Super Monkey Ball 2 Review

Again I apologize for the delays. The frequent trips to the doctor’s, and the ten-hour work shifts took up a lot of time this month. But I had one day in May free to spend with family, and that surprisingly leads to a game review. When you’re spending time with people who aren’t the rabid video game fans you are you want to make sure there’s something approachable. But something challenging at the same time. It would be easy to choose some Atari 2600 games. Many of them fit the bill. But it’s an hour’s work getting pre-composite systems up, and running on a modern TV. Then you must have a good scaler in the set, if you don’t you need to get your upscaler to bridge the VCR to the set. Your folks don’t have all day. And while there are some great experiences on current consoles, some of the older relatives may find the multiple functions required rather daunting. You need something older in a pinch, but you don’t have to go back to the 1970’s for your indoor picnic. You can break out a Nintendo Gamecube for this one.

PROS: Campaign. Mini games. Visuals. Pretty much everything.

CONS: Some mini games aren’t as memorable as others.

CROSSOVER POTENTIAL: Nintendo, and Sega collaborate a lot. Where’s Super DK Ball?

Following on the heels of Super Monkey Ball, Super Monkey Ball 2 is easily one of the best games on the Gamecube. (Admittedly, one can also get Super Monkey Ball Deluxe if one does not own a Gamecube, but does own a PS2 or an Xbox. It’s basically both games in one.) Released in 2002, Super Monkey Ball 2 is a bigger, and better version of the already excellent Super Monkey Ball. It has even better stages, and even more party games than the original, making it the preferred version to play at gatherings. Though the original is still a tremendously wonderful game everyone should check out if given the chance.

So what do you do in Super Monkey Ball 2? Where does one begin? There are so many cool modes to play here. The obvious meat, and potatoes are the game’s challenge stages. What makes this fun, are not only the well crafted levels. But the fact you can play with three other people. The object of the game is to get your monkey through a goal ribbon. That’s it. Now that may sound easy, but as the old adage goes it’s “Easier said, than done.” When you first begin any of the modes, you’ll choose a monkey. Each of whom has some minor differences in how they control. Aiai is the main character. He’s the most well-rounded of the primates. Then there is MeeMee who is similar in stats to her co-star. Baby is the lightest of the monkeys while Gon Gon is the heaviest.

The challenge stages are broken up into three sets. A ten stage beginner set, a twenty stage intermediate set, and a fifty stage expert set. Everyone alternates turns, and turns end when someone succeeds or fails at a stage. Everyone also gets two lives, and several continues to try their hand at clearing the stage. If you can manage to get through an entire set of stages without using any continues the game will then enter you into a gauntlet of bonus stages, which increase the challenge ten fold. Some of the main stages can get to be quite the challenge. Some of the bonus stages can get almost sadistic as they require pinpoint accuracy, and impeccable timing.

But through it all, none of it is really all of that infuriating. It’s just something really addictive. When you fail at a stage, you just want to attempt it again, and again until you’re victorious. The mechanics in the game work something like Marble Madness, where you’re pushing your monkey ball or pulling it back as you’re trying to navigate paths. Except it is then combined with mechanics out of a rolling ball sculpture. Some stages feel like you’re moving the stage around, while others feel like you’re in control of the ball. The only thing you’re ever-moving in these stages is the thumb stick. Again, many of the courses on display get pretty elaborate. Combined with the short amount of time you’re given to complete them, you can easily find yourself frantically trying to keep your monkey from falling into an abyss.

Super Monkey Ball 2 also has a story mode in it for those who want a solitary experience. Here, you have to go through 100 stages in a row to stop a mad scientist from taking all of the world’s bananas. Immediately you’ll wonder why Sega, and Nintendo haven’t done a Donkey Kong, and Super Monkey Ball crossover together. Be that as it may, these stages are very much an extension of the challenge stages. Just more of them, and more intricate in the second half.

But if a massive story mode, and huge number of multiplayer stages isn’t enough for you, there are a plethora of mini games on hand as well. Some of them have to be unlocked by earning points in other modes. But you’ll have the best of them opened up almost immediately. There’s Monkey Race, which tries to combine the main game with elements of Mario Kart. This one is decent, but nowhere near as good as a proper Mario Kart game. There’s a fun brawl mode, as well as a boat racing mode. Then there’s Monkey Golf which is an interesting take on Golf, as well as a really fun Monkey Bowling mode. This one makes our monkeys into the bowling ball, and does all kinds of wacky things with the lanes. So you really have to nail timing to get a good angle, and approach each lane as a puzzle.

There are mini games based on Baseball, Tennis, and Soccer too. These play about as well as the Golf mode does. Monkey Dogfight is a pretty fun mode as well.  It’s basically a combination of one of the other mini games, and the Vs. mode from Star Fox 64. Monkey Shot is an on-rails light gun shooter. It’s a fun concept, but it would have been better if it had a compatible light gun to play it with. Still, you can move the cursor about at a fairly quick pace, so it’s still an entertaining diversion.  Monkey Billiards is a pool mini game where all of the balls are replaced with monkey balls. It’s cutely crafted to say the least.

Arguably the best of these mini games is Monkey Target. I must admit it takes some getting used to. But once you understand how it works, it’s a phenomenal party game. Each player rolls down a ramp, and after launching off of the half-pipe at the bottom can open their ball. This converts the halves of the ball into a hang glider. From here, each person has to hang glide over an ocean, and try to land on a floating target for huge points. Depending on where you land, you’ll get a different number of them. To make things more interesting you can collect bananas in the sky for points, find stars to double your points, and even items to help you stop on a dime. For your landing to count you have to close the ball before landing. Falling on that 1,000 point spot gets you zero points if you land on your stomach.

But the best part about Monkey Target is just how deep it is, in spite of how simple it is. You have to account for altitude, and wind which are represented in your corner of the screen. If the wind is blowing west, and you try to move east, you’ll get some resistance. Also if you lose momentum your monkey starts to beep that they’re falling. This is where panic mode sets in when first starting out, and people pull back. But you can’t. It is here you want to push into a nosedive, pull back at the last second, and get a nice lift back into the sky.

Of course, in spite of how good you become at the gliding, some of these targets have shapes that make landing on them quite the task at hand. Often if you don’t line up your landing just right, you’ll roll off into the ocean, and sink. And, because this is a party game, your Uncle can employ dirty tricks like crash landing into you, stopping on your coveted point value, and knocking you back to that ten point border. Still, it’s a great time, and one of the reasons you’ll want to fire up the game beyond its primary puzzle stages.

And it does all of this while looking, and sounding amazing. Character models have some nice little details on them. The bright colors, and lighting effects feel right out of Sega’s 00’s arcade era. It looks like the natural extension of a First-Party Dreamcast game. The soft Electronica soundtrack complements the game nicely. Even today, 16 years after its release Super Monkey Ball 2 holds up well. It’s a beautiful game indeed. It also supports the Gamecube’s Progressive Scan mode. So if you have the costly Gamecube component cable or you’re playing it through a Wii on component cables you can make it look considerably sharper than on the stock composite cables. There are some Third-Party HDMI solutions coming out now as well. Like this one reviewed by RAXTheGreat1. So that’s something you may consider looking into.

Overall, Super Monkey Ball 2 is a must own if you have a Gamecube. Especially if you have company over for events, or holidays. It’s a lot of fun. The original is also a blast, so you may just want to pick up both of them. For those who don’t have a GCN, but do have an old Xbox or PlayStation 2 Super Monkey Ball Deluxe basically contains both games. So be sure to pick it up. The series would continue on newer consoles, and even a phone app. But honestly SMB2 is the apex of the series. Hopefully Sega will revisit the franchise someday. Whether or not that happens however, Super Monkey Ball 2 is still highly recommended.

Final Score: 9 out of 10

Pac-Attack Review

Back at RetroWorld Expo I managed to snag up a number of Super NES, Atari 2600, and NES games for the collection. Among the mix of games was a Pac-Man game that I never saw once when it was new. Of course I grew up playing Pac-Man, Ms. Pac-Man, Jr. Pac-Man, and Super Pac-Man during visits to the arcade as a little kid. The earliest games have been on pretty much everything. But by the early 90’s, Namco did try to put the character in some other genres. Pac-Man 2 was noted for blending puzzle elements with point, and click elements. Years later, the Pac-Man World series would put the yellow icon in platformers. But there in my pile was Pac-Attack, a game I heard about, but never experienced. Until now.

PROS: An excellent combination of block dropping, and route planning.

CONS: Difficulty settings can be manipulated to boost your score.

PASSWORDS: Mercifully short.

Released in 1993, Pac-Attack is actually a retooled version of one of Namco’s other games, Cosmo Gang; The Puzzle. The original game was released a year prior, exclusively to the Japanese market. So essentially what we end up with is the same game with all new sprites, and backgrounds. But don’t assume that Namco swapped out characters to dupe the rest of the world into buying a mediocre game. Pac-Attack is actually, a lot of fun, and probably would have done exceptionally well as an arcade machine too.

But this was not to be. That said, Namco did bring it over to the Super NES, Sega Genesis, and Sega Game Gear. Where a lot of us likely missed it since we were obsessed with home ports of Street Fighter II, Mortal Kombat,  or Sonic The Hedgehog, Super Mario World, or any other high-profile game of the time. But if you did have this one back in the day, you had a treat on your hands. And if you didn’t, but love discovering oldies you missed out on, you’ll probably want to read on.

So what do you do in Pac-Attack? At a first glance, you’d swear it was just another Tetris clone. The idea is of course to clear lines for points. However, that isn’t the main goal. The blocks drop down in similar fashion, but you’ll find they aren’t arranged in Tetris shapes. They’re in different formations, and they’re composed of bricks, and ghosts. Your initial instinct might be to group all of the ghosts together, to create some super ghost rectangles. Like the blocks in Super Puzzle Fighter II Turbo.

But this isn’t what you do at all. Eventually, you’ll get a Pac-Man block who of course, eats ghosts. But he will always travel whatever direction he faces. So you don’t want to group all of the ghosts together, as he won’t eat all of them this way. So you’ll actually want to create pathways with the ghosts, while simultaneously trying to create lines with the brick pieces that fall.

The results are an addictive, and captivating puzzle game that you can easily sink hours into playing. Not only does the main objective of the game create an engrossing experience, eating ghosts fills a meter. When the meter gets filled, the fairy from Pac-Land shows up to clear up to eight rows worth of ghosts. This causes the blocks above them to fall, and if they create whole rows, you’ll get a huge point bonus.

But like any good arcade game, this one eases you in. In the early goings, the blocks will fall slowly. This allows you plenty of time to arrange the pieces how you want. The first few rounds you’ll get your rows of ghosts set up nicely. You’ll create rows of blocks pretty easily too. However, before long, the blocks will fall faster, and faster, until you can’t line things up anymore. Then like Tetris, things will stack to the top, and the game will end.

As I said though, it’s executed so well, you can spend an entire day just trying to get your best possible score. But it doesn’t end there. Because Pac-Attack also has a second puzzle mode. This time there are 100 puzzles, each giving you only five attempts to have Pac-Man clear the board of ghosts. As with the main mode, the puzzles start out simple enough. But they quickly start throwing in some complexity. By around the tenth puzzle you’ll have to start predicting chain reactions at an almost Rube Goldberg level. Not to the degree of dominoes landing on dials just so, but there is a complexity there.

Fortunately you don’t have to solve all 100 puzzles in a single sitting. You do get to retry every time you fail, but you’ll also get a three character password. So it’s pretty easy to continue where you left off.  The one complaint I have with the game is that you start out with a bunch of points in advance should you choose to start the main mode on a higher difficulty setting. If you’re not the only one playing the game, this makes it easy to be cheap as you can get your name on the scoreboard just by doing so. Starting at zero, and listing the difficulty would have been a better solution for competitive roommates.

But thankfully, this is mitigated with the inclusion of a versus mode. This is a two-player variation of the main game, where doing well will make things tougher for the other player, and vice-versa. A mechanic used in many head-to-head puzzle games, but it works well here. And this mode, like the main mode, is a lot of fun. Battles usually go quickly, but they’re a blast. Consider breaking out Pac-Attack when entertaining guests who come over for a party.

Overall, I’d say even if puzzle games aren’t your first choice when adding a title to your collection to consider this one. Pac-Attack is excellent. The base game may have origins in a different title, but Pac-Man almost seems born for it. It may not be as iconic as the maze games Pac-Man popularized. Nor as remembered as the third-person platformers he’s starred in since the original PlayStation was king of the hill. But Pac-Attack is easily one of the more attractive puzzle games to put in your rotation. And if you don’t have an old Super NES, Genesis, or Game Gear knocking around, it was in the Namco Museum compilation for the original Xbox, Gamecube, and PlayStation 2.

Final Score: 8 out of 10

Roadkill Review

Grand Theft Auto 3, and its expansions were some of the most influential titles in gaming. Many titles have come out over the years trying to ride the series’ coattails. Some titles have actually tried to dethrone it. Outside of the Saints Row series, few ever came close. But there were other titles that simply took some of GTA 3’s better elements, and implemented them into entirely different experiences. Roadkill is one such game.

PROS: The best elements of car combat games, and open world adventures. Humor.

CONS: A very threadbare multiplayer mode. Nothing is done on foot.

MORE COWBELL: Remember that SNL skit from 2000? You’ll be reminded of it often.

Roadkill is truly an underrated gem you should buy if you collect old games. It’s an experiment in merging the open world play of GTA3, with the exhilarating  car combat of the Twisted Metal series. Throughout the campaign you’ll drive all over a pretty large map, going on missions, heading to shops, or even just goofing around. In many ways you’ll feel like you’re playing a GTA game. Except that you’ll be in a car the entire time. You’ll never step foot outside of your vehicle the entire game. Aside from FMV cut scenes.

The game opens up with an FMV of your character driving through a wasteland to the tune of Don’t Fear The Reaper, by Blue Oyster Cult. Which will remind almost everyone of Christopher Walken exclaiming “I’ve got to have more cowbell!”. The song is played a lot throughout the game, so much so that you’ll probably need a month long break from hearing it upon completing it. The set up is that the world has been through an apocalypse. A disease has wiped out large swaths of the human population. In true Mad Max fashion, different clans of renegade gangs have all risen to power. Each laying claim to different parts of the world.

You play as Mason Strong. Yes, your character is named like a mid 1990’s Cinemax movie protagonist. But once you get over the cheesy moniker, the game begins to pick up the pace pretty quickly. You’ll end up joining one of the gangs to rise through the ranks, and fight your way to the top. All so you can take down one of your age old rivals. You start this quest by going on missions. Some of these move the story along, while others are side quests that can get you new vehicles, and upgrades. Many of the missions consist of the typical objectives you’d expect. Sometimes you’ll be told to blow up a certain target. Or win a specific race. Or get to a certain place within a designated amount of time. Roadkill employs a GPS mini map like its contemporaries as well.

As you play you’re going to find there is a pretty wide variety of weapons you can get for your vehicle. Machine guns, rockets, missiles, mines, sniper rifles, and more. Many of them have both primary, and alternate firing modes.Your car also has different stats that can be levelled up by three grades. Defensive armor, handling, speed, are among them. You can find the majority of these in the various shops in the game.

You can also choose to goof around, and run over pedestrians at your leisure. Or explore the town of Lava Falls, at your own pace. Doing this might even be preferable sometimes, as some items, and upgrades are hidden throughout the world. Some of which can actually help you a lot much later in the game. But exploring also has the risk of running into enemy gangs. Which can get very hectic as you can quickly become outnumbered. The good news is that this ties into Roadkill’s reputation system. The more of these fights you win, the more likely it is that other people will join your cause. Get a big enough reputation, and you’ll have priority in the area.

There are three main cities you’ll venture through in the campaign. Each with its own unique style, and theme. The first is Lava Falls, a city built on a dormant volcano. The second is Blister Canyon. This area is a city built in desert canyons. Finally, there’s Paradise City which is a bustling metropolis.The mission difficulty increases as you unlock these areas. Doing so is similar to Grand Theft Auto 3’s system. Where getting enough experience will open up the road ways between cities. You can also go back to previous regions to look for items you may have missed, or to play earlier missions you may have skipped.

This might not sound very original, and admittedly it isn’t. But Roadkill’s take on these open world tropes are a good time. Especially the driving, and shooting. Which they should be. Roadkill is inspired by car combat games like Twisted Metal, Vigilante 8, and Interstate 76. So when you run into enemy gangs, they too will be driving around in battle cars. Fortunately driving around the world is a lot of fun thanks to some pretty nice steering controls. Driving feels much tighter, and precise than in other open world games. Yet you’ll still be able to go E-braking for quick turn around time, or power slides. The hit detection is pretty solid, and the gun play is satisfying. The cars also have some pretty cool damage modeling.

Obviously, being an older game it isn’t going to wow you after playing the most recent GTA, or Saints Row. But it’s still pretty great. Doors, bumpers, hoods, and other body parts go flying off of vehicles in firefights. Cars, and trucks catch fire. Seeing as how you spend the entire game in a car, these are also visual cues for health beyond your health meter. You can see when you’re doing well. You can see when you’re pretty screwed.

Graphically the game keeps pace with most open world games of the era. Geometry is about as complex as in GTA3. Buildings will look pretty simple by today’s standards when revisiting it. But it isn’t any worse looking than the lion’s share of AAA games from the time. The textures are generally pretty good, and some of them even hold up decently. There is a short draw distance however in all three versions of the game. So expect to see some pop in. None of the versions really come out a decisive victor in this regard. The Gamecube, and Xbox versions have a hair better performance over the PlayStation 2 version. But the difference is so minimal you would have to really go out of your way to notice it. There’s virtually no difference here.

Audio really shines here though. The game has some of the most entertaining voice acting of its time. There are even a few names you might recognize like Dameon Clarke (of Dragonball Z, and Borderlands 2 fame) or Laura Bailey (Bioshock Infinite). Some of the funniest stuff here are the radio station voiceovers. These segments lampoon not only talk shows, but news segments, and relationship advice shows too. The relationship advice show parody is by far the funniest one. On top of that, the lines in the story, as well as the random pedestrian NPC’s dialogue are delivered fantastically. If you’re the type who pays attention to small details, Roadkill will make you laugh. Listening to the stations is also a great way to learn more of the game’s lore. Show hosts will often reference the outbreak that threw the world into chaos, or discuss events that involve the characters your working for or against.

The game also boasts a classic rock soundtrack. It does have a pretty good song selection for what is there. Unfortunately there are still far too few songs to carry you through the campaign. As I said before, by the time the end credits roll, you’ll want a month long break from Don’t Fear The Reaper. But the other tunes will also get old fast. Which is too bad because they are classics. The upside is it does give you an incentive to listen to the voice acting performances, which again, are pretty well done.

When you finally do complete the campaign, there is a multiplayer mode you can play. Up to four players can join in split screen death matches. Regrettably, there isn’t very much to experience here. The mechanics are there, but there isn’t enough content to compete with the games that inspired it. The mode plays almost exactly like Twisted Metal. Drive around, racking up frags. Simple. While this might be fun initially, it won’t take long to run through the 11 maps. Which are repurposed assets from the campaign. There are a fair number of interesting vehicles for you to use. But again,  If you’re coming into this game for the multiplayer, you’re really better off sticking with a multiplayer focused car combat game instead. Roadkill’s take on it is fun, but brief. Which is the most disappointing thing about it since it feels like a missed opportunity for an otherwise great game.

Earlier I said Roadkill is an underrated gem. It really is in spite of its shortcomings. The single player campaign is great. You can spend a long time tracking down every last vehicle, and upgrade. That’s in addition to the meaty campaign. The multiplayer may only be a touch it once experience, but aside from that, and some draw distance pop in there isn’t much to complain about. Roadkill is a fun ride, and at least at the time of this writing is a relatively inexpensive game. If you’re looking for something familiar, and yet somehow unique to add to your collection pick it up.

Final Score: 7.5 out of 10

Rainbow Six 3: Raven Shield Review

Ask many modern gamers if they’re familiar with Tom Clancy’s Rainbow Six series, and a lot of them will bring up Vegas, and Vegas 2. While in their own right they were solid games, they were a far cry from where the series began. Rainbow Six started out as a tactical shooter, one of the earliest departures from the death matches, and flag capturing rounds of Doom, Quake, and Unreal Tournament. Based loosely on the late Tom Clancy’s Rainbow Six novel, these games had more variety than their contemporary versions.

PROS: Solid mechanics. Fun multiplayer. Strategy, and action meld nicely.

CONS: PC Multiplayer is mainly LAN nowadays. Console Multiplayer is mainly split screen.

AWESOME: The gold edition includes the Athena Sword expansion pack.

Tom Clancy’s books had been adapted into many hit movies. The Hunt For Red October, Patriot Games, and Clear and Present Danger were turned into theatrical thrillers. Video game adaptations were also inevitable. Red Storm Entertainment was partially conceived by Tom Clancy, and one of his earliest books, Red Storm Rising was adapted into a game for 8-bit computers like the Commodore 64, and Atari ST by Micro Prose. Years later Red Storm Entertainment would become a competent studio, making games based off of Tom Clancy’s novels as well as original games. When First Person Shooters were hitting their stride, Red Storm gave the world Rainbow Six.

The earliest Rainbow Six games took a different approach to the FPS. Instead of throwing you into a giant labyrinth to explore, or an arena to battle in, they went tactical. Maps were shown from an overhead view before each mission, and you could select a number of characters to put into teams. From there you could mark entry points to the level for each team, and would be tasked with sneaking in, subduing enemies, and rescuing hostages. The games also had a very strict damage system. Getting shot by a terrorist or other nefarious enemy would impede your movement. A second shot would be fatal. You could then control one of your NPCs. If all of your crew perished, or if a key target died you would fail a mission.

Rainbow Six 3 is the apex of these titles. Rainbow Six 3 takes all of the game play foundation of the originals, and builds upon it. When you fire up Rainbow Six 3 you will be greeted with a number of tabs. You can play through the single player campaign, play a single solo mission, or hop on for some multiplayer. The campaign opens up with a brief prologue describing the end of World War II, and how two high-ranking officials of the NDH puppet state of Nazi Germany, and Italy made off with untold amounts of loot. Sixty years pass, and suddenly there are attacks happening around the world. The  counter terrorist team, Rainbow is contacted to investigate, and thwart these attacks. The team follows a trail of attacks on banks, energy sources, and other interests that ultimately lead to South America. It is revealed that one of the two World War II war criminals is using the stolen money to try to resurrect a Fascist empire.

Along the course of 15 stages, Rainbow goes through all kinds of environments. Snow capped mountain towns.  An oil refinery. A shipyard. A penthouse. Just to name a few. Rainbow Six 3: Raven Shield’s game play will start each mission with a detailed briefing. Each of the stages will have different objectives. Sometimes you’ll have to rescue a key person, or save multiple hostages. Other times you’ll have to kill every bad guy in the map. Before the mission begins you have the option to plan your course of action.

Players can first go to a screen where they can select which members of Rainbow to put on each of the teams.  Similar to the first game. From there each soldier’s load out can be configured in the gear room. Each soldier can have access to a primary weapon, a secondary weapon, and a few gadgets. There are many weapons, and gadgets to choose from. Rifles. Shotguns. Machineguns. Explosives. Heartbeat sensors. Infrared goggles. That’s just the tip of the iceberg. You’ll want to be careful when choosing load outs too. Because each mission can be easier or harder depending on the gear you choose to bring along.

Once you have your members, and equipment sorted out, it’s time to make a plan of action. The overhead view of the map is then displayed in vectors with icons for certain pathways. One can even see plans for each of the floors, and elevations. After surveying the entire map, players then choose entrances for each team to enter. From there it’s time to deploy your team, and make the best of your decisions. You can also let the game decide everything for you, if you just want to jump in, and play. But this won’t necessarily give you the best setup for the mission at hand.

Each group enters the stage, and proceeds to attempt to complete their objectives. You will find icons come up on interactive objects. When this happens you can press or hold the space bar (or another key if you change your binds) to do just that. There are all kinds of interactive moments. Mundane things like climbing ladders, to the more advanced stuff, like giving your NPC’s commands. In the case of opening or closing doors, This will kick them wide open. If you need to be more discreet, (9 times out of 10 you’ll want to) You can use the wheel on your mouse to slowly open it or close it. You can also use the Q, and E keys to peek around corners. This is a must. Because terrorists love to flank the doorways in this game. You’re definitely going to want to ensure your safety when entering areas.

You’ll also want to use some of the specialized gear for the same reasons. Heartbeat sensors give you a rough estimation of where hostile threats may be ducking out in a room you are about to enter. Night vision is useful in darker rooms or other areas. Putting silencers on your guns also makes it a little bit harder for enemies to know where you’re shooting from. Of course, there are the big loud weapons too, as I’ve already mentioned.

If things do go awry, and you end up getting killed, you can take control of one of your NPCs to try to complete the mission. In this regard they can also act as extra lives. But don’t get too comfortable with that idea either. Losing everyone in the mission isn’t the only way you can lose. If an objective isn’t completed, you fail. If time runs out, you fail. If the mission involves rescuing hostages, and even one of them dies, you fail. Rainbow Six 3 can be very difficult. Especially on the higher settings where the AI improves a lot. Also keep in mind the game puts in a fairly respectable attempt at realism in terms of ballistics. Your cross hair will widen farther, and farther in size if you aren’t in an accurate shooting position. So you can’t run, and gun the enemies, and expect to hit them. Many times your shots will miss if the cross hair isn’t positioned as tiny, and knit together as possible. You’ll also be killed in two bullets MAX. So stealth, and accuracy are key.

After every stage you have the option to either accept the outcome or re-do the stage. This is because if any of your characters die during the mission, they’re gone forever. Replaying the stage gives you the chance to succeed without losing anyone. Though you still very well may. Accepting the outcome moves you onto the next stage.

AI is about the only area that isn’t quite up to the bar set by the rest of the game. It is very good most of the time. Usually bad guys will use cover properly. If you’re using a shotgun to kill a terrorist, others will hear it, and give them back up. They’ll react to footsteps. They’ll run away if they feel out classed. Sometimes they’ll actually surrender, and you can arrest them. Unfortunately, the AI is also pretty inconsistent. Sometimes you can shoot one terrorist, and his comrade who is standing six inches away won’t react at all. Other times, a terrorist will go from not being able to hit anything one round, to becoming a crack shot the next. It makes for some unintentionally funny moments in a game that truly tries to be serious.

Once you’ve completed all of the missions there is still a lot of fun to be had. The game allows you to play individual stages with custom settings. Lone Wolf tasks you with trying to beat the stage using only one character with no NPC backup. Die, or fail to complete an objective, and it’s game over. Terrorist Hunt of course, peppers in however many terrorists you select, and it’s up to you to clear the level of them. Hostage mode tasks you with rescuing the hostages. You can also do individual story missions here.

Multiplayer in Rainbow Six 3 is a lot of fun provided these days you can get some workarounds going. Regrettably, Rainbow Six 3 is one of the games that used Ubisoft’s old account system which was replaced with Uplay. As such there aren’t anymore official servers for it. Thankfully, the game was coded with LAN support. So there are a number of ways you can still play this gem with friends. The first is the ever common P2P (Peer to Peer) way. Most homes these days have a P2P network set up, and don’t even realize it. If you have more than one computer in the house, networked through a router you can play multiplayer. Each person with a copy puts it on their respective computer, one person hosts, and everyone else can connect locally.  This is why the game was a popular choice for LAN parties (gaming parties where everybody brought their computer to a mutual friend’s home or other venue).

But if you don’t have the luxury of the time to organize a LAN party, there is a second way. You can use tunneling software to simulate a LAN over the internet. I’m not going to include a walk-through in this review, as explaining it is rather laborious. but I will say with a little tinkering it can be done. Everyone will need the same software, but once you have it the software simulates a local network by giving everyone a simulated IP. It’s generally secure, but there is one thing to be aware of. There is a security risk in that other players can possibly see your machine’s contents. So if you do go this route be sure it is only with friends you can trust.

Once you have everyone set up, you can play either Cooperative modes or Adversarial modes. Cooperative modes are essentially the same as the custom single player modes. Except that there will be a number of you playing together. Adversarial modes are mostly very different. There are death match modes for single, or teams. These act more like a Last Man Standing game type as they go on until one man or team is left. More interestingly, is a bomb mode, where one team of bad guys tries to set bombs, while the other tries to disarm them. It’s similar to the mode found in Counter-Strike. There is also a variation on Team Fortress’ Hunted Style. In it there is a downed pilot one team needs to lead to an extraction point on the map. The other team needs to kill the pilot before he can get there. Finally, there’s a variant of the cooperative Hostage mode, where one team controls the terrorists, and has to stop the other team from rescuing them.

Overall the game is still a blast some eleven years later. Don’t let the antiquated graphics fool you.  The game’s fuzzy skyboxes, and lower geometry may not look that impressive today. But there is a lot of fun, and challenge to be had here. The audio also excels. The score is right out of the sort of Hollywood thrillers other Tom Clancy novels were converted into. Sound effects are well crafted. The game was also one of the earliest to support 3D audio cards like the SoundBlaster Audigy. Being an older title it’s also an inexpensive title, that nearly anyone today should be able to run.  Considering the minimum requirements were an 800mhz Pentium III, 128MB of RAM, and 32MB of Video RAM on DX8.1 I think it’s safe to say, that old laptop you have in the cellar can handle it.

Although I should mention the game was ported to consoles. The Xbox actually saw two versions of the game, Rainbow Six 3 Raven Shield, and Rainbow Six 3 Black Arrow. The latter of which added a couple of new modes to the game. The PlayStation 2, and Gamecube received a port simply titled Rainbow Six 3. The key differences between these ports, are that the Xbox supported more players online, and had a few minor enhancements added to the visuals. It also received Downloadable Content like new multiplayer maps. The PlayStation 2 supported fewer players online, while the Gamecube had the online modes completely cut. Oddly enough however, the PlayStation 2, and Gamecube did feature two player split-screen. So if you were to want to revisit a console port today, those would be the ones to nab.  The other reason would be the console versions replace some of the PC versions multiplayer maps. So if you’re curious you can certainly track them down. They are ridiculously cheap should you decide to go that route instead.

No matter which version you pick up though, Rainbow Six 3 is a far cry from the norm. It combines some strategy elements into team shooting. Something all of its subsequent sequels thus far have seemingly abandoned. If you weren’t around for it when it came out, or missed it for some reason, check it out.

Final Score: 9 out of 10