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[Minor Spoiler] ... nothing you don't already know or have seen if you played the Closed/Open Demo.
FOB Armadillo, is the first bigger enemy base, before you are going after the first "boss" fight, as in, the love birds: La Yuri and El Polito.
It is a fairly well fortified base with sniper towers and patrolling soldiers. But also with "look here" type of invitations to infiltrate the base. The base design is hitting you on the head with how you can approach it ... silently.
Yet, trained by so many run-and-gun, create chaos, play GTA-style "action games", I failed to see it the first time around.
Not this time.
Hardest difficulty. All HUD and mini-map turned off. (Occasionally - for marking targets, with the drone - I turn the icons on ... and off again). No icons over peopls's heads in real life neither).
I went on a night recon tour (it just happened to be getting darker, to my advantage). I made it to the dock, climbed up the storage building, behind the base, collected the rewards inside it. I made it to the roof and familiarized myself with the base layout, marked the targets. All went smoothly. Except, I was clueless, how to assault this base with my NPC AI buddies.
I smelled another failed attempt at approaching stealthy and then, at some point (there is always that "some point", isn't there?), everything goes to s**t, and hell brakes lose, again.
So, to my own surprise, I decided to .. retreat.
I told myself, I needed the thermal vision, vs the snipers in their towers, instead just night vision, to catch them clearly. I abandoned the mission for that night and decided, I would attack the 'next night'.
Like a real recon op. I found myself 'role-playing' the game.
Next game session. Next day. Next evening (in game). It was time to revisit FOB Armadillo. I had just upgraded my skill tree and acquired the thermal vision ability.
Again: Warehouse rooftop. Drone recon. Tagging enemies. Staying silent.
Killed one sniper (the one next to the gate).
Went downstairs. Entered a Unidad truck. Near the gate, the truck triggered the gate to open. I didn't drive inside, just let the truck open the gate.
Commanded my NPC buddies to find a dark spot inside the camp, where they would not alarm the enemies. Went after the generator - just in case. Eliminated a single, isolated enemy on my way to the second sniper tower. Walked up the sniper tower, with my pistol (silencer) and neutralized the threat. Went to the next sniper tower and did the same thing. Also caught a sleeping guard (sorry man). Took the last "Kingslayer File".
It was time to go after the Lieutenant, to extract the info about the whereabouts of La Yuri and El Polito.
Caught the leader talking on his cell phone. Interrogated him after the Geneva conventions (more or less) and it was time to silently go back to my NPC buddies, who - luckily - didn't trigger any alarm.
On my way back, I had to pass the generator, I turned off. To my surprise, three soldiers stood around it, wondering if their High School knowledge would suffice, to turn the generator back on. To their surprise, my buddies were ready for a triple sync shot.
Made it back safely, to the warehouse in the back. Took a fast boat and we disappeared into the morning dawn, without triggering any alarm.
Like a *real* Ghost Recon team.
Now, other games do these kind of missions for a very long time. Not long ago, I played Metal Gear Solid V. But MGSV did not immerse me in the same way, since Kojima's game STILL is so 'gamey' mechanical. You click buttons and Snake does his robot movements. You look at icons and trigger icons.
GRW - while still having similar mechanics, allows me to play without HUD, has *smoother* transitioning animations, allows for a far more "cinematic" experience. I felt, like I was in a Michael Bay movie (except for the missing explosions, this time - choose your own action stealth director).
The whole mission experience, did remind me of the time I was playing Warren Spector (and Harvey Smith's) Deus Ex Demo, before the release of the game. The first mission of the game is an extraordinary example on how to create a sandbox and a toolbox and let the player approach the 'solution' to solving a 'puzzle'. Deus Ex offered a blueprint on mission design, everyone followed in the past decades.
While, this FOB Armadillo mission, in GRW, is nothing 'extraodinary', it is ... well executed. And it is successful in achieving what it was meant to achieve.
I am looking forward to replay the mission in many different ways, in the future.
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What I found quite amazing, is that I had played this mission twice in the closed, twice in the open, and once already in the full game. All a little different, but mostly the same.
However, playing a second time yesterday with a friend who was catching up, we arrived at dinner time, and EVERY enemy was sitting in that middle area around a table eating. It was incredible. We just stayed on the perimeter, and went unnoticed. Then just as we were leaving, they started finishing and returning to their places. It was soooo awesome.
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...woa..what?!Originally Posted by zman7895 Go to original post
That sounds incredible!
Only 10 hours into the retail version myself. I knew, from watching the NPCs in towns, that they had some kind of AI routines, beyond just 'walking around', but what you describe does sound amazing.
I know, eventually, we will all get bored and 'figure out' all the systems and game mechanics. But so far, it is nice to play a 'new' game and everything feels fresh and illuminating.
