Red Orchestra: Ostfront 41-45 (PC)

GameSpot editors' review

• CNET editors' rating: 3.5 stars Very good
  Detailed editors' rating
  Overall score: 7.9 (3.5 stars)

• Reviewed by:
  Bob Colayco
• Reviewed on: 04/05/2006
• Updated on: 05/17/2006
• Released on: 03/14/2006
• Originally published on GameSpot: Red Orchestra: Ostfront 41-45 (PC) Review

Red Orchestra: Ostfront 41-45 is a team-based multiplayer shooter set, as the name suggests, on the brutal eastern front of World War II, where the Russians and Germans fought a brutal war of attrition. While that setup probably sounds pretty familiar to those of us who've played games such as Battlefield 1942 or even Call of Duty, Red Orchestra manages to differentiate itself. The game offers a hardcore gameplay design that weeds out the arcade-shooter crowd with a meticulous attention to realism, albeit sometimes just for the sake of it.

Red Orchestra has its roots in an Unreal Tournament 2003 mod of the same name. Like other such mods, including Counter-Strike and Day of Defeat, Red Orchestra is now available as a stand-alone retail game. The package requires you to activate the game through Steam, which was a process that resulted in some complications for us as we tried to play from an office PC and from a separate home PC. Once you sort those installation issues out, the game loads up like any other game on Steam, and you're able to load up a server browser to search out games to play online. Much like other mod-to-retail games before it, Red Orchestra is an online-only game, although the developers have included a single-player practice mode where you can populate a map with bots--this is a "safer" environment where you can learn the many nuances of the game without getting berated by human players. You'll find that the bots included in the game are pretty brain-dead, so once you get the mechanics down, you'll want to jump right into a live match.

There are 13 maps in Red Orchestra, ranging from small farm towns and the plains surrounding them to a bombed out rail yard and a monastery set atop a hill. These maps are generally quite large and well designed. There's plenty of room to stretch out, which lets teams move around and attempt flanking maneuvers in a lot of cases, though at times it seems like the action doesn't feel as concentrated and directed as it could be. The detail in the environments is pretty good--you'll find buildings to garrison and shoot out from; foxholes and trenches to dive into; and plenty of foliage, rocks, and other debris to use as cover, all of which looks quite good. Most of the maps have required objectives for each team to capture--once all the objectives are reached, that team wins the round. The maps vary from vehicle-oriented maps, where each team has plenty of armored personnel carriers and tanks spawning right at their base; to infantry-only maps; to combined-arms maps, where both infantry and tanks roam about.

One of the interesting things about Red Orchestra is how the various classes work. Like many other team-based shooters, Red Orchestra lets you select from an array of different classes, each of which has special weaponry. Riflemen get guns such as Kar-98s or Mosin Nagants, squad commanders and other shock troopers get submachine guns such as MP-40s. There are also machine gunners who carry heavy automatic weapons such as MG-42s. The vehicle specialists, which are the only class that can jump in a tank or operate other vehicles, only carry a sidearm, but they can pick up weapons lying on the battlefield.

More so than most other team-based shooter classes, these classes feel a lot different from one another. The machine gunner can't shoot accurately from the hip. Not only is there no crosshair to assist your aim, but the gun sprays wildly out of control unless you find a rock or ledge to set the gun down on or go prone so you can deploy the bipod. The machine gunners will also find that the barrels can warp from overheating due to repeated firing, which severely hampers accuracy. Yes, there's a separate button you'll need to learn that swaps in a fresh barrel. Submachine guns have a ton of recoil, more than you'd expect if you're a veteran of the more-popular WWII shooters. Commanders can use binoculars, which on certain maps are used to call in artillery strikes, which need to be radioed in by another player.

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