Chapter One: The Clubs

After selecting your mercenary, you'll need to collect your equipment from the storage bins around the plane. There's a carbine, a PDA, and some grenades, so grab everything from their racks, then use the cargo door switch to open it. You'll soon hit the ground in an M1025 Scout, which has been disguised to look like an American vehicle. Congratulations, you're now in North Korea - time to start taking out some of your bounties!

Before you can do much of anything, though, you'll need to head to the Allied HQ, marked on your minimap with a yellow dot. (You can also check a larger version of this map by hitting select.) You'll have some obstacles in your way, though, including a bunch of North Korean soldiers; you'll need to avoid their roadblock by heading up the ramp to the left, then dropping back down to the road. You'll soon come across some Allied forces engaging more North Koreans; you can honk your horn with the O button to call them over to your vehicle, where one of them will man the turret mounted in the back. Just be sure not to run any of them over, as you'll take an instant 25,000 dollar penalty if you do so!

When you finally reach the Allied base, you'll find that it's being constantly hit by artillery shells. You should be able to make it to the entrance to the base without too much trouble, though, so wend your way through the buildings to the yellow dot on your map and talk to the Allied guard there; he'll send you in to talk to one of the men in charge, Colonel Samuel Garret. You can listen to the little spiel here, or just get up out of the chair and walk to the guy with the yellow circle beneath his feet to accept the contract. You'll need to accept it to move on with the game, so, well, go ahead and do so.

Getting To Know You...

Before you can start taking the normal missions offered by each faction, you'll have to meet up with each of them. There are four of these beginner missions; after you complete them all, you'll be able to start taking normal faction missions.

Contract: 'Ante Up'

This mission, as befitting the first real mission in the game, isn't going to be too difficult for you to complete. Your goal here is to "verify" the Two of Clubs (meaning to either capture him alive or kill him), and to destroy the artillery that's shelling the base.

To begin with, find a healthy vehicle near the entrance to the Allied base and hop in, then honk your horn to get some teammates to ride along with you. The Two of Clubs is situated on a hill to the north of the allied base, so drive up that way until you reach his little hilltop hideaway. There are going to be a few North Koreans about, which your turret gunner will no doubt be shooting away at, but if you're aiming to take the Two of Clubs alive, be sure to park your Scout so that one of the large trucks here is between him and the humvee, so that the turret gunner can't get a clean shot off at him. Note that there's an equipment crate near one of the trucks; if you bust it open, you'll be able to find some health and ammo, as well as a very nifty rocket-propelled grenade weapon.

To subdue the Two of Clubs, which is more desirable than just killing him outright, you'll need to close in on him and beat him down. This isn't too difficult to do - although he has a machinegun, he won't be able to damage you very much if you keep running around him. When you get up close, bash him with your square button, then subdue him with the triangle button; this will lay him out flat, and let you scan the area for any other hostile soldiers. When everything looks clear, you'll have to call in an aerial pickup for the hostage. To do so, hit the D-pad up or down to bring up the menu of special attacks, select the Call For Extraction power, hit R1 to equip it, then throw the smoke grenade you obtained onto a flat patch of ground with the R1 button. When the helicopter arrives, pick up the Two with the triangle button, then use the same button to load him into it.

Now that you've captured your first card from the Deck of 52, you'll have to take out the artillery that he was commanding. It's on the northern side of his area; run back to where you found the Two and scout out the guns across the valley. To destroy them, you'll need to select the Surgical Strike option from the special attacks menu and press R1 while you target the two guns. After each of them are destroyed, you can return back to the Allied HQ for your reward, a cool $20,000. When you return inside, Garrett will refer you to a CIA man by the name of Buford, who's running the intelligence operations of the South Korean forces in the area.

Before moving out to the South Korean HQ, check out your minimap; you should see a few blue dots (representing Allied helicopters or airplanes in the area), as well as a few cash icons. One of these is situated above a humvee near the Allied HQ. Get into this vehicle to start a conveniently-placed race; when you hit the first checkpoint here, you'll be asked to make it from the Allied HQ to the South Korean HQ, which is where you want to be anyway, in under two minutes. If you do so, you'll net $5,000. Not a huge amount of money, but it's something, and you'll be making the trip anyway, so you might as well take advantage of it. After you're in the car, feel free to honk for a gunner if you want one. While racing, your next checkpoint will show up as yellow, while the one beyond that will show in turqouise. Don't worry too much about losing your way; you can make the run in as little as 45 seconds if you stick to the road, leaving you plenty of time to find your way to the base.