An improved version of it's older sibling

Author's Rating:

Pros: Good mission variety...AI is better than average...multiplayer is a blast...very good graphics

Cons: All minor things. No blood...animations are lackluster...the plot is shallow and unoriginal.

The Bottom Line: 
A top-notch game with no major flaws. Personal preference is really the only deciding factor on weather or not you will like this game.

Author's Review
I remember I played the demo for the PC version of Ghost Recon a long while ago and although I remember kinda liking it the thing that struck me was "Wow, this is just like Rainbow Six." It had separate squads of soldiers all whom you controlled through commands...the overhead map showing your squadmates and enemies within view...and also had that ultra-realistic, one-shot-kill thing going. I have never been a very big Rainbow Six fan because I didn't like the detailed-oriented gameplay structure and most of the time just wanted to kill bad guys. For this reason I was a little weary when buying Ghost Recon 2 but I had read some reviews giving it high praise and I can tell you that I'm happy with my purchase.

Story
The game is centered around North Korea and is set in the near-future of 2011. Apparently some Korean general with a fanatical following has taken control of the country and is trying to cause trouble. The story really doesn't play a big part in the game and many times you find you don't even know (or don't care) what is going on. In the setup to each mission there is a History Channel-esque show that you watch for a couple minutes that explains the mission (through interviews of your character and squadmates) in a past-tense fashion. They basically tell you how things went down in a general sense and then you play the mission. It's definitely an original means to move the story and some might find it interesting.

Gameplay
The game consists of about 15 missions that all take place outdoors and have a pretty good variety. I never found myself tired with the missions and was often thinking "wow, this is pretty cool." A few of the missions can get pretty hard but most will take you around 30mins-1 hour to complete on Normal. In total it took me around 15 hours to complete the single player portion...about average these days. The game plays in a 3rd person view although you have the option to play in 1st person mode. Sometimes games have camera-angle troubles in 3rd person modes but it never seemed to be a problem...likely because all the missions are outdoors and in the open. Also worth mentioning is the learning curve is in the medium range but there is a fairly comprehensive training mission at the start that is a big help. By the end of that you are pretty familiar with the controls but it might take a couple missions to find your "groove" in handling the game.

Despite the title implying this being a strait sequel to Ghost Recon, this game is quite different in terms of gameplay. The main this is it's much less "Rainbow Six" and much more "run and gun." You now only command three other squadmates and sometimes you find yourself on solo missions. In addition the characters can take considerably more damage before dying. Very few times are people killed on their first hit and often can take a few hits before dying or needing medical assistance. The same goes for your own character. Another change from the original is that you cannot take control of your squadmates...once your character dies it's game over.

One of the mechanics that still makes Ghost Recon 2 much more strategic than most shooters is the command system. Assuming you are not on a solo mission you can always give your squadmates some basic movement commands including Advance, Flank Left, Flank Right, and Suppress. You can also tell them to Hold Position, Hold Fire, and Regroup. Learning the command system (which takes all of 5 mins) is crucial to playing the missions effectively. There is a plethora of other commands for specific situations like planting demo charges and taking out vehicles that all are done by pointing your cursor on a target area and pressing a button. On the flip side to all these commands, your mates don't always follow the commands very well and seem to just take them more as "suggestions." Often when I told them to advance, only one or two of them would actually do so often leading to a suicide situation. Flanking is sometimes also a chore in micro-management. One of the things you can't do with the commands is command single members of your squad. All the commands are always of the "general" variety so they all do the same thing. If it involves just needing one person, like planting demo charges, the game automatically decides who is best suited for the job and they do it.

The whole weapons/aiming/shooting system is fairly straightforward. Before each mission you equip your player with a set of weapons usually consisting of a primary weapon (assault rifle, sniper, machine gun, etc), secondary weapon (pistol or grenade launcher), anti-vehicle weapon (almost always anti-vehicle rockets), and then something else (grenades, satchel charges, claymores). As the game progresses you have a larger and larger variety of weapons at your disposal mostly in the form of different types of primary weapons. You quickly learn the best weapons tend to be the M-8 (the one featured on the box cover) and it's variants. Also the LMGs tend to be quite useful. Changing weapons is a simple matter of holding down the B button and selecting which of the four weapons you want with the D-pad. One thing that irked me was the absence of recoil. There is an accuracy meter of sorts that goes in and out as you move or shoot but no recoil. You can sit in a spot and just shoot to your heart's delight and never have your crosshair move from it's position. For a game featuring realism I thought this was a big oversight although I used it to my advantage often.

In the solo missions (there are three of them) you are always equipped with a "future soldier" system that gives you a better version of the M-8 and some other goodies. For one, you get a "gun camera" which is like a video camera built into the gun. You can extend your gun around corners and above obstacles and see what is going on plus you can shoot enemies. Very useful in urban environments. You also get a grenade launcher that can shoot 6 grenades at once in semi-automatic fashion as opposed to the one-shot-and-reload on most guns. These grenades can also be set to airburst at a certain distance which comes in handy for enemies hiding behind obstacles. The other goodie is you can call in air strikes using a built-in lazing system in your gun. All in all it's fun and adds some good variety to the game just when you need it.

The game's AI is pretty good. If an enemy is looking in your direction they will often spot you quickly if you aren't being stealthy and open fire. If they aren't looking your way or you are taking extra measures to prevent being detected you can often have the element of surprise. Enemies are also pretty good about taking cover and not being too predictable. A feature of the game is that it is never the same twice. Even directly after loading a saved game enemies are rarely in exactly the same place or might be walking in different directions. One time, I was killed when a small wave of enemies came out of the woods and killed me. Luckily I saved right before that point so I loaded up the save and proceeded to find cover anticipating their attack. Instead I was left in the open because the soldiers came from the exact opposite direction and caught me from behind! I was impressed despite having to load my saved game again.

Lastly, what I always see as a big plus in the game is the ability to save at any point. Some games do a checkpoint system but I often find the checkpoints to be few and far between making for a frustrating game. With the ability to save at any time I usually don't have to retrace my footsteps that far as long as I remember to save often. The other plus is I can put saves at certain spots in missions and be able to jump right into the action at a later time (I always wanted to be able to start the final level of Halo right before the Warthog Race thing at the end...but alas I always had to play through the first 80% of that level just to get there).

Graphics & Sound
Overall, quite good. The detail of your own character is very good and your squadmates tend to be quite good as well. The levels tend to be fairly large and wooded and the game doesn't skimp on the trees and foliage. I wasn't particularly impressed with the explosions from the grenades but explosions from mortars and artillery are awesome. The enemies all tend to look the same but I was never bothered by that...just faceless enemies to me! Despite what seems like a high load on the graphics and textures engine, the game loads it's levels quite fast. You don't even have enough time to run to the fridge for a soda.

I was a little disappointed with the lack of blood and gore. I don't need Doom 3-type gore here but a war game having a complete lack of blood doesn't exactly help to set the mood. Also the death animations needed some work. When shooting enemies, rather than "blowing them away" with decisive kills they often usually looked like they were lying down to take a quick nap or something. It's not always easy to distinguish a kill from wounding people so often found myself pumping extra rounds into dead bodies.

The sounds throughout the game are top notch. Guns firing in the distance and those close to you all sound good and are easy to distinguish in terms of direction and distance. The ambient sounds do a really good job of setting the mood. In more stealthy maps, it's often just your own footsteps and the bugs but in the more battle-like maps you can hear mortars in the distance, jets screaming overhead, shouts of chaos...the works.

Multiplayer
These days, I very rarely buy Xbox games that don't support Xbox Live. Multiplayer aspects often make-or-break the replayability value of a game and help justify the $50 cost. For Ghost Recon 2, there is a very extensive multiplayer portion to the game and you will no doubt be finding your way here very quickly. The game can be played locally, on System Link, and on Xbox Live allowing you many options. From there, there are three options you can do including Co-op, Solo, or Squad. Solo and Squad is basically just FFA and team-based but the game also lets you do cooperative play online. You can play any map with up to four people cooperatively either online or on your own Xbox. This can be very fun and isn't found in that many games. For the Solo and Squad aspect, it's pretty much your run-of-the-mill multiplayer. It supports various deathmatch modes, king of the hill, capture and hold, siege (one team on offense, the other on defense), and search and rescue (escorting helpless civilians). You can play these games on any of the single player maps plus there is another 8 (or so) maps made just for multiplayer. Some are better than others but most of them are pretty good.

Overall the multiplayer portion is very well developed and fun. In many ways Ghost Recon 2 is similar to Halo 2 in that you'll buy the game for the single player portion and keep it for the multiplayer.

Summary
This game is top-notch. The single player might lack a deep story but in terms of gameplay it's fun, easy to learn, and you won't be beating the game between meals. The multiplayer is just as important as the single player and will keep you entertained long after you are done playing the single missions. The game has some significant changes from its predecessor in the gameplay area but I found them to be improvements. If you really liked the first game, you might be disappointed with this one because of those changes. The graphics and sounds found in the game are both of top caliber and aren't easily surpassed. Any downsides of the game tend to be minor and hard to find. If you are even remotely interested in a somewhat-strategic, modern-military-warfare-shooter game then this is probably the best one out there right now.