Almost, but not quite
Difficulty: Just Right
Time Spent: 20 to 40 hours
Rating: 6.5/10
First Off: Don't completely believe what I put for the difficulty because honestly, sometimes things go really smoothly and other times you sit at your computer thinking "What the hell just happened?" So I guess it varies. Secondly: I'm going to list the pros and cons because it's easier and it gets my points across so much better than one big story. Oh and I'll give you examples and reasons, awesome right?
The Cons
-Sometimes your AI teammates don't respond to your orders.
Reason: I set a demo charge to blow up a tank and told my team to move back but one guy just felt the urge to stand in front of it no matter where I ordered him to go, causing me to blow him and the tank out of existence.
-Apparently your AI teammates never learned how to drive.
Reason: To get to a far away objective I ordered my teammates into a jeep and ordered them to move to the objective but instead of driving through the forest in front of us apparently it was much better for him to just floor it into the nearest tree and keep trying to go forward instead of backing up.
-Your the Brains, the Brawn, AND the Babysitter (Stupid AI)
Reason: As the other problems would suggest, the BIGGEST down fall of this game is the AI. I had my teammates defending my sniping position and when I turn around to check on my guys I saw an enemy soldier right behind MY guy about to shoot ME. For the most part, the AI in this game is brain dead and in some cases will make your job A LOT harder than it has to be, like giving away your position or just doing some unbelievably dumb stuff.
-Terrible Instructions
Reason: I noticed when trying to snipe guys from far away that the bullets would land at the ground in front of them. It turns out that you need to put your gun on a bit of an arc to hit them from far away, which makes me wonder, where is the tutorial/manual/walk through for this game in case there's anything else I need to know, like If I can in fact just drop grenades instead of using my apparently very strong arm to throw them at things that it just bounces off of.
-Stupid Voices
Reason: When you issue certain orders, you or someone else will announce this long abbreviation of where the order is, not only does it not make any sense at all and sound very annoying but it sounds very robotic and reminds you that your playing a game instead of really immersing you into this virtual battlefield.
-So Many Enemies But Nothing To Shoot Them With
Reason: I had an objective that required me to blow it up (real original I know) but unfortunately I had run out of explosives along time ago and had no real way to blow up the objective. I remembered something about ammo or supply boxes being mentioned so I went off on a long adventure, I climbed and walked the island in search of the fabled explosives. Eventually I found the box about 100 m away from some ruins about 800 m away from my objective and was able to blow it up but it makes me wish there was an easier way to get ammo and weapons or find the boxes themselves without all the trouble.
-Harsh Co-op Campaign
Reason: Well the title gives you a good idea of what im talking about, basically if all your teammates die (which, if your in a tough battle it can easily happen sometimes) you have to restart the WHOLE mission, sounds awesome right? Yea it was loads of fun.
-Realistic? Yea Sure, and I'm Santa Claus with an Uzi
Reason: It's not always that hard to find things that make NO sense, like how you can sprint up and down seemingly impossible angles, or how if you get in a helicopter and then get out sometimes it won't stop and instead lift off to a point you can't reach and just hover there, completely useless. It might take me while to type all the bugs and glitches so I'll just leave it at that.
-Invisible Dead Enemies? Who Does That Help?
Reason: After a long fight in which the first kills are long dead, usually the bodies will disappear giving you little or no time to loot and replenish your ammo. Also, in the Co-op Campaign, say you have a javelin launcher you need to take down a hard target but you die before you shoot it, for some reason your not allowed to loot your own body when you re-spawn but you can loot your teammates dead bodies (not sure about human allies) .
-Conclusion to Cons
The biggest problem for me was just trying to beat the co-op campaign with my friends, I mean why the hell does it put checkpoints in the Co-op game if its just going to make you do everything all over again, seriously, I don't think that's the type or realism people want because we don't like smashing our faces in to monitors, it hurts.Well I could go on forever about the cons, honestly I could put them in great detail but, as I'm sure the reason any of you people are reading this is because you want to know if you should buy it or not, and you probably want to hear some pro's as well right? No? Well you do, you just don't know it yet.
The Pro's
-Command System Works Very Well
Reason:Even though its obvious that this command system was taken from the console version, it actually works very well and is easy to learn which I'm sure is a huge relief to some of you.
-Co-op Done Right Is A Recipe For A Fun Night
Reason:If you get yourself three friends who want to play this game with you your in luck because that's really the hardest part. After that all you do is make your online account, get the guy with the best Internet connection to host the game and then start playing and even with the for mentioned harsh restart rule, done right this game can be really fun, or at least entertain you for a day or two.
-What Realism There Is Can Be Really Fun
Reason: Whether putting together a rocket launcher and then blowing up a tank or a lighthouse, or adjusting your sniper according to wind and distance and then literally blowing the enemies head open, what realism there is in this game that isn't completely laughable/terrible works really well and can be really fun.
-AI Sure Know How To Fly
Reason: Even though they are embarrassing when it comes to driving vehicles, your teammates, when ordered to of course, can expertly take off, travel, and land at the designated location. Even though there are a few bugs every now and then, its more fun to sit near a window and let the AI take you to your destination giving you time to relax and enjoy the view or plan the attack.
-Whatever Just Happened, It Was Really Cool
Reason: The game does a good job of making you feel rewarded for pulling off cool strategic plans with great effects and graphics (On High, anything less is just not worth it), cool weapons, great experiences like flying over an enemy base and mowing down guys with rockets or the chain gun on some helicopters or calling in combat support and blowing up a whole base in one easy command.
-Conclusion To Pro's
With this game its hard to know 100% if you'll like this game because sometimes you'll have a lot of fun completing objectives in the coolest way possible or be entirely frustrated because your team just got completely mowed down or some bug or problem ruined your plans.
In the end, Operation Flashpoint is classic example of could have, should have, but didn't. With such great potential it really makes you ask yourself, why do games like these, that have so much going for them, get released with so many problems? If you find this game on sale cheap like I did for $5.00 (On Steam) and your willing to get it for a fellow gamer friend or friends, do it because your sure to get at least a day's worth of kicks out of this. But if you got a better game to beat, it's probably best to just save it for later because this game isn't getting any better or worse and might be an example of what to do and what not to do for people trying to make a game like this in the future.
Hope You Guys Enjoyed My Review Of The Game
