Operation Flashpoint: Dragon Rising Review

The stock market crash of 2008. A global recession spreads throughout the world in 2009. Massive unemployment leads to hardliners rising to power in China. Facing a dwindling supply of oil, they turn to a nearby island where recently discovered deposits promise to meet the country’s energy demands. Only one problem: the island is part of Russian territory. Operation Flashpoint: Dragon Rising puts you in the role of U.S. Marines and Special Forces units to prevent an outbreak of violence between the two countries as China’s army invades the island.

It seems that a lot of games these days take a similar storyline (wars over oil), yet Operation Flashpoint is distinctly different from them in how it is played. This is a franchise known for its stunning realism. Operation Flashpoint: Dragon Rising is a military simulation, not an action game. While it has a first-person perspective and controls similar to other shooters, the difference is in squad based tactics, stealth and precision.

The game is extremely large and open-ended. There really are not many limitations on where you go on the map (although if you stray too far from your objective, they will instruct you to turn back). This creates an atmosphere of free choices, but also potentially makes the game more challenging since it does not lay out for you a direct path. Depending on the difficulty that you play on you may or may not have markers that indicate where an objective is located. You also have a limited radar that tells you the general direction of enemies.

Your character and squad as a whole move quite slowly. This is, afterall, a simulator. The game offers you a run button (L1 for PS3), but your character also has a certain amount of stamina before he gets tired. This is where ground vehicles become handy. Many of the levels have at least a couple Jeeps laying around that can be put to use. Of course you don’t want to drive straight into an enemy base in one, but it can get you near where you want to go much quicker than going on-foot.

As far as the shooting goes, this game is not a run and gun shooter by any means. Doing that will get you killed instantly. Using cover intelligently, crouching/crawling when necessary and using your scope are all critical. The most important thing is to stay low, scope out the battlefield and only fire when you are prepared to react to the enemy. For the most part, the enemy is an accurate shot, even from far distances. They aren’t very good at short range combat and are rather limited in their movement, but damn do they know how to shoot.

You can command your squad to do a number of defensive and offensive things, as well as follow you, stay put and move wherever you tell them. Unfortunately while the enemy A.I. is more than capable of spotting you from a mile away, your team just is not competent when it comes to commands. If you are not careful, they may fire and give away your position, unintentionally causing your death. There was a situation where I was going to walk up and knife an enemy only to have my allies burst fire at him. Since there are so many different commands to choose from (R1 brings up these commands and a radius pops up giving you options) it can get quite confusing.

If you have played and liked Operation Flashpoint games in the past, Dragon Rising is a game that you will probably want to pick up. With so many shooters out there on both the PS3 and Xbox 360, it is difficult to have a stand-out title. Operation Flashpoint: Dragon Rising stands out due to its realism. You really are not going to get a more challenging shooter than this. Yes, it can be frustrating, but if you have the will and enough patience, the experience can be quite enjoyable.