First Impressions: Rainbow Six Vegas 2

Rainbow Six Vegas 2 is a slightly disappointing sequel to one of the best games of 2006.

Vegas 2 lacks the polish and level design of its predecessor, with the first 3 acts consisting of narrow corridors in dull buildings. Some of the levels, like the Convention Centre, are constructed from multiple featureless rectangular objects and flat surfaces. The result is that Vegas 2 looks like a high-res version of a 5 year old game...quite frankly, it is ugly in places. The original Rainbow Six Vegas had much more variety and far superior level design to this. It makes me wonder if this game was developed by a different team?

The basic gameplay is still spot on, and T-Hunt is great. However, both are hampered the numerous technical issues and AI problems that did not effect the previous game. I lost count how many times the NPCs have got stuck or I have fallen through or clipped the scenery. What is it with Ubisoft at the moment? Do they not have a QA department?

The additional EXP stuff is neat, but it only unlocks all the same weapons we had in the previous game. That seems kind of pointless really? The revised achievements are well designed, equally rewarding players in Player and Ranked matches.

Unfortunately, Rainbow Six Vegas 2 feels rushed and unfinished. For me, this was a missed opportunity.