Threat Sensor aside, one of the most controversial aspects of Ghost Recon is the lack of any scavenging options; players will not be able to loot dead bodies for weapons, or even ammo. There has been a fair bit of sometimes heated debate on this, on just about every Ghost Recon Forum.

When Red Storm finally came out and justified this decision some people were not overly impressed with one of the main reasons they put forward - dead bodies were potential booby-traps set by enemy forces. Some thought this was weak at best, outright unrealistic and false at worst.

However Red Storm were right on the money with that assessment, as warned by SAS trained covert operative Tom Carew. Tom describes in his book Jihad! The Secret War in Afghanistan why it is unwise to loot from the dead.

"...bodies are classic sites for booby-traps and simple anti-personnel mines, ..."

Which is exactly what Red Storm said - hands up those who doubted them?! Feel free to debate this point further in our friendly forums.

[Tom's book is a great read by the way, about his covert operations in Afghanistan for the British Secret Services, UK readers can grab it here.]

Scuba Steve has launched a mIRC channel for Ghost Recon, so if it's real-time hard core Ghost Recon chat you are after point your PC to east.gamesnet.net and select channel #ghostrecon!

That's the title of PC Gamplay's latest Ghost Recon preview in the popular UK PC Games magazine. It's a four page article based on the same visit to the Red Storm offices that spawned their great "Ghost Recon Week" of interviews.

What I found amusing was this is the third time a preview team has returned from Red Storm offices and gone to print with "The trees are particularly impressive", or similar!

The article rounds up with "...come this Christmas, who'd bet against Ghost Recon going down a storm", not us anyway!

We have updated our Ghost Recon FAQ with the minimum system specification required to run Ghost Recon, as posted at the official site.

CPU - Pentium II 450 MHz processor or equivalent
Memory - 128 MB of RAM
Operating System - Windows 9X/ME/2000/XP
DirectX - DirectX 8.0 or higher (included on CD)
Video Card - 16MB DirectX 8.0 compatible 3D card
Drive Space - 1GB minimum hard drive space
CD-ROM - 4X or better
Sound Card - DirectX 8.0 compatible sound card
Internet/Network - TCP/IP connection at 28.8 KBPS or faster

Remember these are minimum requirements, if your PC only just meets those specifications you probably will not see the game at its best. Having said that the spec. is lower than some had expected so rejoice that you may not have to upgrade that ageing PC just yet!

Our first screensaver just made Fileplanet's Top 5 screensaver downloads! We released this Real World Ghost Recon screensaver a while back, before there were any Ghost Recon screenshots. We have a brand new full on Ghost Recon screensaver in the works though, for release later this week.

Ubi Soft's latest screenshot shows how the OICW is going to look in-game. The only problem is that it's a very atmospheric "night-ops" image, meaning it's very dark. A few PSP filters later though and we can clearly see all the cool detailing. Select the last image in our Ubi Soft panel to check it out.

As well as composing Rainbow Six, Rogue Spear, Black Thorn and Ghost Recon soundtracks Bill has worked on many other game and film scores. Gamasutra have a cover feature on Bill Brown this month, listing those other titles, with mp3 downloads and some great detail on this talented and sought after composer. Bill's official website can be found here.

Xian Saint has completed our hat-trick of Assault Rifles with the addition of the superb M4 Masterkey.

A new breed of Next Generation Clans has started to grow in advance of Ghost Recon's release in November.

Blackadder is a new full on flash site with some nice tricks, probably best suited for fast connections though.

The Art of Warfare have been around a little longer, but have just opened their Ghost Recon clan - Black Diamond. (If you don't like your browser being taken over by TAW remember to press F11 in IE.)

Then of course we have respected RS vets SOTO, with another Flash site. These clans will be added to our Clan section shortly.

I just noticed that gr.com has a poll running on which weapon players are looking forward to most in Ghost Recon. Currently the M24 sniper rifle is getting most votes, which is nice as it was the latest addition to our armoury database, check out Xian Saint's M24 report.

So, you haven't signed up at the official forums yet? Would that be because they suck?! Well don't give up just yet - word from the Ubi Soft Director of Online Gaming and Content is that they are just about ready to replace those temporary forums with, and I quote "probably the most versatile, most feature filled (forums) on the web".

Sounds good - keep an eye on gr.com for the release of those forums, and for regular news from the horses mouth.

For those that don't already know, Vertigo stands accused of ruining Rogue Spear multiplayer by producing a series of cheats, distributing them through his website. He recently made this statement regarding Ghost Recon

"I am waiting for GR to be releases [sic], it looks very good, but I definately want this to be anti-cheat free... for at least 3 years or so untill [sic] it begins to die."

I think that means he doesn't plan on making cheats for it for 3 years....

A spurt of news over the last 24 hours! First of all you are now browsing GhostRecon.net from its new home on the web! The switch seems to have went smoothly, with only a handful of Forum posts going missing.

The other big news is that Ubi Soft have released the first official Ghost Recon Movie. The "we got a casuality" movie features the first ever look at the new Threat Sensor and sniper's sight in action. You can choose from 2 file types at the official movie page.

Ubi Soft have also updated the Designer Diaries, which now has 12 reports from the Design team.

The latest issue of UK magazine PC Zone just hit the shelves with a four page Ghost Recon article. There is a nice selection of atmospheric screenshots, and a short interview with one of the Red Storm Ghost Recon team. Read the online version here.

GhostRecon.net is moving to a new server over the next few days. There should be no downtime, hopefully you will not even notice the switch. The only pages I may have to put on hold for a day or two are the Forums. In the event of any problems our sister site Aggression will post news of the current situation.

The Platoon picked up on some new fancam Ghost Recon footage reportadly filmed at E3. It contains the prone footage that was included in a UK magazine last month, some brand new footage of an assault on a tank, and night vision in use. Download the 12.7Mb file from R6/GR Universe .

Ubi Soft have just confirmed that Ghost Recon will ship in November to US and Canada stores. I am working with their UK office to bring you a Euro launch date, which will not be the same as the USA date.

Ubi Soft have issued a press release stating that the next Red Storm release, RS Black Thorn is delayed until further notice. This is due to the recent events in New York. Not only is the release date delayed - but the actual game content is to be changed.

This of course casts doubt on the release of all games with war/terrorism content, including Ghost Recon. RS Black Thorn is not the first game to be pulled for this reason, as Red Alert 2 was actually removed from store shelves at the weekend.

I noticed a quote from Ubi Soft PR representative Cassie Vogel however, on Pie's Tactics that redresses the balance a little.

"... the planned release of ... Tom Clancy's Ghost Recon, is still set for release on the PC platform later this year"

Whether war games shall be deemed okay for release by Christmas is still very much open to debate though.

We will of course keep you posted as more news leaks out. In the meantime you can catch up on what other games have been affected by recent events at Eurogamer and Avault. You can also comment on these developments in our forums in this thread, which will be moderated.

Some quick updates :

• Threat Sensor Description
• MG3 added to Arms section
• Cool new official images
• Every movie now listed, and new wallpapers here.

There will be no news updates for a few days, games are not relevant at this time. What is relevant is the small part we can play in helping the recovery process from the awful events in New York.

I can do my small part by bringing the Red Cross disaster Relief fund to the attention of the many thousands of people that read this page every week. You can each play your own small part by clicking that banner and depositing a small amount into the fund.

Other Ghost Recon webmaster's might like to think about adding the banner, or a simple link to their own sites in a united effort to help.

Thank you. Rocky

Stop mailing me! Our hands on ECTS preview of Ghost Recon is now on-line! Be warned, this is a huge report spanning 11 sections, but we think you'll like it! We managed to grab seven digicam screenshots and details on the impressive graphics, character control, new reticule information, the sniper scope, some nice eye candy details including wound effects and thankfully the Artificial Intelligence actually showing some intelligence!

Did I mention this is only Part One of our ECTS report? We also have a 15 question and answer interview with Ubi Soft coming up very soon!

The guys over at Platoon have found a new Ghost Recon movie, and it's quite good. Although the E3 clip was very cinematic, there were some moans that it didn't contain any in-game footage. This smaller clip from Games Domain is cam footage from ECTS, and is all in-game footage, don't miss it. You can grab both clips if you missed the E3 one from Games Domain movie page.

When is Ghost Recon "Going Gold", when will it hit the shelves? There are two or three dates doing the rounds right now; at ECTS Ubisoft told us the release date was 7th of December. The date Ubi Soft were offering before that was 20th of November. We will always have the up-to-date release schedule on our FAQ page, another reliable source is Gonegold.com who have a good track record on release dates.

One of the "must have" downloads for Rogue Spear is the excellent Stats tool from Gallaleo. Good news is that Ghost Recon.net have contacted Gallaleo and he has promised a Ghost Recon version if there is not a similar function built in to GR! Here's what he told us

I sometimes get asked if there is a Tom Clancy novel based on the Ghosts, like the Rainbow Six series. Unfortunately there is not, so what's a guy to do to pass the time until Ghost Recon is launched? Well, you could do worse than read "Ghost Soldiers: The Forgotten Epic Story of World War II's Most Dramatic Mission" By all accounts it's a "Once I started I didn't want to put it down" kind of book!

GhostRecon.com is Live! On the screenshots page they have a "find the sniper" image to take a peek at, and there is also a designer diaries section that will grow as the weeks go on. There is also a fun poll to vote in, assuming every one who visits that page has voted I guess I was visitor 18!

Ahead of publishing our hands-on ECTS report we are releasing for the first time the full list of Mission names for Ghost Recon.

Details of actual mission objectives are still a little sketchy although we do have some information on our GR-S page.

Ghost Recon.net have seen the light, and it is Ghost Recon! Mod Viper is just back from ECTS where Ubi Soft took him through Ghost Recon from Equip to Mission Complete, and has some brand new images and lots of information to share. Here's a snippet from Mod Viper's report

"The Ubisoft booth was the first I came a cross, and I never moved ...I'm glad to say WOWWWWWWWWWWWWW. Yepp it is that good"

Unusually for Ghost Recon previews we were actually allowed to play the game hands on! Once we have Ubi Soft clearance we will publish the full report as soon as we possibly can.

If you really cannot wait for us to publish our report head over to Eurogamer who have just this minute published their own Ghost Recon ECTS report!

Awesome new Ghost Recon footage is out! Ghost Recon Universe just mailed us that they have uploaded a 1.5 minute official cinematic trailer taken form a magazine DVD. The clip shows the Ghosts arriving by helicopter before proceeding to target and destroy a tank. Grab the 10.2Mb avi file from their Video section. It's a fantastic movie - the best yet by far, roll on November! The footage originates from the E3 Expo, but this is the first time we have seen it available on the web.

If you have trouble playing the clip you may need to download the Divx4 codec before playing it through Windows media player, or you could try using the DivX Player.

Congratulations to Ghost Recon publisher Ubi Soft who were just awarded Publisher of the Year at ECTS. You can see Ubi Soft's ECTS line up here.

Thanks to LofD we have another quality wallpaper to decorate our desktops with.

Eurogamer are first to publish news on Ghost Recon at ECTS, here's what they had to say "At UbiSoft I became so engrossed in Red Storm's Ghost Recon that I didn't get to see any other PC games during my one hour meeting". Read the rest at their ECTS page now. We hope to get our own hands-on at ECTS within the next 48 hours!

Good news on the Ghost Recon soundtrack, the same person who produced the excellent Rogue Spear music is composing for Ghost Recon - Bill Brown. Bill's site has been updated with some of his most recent work - and has a promise of some Ghost Recon downloads in the near future. Bookmark Bill Brown now and keep checking back for updates.