SpawnPoint

om Clancy's Ghost Recon Advanced Warfighter 2 continues right where the first GRAW left off. You play as a futuristic soldier in the U.S. Army Special Forces unit, the Ghosts. Each soldier in your team is equipped with a high-tech Integrated Warfighter System (IWS), which digitally tracks enemy locations, allies, and provides navigational information. The Ghosts are needed to fight off an imminent threat to the United States in Juarez, Mexico.

Seeing the success of the first Ghost Recon Advanced Warfighter, Ubisoft decided to build upon the original game and improve it in a number of ways. This includes graphical enhancements, changing climate, improved AI, wider selection of arms and equipment, improved communication system, and a number of new support and tactical options.

The PC version of GRAW 2 is very different from the Xbox 360 and soon-to-be PS3 versions of the game. It is good to see that Ubisoft didn't just port the game over to PC, but took the time to change it in order to take advantage of the PC's capabilities. First and foremost, GRAW 2 on the PC is a first-person shooter, whereas the console versions are played from third-person perspective. The PC also lets the player have significantly more control over mission options, tactics, and how you choose to play the game, while the console versions tend to throw you into the action as fast as possible and not bog down the player with options.

he single-player story of GRAW 2 continues where the original GRAW left off, and you play as Army Captain Scott Mitchell of the Ghosts Special Forces squad. The timeline picks up immediately after the original GRAW, in which you struck down a coup in Mexico City and saved the U.S. President. Now, you must stop more rebels who have gained control of nuclear weapons that could strike anywhere in the U.S. In each mission, you are presented with a video briefing and situational data about the mission before being brought into the action by a Black Hawk helicopter.

If you have sufficient hardware, the graphics in the PC version are notably superior to the Xbox 360 version. I ran the game with an Athlon 64 X2 5200+ and a Geforce 8800 GTS with max details on 1280x1024 resolution, and I received about 70 frames per second. This is a vast improvement over the original GRAW, which seemed to run sluggishly even with a good system. The console version of the game has much glossier lighting effects than its PC counterpart, while the PC's lighting effects come across much more sharp and realistic. The PC also has better draw distances; far-off objects that appeared blurry on the 360 version can be seen clearly on the PC. Additionally, GRAW 2 supports the use of an AGEIA PhysX processor, which greatly enhances the physics to increase the sense of immersion in the game.

Throughout the missions, you will control a squad consisting of yourself and three other Ghosts. You have the option to select which team members you would like to bring, with each contributing something different to the team, such as the demolitions expert, the sniper, and the support member who totes a machine gun. You can also customize your equipment for yourself and your teammates before each mission by selecting primary and secondary weapons, sidearms, and miscellaneous equipment, such as grenades and explosives. The selection of weaponry and options is quite vast; there are over 10 primary weapons to choose from, and almost each weapon has options such as adding a scope, a suppressor, or a grenade launcher.