Operation Flashpoint: Dragon Rising

[[29ID]B|Pvt.Mickd]

Re: Operation Flashpoint: Dragon Rising

I consider myself a multiplayer gamer. I have yet to get to play MP on this game as all of teh servers are down/overloaded. Thus until I get the chance to play this game online, it will remain a waste of money.

[CybrSlydr]

Re: Operation Flashpoint: Dragon Rising

I'm the opposite. I'm all about the SP. Here are my final thoughts on the game...

[quote=CybrSlydr]Impressions...

This is always what I wanted the original OFP to be! Great game!

I'm on mission 7 I think and love it. It's not as... free-ranging as say the original OFP or ArmA. I know in the other two, I'd often on covert missions, steal a tank or BMP or something to make things a bit more fun. You can't do that in OFP2 so far. I haven't found (or really looked) for vehicles sitting idle. You can typically find a jeep or something near, but the way the missions are, they're not quite as useful. Certainly nice to cover ground, but not really useful.

Enemy soldiers blend in very well with the environments. Can be very difficult to spot them. On normal difficulty, they certainly seem to miss the first few shots alot, but will soon home-in on you. One shot you're dead. However, you don't always die with one shot. You can take a few before dying. If you're incapacitated, you can use the Q menu to call your medic over to heal you and get you back into the fight. However, he has to do so before you bleed out.

Arty strikes and air strikes are nice. Work as advertised. Sound is incredible - just wow! Sound is where this game totally and utterly trounces and stomps ArmA and others into the ground. Beautiful sound!!! A real treat for those of you with 5.1-7.1 systems.

Voice comms are another area where this game really trumps ArmA. The voice acting is good and you don't have that omg annoyingly stilted robo-talk when you issue orders.

So far there have been a good mix of missions. Assault, support, assault and defend, infiltration, etc. This does a very good job of making you feel like a part of a bigger battle.

As others have stated, this doesn't have the adrenaline pumping action of COD or others like it, but it's full of tension and gets you on that knife-edge. However, it's still very, very exciting to play.

Teammate AI is decent. Nothing spectacular other than a few path-finding problems on the first mission when I tried to do an aquatic assault (they got stuck and we couldn't progress as they wouldn't get in the water). They will call out enemy positions and handle themselves well enough you don't have to babysit them - but always keep an eye on them.

A slight oddity though... In ArmA and the original OFP, the landscapes really did feel sprawling and it really felt like you could go anywhere to do anything. This certainly has that wide-open look, but doesn't quite feel as expansive as the others. The world is a lot, LOT less lived in as well. You don't have civilians running around doing their thing or driving around in big cities. Those two games definitely get bigger points for giving the feeling of a living, breathing world. On OFP2, it feels like the only people on the island are you and your allies and the enemies you're attacking. I haven't even seen a city or town yet.

After finishing, I gotta say it was a fun ride.

Was over way too soon (campaign timer said 6hrs 5min 42 seconds on Normal difficulty).

I also feel like I may have broken the game. I rarely/never used the Suppress/Assault/Flank, etc commands. I just kept them in a wedge (or Column/Line if needed) and told them if and when to fire.

Unless I missed it somewhere, while in the game you cannot issue orders to a specific teammate. You can on the map, but not when you're in game. Big bummer. Would have been nice when I had a sniper to have him do some long range wet-work. Something I'll explore on another play through.

While not being able to customize your load out was a downer, it didn't hurt too much. Though there were a few times I felt like a TK so I could use the M249 or the marksman weapons on a few missions.

Story was... light and not much there, but it served it's purpose in getting you towards the end of the fight. Big props to the voice actors again!

All in all, I'm glad I got this game - well worth the money so far. Now to go through again - and see what the modding community can come up with.

So, to summarize...

PROS:
-Great graphics
-Amazing Sound
-Good assortment of Weapons
-Awesome environment
-Sprawling map on which to operate
-Good variety of missions
-Difficult, but not unforgiving as ArmA and original OFP could be
-Night-time infiltration mission not nearly as tedious and annoying as ArmA or original OFP, rather fun
-Very polished and complete - never ran into any bugs or CTDs
-Runs very well on High settings on my modest system (x3360 @ 2.8Ghz, 4GB RAM, 4870 512, Vista x64 Ultimate, 1920x1080 4x MSAA)

CONS:
-While the map may be large, battles feel small in scale
-Cannot change loadout pre-mission (can sometimes find crates at beginning to swap up)
-Teammate control via Q menu, while better than the F1-F9 system, is still clunky
-Inability to control single teammates when not on the map screen
-Some minor path-finding issues
-Lack of vehicle usage during SP campaign
-Relatively short
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