Running through the jungle.
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We thoroughly enjoyed the first Rising Storm, first a mod and then a standalone expansion for Tripwire’s Red Orchestra 2: Heroes of Stalingrad. It took its intense brand of WW2 first-person action to the Pacific Theatre, and it did so to tremendous effect. Thanks to a mixture of expansive maps and objective-based game modes, Antimatter Games was able to craft a shooter that felt really distinct in a genre that had long since stagnated, and where competition was fairly thin on the ground.
How times change. Since the first Rising Storm, Battlefield 1 has explored trench warfare (in the footsteps of Verdun, an altogether more modest affair), Call of Duty: WWII is going back to its roots, and we’ve also had another very good indie shooter in the form Day of Infamy. If you’re among those who enjoy their shooters flavoured with history, the ongoing resurgence of the sub-genre means that you’re currently spoilt for choice. Well, now you can add Rising Storm 2: Vietnam to the list of shooters that are worth keeping in your sights.
It strikes the right tone almost instantly; any game that opens with Creedence Clearwater Revival is probably going to be good, right? Well, without any evidence to the contrary, we’re going to assume our theory is watertight because Vietnam (as we’ll call it from now on) is good. Very good, in fact.
It’s not a perfect game, though, and the most frustrating thing about this sequel is that it fails to really address the significant faults of the first. The main one is crawling; the animations when prone are horrible, and playing close to the ground is very frustrating at times, with janky movement and unpredictable traversal across what looks fairly straightforward terrain. The animations when moving between stances also leave much to be desired.
The only other criticism of significance that we’d level at the game is a design issue, but we’re not sure there’s a fix considering what Vietnam tries to do. The maps are pretty big, and the action revolves around the struggle for capture points, and spawning can drop you a fair distance from the nearest gun battle. We’ve spent a lot of time running between skirmishes, and when you arrive at a battle only to get insta-killed by a sniper you didn’t even know was there, the distance you have to travel can get quite frustrating at times.
You can alleviate this to an extent by playing the Skirmish mode, which has smaller teams battle over fewer capture points on slimline maps. The action here is punchier, certainly, but the best of five format keeps the contests feeling substantial. Across all three game modes, however, there’s a push and pull feel to the action as teams scrap over multiple objectives, and it’s the focus on coordinated teamwork over individual kill counts that really defines the experience.
In Supremacy players must capture new objectives, and earn points from the objectives connected to their home base. The more objectives that are captured, the more points your team earns, and the difference between the points currently being earned by both teams is routinely deducted from the total of the losing team. This continues, sometimes for a significant period of time, until one team runs out of points and reinforcements, or alternatively, the other team gets maximum points or holds all of the objectives for a minute. Territories, on the other hand, has teams take turns to attack and defend objectives, with the attackers winning by taking all points, and the defenders winning by holding out until the bitter end.
Vietnam’s three modes all have teams searching for weaknesses in the enemy line, always hunting for flanking opportunities that might turn the tide. Coordinated teams stand a significantly better chance of winning, so it pays to listen to those being vocal in the chat. When viewed from a wider angle, there are multiple fronts, with both teams battling over vantage points, Vietcong soldiers slinking through muddy tunnels while American helicopters spit metal from the skies above. On a granular level, players must balance cautious forward progress with defensive nous as troops try to avoid both the gaze of snipers and tripping over explosive traps. Life can be short, especially for those who play with a cavalier attitude, and the sometimes wide-open battlefields can make it hard to get a foothold in a match, but then again, that relentless challenge is also part of the game’s charm.
With artillery strikes raining down, flamethrowers burning out defensive positions, and helicopters cutting through the sky, it can be a punishing and chaotic battlefield, but it’s also intensely satisfying when things click and you find your groove. The gunplay is very good, with punchy weapons that look and feel great to fire. A little icon on the top-right roll of honour will sometimes offer you insight into how you died, whether that be an explosion, sniper fire, or a deadly body shot. You won’t have to look there to find out if you’ve been shot in the head, though, because Vietnam uses a powerful blackout to illustrate an instant kill. You simply don’t see it coming, and it can be a genuinely heart-stopping moment.
The audio-visual element is largely a strong point, but there are a couple of less-than-stellar elements. The most obvious is the scenery pop-up, which at times isn’t great as you can see the world populated with assets and textures as you play. Hopefully, this will be optimised post-launch, because it detracts from what are otherwise lush jungle environments (a word on the maps: they’re largely excellent, but we would have liked a few more). Elsewhere, at times it can be hard to differentiate between friend and foe, and friendly fire is fairly commonplace because of this. In that vein, there are cosmetic options that are unlocked as you earn experience, but getting to the good stuff (those aviators, for example) will take a lot of time. There can be no complaints about the audio, though. Everything, from the ’70s-themed soundtrack to the crackle of gunfire and the chop chop chop of hueys flying overhead has been well-implemented, and with a good sound setup it can make for a punchy, immediate experience which is both dangerous and evocative in equal measure.
Through clever modes and interesting design decisions, Antimatter has captured the spirit of a conflict that gels nicely with the current resurgence of the historical shooter, and in Rising Storm 2: Vietnam we’ve got a game that can go toe-to-toe with anything else on the scene. It stumbles slightly in the technical department, and it’s here that we want to see the next game really push forward, because, with a bit more spit and polish, and a dash more refinement, Rising Storm has the potential not only to be a very good historical shooter series, but the best historical shooter series. Vietnam comes agonisingly close to being an essential entry in the genre, and here’s hoping a third game in the series will take that final step towards unconditional and total victory.
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Keyword: Rising Storm 2: Vietnam