Tom Clancy's Ghost Recon: Advanced Warfighter (Xbox 360)

Single Player & Multiplayer Weapons
M8 Carbine
36K Carbine
SCAR-L Carbine
SCAR-L CQC
SCAR-H
MR-C (Crye)
MK48 LMG
MG21 LMG
M107 Sniper
SR AS50
M95 Sniper
SCAR-LCQC/EGLM
SCAR-L/EGLM
SCAR-H/EGLM
M8/M320
MR-C/AGL
MR-C LW
ZEUS-MPAR
M9
M9SD
M67 Grenade
Smoke Grenade

Multiplayer Exclusive Weapons
AK-47
SA-80
MP5SD
A4 Rifle
M468-SD
T-95
T-95 LMG
M60
KJY-88 Sniper
SR-25 Sniper
PSG-1
A4 Rifle/M320
SA80/M320
T-95/M320
M468-SD/M320

As you can see there’s a great deal to choose from in GRAW in terms of weapons, some of the more exciting choices come in the form of the Modular Crye rifle and the wall-piercing countersnipe rifle.

HUD

We briefly touched on the HUD in gameplay, but this section requires a little more depth since it simulates what the future soldier might actually see via the Cross-com system. You can keep a track of your own status, that of your squad and various assets, weapon status and ammo counters are also displayed on the virtual HUD.

The Cross-com itself (back button) brings up a virtual map of the battlefield and allows accurate positioning of assets, both in SP and MP game modes. It is a simple system to use and requires only a few moments to activate; it provides information on enemies and their movements as long as they have been sighted/tracked by assets.

The Cross-com information is directly linked to the HUD. It projects a virtual information system that indicates target status, health and lights up potential targets, this is very useful for maintaining battlefield awareness and also has a definite cool factor attached to it. At a glance you can tag one of your squad and see how they are, or settle the reticule on the enemy.

When you’re equipped with a counter-snipe weapon and the enemy is behind cover that can be penetrated, you’ll get their outline as a clear indication that the shot is good. Pull the trigger and pop a round into their head, shocking the sucker behind the wall and making his allies run for thicker cover.

There are certain enemy assets that can jam your HUD as well, so watch out for those.

Graphics/Models/Animations

You won’t find technical specs here, or detailed information on every aspect of the game’s engine, that’s not my style so with that said:

This is the game that pushes the 360 a little and definitely marks GRAW as the first of the next-gen titles to roll out for the console. The game looks beautiful and is full of graphical eye-candy that delivers solid frame rates and gameplay while providing all the bells and whistles that we were lead to believe would be there, advanced lighting techniques, shaders and copious amounts of bump-mapping bring the future battlefield to life in a richly designed environment.

It is a marriage of many graphical techniques, the models for the game are superb and the level of detail on everything is exactly what the gamer is looking for. The explosions are big and bold, the character models are extremely detailed and they work perfectly with the animations, moving through the gameworld in a lifelike and very realistic manner.

GRAW’s developers have implemented military tactical movements for their troops and your squad animations are solid, they move how you’d expect them to and along with the superb levels of detail they start to show what the console is truly made of. There’s one scene that I particularly like, where you’re flying over the whole city and through the open door of the Blackhawk you can see that city, completely laid out before you – the Xbox and PS2 would struggle with the same view but the 360 pounds out that skyline without blinking.

When you get down and dirty in the streets or into combat with the heavy machine gun on the helicopter the 360 doesn’t blink as explosions go off, men are killed and bullets fly past like confetti. There are so many enemies and assets on the ground at one time that it really is chaos; the 360 pours on the pressure by adding more into mix in one of the missions that will have you screaming and pulling your hair out until you figure out the way of beating it.

All of this is delivered with pulse-pounding graphical action and superb animations to boot, ducking and weaving through the streets using the spot-on control system as the 360 produces the backdrops and the game engine rumbles on in the background, delivering updates and mission briefs transports the player to 2013 where war is certainly hell and the Cross-com becomes more than just a little gadget, it actually helps keep you alive.

Physics

There’s the usual mix of rag-doll physics and environmental physics, the game allows you to hide behind cover, some of this cover will be eroded or ignored by certain calibre weapons and some weapons will cause a car to explode when it’s been hit a certain number of times or a key point gets destroyed. The rag-doll physics are implemented very well and tie into the superb death animations for you, the enemy and the various other entities on the battlefield. I expect to see the same kind of thing in Epics up and coming Gears of War for the 360 and many more games.

AI

Ghost Recon has been plagued by some dumb-as-a-rock AI in the past and it’s nice to see that team AI has been sharpened up, the extra clock cycles on the 360 must have helped. There are still some strange and stupid things that will happen when you give a move order to your team, and they pick the most direct route to come back to you – taking them at a full run through a heavy fortified enemy sector. But these are few and far between thankfully, and most of the time they’re stone cold killers.

Enemy AI varies based on the unit in question and where you are in the story, they can be a little dumb to begin with and as you progress the game seems to sharpen their skills – in places they felt a little too observant but I let that slide since it sharpened my own skills and gave me a very lethal challenge as well.

The enemy use advanced tactics as they learn your position, they will flank you, they will hurl grenades and they will use cover, concealment and the advantage of height if they can. They’ll run back a way to get a better position with more cover and even hit the deck if they come under fire.

Overall, the AI in this game is spot on with just a few quirks from your team.