Not-so-friendly fire
Sometimes "more" doesn't equal "better," but in GRAW 2 that couldn't be further from the truth. To start, player capacity has been raised from a paltry ten participants to a whopping sixteen - that's 60% more dudes just waiting to become your victims. Also, GRAW 2 provides fourteen multiplayer maps, of which I was able to experience four: Aftermath, Crashsite, Lagoon and Back Alley.
Aftermath is reminiscent of The Boneyard map from the first GRAW in that it is a veritable warren of nooks and crannies. Set in a busted out South American collection of hovels, the infrastructure of the village is coated in modern detritus such as discarded automobiles and various other industrial wreckage. In one instance, I was able to scale the husk of an old car up to a balcony that would have been great for sniping if I trusted it (but I don't, because this is GRAW 2 and all I ever get from trying to snipe is shot in the back by someone that snuck up on me).
Crashsite is pretty self explanatory when you get right down to it. The level consists of a wooded area scarred by the wreckage of a huge crashed airplane and the huge furrow it has recently plowed in the surrounding environment. With the still-burning airplane hull scattered in large chunks across the level, there are plenty of places to hide and snipe. The changes in elevation created by the huge valley the downed plane has dug into the landscape provides ideal opportunities for ambushes from above, although, I did notice that even though you play the most technologically advanced soldiers in the world, you still can't seem to navigate your way down a steep hillside.
Lagoon is a throw-back to the beach level from the original Ghost Recon Advanced Warfighter set on a sandy oasis. Of course, this sandy oasis is particularly deadly because it's full of bloodthirsty soldiers armed to the teeth (maybe even armed to the nostrils, these guys come seriously strapped). This map seemed a lot more cluttered than its predecessor as there were more rocks jutting out of the beach than in the previous GRAW, so cover is plentiful… as are places to scurry around in order to get the drop on some poor chump.
Back Alley is based in a relatively modern South American town consisting of a central plaza and lots of little side streets. This map was a tough one to get the hang of, mostly because I couldn't stop gawking at the beautiful lighting effects that provided complex shadows cast by the multitude of buildings. That great lighting is a direct result of a new feature added for this iteration in the Ghost Recon legacy; you can now alter the time of day as one of your game options. Maps can be played at midday, sunset and midnight, providing a whole range of "mood lighting" to go with the color tone that best describes your particular variety of homicidal violence.
