Yes, Corporal, I understand how unwieldy it is to drive in OpF.

There aren’t too many games that are better than America’s Army when it comes to realism, but once you’ve played Operation Flashpoint, you’ll find that AA, while great fun and very realistic, is no match for Operation Flashpoint when it comes to variety, warfare, tactics and simulation. The game involves you in a fictional war that was caused by a rogue Soviet general by the name of Alexsei Guba. Armed with personal goals of taking down Gorbachev and proclaiming himself as the leader of the Soviet Union, he takes the army he leads into nearby territories, where the United States has interests in.

And that is where the Cold War Crisis starts. Of course, if you got the Game of the Year (GOTY) version, there are also other expansions which put you in different scenario. Resistance is probably the most poignant, since it pits you against the Soviets with a minuscule army. It’s probably the most challenging expansion of the GOTY.

A smart soldier will just steal that BMP and sabot him to smithereens

The best part of the game has to lie in the fact that you’ll take up many roles all in a very simulation-based territory. This is not Doom 3 or Quake. This is serious. You have to think about how your attacks are going to be, plan the routes, wait patiently, and commandeer tanks to support people. Ambushes, bombs, artillery, saboteurs will all be at your disposal, but how you use them will greatly affect how many people die – be it soldiers on your side, or the enemies’.

On the other hand, in Cold War Crisis, sometimes you’ll be in the shoes of a Sam Fisher look-a-like saboteur which will demand that you work mostly alone and do things stealthily. A one man show has only his silenced MP5 and brains to save him from alarms that will trigger all sorts of unwanted resistance.

At the same time, you’ll be driving tanks, flying helicopters, jeeps and shooting guns both of Soviet and American origin. There’s the M1A1 Abrams as there is the T72. The Mi24 as well as the Apache. And the most classic distinction between Soviet and American machinery: the AK47 and the M16. No crosshairs here, you’ll need to shoot using the ironsight.

Performance on a Netbook

Performance of Operation Flashpoint GOTY on a Intel GMA 3150 can vary. Unfortunately, the worlds that OpF has are large with a lot of objects in them, and if you ran using the Autodetect settings, you’ll have the game that runs barely. Toggle it a bit and you’ll have a better running game, though you’ll probably have to settle with forgoing high and widescreen resolutions.

However, the good news is that OpF does not require any modifications to run. You can play it straight out the box, however, as aforementioned, do remember to toggle down your graphics!

RPG? Prepare three or prepare to run. M1A1 vs T80 on the other hand...

Like

Extremely good variety of missions and roles

Very realistic

Plausible storyline (after all, the Soviets were evil, right?)

Dislike

Playability fps-wise ranges from barely to maybe.

Animations are really ugly

Verdict

If you haven’t tried this game and you’re a fan of ARMA and America’s Army, then you ought to try it. Your netbook is preferably a powerful one, and hopefully you’re a forgiving person to ugly graphics. However, the game makes it up with a great concept, great storyline and great realism.

Screenshots: msxbox-world