E3 demo: Rainbow Six Vegas (Xbox 360)
We're pleased to report that Rainbow Six is back on track. Lockdown was a huge disappointment, but Ubisoft Montreal lead game designer Jean-Pascal Cambiotti has pledged to bring the series back to its "core values," meaning tactics.
Rainbow Six Vegas was running off of an Xbox 360 dev kit and being played by a developer. We caught a glimpse of the new snake cam, which can be inserted under doorways to assess what lies within. Using the camera, players can tag enemies within the room, in effect, giving your two teammates targets to attack upon entry. This is all part of an improved tactical interface, which oozes smart action.
You bust through one door, your teammates through another. You've already given them their targets, all you need to worry about is yours. A few calculated bursts from your rifle, a few more from your teammates, and when the smoke clears, you've got a pile of dead evildoers and a handful of lucky hostages.
While developed on a different engine (Unreal 3), it's hard not to notice the conceptual similarities between Vegas and GRAW: from a single city setting, to between-mission helicopter transportation, to a focus on fighting from cover. Thankfully, Vegas looks to abandon the faulty friendly-AI that plagued GRAW's single-player. No babysitting tonight*.
*Vegas unfolds during a long, 12-hour night.
[Note: Cambiotti has assured us that Vegas' multiplayer will do things that have never been done before on Xbox Live. He confessed that the full details will be revealed during a special event this summer. About all that we could squeeze from the tight-lipped developer was that Vegas will feature a robust 4-player co-op mode.]
