GR:AW for the Casual Gamer

[scott_dft]

Hello, thought I'd stop lurking and add a couple of posts.

So who am I? If you were trying to be nice about it, you could say I was a Bargin Bucket Gamer. Will pick up a game that catches my eye on the discount shelve and give it a go. I can imagine there are lots more offensive names the community has for newbies that wander in on the scene...

Still it's like film, enthusiasts will queue to see a new film on the big screen, to admire the great acting and director's vision, while others will rent/buy the DVD because they liked the cover, or the back cover promised lots of violance and nudity. But the film industry would be a shadow of it's current self if it were not for the after-market.

So while everyone else is champing at the bit for GRAW2, I'll chip away at GRAW (just finished mission 2) and post in the original GRAW forum, for anyone left listening (perhaps some other tentative Bargin Bucket Gamer, nervous around all these FPS afectionados).

So is GRAW any good for the BBG?

Pros

Immersive & Realistic: well ok maybe not to the nth degree like so many of you had hoped for, but still a lot better than many of the arcade type FPS you can pick up. No health packs, ammo packs floating in mid-air, no press this - turn that - jump here to pass mini-puzzles and so on.

Reasonable learning Curve: on the early misions atleast. Again, in part due to it's difference from arcade type games, no devilish puzzles (well apart from maybe how to get the ZEUS of the chopper) or hordes of enemy swarming at you. If you take your time, use your men, use your tactical map, you can can progress quite smoothly along. Sure you'll be ambushed a couple of times, but just reload and rethink your tactics.

Helpful A.I.: no don't laugh, I found they've been quite good so far.If you work them as a team, and not the stupid newbie setup of having them drag their heels 10-50m behind you, then they definately make the game easier and more interesting in a tactical way. I would guess 90% of the first two missions could be done with-out you having to fire a shot. Althought from what I gather from these forums, that percentage drops as the missions go on and you have to work harder to keep the team alive. Fair enough, goes back to the learning curve above.

Linear Play: had plenty of negative comment but it does make the game quicker and easier to get into. Each objective usually has serveral routes and a couple ways of tackling them, so it doesn't feel to restrictive. Although it would be nice to see a game with more flexible, moveable objectives within each mission and there are plenty of ways with the cross-com system to prompt the helpless newbie wandering around empty mexican streets wondering what he was meant to be doing.

Cons

Bugs: nothing puts off the casual player like bugs.

No Quick-Save and too few Save Points: rather annoying for the casual gamer to be pulled so far back, especially in such a relatively slow and methodical game. I applied the mission mod that doubled the points in mission 01 (thanks for that Rocky) and used the info on this site (thanks Wolfsong) to mod mission 02 myself to add an extra save just after I get the ZEUS, allowing me to try different tactics to remove the tank and covering fire.

Lapses in Realism: I said the realism was good but not perfect and some of the limitations are a bit annoying. Keep trying to get through doors to go inside, even tried blowing a couple of doors up, but decided all the doors in mexico city are really just fakes painted onto walls. Then the road-blocks, didn't realise at first that these were edge-of-map markers, a big 2m high fence would have made things more obvious rather tham have us pondering why a highly trained special ops soldier can't step over a couple of sand-bags!

All-in-all, I would say the pros out-weight the cons at this point and would recommend GRAW to any BBG looking for a taste of a realistic, tactical FPS. You'll notice I haven't mentioned MP once, far too scary for BBGs!

Oh, and sorry, all other posts will be short and to the point, honest.

[Nutlink]

About 10 months after the release and here's a new review. Pretty good scott, and very accurate...except maybe about the AI

[scott_dft]

About 10 months after the release and here's a new review. Pretty good scott, and very accurate...except maybe about the AI

Thanks Nutlink. People outwith the core tactical FPS community are going to come across GRAW every so often and possibly ghostrecon.net thereafter. Especially now as I would guess there would have been a push to offload remaining GRAW discs in anticipation of new stock of GRAW2. Stand by my final comment that anyone that does not have GRAW but sees it at a knockdown price, should get it and have a go. Easy to get into but soon has you hooked and ramps up the challenges (ignoring the bugs with the AI etc.)

Indeed, enjoying GRAW so much, may well get GRAW2 before it hits the bargin bucket (shock/horror, don't tell the misses ) . Will keep an eye on the GRAW2 forums to see how it pans out on release.

On that note, for those casual gamers that like GRAW, what other titles can people recommend, from the three classes:

New Release (needs to be seriously good for BBGs to pay full price )

Bargin Bucket

Off the Shelves (via download or ebay, etc.)

[GRIN_Wolfsong]

Then the road-blocks, didn't realise at first that these were edge-of-map markers, a big 2m high fence would have made things more obvious rather tham have us pondering why a highly trained special ops soldier can't step over a couple of sand-bags!

Good review.

But I have to say that the above quote isn't a con issue. It's a common way to split up maps and still having some motive to the objects being there. You can't put fences across a road, and you can't only have roads going in circles inside the map for example. If you keep focused on the mission objectives and which area you should be moving around in you should most likely would never notice those at all. It's the way thing have to be unless you want the feeling the map is inside a closed area where only helicopters can get in.

Check Embassy on GR1 for an older example of the same. There they didn't even bother with covering the entire road with them. Put up 2 small road-blocks for a little visual aid and a big invisible mover collision to prevent the player going that way.

Edited March 2, 2007 by Wolfsong

[scott_dft]

Glad GR:AW doesn't have jump ability or I would have looked even dumber trying to pogo over them

(Please, Please, no comments on jump/no-jump, don't want my newbie name forever sullied by my very first topic falling into yet another jump/no-jump argument)

[Janie42]

@scott_dft=> x 2 "Good Review" & esp. I like your Bargain Bucket Gamer perspective focus. I believe this applies to many ppl, thus your comments concerning Learning Curve are esp. salient IMO. I laughed about your trying to open/blow up false doors ...glad I'm not the only one who does this! Ta for your post...

Now, about this jump/no-jump in GRAW stuff...

[ROCO*AFZ*]

Then the road-blocks, didn't realise at first that these were edge-of-map markers, a big 2m high fence would have made things more obvious rather tham have us pondering why a highly trained special ops soldier can't step over a couple of sand-bags!

Good review.

But I have to say that the above quote isn't a con issue. It's a common way to split up maps and still having some motive to the objects being there. You can't put fences across a road, and you can't only have roads going in circles inside the map for example. If you keep focused on the mission objectives and which area you should be moving around in you should most likely would never notice those at all. It's the way thing have to be unless you want the feeling the map is inside a closed area where only helicopters can get in.

Check Embassy on GR1 for an older example of the same. There they didn't even bother with covering the entire road with them. Put up 2 small road-blocks for a little visual aid and a big invisible mover collision to prevent the player going that way.

Agreed. The map isn't like a prison... the road can't be fenced off... and look real... although i guess you could gate it.