Review: Operation Flashpoint: Red River - PC, Xbox 360, PS3

by Steven Williamson on 12 May 2011, 16:26 3.3

Tags: Codemasters, Action/Adventure

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Built with online co-op in mind

Your four team-mates represent the four classess available in Red River: rifleman, grenadier, scout or automatic rifleman. You can switch classes at the beginning of each mission and earn perks, weapons and upgrades along the way. If you're playing alone though, you'll soon realise that the Scout class and his sniper rifle is the only man you need to get you through the enemy, most of which you can kill from a distance. There's no real need to use to any other class while playing alone. Nonetheless, putting your team-mates in the hands of real gamers, playing co-operatively, changes the experience of Red River quite signficantly.

The scale of the environments and the length of the missions are certainly made with online co-op play in mind and therefore working together, now using that combination of classes and the different strengths they bring, really does pay dividends. Enemy A.I. still has the uncanny knack of pin-pointing you the very second you’re spotted, but it’s good fun working out how to get past enemies - far better than having to keep your finger-crossed in the hope that your team-mates will follow your orders.



With friends, the Red River experience is almost totally different to the pain you’ll experience solo. There’s still all the minor glitches, the daft A.I. and the slow-paced missions, but with the biggest problem in the game – the A.I. of your own team-mates and having to try and keep them in order – now eliminated you’re free to really experiment, leverage the help of other real team members and enjoy the experience together.

Continued overleaf...