I read on a gaming site taht GR Future Soldier for the PC is third-person only. Is it true? There is no full time first person mode?

Yes, it's 3rd person only. You have a first person view through scopes though.

That TOTALLY, TOTALLY FRIGGIN' SUCKS!!!! That makes it nothing more than a console game!!!! My God! What has happened to this once great franchise? Totally DUMBED DOWN! No one self-respecting tactical shooter fanatic should waste money on this piece of crap!

It's actually not a bad game.

Arma must be terrible, you can switch back and forth from 1st to 3rd on demand.

Where have you been for the last eight years bud?

You don't have many good options.

1. Keep playing original Ghost Recon for 11 straight years.
2. Don't play anything at all, because there are no tactical shooters like original GR anymore.
3. Keep playing ARMA 2 while waiting for ARMA 3.
4. Face reality and play what is available.

Future Soldier singleplayer isn't as bad as I expected it to be. It's actually pretty entertaining. Unfortunately it's also about the closest you'll get to a true tac shooter outside of ARMA right now. And that's about as far as I will go in defending the game...

Also don't take this post the wrong way. I think we all feel the same way as you about the lack of tac shooters and the current state of the Ghost Recon (and Tom Clancy brand) games. I'm just not ready to find a new hobby because they don't make games like original GR anymore, so I'll try out what they do make.

I'm not defending GRFS, but, just who made it law that a tactical shooter MUST be 1st person?? What exactly is a "tactical" shooter anyway?? Seriously, GRFS was never going to be anything more than an FPS with a bit of a twist console port to compete with BF and CoD!! I mean, weren't there TV adds focused entirely on weapon customization......excuse me, did you say weapon customization.....big freakin deal!!! This had console FPS written all over it from day 1.


....and I'd still like to know why 3rd-person can't be tactical??

I got a really sloppy hat-trick in “Siege” (one life) mode for the win tonight (thanks to my squadmate NIGHTSTAR) ...


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Yt3PV3v2060

So nobody here at SimHQ is playing GRFS??? Wow.

I'm playing it although MP is hard to get used to with the odd run sensitivity and aiming mechanic good though.

Well said, HogDriver. I understand your logic. I guess I'm just a stubborn old codger. I'm still playing Raven Shield, much more of a tactical shooter than GRFS! I play every day online, and the two servers I frequent fill up quite nicely with people who have similar interests. A lot of Germans for some reason. And, yes, I still play the original Ghost Recon and the original Rainbow Six and Rogue Spear, but mostly single-player. Why give up the best of all time for crap?

To the fellow who asks why a tactical shooter has to be first person, my response is this: Does a legit flight sim need a cockpit view? Seriously, imagine the DCS flight sims or FSX or Falcon with no cockpit view, but instead only a third-person, outside the aircraft view to fly with? What kind of flight simulator is that? Answer: it isn't. It's arcade. Well, what kind of legit tactical shooter does not have a full-time, through the eyes of your soldier view?

Call GRFS a terrifically fun game, if you like, but don't call it a tactical shooter! You blaspheme the legacy of the superb Red Storm tactical shooters which did it the RIGHT way. GRFS' 3rd person view is another horrific step to console hell. Obviously, today's programmers are all grown up console gamers who as kids worshipped the 3rd person action view and hated the more realistic first person view because they weren't any good at it.

The Red Storm programmers must've all died off. Where are they? It's sad, really, but simple. It's all about market share. To expand your market you have to dumb down the product. The more complicated (or difficult) the product, the smaller the market. The easier and simpler the bigger the market. That's why the Wii took off when it did. Even 80 and 90 year olds could do it. Very basic capitalism, but it doesn't do anything for real tactical shooter aficionados. We're not the capitalists who made the product. We don't stand to benefit one dime. We're the end consumer. We want what we want, not what the simpleton living next door or the grandma across the street can play.

Maybe DCS should only make out of the cockpit arcade flyers to appeal to more gamers and sell more product? Would you like that? Maybe SimBin and ISI should dumb down their product to Need for Speed level. Would you like that? I don't think so. Well, dumbing down is exactly what's happened to GR and what was once a great series of product from Red Storm. Look at what's happened to R6/Rogue Spear. They've morphed into the pathetic, nauseatingly SCRIPTED Vegas games just to attract more buyers.

Before you criticize me for criticizing a GR title with no first person, just imagine how you would feel if DCS, ISI, SimBin etc., produced their flight and racing sims with no cockpits. That's how I feel seeing first person view go bye-bye from a once great series.

I get your point - you don't like GRFS because it isn't 1st person. What I don't understand is why you think 1st person in a squad game is required to be tactical? Comparing vehicle simulations to a squad game (is GRFS a vehicle simulation?) or saying GRFS' predecessors all had 1st person (making them more tactical, I guess?) isn't an explanation of how a 3rd person squad game can NOT be tactical. There are a number of 3rd person squad games that offer varying levels of tactical gameplay.

For the record, I totally support your stance for not settling for what's available, as others have suggested. If you don't like it, don't give them your money - I wish more gameplayers were as dedicated!! And again, I am NOT defending GRFS, nor am I asking why GRFS isn't more like a vehicle simulation. I'm just wondering why you so loudly proclaim the impossibility of a 3rd person squad game being tactical?

Plainsman,

I thought of you when I saw this video! Kind of makes me want to fire Raven Shield back up!




We gave Ghost Recon:Heroes Unleashed a re-try a couple of weeks ago and remembered with great fondness the great GR sessions we had with you onboard!

I'm not really saying 3rd person can't be tactical. I'm saying it's less realistic. Just like flying a fighter jet sim from outside the cockpit is less realistic than flying from inside the cockpit. I think all but the most dedicated arcade gamers would agree. It seems they've dumbed down the realism level over time in the GR series. The calculated elimination of the 1st person style of play is just another nail in the coffin for tactical shooter fans that prefer the greater realism of first person. I'm so disappointed.

For certain, the GR franchise is not what it used to be. GR might not be the run-n-gun fragfests that many other shooters are (thank the maker!!) but it is a shooter nonetheless. Comparing GR to a vehicle simulation is, IMO, comparing apples to oranges and your comment that a 3rd person shooter is automatically less realistic, more arcadey, and less tactical simply because a 3rd person jet simulation would be less realistic, more arcadey, and less tactical caught me off guard. That said, I agree it is rather odd that GRFS (a shooter) should NOT have 1st person....in fact, it makes no sense at all ("calculated elimination" is probably a bit strong, but I get your point!)

I've been wanting to give this a go, have they cleared up the important issues yet?

I think 3rd person works for stealth games like Thief and Splinter Cell, but I dislike 3rd person for shooters for the same reason I dislike carrying giant guns...they block your FOV. Plus, I don't need to see my body. It does nothing for me when all I do is run, stand, crouch, and lie down. Big deal.

So that's my beef with it...it doesn't ADD anything to the experience at all, but it does DETRACT in several ways which affect you more or less depending on how you play. What's funny is that you would think it would be harder to make it 3rd person than 1st, or another way "how hard would it be to allow 1st person as well?"

I do use 3rd person in Arma, but usually in non-combat situations.




The Jedi Master

Amen! Well said, Jedi Master. Well said!

I remember in a video by one of the ARMA 2 devs before it came out saying they added the 3rd person view to make up for lack of peripheral vision when playing a game on a monitor. Wider FOV would fix this on first person?

Yup, the 3rd person view offers a wider FOV.

I also agree with Jedi Master in that the 3rd person view works well in GRFS since it’s largely a stealth game. You can pull off some pretty advanced maneuvers behind cover so being able to “see” your body helps a lot.

Also, don’t forget that the 1st person weapon sight view is quite functional in GRFS. I guess I’d call it the “cockpit” view

A wider FOV in first person distorts things. It's like Walleye-vision. Might give you more viewable area, but it looks terrible.
Generally I prefer 1st person, other than stealth games, as Jedi said, but if a game is well done and I enjoy playing it, that's all that really matters. Seat of the pants feel is worth more than items on a Like/Don't Like checklist.