Recon Versus Assault matches end up becoming intense games of cat and mouse, only the mice are packing heat. It's important not to get overconfident as an assault team member. Sure, your gun is bigger, but it only takes one bullet to the noggin to put your lights out. Luckily, assaulters have regular respawn intervals whereas the Recon guys can only respawn after an ADATS is destroyed. If everyone on the recon team is wiped out, it's game over for them.
Gone is the third-person view from the console version of GRAW 2.
One touch that we really dig has very little to do with gameplay, and everything to do with presentation. Once the recon team accomplishes its objective and destroys all three ADATS, an air strike will come in and drop hot flaming death from above all over the map. It's a beautiful moment for the recon team, and a terrifying one for the assault team. Unfortunately, there isn't any sort of counter event for when the assault team wins, but that's not really a big deal.
Standard team-on-team deathmatch is also available, but the Recon Versus Assault mode kept most of our attention. You also rank up as you play, much like you do in Rainbow Six Vegas and Battlefield 2142. This is a great motivator to keep you playing. As you rank up you'll get access to more weapons, grenades, and accessories for your weapon (such as scopes and red dot sights).
There aren't a whole lot of people playing the Ghost Recon Advanced Warfighter 2 multiplayer beta right now... after all, it is a closed beta. Nevertheless, the games we got going were all tense and satisfying. The slow, deliberate pacing of the Ghost Recon series is intact here, and all the weapons have distinct handling characteristics that just feel "right" to us. Sound effects and graphics were also both top notch. We did have some performance issues on our Vista machine, while XP was noticeably more stable. We're definitely looking forward to seeing what else GRAW 2 for PC has to offer.
