The Red Orchestra franchise was one that specifically catered to the
hardcore, simulation shooter crowd but those who found themselves at
home in Ost Front might find themselves a bit lost in this new world.
Red Orchestra 2 is a game stuck between sub genres. It's a realistic
shooter that seemingly wants to be an arcade style shooter which will
leave the most hardened veteran confused. It's this lack of identity
that is keeping Red Orchestra back, it's inability to chose whether it
wants to appeal to its original followers or pick up the left overs of
games like Call Of Duty which are really hurting it.
Aside from it's personality disorder, it's a really good game. Every
gun is unique and really feels like it has some weight to it. From the
SVT-40 semi automatic rifle to the DP machine gun, every gun is simple
to fire, but hard to master. That being said, killing the enemy isn't
so easy. With only iron sights to guide your aim, players will have to
rely on their eagle eye vision and ability to predict their targets
movement to really get a good rhythm going.
The three multiplayer game modes also make for a unique experience in
their own. Fire Fight is your basic team deathmatch map. Teams spawn
in random locations and the team that is able to deplete their
opponents reinforcements bar the quickest wins. Countdown is a more
serious, slow paced mode that sees players have just one life to
defend/attack their objective. Finally Territory is the bread and
butter of Red Orchestra where the attacking team have to capture enemy
positions across the map.
Overall Red Orchestra 2: Heroes Of Stalingrad is a really good game.
Veterans may feel the franchise has forgotten it's roots while
newcomers will still have trouble getting over the steep learning
curve. But with that said, there are some real issues that need to be
addressed. The game is a mess when it comes to bugs, errors and
crashes. It's absolutely littered with broken mechanics and game
breaking faults. Some of the few complaints players have had are:
- The game crashing
- Stats not tracking
- Audio cutting out during a game
- Extensive issues with performance and poor frames per second
- Server browser crashing and cutting out any online connection
- Players being falsely banned for cheating
All in all the game, in it's current state, is not worth the money.
There are simply too many unresolved problems that make playing the
game an unenjoyable experience. If the bugs were fixed, Red Orchestra
2 would get a 4.5 out of 5, but at its current quality, it gets 2.5/5