Tom Clancy. Can’t live with him, can’t tie him in a sack and beat him with a stick (no matter how much the North Korean government wants to do it).
You might remember that one. When North Korea accused Tom Clancy’s Ghost Recon 2 of being a plot to overthrow their government… yeah, right. Well we’ve moved on towards Ghost Recon 2 : Summit Strike and the upcoming Ghost Recon 3 and, yes, the North Korean government is still in power. No political overthrow, no invasion, nobody waving a Ghost Recon 2 case and proclaiming that the path to overthrow North Korea has been set. Well, at least they didn’t accuse Project : Snowblind on their list of games holding a thinly veiled attempt to overthrow everyone‘s least favorite wacky dictatorship. Whatever.
Anyway if that was the case then Tom Clancy’s house should be the equivelant of a mini UN since there should be quite a few world leaders dropping in at his doorstep for one reason or another since he’s done quite abit of work that’s involved somebody’s country being overthrown or being the target of one of his black op special forces units at one point or another… like Russia in this case.

When people think of Tom Clancy two words might come to mind… and yes I’m not thinking of words that my Editors won’t censor out due to their graphic nature… I’m thinking of the words “Oppressive Realism”.
And nothing quite says “Oppressive Realism” like the triad of Tom Clancy game series doing the rounds now in the video game arena : Ghost Recon, Rainbow Six & Splinter Cell. At least it’s better than Tom Clancy’s baby steps into gaming with “Oppressive Fantasy” with tripe like The Hunt For Red October (the
(bleep)y video game).

Ghost Recon 3 is coming to the Xbox360 sooner or later , Rainbow Six just had it’s latest game on the present consoles with Lockdown, while Splinter Cell hasn’t had a game since Chaos Theory… guess it’ll have one soon. And yes, I also know that Tom Clancy’s done a few crappy games too (of which he hopes you’ve all forgotten by now). Games like the spectacularly crappy “Hunt for Red October” for the SNES, which I mentioned above and once again proved that movie based games blow… I’m not sure if he did a Patriot Games or Clear & Present Danger game but I’m suspecting that he wants you to forget that fact too (just in case they blew like Hunt for Red October). But I digress, we’re talking about his present stock of games.

First off a bit of clarification.
Yes, I said above this is about Russia… but,

you might say, doesn’t the original Ghost Recon concern Cuba? Sorta. There’s this game, Ghost Recon, and then there’s Ghost Recon : Jungle Storm of which only the training exercises are the same as the original GR, the story games are entirely different.
The original is set against a reborn Soviet Union, while Jungle Storm has a Cuba based scenario from my understanding of the game (though only a review will clear that all up).

This game is also noteworthy for another reason. This game, you see, was voted PC Game of the Year in 2001 which makes this one of the last pre 9-11 Clancy games to release. Thus the story.
In a pre 9-11 world this story is not so much about terrorist threats as it is the “Sum of All Fears” concerning the rebirth of an old threat, the Soviet Union.
It’s 2008 and the old Soviet Union has been reborn, and it’s on the march (as opposed to reality where -- OK, there’s still two years to go so maybe it might happen)… anyway one by one it’s swallowing up old countries that abandoned it years ago for freedom, returning them to the iron curtain of fear and death. You’d think this scenario would call for a “War Games” style full out RTS game now wouldn’t you! Nope, you’re going to be doing it with a small band of brave US Soldiers known as the Ghosts… yeah, sounds like you’re going to be needing a bigger boat.

Your objective? Keep the situation from escalating to all out nuclear war, and you have to do it in 15 missions… sheesh, that’s a tight schedule now isn’t it. 15 missions. But let’s put that aside as we take a look at the trademark of Clancy gaming… the oppressive realism.
If you are used to playing first person shooters in one way or another then you’ll find the hard lined realism set rules of Clancy’s “worlds” to be abit too… yes… “Oppressive” for your taste. Hence the name “Oppressive Realism” when describing Tom Clancy games… except for Tom Clancy’s Splinter Cell : Chaos Theory for the Nintendo DS which supplies “Oppressive Mediocrity”… really.
Besides the fact you’ll need to juggle control memorization (as well as all the buttons you’ll need to control your teams -- which won’t be so hard since the instruction booklet has a quick list of commands for you to reference at a moment’s notice) you’ll also need to be aware that you can’t approach the enemy the same way you might in other games -- this game is brutal even at Easy levels -- “Oppressive Realism“ brutal!

First off once you get hit a few

times your vision blurs and you move weird, then that happens again and again as your hit so you can’t exactly strafe back and forth taking hits as you mow down enemies… then again I saw that in action with the AI in Conflict Global Terror (with the AI) and… I never knew how dorky that tactic looked like until I saw someone else use it. Damn, I need a new method for playing 1st & 3rd person shooters. Uh, well back to the game and not on my shooter techniques, because next is the fact that you seem to be rather easy to crumble despite the fact you‘re supposedly wearing lots of body armor! Not to say you won’t stay on your feet after several hits but you do seem to die quicker than you would in other games set in the “real world” (the only exception to the rule being Operation Desert Storm where you crumple as easily as you do here). And when you go down you end up in control of another member of your team (no revives here), and this continues until you either exhaust your entire squad or you lose too much gear or specialized troops and are unable to continue a specific mission for one reason or another.

This, by the way, is only the beginning of the oppressive realism of Ghost Recon. There’s more.
Just look at the training missions you get sent on! Some of these require you to accomplish such and such a goal, and for that you need so much equipment to accomplish this! However if you lose too many men you’ll also lose equipment, until you can no longer continue the mission because you don’t have enough explosives to neutralize a target, or enough rockets to take out a convoy, something like that.
This is definitely not like, say, Medal of Honor : European Assault where you didn’t have a set amount of supplies or needed such and such a weapon to complete certain tasks like taking out tanks (of which the mission is deemed a failure if you fall short of having enough of said weapon to complete the task at hand).

This means you’ll need to approach Ghost Recon (and other games of the Clancy series) in a far different way than you would your standard shooter. A slower, more gentle velvet glove touch is required at times to handle missions you might have done by rushing in guns blazing, and that is actually a plus if you think about it. Maybe that’s why people flock to Clancy games like young men to Sexy Beach 2, the strong realistic gameplay draws the

realism loving gamer to these tactically sound pieces of gaming depth and thought, making them think through each and every action before committing to it offering up a far more stimulating experience than other games in this particular genre (military based shooters) could offer up.
Of course it’ll never replace the sheer joy of WWII shooters (Medal of Honor being my cup of Coke Zero) but it is solidly done and worth checking out. And at a mere $20 or so you can’t go wrong here!
Finding a game that is good AND at a low price? That’s gotta be worth it! Breakdown time.

Ghost Recon Breakdown the 1st
What’s Hot?
Some might consider Ghost Recon “Oppressive Realism” but if you think you can stand the harsh realities of a Clancy 1st person shooter then Ghost Recon is the game for you. And at $20 a pop you can’t go wrong with a series that is affordably priced AND a fan fave at the same time.

What’s Not?
You might become frustrated by the realism of the game, so make sure you at least rent it first before you buy it just to make sure it’s the game for you. And if you do buy it make sure you spin your way through all the training lessons and the practice missions first so you get your feet wet in the Tom Clancy style of gaming since it’s a completely different beast than from what you might be familiar with.

Moments to Remember?
Hmmm… the fighting is probably the only memorable thing here.

What to Ignore?
Ignore the fact that Russia didn’t seem nearly as offended as North Korea in terms of having a Tom Clancy game (or two) based against it. Anyway Russia should be more miffed with being associated with tripe like The Hunt for Red October game than this best seller!
As for North Korea? They should grow up and stop whining everytime somebody makes a game set in their backyard since that’s going to be the norm for sometime to come… look for more North Korean bashing games to come in the near future, whether they want it or not.

Overall?
Yes, I know, it’s “oppressive realism” but then again when is a little realism ever a bad thing?
It’s a Tom Clancy game, it’s good and it’s now available at a low low price so why not check it out?
Rent it if you don’t think you can play it, otherwise be sure to check it out and consider it.
Anyway Tom Clancy can’t make enough money so he wants you to help him make more, and more, and more and more… yeah, I like supporting other people’s money habits, don’t you?