PixlBit

One of the most popular genres this generation is the first person shooter. While most modern FPS titles look realistic or claim to be realistic, they all usually have some unrealistic mechanics, such as automatic health regeneration. Operation Flashpoint: Dragon Rising is unlike your typical FPS title; it provides one of the best realistic military experiences, though a couple of frustrating issues keep it from being great.

In the game you are the leader of a four-man squad of U.S. Marines that is deployed on a fictional island off the Russian coast. Skira, which is rich with oil, is invaded by China due to economic tensions with Russia. Your task in the game is to assist Russia and drive out the Chinese before a full-blown war occurs.

Since this is a realistic strategy simulation, commanding your squad is vital. In the game you can die from only a couple of bullets or even one well placed shot. As such, you are always forced to proceed with caution and strategically eliminate your enemies. If you are critically wounded you will start bleeding until you die, thus requiring players to apply field dressing to stop the blood loss. If a specific part of your body is severely wounded, you lose one of your abilities associated with that body part for the remainder of the missions. For instance, in one mission my legs were wounded and as a result my ability to sprint was revoked.

Being a tactical shooter, you will depend heavily on your squad mates. Thankfully, your squad will communicate with you where the enemy is or if they engaged with a firefight with an enemy. The AI generally does a good job defending each other and healing fellow wounded squad mates. Enemy AI also tends to have the same behavior and aggressively attacks you if they spot you or try to flush you out from hiding. Unfortunately, the friendly AI also has a few severe problems. I had a number of instances where my squad would do nothing even after acknowledging that they would comply with my order. Sometimes your squad mates get stuck behind a tree or a rock indefinitely. When that happens, the only way to end it is to plant an explosive such as a C4 and detonate it near them.

Skira is a massive island and your mission objectives are usually far apart. Vehicles are scarce on the island so you will mostly travel on foot in order to reach said objectives or checkpoints. This means a lot of walking… too much walking. In one mission I had to walk 3,000 meters, and feels it took just about as much time to do it in-game as it would in real life.

Since the island is massive and the game informs you of all the objectives you need to complete at the start of a mission, the game allows you to complete each objective in an open-ended manner. However, some objectives have a hidden time limit, which is frustrating because in most cases you don't even learn about the time limit until the commanding officer tells you over the radio that you failed to complete the mission. In the missions with a time limit, you don't see a time limit countdown, instead you hear vague hints over radio communications that a friendly unit is positioning somewhere and you have to destroy a specific thing before it lands.

The game’s missions also lack some variety. Though each mission has slightly differing objectives, most missions are one of the following: detonating a specific enemy object, stealth maneuvers, or assisting another friendly squad by defending a specific part of land.

Aside from the single player experience, the game does have a strictly-online multiplayer mode. The mode offers both co-op and player vs. player game types. The console versions support up to 8 simultaneous players online, with the PC version supporting up to 32. Unfortunately, at the time of reviewing the game I could not test the multiplayer component due to countless online connection errors and a lack of other players (i.e. no one was online).

Overall, the best aspect of the game is the realistic experience the game delivers as well as the convincing war-like atmosphere. The realism in the game is a good change of pace in comparison to other modern FPS titles. It’s very different, which gives it an identity amongst many similar shooter experiences currently out there.

It’s unfortunate because the game is hindered by a number of technical issues. There are numerous AI glitches, a couple of game stopping glitches, and a couple of glitches that will end up killing you. I had a couple of instances where the game just crashed on me, and other instances where I couldn’t destroy my objective no matter how hard I tried. One of the more memorable glitches occurred when I walked over certain rocks. Sometimes they would launch me a couple feet in the air, causing me to crater and die when I hit the ground.

Ultimately, Operation Flashpoint: Dragon Rising is a good game that is held back by a variety of issues. The realistic experience and setting is unparalleled, as are the numerous technical issues that plague the title.

The console versions supports only up to 8 players online while the PC version supports up to 32 players.