14 DAY TRIAL // Codemasters has officially revealed the new entry in the Operation Flashpoint series. The new first person shooter will be called Red River and the Official Xbox Magazine has the first details on the experience. The developers are saying that they are aiming to create a more focused experience that addresses the issues that gamers have had with the previous launch, Dragon Rising, which was released during the fall of 2009.
The launch date for Operation Flashpoint: Red River is set for 2011 and the team working on the game is still determined to make the game as close as possible to a realistic simulation of warfare. The Official Xbox Magazine only refers to the Xbox 360 version of the new game but Codemasters is platform agnostic, meaning that the game will probably also arrive on the PlayStation 3 from Sony and the PC, probably through Steam.
Jon Hicks, the editor of OXM, stated, “Operation Flashpoint: Dragon Rising was tremendously ambitious, but struggled to deliver. So we were pleased to see that the sequel is a tighter, more focused game that's nevertheless still striving for a more realistic recreation of warfare”.
The biggest competition for the Operation Flashpoint series is the ArmA franchise that is developed by Bohemia Interactive. The game is arguably closer to reality that the Codemasters game and has just received a stand alone expansion called Operation Arrowhead. It's likely that the two franchises will continue to battle for the title of best simulation in 2011.
Operation Flashpoint: Dragon Rising had a lot of potential, simulating quite a bit of real life military hardware but the single player campaign, while benefiting from a slick presentation and nicely constructed missions, felt limited and lacked the scale of an actual conflict between the United States and the People's Liberation Army. It's not clear what forces the player will be fighting against in the upcoming Red River.