Ghost Recon: Desert Siege Preview

By Stephen Poole, GameSpotPosted Mar 14, 2002 4:50 pm PT

We take a look at the forthcoming expansion pack to Ghost Recon.

Ahh, those pesky Russkies. You probably thought you'd calmed things down pretty well at the end of Ghost Recon, but it turns out that the way the bad guys in the motherland had financed their coup was by selling surplus arms to a rogue colonel in Ethiopia named Tesfaye Wolde--and he wasn't using them as decor for his sitting room, either. After toppling the legitimate Ethiopian government in 2008, Wolde has fixed his eyes on Eritrea, a small nation straddling the northern Ethiopian border that gained its independence from that country in 1993 after six decades of war. The Eritrean government is anxious to halt Wolde's invasion, but at the same time it realizes a large ground force could inadvertently destroy the poverty-stricken nation's infrastructure in the process. What it needs are fast, pinpoint tactical strikes aimed to slow Wolde's advance, which is another way of saying it's time for the Ghost Recon crew to get busy once again.

Mission briefings give you a good idea of what your objectives are.

Unlike Red Storm Entertainment's mission packs for Rainbow Six and Rogue Spear, which featured only five new levels each (Covert Operations for Rainbow Six boasted nine, but it was a higher-priced stand-alone title), the Desert Siege mission pack features a respectable eight-mission single-player campaign that starts on the beaches outside the Eritrean coastal city of Massawa. That amphibious landing turns into a real nightmare when you run into multiple machine-gun emplacements, and the going gets even tougher on the next mission as you race against the clock to prevent Wolde's troops from dynamiting a refinery they've decided to destroy as part of a desperate scorched-earth policy (oh yeah, they're holding hostages in another building a few hundred meters from the facility!). Save the refinery and hostages, and you still must seize a rail depot quickly enough to ensure the rebels don't destroy valuable supply-line documents.

Without your help, these trucks would be helpless against the local warlords lining the hills above them.

Those missions might faze newcomers, but in fact they serve as a baptism by fire, and the next few missions place more emphasis on fast-paced fun than hair-pulling challenge. Escorting a convoy of trucks carrying supplies to a refugee camp will give you a warm, fuzzy feeling even as you mow down enemies who've lined the roads to commandeer the vehicles, and eliminating the remains of a downed chopper is surprisingly easy because the Ghost Recon team is equipped with night-vision goggles. Retrieving a map detailing land-mine placement requires good coordination between two or three squads because the tangos are hiding behind wrecked vehicles interspersed between the hovels of a shantytown, but once you've sussed out the enemy strongholds all you need is patience to bring home the bacon.

But Wolde's saved his best troops for the last two missions. The first, Subtle Keep, pits you against two separate contingents of enemies--one ensconced in and around a castlelike structure and another entrenched along a road and hiding in bunkers overlooking a valley--that adapt to your tactics in surprisingly quick fashion. The final mission is a fast-paced firefight that's one of the most heart-pounding outings of the bunch--definitely a great way to end this minicampaign.

prev next

1 Comments

Refresh comments

jakeboudville
Posted Sep 4, 2006 5:43 am PT

[This message was deleted at the request of the original poster]
- agree 0
- disagree 0
- = 0
- Login to rate this comment

Tom Clancy's Ghost Recon: Desert Siege Quick Links

GameSpot Score 8.0 great
Critic Score 8.3 17 reviews
User Score 8.4 453 votes
Your Score N/A
hover & click to rate
- 1
- 1.5
- 2
- 2.5
- 3
- 3.5
- 4
- 4.5
- 5
- 5.5
- 6
- 6.5
- 7
- 7.5
- 8
- 8.5
- 9
- 9.5
- 10