Rainbow Six 4: Lockdown Demo

Highly trained military teams take on dangerous missions on a regular basis, especially now with all the wars that are happening all over the world. These teams are mainly formed out of a handful of people and each one of them has a specific role in the operation, as well as a unique set of skills that are crucial in accomplishing the objectives.

Rainbow Six 4: Lockdown is the latest installment in the highly acclaimed tactical shooter series that puts you at the helm of a counter-terrorism squad called Team Rainbow. As always, your purpose is to participate in a variety of missions all over the world and eliminate the threats, as well as save hostages and prevent the bad guys from achieving their objectives.

Before heading out for any mission, though, you can choose what equipment you and your teammates carry, including weapons, grenades and a few other gadgets that make your life easier. To illustrate an example, scopes can be attached to your main weapon, so that you are able to take out the enemies from long range and avoid close encounters as much as possible. Naturally, because this is a tactical-oriented game, you must first analyze the mission briefing, because not all locations can accommodate the long range style.

In order for the scenarios to provide you with a challenge, the enemy needs to be able to use some tactics as well and organize ambushes, or stay in cover and avoid exposing themselves too much. Your teammates must adhere to the same standards and balance the gameplay, by listening to your orders and being aware of their surroundings at all times. Lockdown put a great deal of effort into achieving this, which means that the enemies will certainly cause you a few headaches and take you by surprise more than once.

To make matters more realistic, high-end graphic and physics engines have been used to render the characters and the environment. Thus, every NPC benefits from convincing rag doll physics and the objects around you respond in a very realistic manner, especially in the case of explosions. It is, however, rather frustrating that the levels are very linear and something as insignificant as a fallen plant can block the access through a door that is already open and forces you to follow the scripted path.

Rainbow Six 4: Lockdown may have its downsides, but the overall experience is well worth to overlook them. The tactical approach is as refined as ever and you do get a sense of accomplishment each time you manage to execute a clean sweep of the level and deny the enemy the chance to retaliate.