Price: £44.99 Players: 1 Widescreen: No Dolby Digital 5.1: Yes Xbox Live-enabled: Yes Downloadable content: Yes The last time I played a game like Tom Clancy's Ghost Recon: Island Thunder is was the PC game apparently based on the film The Sum of All Fears although the objectives were totally different and Ben Affleck was nowhere to be found (thankfully). This episode is set in the near-future when Castro has been assassinated and you're going in to storm Cuba. There's only 8 missions to this game, but the retail price is only a penny short of twenty quid, which is half the cost of a usual Xbox game, it doesn't require the original Ghost Recon title to enjoy it, and the emphasis is really on Xbox Live play as is with so many games these days. For those going online, there are 12 multiplayer maps including a new desert terrain and 4 fan-picked maps from Ghost Recon itself. Note also that there's a free downloadable level in which you have to save an Oil Refinery from rebel forces.

The graphics are far from outstanding, looking pretty much the same as in the aforementioned movie tie-in although the other players are pretty well-defined and move adequately. Just don't look too close-up to a wall or door. Soundwise, the Dolby Digital 5.1 effects are essential when trying to work out exactly where the enemy fire is coming from, as well as hearing planes and birds fly overhead. It can prove incredibly atmospheric as you creep about, zooming your rifle in and out, as you need to, to cap those low-lifes from a distance, and while it can be moderately difficult to achieve your goals, the mission objectives aren't particularly taxing here in terms of their complexity - go from A to B to C, securing the places as you go and trying not to let too many of the men under your control die. Some of you will follow you as you travel about, but you can also cycle through them or choose another if "you" die. At first you'll no doubt try to go and wade in like John Wayne, but such foolhardyness is its own downfall. It's the simplicity of the gameplay that undoubtedly keeps people coming back for more, and the addition of Xbox Live helps everyone playing that game feel much more closer to the action, and feel more in a position to want to help someone out since you can talk to them rather than just see a computer-generated man run about.

The options to play with on Live are Co-operative, Team mode or Solo, the latter including options such as 'Last Man Standing' and a 'Sharpshooter' match to see who can get the most kills. Trying this out on Live, I started with a team game and got shot pretty damned quickly while being on the offensive team. It probably didn't help that those on my team were all German and I could barely understand a word they were saying, so no wonder I seemed to go it alone. This game should really allow a 'search by country' option. However, once I was dead I was able to spectate as one of my fellow comrades and see the world through their eyes. I can be bloody hopeless at games like this, so anyone seeing me home, home on the terrain, don't fire too many bullets in my direction...

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Review copyright © Dominic Robinson, 2003.