 Get ready to wash your mouth out with soap. American troops have chased Al Qaeda into Tajikistan. Unfortunately, this annoys the Chinese, who promptly decide to invade the country and attack the Americans. Now it's up to one platoon of Marines to push back the entire Chinese military.
1. Gameplay
The original Operation Flashpoint was designed to be a realistic military shooter. If a player got shot once, there was a good chance that they would be either severely injured or dead. Getting hit twice ensured a 99% chance of death. Fortunately, the same went for the enemy forces. Operation Flashpoint: Red River clearly takes from its predecessors and tries to put it in a package that’s a bit more modern, but compared to its competitors this game has very little going for it. The ultra-realism has remained, but in a package that feels very forced. Like its predecessor, Red River also includes large, sprawling environments that are actually pretty at times, but unbelievably empty. The game gets away with this by taking place in Tajikistan, but the absence of any noticeable landmarks is extremely evident. 
Welcome to Afghanistan. Or Tajikistan. Or Uzbekistan. I can't remember which.
Most of the time, the lack of anything interesting is made obvious by the fact that the game has very few loading sequences. For most games this would be a good thing. Unfortunately, Red River’s large environments don’t include combat engagements over the majority of those environments. Combat takes place in small sections of the larger landscape, which means that the player will either sit in a humvee for minutes on end in order to move to the next section or, even worse, run from one section to another. This meant that the majority of my time was spent traveling from point to point which, trust me, is not fun. 
Marathons are for wimps. Try running across Tajikistan with 75 lbs of equipment while getting shot at.
Another problem that I encountered with this game is that, when the enemy does target you (they don’t always), their absurd accuracy and the overall lack of cover means that you’re very likely to get killed. This meant that I ended up engaging most of the enemies from a serious distance (something between 150 and 300 yards). While this may be realistic (I wouldn’t know from experience), it makes most weapons useless. Shotguns and submachine guns had to be eliminated from a player’s arsenal. This left two machine guns, two assault rifles, and at least one sniper rifle. Compared to the dozens of weapons included in Call of Duty or Battlefield games, this small cache of armament is pretty bland. I might have been able to let this go if the storyline had been good. Unfortunately, it made no sense at all. The game sets the scenario with an unbelievably awesome introductory cinematic which explains that the Americans have chased the Taliban and Al Qaeda into Tajikistan and are attempting to clear them out. Then, for some unknowable reason, China decides to invade Tajikistan at the exact same time and use the country as a staging ground to threaten the rest of the world. Why a nation as large and powerful as China would decide to use a mountainous desert in the middle of nowhere as a military staging ground is completely beyond me, and the game never bothers to explain. On top of this, the Chinese forces end up directly attacking the American forces. This should cause a World War 3 scenario, but evidently it doesn’t. It’s then up to the player and his band of merry men to push the entire Chinese army back out of Tajikistan. 
The Chinese have nothing on these guys.
I wasn’t really frustrated by this game. There were some annoying parts, but this game was more genuinely boring. It’s too bad really because the mechanics actually had some potential. More weapons, more drivable vehicles (which the game thoroughly lacked), and a half-way decent story would have made this game an excellent successor for the Operation Flashpoint series. As it is, though, this game is barely worth bargain prices.
It took me 13 hours to complete the campaign and a few sessions of the multiplayer. If you cut down on the boring travel time when the player is actually doing nothing, there would probably be 6 to 7 hours of actual gameplay. Unfortunately, there was very little to keep me interested in the campaign. I finished it, but I have no desire to go back and play it again ever. The multiplayer was surprisingly decent. The player is placed in a four-man squad and given a specific mission to accomplish. Those few players that are still at least attempting the Red River multiplayer are usually decent at the game, so making a run at some of the missions was actually somewhat entertaining. Unfortunately, there simply aren’t enough players online to keep things fresh, and even then the game modes get repetitive. It would be fun to continue the multiplayer with a small team of friends, but it wasn’t enough fun that I would suggest it to anyone.
As I mentioned before, my frustration level with this game was rather low for the most part. I was annoyed at the long drives and long walks between sections, but this was more because it was unbelievably tedious and not because it was frustrating. The finale was almost more boring as the rest of the game, but that left me more frustrated with the developers and where they decided to take the game, not frustrated with the game itself. 
Back in the truck. Again.
The one thing that did leave me frustrated at times was the “checkpoint” system. In one mission I was tasked with taking out an anti-tank position across a bridge. This wouldn’t normally be a problem except for the fact that the bridge had zero cover. This meant that, aside from the normal enemies that were firing at me, I had to dodge rockets from the anti-tank position while trying to run-and-gun across the bridge. I died at least a dozen times before I was able to figure out a solution. This wasn’t extremely common, but it definitely happened more than once. 2. Parental Notices
The violence level in this game made me pause for a moment. On the one hand, the game does include blood and characters can get visible, bloody wounds. On the other hand, violence is often sporadic and takes place over long distances, which significantly reduces from the overall violent nature of the game. 
I thought I saw an enemy.
This is, however, a first person shooter. So while the quantity of violence may be far less than its competitors, the player will inevitably have to use guns to shoot and kill enemies. As I mentioned, however, the majority of combat will consist of the player shooting an enemy over a long distance. Enemies spray blood when shot, but both the enemies and the bloodspray are often so tiny that even I had difficulty detecting how much blood or gore there actually was. 
There might be blood.
I can use a specific example to highlight just how difficult this game makes it to see any serious violence. During the game I had access to a high-powered sniper rifle that used a specially designed scope. The scope would allow me to see across long distances very easily. I believed that this sniper rifle could shoot the limbs off of enemies, but despite the greater magnification of the scope I was unable to confirm these suspicions. Even with the screenshots that I took, I am still unable to confirm this. 
Looks painful, but his limbs still seem attached.
The only obvious evidence of violence that a player could see were the bloody battle scars left on the player’s allies after a firefight. Hits on an ally would generate a bullet hole and a decent amount of blood, the size of both depending on the location of the hit. 
BOOM! Headshot!
In the back of some of the humvees during the campaign, magazines and a small poster of a woman in underwear can be found. However, this is extremely difficult to find and it is never mentioned in the game. 
Do Marines really just leave that kinda stuff in the back of humvees?
In order to heal, the player will hold a “field dressing” kit in front of his face. There is no healing animation and no substances of any kind are ever shown or discussed. Therefore, substances are not a factor in this game. 
I feel better already!
Gambling is not a factor in this game. 3. Other Factors
There are no modding tools available for this game.
Religion is not a factor in this game.
Anti-law is not a factor in this game.
What few gamers I managed to find still playing this game online were all decent. They never talked, they did their job, and for the most part they never got in each other’s way. After a single round, we all found out how to work together in order to complete the mission. The gamers that I played with made the multiplayer experience much more enjoyable than the campaign. 
Off for a brisk jog.
There were a few times when I was able to control a humvee during the campaign. However, the humvee is rather slow and the possibility for off-roading is almost nonexistent. Therefore, extreme sports are not an issue in this game. 
Seems pretty crowded in here.
Magic is not a factor in this game.
Language The language in this game is absurd. It’s not necessarily graphic, it’s just that the same four letter words get repeated in every single conversation. The few sentences that do not contain some form of profanity are a rarity. 
Par for the course.
Aside from the typical “shit”, “damn”, and other similar words, players will become familiar with the various forms and uses for “fuck”. I’m not sure if real marines swear this much, but I was wondering if they’d ever been taught the term “radio discipline”. There was almost no end to it. And to top it all off there are a number of racially grey terms directed towards the Chinese (once the two countries begin fighting). I remember one distinct occasion when my commanding officer referred to the enemy forces as “Chinese Chicken Salads”, or something to that effect. I did notice that no one ever called the Al Qaeda forces “camel jockeys” or “towelheads”, though.
2 Comments
4/11/2022 09:05:18 am
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