of the flashpoints were sold out!!! They had **** loads of prebookings too! I was like WTF?!

Arma is cool game allright, but my pc poops it self ad dies when I try play it .

Grumpypants

PogMoThoin wrote: »

Good review here, I LOLed
http://www.pcgamer.com/2011/04/21/operation-flashpoint-red-river-review-2/

This review pretty much sums up the game, i thought i was playing a different game reading Eurogamers review.

Broken AI both enemy and Team (retarded team mates again)
Loads of Bugs, getting into and out of vehicles, going up stairs, and hitting the deck with the camera looking at the sky!
Terrible puerile writing (To think they compared it to Generation Kill :eek: ) Even includes your mother jokes.

The squad commands using the D-pad is terrible, only registers half the presses, gets them wrong the choices are very limited.

I so wanted this to work but it just doesn't its just a tiny bit better than DR.

Retr0gamer

Grumpypants wrote: »

Terrible puerile writing (To think they compared it to Generation Kill :eek: ) Even includes your mother jokes.

Eurogamer also said that GTA 4 had HBO level writing. They must have been playing a different game because the writing in GTA 4 was ****ing awful.

dreamers75

Wow played the 1st mission and really want to kill Shouty Mc Racist


Hes like jar jar binks in a war.

dreamers75

Potential-Monke wrote: »

Jesus Christ those night missions look intense in Arma II.

That shows nothing really, it gets awesome when its dark and you have no clue where you team is without decent comms.

Could join our server...........oh wait

Helix

this game is so bloody buggy

Helix

My Review

Although the first person shooter market is well catered for in terms of action oriented titles, there is a real shortage of quality in slower paced tactical shooters. How can Codemasters' follow up to Operation Flashpoint: Red River measure up to the competition?

We’ve been mentioning from time to time that we’d like to see a game changer when it comes to first person shooters – something that can take the genre by the scruff of the neck and beat original new twist into it. With each game released seemingly just following the exact same template laid down by the more successful titles in the genre like Activision’s Call of Duty series, things have grown a little tiresome for us, which is precisely why we were looking forward to Operation Flashpoint: Red River more than the pre-game talk perhaps warranted.

Taking place in a fictional near future of 2013 the game focuses on Fireteam Bravo, a newly arrived squad of four Marines, and their progress through a series of missions in Tajikistan as they seek to drive back insurgents while trying to avoid a major conflict with the Chinese People’s Liberation Army.

While Red River certainly isn’t the game changer we mentioned earlier, it does take a somewhat novel approach to things, eschewing the trend of offering players a competitive multiplayer frag-fest and instead offering a well thought out four player co-operative version of the single player campaign. One thing is for sure, this game is certainly not one for those of you who get your kicks from balls to the wall action.

The tactical approach to gameplay is evident right from the off. You’ll play your way through the initial stages which offer you the basic training you’ll need in order to succeed later on. The pace of the game will certainly come as something of a culture shock to players raised on the COD style approach to warfare, with ammunition in limited supply and enemies capable of taking you out with just a couple of well placed shots.

Success, instead, will depend very much on a mix of patience and analytical thinking. As you are briefed about the forthcoming mission by your Staff Sergeant, a stereotypical Marines sort who tells it like it is by virtue of some of the most colourful language we have yet to come across in a game, you’ll be well advised to pay close attention to the mission plan. Although the option is there to display markers, waypoints and on-screen indicators about your current goals, advance knowledge of just what is expected of you will make the whole experience that little bit more enjoyable – and manageable.

Initially, we found these briefings to be a little tricky to follow, being that we’re not particularly well up on military parlance, but as we progressed things started to sink in a lot more which was quite nice given that the difficulty ramps up surprisingly quickly in places. While this may well have been nothing more than a happy coincidence, we’re willing to give Codemasters the benefit of the doubt and accept that it actually represents some top notch development on their part.

Despite the fact that the overall approach to the gameplay is wildly different to the majority of its competitors, the actual control scheme and dynamics themselves are much the same as you’d expect from a first person shooter. The usual mechanics are all in place, making it a doddle for anyone with FPS experience to jump right in, and instead focus on adjusting to the slower, more tactical side of the gameplay.

While playing in single player campaign mode, you’ll be able to direct your squad by virtue of a pop-up command display. It’s a great idea, and it works quite well, but we found that it wasn’t particularly necessary during the vast majority of gameplay. Your squad will follow you around whenever you go anywhere, and they’ll take out any enemies they encounter along the way, so it’s rare you’ll need to give them any specific instructions apart from the occasional times where you decide to go on alone.

The fourth mission is a prime example of this, and illustrates one of the fairly major problems inherent in such an ambitious title. As you approach a bridge, your team is attacked by a group of insurgents on the other side, complete with RPGs and anti-tank guns, so unless you’re equipped with a sniper rifle, you’re faced with either a very, very long and patient long range battle, or you can simply make your way under the bridge, across the shallow stream, and gradually pick the enemy off one by one using stealth and plenty of care. The problem is, unless you tell your team mates to stay where they are, they’ll follow you in making your way across the river – except they’ll walk straight across the bridge into a hail of enemy lead, which will kill them off in a matter of seconds.

Not that killing them off actually matters anyway. In one of the most bizarre continuity failures we’ve ever come across, your team mates can die during a mission, only to be just fine and dandy for the next one. We can appreciate that the game is team based, so it was obviously important for players to have team mates beyond the first few levels, but surely “injuring” the AI squad members rather than actually allowing them to die would have made the whole thing a little more believable? It’s not even as if you just assume that they’re dead – the game tells you. “Sato’s dead!” shouts a teammate, as you think “So what, he’ll be fine for the next mission”. It doesn’t really help with immersion, especially given the fact that the game prides itself on realism.

And while we’re complaining, another massive irritant for us is the fact that the in-game dialogue cuts out far too much for our liking. For no apparent reason we lost sound, on more than one occasion, for the duration of entire missions, as well as the actual debriefing at one stage. That might not sound all that bad, but when travel between missions takes place in real time and the developers have filled that time with debriefings and updated information for the forthcoming mission, it’s not exactly ideal. Sure the option is there to reload the last checkpoint and hope for the best, but is it really too much to ask that developers can get the small things right?

While it might sound like I’m ragging on Operation Flashpoint: Red River, the truth is I really enjoyed it. I’ve never been one for tactical shooters, often finding them as dull as the proverbial dishwater, but there is an intensity here that you can’t help but admire. The set pieces are well structured and everything is helped along by the (relatively) good AI on both sides of the conflict.

The visuals range from nice to breathtaking, with some of the scenery just begging for your attention as mountain ranges spread out for miles, orange tinged clouds signal the sun’s imminent departure, and the deserted rustic wastelands suddenly spring to life with the heartbeat of war. Up close, things are a little less impressive, but still very much on the pretty side. Obviously the real life setting of the former Soviet state limited the variety of terrain that could be utilised by developers and miles of sandy repetition was always going to be inevitable, but all things considered it’s a job well done.

The sound, on the other hand, is a little hit and miss with satisfying weapon sounds supplemented by occasionally weedy explosions and some poor interactive dialogue (as you play, your team will inform you of any hostiles they locate, usually along the lines of “Rifleman 100 meters north-east”, which is great when it works, but often the telltale split second of silence between words ruins the illusion of real time communication). The in-game music is limited to the typical military sounding orchestral pieces at menus and some contemporary music blaring from your Humvee en route to missions – Fun Lovin’ Criminals providing the musical high point for us.

Despite the fact that there is no competitive multiplayer available, levelling still plays a huge part in the Red River experience. Everything you do as any of the available classes will earn you experience points which can be spent to improve your character’s attributes. You can’t customise him in the traditional sense, but as you progress through the game you’ll be able to tailor his skill set to suit your own requirements. Changing up between the character types becomes essential in the later missions, as the default rifleman setting just doesn’t offer all the attributes needed for success.

The campaign itself lasted us a reasonable eight hours, although we were progressing at a rather pedestrian pace in the initial stages as we got used to the more thoughtful style of gameplay, and the online co-operative multiplayer will obviously ensure that this is at least doubled. You can see right off the bat that the game was built for this style of play, and although the AI does an impressive job, given how ambitious the whole project is, it really is no replacement for real humans.

Finding a game is painless and, so far, the lobbies have all been well populated and well behaved. Communication is the key, so if you’re not the sort who likes to make his mind known verbally while playing online, you’ll be able to make some use of the pop-up commands to order your team mates around – although it’s probably not worth the hassle if you do have the choice of using a headset instead.

It’s tough to say whether or not the claim of realism from the developers is accurate or not, given that we’ve never actually been involved in a war, but if the stereotypes are anything to go by they’ve certainly got the behaviour of the marines down to a tee. If you’re easily offended by games, then you might be advised to look elsewhere. The over the top machismo rubbish we’ve grown to expect from movie Marines is here in full effect, with the game rarely going more than a few seconds between missions without your Squad Sergeant spewing some form of hateful bile in your direction. Personally, I found it moderately amusing in place, but it’s potentially the type of thing that could very well get irritating after prolonged exposure.

Operation Flashpoint: Red River tries to offer something a little different from its contemporaries, and to a certain extent it succeeds. There are some glitches that try their best to sap the enjoyment out of the game and some questionable AI decisions can prove frustrating at times, but the campaign is varied and intense (especially during the night time missions), and with three more humans it really comes into its own.

It’s a step up from Operation Flashpoint: Dragon Rising and although Codemasters haven’t quite nailed the formula yet, they can’t be too far away at this stage. If there is another Operation Flashpoint, we’re quietly confident that it’ll be the game the developers’ ideas and ambition has deserved.

Helix

Grumpypants wrote: »

This review pretty much sums up the game, i thought i was playing a different game reading Eurogamers review.

Broken AI both enemy and Team (retarded team mates again)
Loads of Bugs, getting into and out of vehicles, going up stairs, and hitting the deck with the camera looking at the sky!
Terrible puerile writing (To think they compared it to Generation Kill :eek: ) Even includes your mother jokes.

The squad commands using the D-pad is terrible, only registers half the presses, gets them wrong the choices are very limited.

I so wanted this to work but it just doesn't its just a tiny bit better than DR.

I agree its buggy, but i quite enjoyed it when it worked. Nice change of pace

PogMoThoin

What format Helix? Cos for me as a pc gamer it's another half arsed console port that looks terrible, but then again i didn't expect much.

Grumpypants

PogMoThoin wrote: »

What format Helix? Cos for me as a pc gamer it's another half arsed console port that looks terrible, but then again i didn't expect much.

For me it was a half arsed pc port that was unworkable on console

Helix

PogMoThoin wrote: »

What format Helix? Cos for me as a pc gamer it's another half arsed console port that looks terrible, but then again i didn't expect much.

360

i had very low expectations and it managed to surpass them tbh

Grumpypants

I had such high hopes for it, think thats why i'm so disappointed i just can't get used to the D-pad on the xbox its so bad and it takes so long to give a command. Hold RB, press up on the d-pad, oh it didnt register, press up again, oh it registered a right press, press left to go back , press up got it this time, press right to hold position. Didnt register press right again. Got it this time.

"No dont run out into the open stay in cover" quickly hold RB press up, didnt register, press up again, got it this time press right hold position. Why are you not moving?? Ah we are all shot to pieces.

They really need voice commands thats one thing i loved about Tom clancy's End war was you could move your squads by voice and controller.


Edit: just played the protect the convoy mission they really should have opened with that mission it was brilliant, everything was nicely spread out so i had time to actually control the squad. Picked a sniper rifle and was able to move them around and take out the enemy.

Chairman Meow

In the past ive been burned by companies, Valve releasing L4D2 a year after 1 really pissed me off, i swore i wouldnt buy L4D2 but i did anyway. I swore i wouldnt buy black ops or MW2 but i did anyway.
But this is the one time ive actually stuck with my boycott. No way would i buy this garbage after being ripped off with DR. That game was a ****ing disaster, and supported for a whopping 4 months after release. Even when it was 2 euro on Steam i stil wouldnt give it a bash on pc.

Arma 2 is buggy, broken, has a learning curve like a vertical cliff face, but i can **** about with it and make **** like this

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a_rdE6sM2dI

ShadowHearth

Arma 2 is cute, but you need a pc frOm NASA .

Allways trying to get in to it, but with no luck. I have respect for these war simulators, I know they give alot of fun to people who know what they doing, but for me bc2 Arcady play works better. Cod is way too much arcade thought.

PogMoThoin

ShadowHearth wrote: »

Arma 2 is cute, but you need a pc frOm NASA .

Allways trying to get in to it, but with no luck. I have respect for these war simulators, I know they give alot of fun to people who know what they doing, but for me bc2 Arcady play works better. Cod is way too much arcade thought.

Not really, all you need is a quad core and an average mid end gaming card to run it at a decent rate. Its completely cpu heavy, but it makes great use of all 4 cores. Its had lots of changes and optimizations since first release and its getting much easier to run, better with every new patch (beta's out nearly weekly). Its not really that graphically heavy so older cards like 8800GTX's would do fine