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Black Thorn

© Randy Scott

A few years ago a company called Red Storm Entertainment shot to prominence with the release of " Rainbow Six". Rainbow Six put you in charge of leading, planning and equipping a squad for action. The " action" could be a hostage rescue, in which the hostage had to survive, or something simpler such as taking out the entire enemy.

Since then Red Storm has released a number of add-ons and sequels to Rainbow Six. This includes the most recent game Rogue Spear: Black Thorn, Rogue Spear was the name of a sequel to Rainbow Six. Black Thorn is a standalone package that does not require Rogue Spear, so if you are new to this kind of first person tactical shooter, now might be the time to jump in.

The heart of Black Thorn is its multi-player mode. Although there are more single person missions, the heart of all these Rainbow Six games is its Internet play. It's fine to " warm up" in the single player mode but to really experience things you have to go on line and with and against real life people. The finest AI is nothing compared to what the human mind is capable of.

The learning curve is fairly high in any of these games and Black Thorn is no different. When playing in single mode you are in charge and as such it's up to you to set way points and tell the other members of your unit when and if they should move. You are also responsible for outfitting your team with the right weapons for the job and planning the mission. Although the game does provide a default team, weapons loadout and plan, until you become comfortable with these aspects yourself.

Although this series has been around since 1998, a lifetime in PC gaming, the graphics have been updated and look much better than in the original. That said, the graphics are still not state of the art, you'll find better in Quake III powered games, for example.

The community around these games is huge, so once you have finished off the canned missions you'll find a vault full of mods and total conversions that will help extend your enjoyment of Black Thorn.

Should you purchase the game you'll find a second CD that documents the making of Red Storm's upcoming release Ghost Recon. You might enjoy a look at what goes on behind the scenes when making a game.

The copyright of the article Black Thorn in Computer Game Reviews is owned by Randy Scott. Permission to republish Black Thorn in print or online must be granted by the author in writing.