Late to the party, ...IGN...

While the demo provides hungry gamers -- with nothing better to do than download the latest free piece of software -- a fully playable GRAW 2 demo, the actual experience is a mixed bag. For one, it' s short and not terribly distinct from playing through the first five minutes of the first Ghost Recon Advanced Warfighter. Demos are normally pretty short, though the Prey and the Crackdown demos were meaty, long-playing pieces of code. So, you can give it that.

But, I' ve played the single-player game through several of the first missions and the deeper one progresses through the game, the better it gets. You see, GRAW 2 starts out slowly and doesn' t impress nearly as much as the GRAW 1 did when it first showed up -- at first. The first few levels in GRAW 2 are basically training levels, and this demo is plucked straight from the beginning of the game. If you play through the demo and you are a big fan of the Ghost Recon series, GRAW 1 in particular, then you' ll easily breeze through this demo and feel a little disappointed. Why? The demo just doesn' t show enough of what' s actually different about the game.

Still, there are some elements to the demo that may tickle your fancy. The sequel to one of last year' s top-selling Xbox 360 games takes place on the border of Mexico and the US cities' Ciudad Juarez and El Paso, Texas. The landscapes in this sequel show that change right away. Instead of big open, Mexican streets and squares, you' re dropped into a dust bowl of dirt roads and barren winding hills. The demo also shows off how to use three of the sequel' s new gadgets. You' ll see and use the new UAV drone, the Mule, and you' ll get your hands on the new team command controls.

The new UAV drone, i.e. 2.0, is nifty for a short while. In the cross-com in the upper left-hand corner, you can switch from your team to the UAV, the Mule, or air support using the D-pad. The UAV now provides a first-person, top-down view enabling you to scan most environments from the UAV' s perspective. The UAV drone is in scanning position while you' re seeing down from it, meaning it' s in danger' s way. Thus, if you want to send it to a new spot at an unnoticeable height, you can use the D-pad to send it to a specific spot. And then you can jump to the UAV' s perspective and scan around, but every time you jump to it, the UAV lowers into enemy rifle range. But the demo, while nice to have, doesn' t really require the use of the UAV 2.0. You can just as easily sneak around the first few areas acting like a ghost and lay waste to the Mexican rogue assailants with little worry.

You' ll then use the Mule, another nice new instrument. The Mule is functional in three ways: It provides cover, offers a new selection of weapons, and provides news updates indicating upcoming enemy types and locations. It can also be commanded just like a team, using the D-pad. It' s faster than it seems, but it is destructible. Thus, if the enemy seems it, after several dozen shots it will explode and you' ll lose it. Again, in this demo you won' t actually need the Mule. It permits you to switch to an AS50 Sniper Rifle for long-range shooting, which you' ll want to do, and that' s something you couldn' t do in GRAW, switch weapons in the middle of a mission. One more thing, like the Ghost team, you can switch to the view of the Mule and see and control it from its perspective.

A few visual special effects accompany this slightly better than so-so demo. You' ll notice a spiffy heat blur in the air, on the side of the support helicopter, and in a few other spots. About three-fourths through the demo, the enemy begins a rocket assault on you. You' ll see the rockets arching though the sky, streaming smoke in their trails, all the way to the target spot. This is not only cool to watch, but you can actually see where the rockets are going so you' ll know where not to go. Last, just like the nifty smoke from the enemy rockets, enemy fire leaves a thin smokey trail in its path, which not only looks good but also helps you pinpoint the location from whence the enemy shoots.

Finally, the newest and coolest of the tools is the command function. Using this, you can switch to you' re a team mate' s visual perspective and actually command the team to move from spot to spot while seeing from their perspective. This will obviously come into play when the fights get thick and heavy, but just like the Mule and the AUV in this demo, they aren' t needed at all. You can easily bust through the entire five to 10-minute demo without using any of these news tools. And that' s my biggest gripe with the demo. You don' t need any of these cool new tools, which are a major part of GRAW 2, to play the demo -- thus making the demo feel more like GRAW 1.5 than GRAW 2.

Sure, it' s still fun as hell to play the GRAW 2 demo because it' s new and it looks slightly better and offers cool new toys to fiddle with. (Demo Spoiler Alert!) But the demo does one more thing that really busts my chops: it ends in the middle of a fight -- the very best fight in the whole demo! Ubisoft pulls a Halo 2 on us! Damn!

Still, there seems to be more to come. This is the single-player Campaign demo, which is stated very clearly on the demo menu. If that is a major point, then will there be a multiplayer demo too? One has to wonder. I sure hope so.

All in all, the demo is OK, if you' re jonesing for anything to play. But having played a little farther into the single-player campaign, it' s fair to say there is much cooler stuff to the game than the slow, rather ordinary first 10 minutes, which is what this demo gives you. I liked playing the demo enough, but it kind of misrepresents GRAW 2 a little. The game is actually cooler than this demo, and if you only see this as a representation of the final game, you may very well be turned off. My advice? Play the demo, but expect the game, especially in the mid- to later- levels to give you a much bigger departure from the GRAW we experienced last year.

Ok, so i mentioned multiplayer...









A multiplayer demo is coming, and it' ll be up at least 2 weeks before the game ships.

Graphically the lighting & shadowing systems have been completely overhauled and they' re now far more dynamic. There should be no instances of the drastic light source changes found in the original game where you' d be running along and then it jumped to look like a filter had been applied.

Like the single player aspect of the game the online will feature many of the same special effects; heat shimmer from explosions and burning buildings, wind and helicopters effecting smoke and foliage, advanced bullet impact effects, depth of field etc...

There won' t be any facemapping like in Vegas, but the camera will be supported.

There will be an ingame scoreboard which you can check at any time, instead of having to wait until the end of the round to see the killcounts etc.

If a team-mate is wounded but it' s non-critical, you can revive them. So being shot in the leg won' t result in death.

There will be loads of new weapons, both primary and secondary and things like satchel charges.

You' ll be able to see just how far you are from your next rank and what the requirements are.



It' s going to be awesome!

There should be no instances of the drastic light source changes found in the original game where you' d be running along and then it jumped to look like a filter had been applied.

I liked that feature of the old GRAW MP actually. Made it seem as if the sun had just come out from behind the clouds. Quite atmospheric.

There will be an ingame scoreboard which you can check at any time, instead of having to wait until the end of the round to see the killcounts etc.

You' ll be able to see just how far you are from your next rank and what the requirements are.

Two major things that were missing imo. Glad they' ve noticed it.

There will be an ingame scoreboard which you can check at any time, instead of having to wait until the end of the round to see the killcounts etc.

You' ll be able to see just how far you are from your next rank and what the requirements are.

Two major things that were missing imo. Glad they' ve noticed it.


Ditto. I mean the new modes and player models are nice and everything but it' s little improvements like these that will make the game better than the original. Rather than just expanding on stuff they' re streamlining it and making it more functional.

Majik' s Awesome Multi-Screenies

Anybody got a napkin?

ORIGINAL: Eddie_the_Hated

Majik' s Awesome Multi-Screenies

Anybody got a napkin?

NITROcaps...

















...the last two caps show the female [enemy] player model.

What you can' t see properly are the facial customization options. Like Vegas there are certain helmets, masks etc that you can' t get until you reach a certain rank. Here' s a example though...





In these caps it looks pretty similar to the original, but running it looks much much better. I just wish they' d " fix" the running animations.

Oh well, at least you can now slide in MP.