GRAW 2 Review - New Game Network

As far as sequels go, Ghost Recon Advanced Warfighter 2 (GRAW2) does not disappoint. It’s more of the same really, so if you are a fan, you will be happy. And if you aren’t a fan, then you will probably avoid the sequel, so technically you are happy too. A pretty happy situation GRAW2 creates. The developers and publisher of the original GRAW are back, and so is the reviewer (me!). I will be making some references and comparisons to the original GRAW, so I advise you read my review of GRAW before proceeding. You should play the games in proper order, after all. But if you have no idea what’s going on, and decided to start with the second game against all advice, then power to you – you’re playing the worst of the two.

In GRAW2, much like the original (see, here I go with the references!) you take on the role of Capt. Mitchell, leader of the Ghost team sent in to diffuse various conflicts around the world. The story picks up pretty much after the original game ended, and this time you spend the game around various locales in Mexico, as the conflict that started in the first game rages on. The plot actually feels like a rip-off from a season of 24 (TV show). You are continuously in pursuit of some rebel forces who stole a nuke from the Middle East and plan to deploy it in Mexico, or worse, the US. Along the way you will discover that not everything is what it seems, and to be honest the twists aren’t exactly shocking. Many of the characters from the original game are back, including the voice actors. The little video window in the corner is back as well, as it will broadcast your missions and commands to you. This time it’s been done a lot better, with all characters appearing in 3D with odd looking backgrounds. Live video is actually taken from the real world, so that further adds authenticity to the story. Overall though, the story feels rather flat – it starts off running and keeps a straight and dull pace until a short, but well-done climax. It ends in a bit of a cliff-hanger too, but you can pretty much guess what happened if they announce another game in the series. There are only a handful of missions here, a couple more than the first game, but surprisingly they took a lot less time to finish overall.

Similarly to GRAW, here you are tasked with completing a mission with your team, which varies in size without much explanation. One new addition to the game is that each mission now provides you with a good map before you start, and you can even sometimes choose between 2 different insertion points. The loadout options are pretty similar, with 4 item slots and a weight limit for you and each Ghost member. This time around, there are a lot more weapons to choose from, and they all come with a very descriptive text menu. However, gone are the accuracy and damage meters, so it’s pretty well a guessing game selecting the best weapon for the mission, unless you’re a gun specialist in real life. Customization of weapons is back as well, but again it’s difficult to make decisions when you do not know what immediate impact they will have. You also have selection of team members to take with you before the mission, a step to the series feature of Rainbow Six. Each member has their own picture and bio, but they all sound and behave identically in-game, so you wonder why developers thought you’d even care who goes along for the mission.

Oftentimes, you will also get some random squad of military to help you. In some missions you’ll also get a portable supply jeep and even a tank. The problem is, you are given quite a lot to control at that point. You have 3 members of your Ghost team, a tank, and an army group – who all need to be controlled manually by issuing orders. Moving along a street simply becomes a chore at this point, forgetting for a second that there are enemies to fight at the end of it. In some situations you’ll also get an airstrike or a tactical bomb available, which will very inconveniently appear in the list together with your squad and anything else you are controlling. Often times, in the heat of battle, I scrolled though the selection with my mouse and selected the airstrike instead of my ghost member, resulting in a massive panic and retreat orders as the area we were using for cover was turned into ashes. There’s no way to cancel orders for things like that, and you only get a limited number of uses, so it’s pretty disappointing to waste it by accident.

And so we are back to the AI discussion. And unfortunately, the AI in GRAW2 has become worse than the original. The enemy AI is pretty much unchanged, they will still pull off superhuman shots from miles away even if you expose a pixel of your body. What’s changed is the friendly AI. It seems the developers decided that it was not to the player’s advantage to have his Ghost squad take out the enemies with little involvement from the player. So, your Ghost team is now really poor at shooting, and will happily waste 3 clips of ammo into a brick wall behind which an enemy is hidden. Gone are the situations where, at difficult levels, I would send my squad ahead to at least have a chance at them picking off the far-away enemies with their superhuman precision. In GRAW2, most of the game was spent micro-managing my Ghosts not to die because they can’t hit an enemy crouched around the corner from blank point range. I had to mostly use them to watch my back as I tried to handle things on my own. That didn’t stop them from their other problem (as mentioned earlier), and that’s wasting ammo. I’ve had my team member waste an RPG rocket in a single enemy standing in the distance, for no reason whatsoever. How dearly I missed having that RPG rocket 5 minutes later when we were tasked with shutting down a helicopter.

With enemy AI unchanged, the game is as brutally difficult as the original. In fact, don’t let the mission drop point selection throw you off – the game is more linear than the original, which makes for some endlessly frustrating sections of gameplay, with no alternate routs available. The game is also very helicopter crazy, you will encounter probably 4 or 5 as mini-bosses and they take forever to kill with conventional weapons. Thankfully, you will encounter almost no enemy tanks compared to the first game.

I realize that most of the review actually talks about specific gameplay scenarios, but really, there is not much else to talk about. GRAW2 is all about completing objectives, which are usually just reaching a certain point or protecting a VIP. Most of the gameplay is managing your Ghosts and fighting enemies – and it’s not a very good experience. Things are made a little easier because the game now allows you to save at any point, together with the usual checkpoint saves. Things like the weird damage HUD and concrete-penetrating MP5 bullets are back, which makes GRAW2 very comparable to the first game. At least the strength of firepower seems reduced, so you will not encounter as many one-hit kills on yourself as you did in the original – your teammates will die though. A lot.

Graphically, everything looks new and improved in the menu department, as well as in-game GUI. The command menu is now neat and good looking, and when giving orders you will see a position marker, something like from Brothers in Arms, which will show where your team will end up after you give the command. Menu and controls aside, the graphical engine seems to be the same. It’s a shame actually, but early missions in GRAW2 showcase identical texture choices from the first game. It’s almost like you’re looking at the same game, if you ignore the updated menu. The enemy models are odd and get repetitive very quickly. As you work your way from early missions down to the end, there is not much variation or difficulty curve to the foes, just their numbers and number of machine gun placements.

The sound is generic as well for most of the time. However, during some intro and post-mission cinematics, they decided to blast hard rock music with lyrics, which is completely out of place. The voice acting is average, but at least the same actors are back so there are no voice oddities. The game performs well on medium range systems, with all the details maxed. This is expected, since the engine received little change since the original game a few years back. It runs completely stable, and I had not a single crash or freeze during gameplay.

GRAW2 is a fan’s sequel. If you liked what you saw in the original game, you are in for more of the same. However, if you are new to the series, it is strongly recommended you try the original first, because GRAW2 is harder but shorter, with some higher production values but it goes through the same notions. The gunplay is enjoyable and polished, but some odd game design changes and flat story make this sequel fall short of the original.