Unlike previous titles, Rainbow Six Vegas does not feature briefings before each mission. Instead, all the information you'll need is delivered to you via voice overs and picture-in-picture display. Information on what is going on in the world around you will be provided via news feeds in the display and conversations with your team-mates. The result is a much more immersive experience. The entire game is set in Vegas and you are literally flown via helicopter from one mission to the next. This gives you a good opportunity to take a look at the city as it is recreated in the game. We saw this in action in the introduction to the level we played. While the individual buildings that the action takes place in are fictional (for many obvious reasons), the overall skyline is seems pretty similar to what we remember from our pre-E3 trip there. Then again our memory is a little hazy of the time we spent there…
The level we had an opportunity to go hands on with was based in a partially constructed casino. The demo starts out with you being dropped onto a helipad and having to move quickly to find cover amongst the bricks and scaffolding littering the roof-top. This time around your team consists of only two members; Mike Walter and Jung Park. Having fewer members appears to have benefited the team AI. In the single level that we played, the team’s reactions seemed much more natural than in the previous outings. They cleverly found cover and jumped over obstacles when needed. When rappelling down the side of a building, they will seamlessly follow your lead.
As cool as it looks.
While we’re on the topic, rappelling is also one of the new features for Rainbow Six. It seems the feature was clearly implemented to take advantage of the platform style levels that characterise the high rise building of Las Vegas, but it works surprisingly well. To move on the roof top you'll need to rappel down the side of the building. While moving down, it's possible to flip upside down to peer into windows, tag and take out enemies. Once that’s done you'll also be able to storm inside the buildings by jumping backwards and kicking through the glass. The animations are all very smooth and the whole experience is very cool.
Once inside the building the light becomes much more scarce and we were frequently forced to use night vision or thermal vision. Thanks to a fierce fire towards the bottom of the building, as we moved downwards, the thermal vision became rather useless and we were forced to switch to night vision. With virtually no ambient light, it was difficult to see much at all, which added a degree of difficulty to the already tricky levels.
Taking cover is crucial in Rainbow Six. It only takes a few bullets to die and your team-mates can’t revive you, so getting shot at is something you spend a lot of time avoiding. A nifty new feature to use while taking cover is the over the head and over the side shooting. While behind cover you can hold the gun around the corner, or over your head to fire blindly at the enemy. While it’s unlikely to kill them, you can’t be shot during this time and it provides good covering fire if you want to send your team-mates on ahead to a more strategic position.
Don't move. I dropped my contact lens around here somewhere...
Once we’d cleared out all the terrorists from the partially constructed segment of the building, we moved inside, working our way through rooms towards the bottom of the building. Here, the games new strategic planning cam into play. With most rooms there are multiple access points. Using the snake cam on closed door you can search for and mark the terrorists you want your team mates to take out. You can then move around to the other entrance, signal your team mates to move in, then take out any remaining baddies. While this type of gameplay can become a little stop-start between rooms, there’s a strong sense of satisfaction when you can clear out a several terrorists in a couple of seconds without taking a bullet.
Undoubtedly the most impressive aspect of the game is the visuals. From rappelling down the side of building to the character models themselves, we couldn’t help but be impressed. Most significantly, there’s no health bar – all the health indications are delivered through the character models and the camera. After you take a shot the screen begins to blur, another one turns it red and a third will kill. You need to take cover for a short period of time until the screen returns to normal to regain health. While the visuals may not quite be up to the standard of Gears of War or Bioshock, as you can see from the screen shots, it’s still one of the prettiest games on the 360 to date.
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