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Tom Clancy's Ghost Recon Online

by Aaron Kaluszka - June 11, 2011, 4:34 pm EDT
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How does the New Controller work?

I only had a short time with the shooter, but my brief demo was enough to hint at some of the technology behind the Wii U system. In Ghost Recon Online, the New Controller is used as the CROSSCOM 2.0, allowing players to choose options, as well as plan and view the battlefield similar to a real reconnaissance mission.

Ubisoft's developers apparently had very little time to prepare the demo, and within the company communication was severely limited due to NDAs, so the game wasn't where they wanted it to be for showing off -- graphics texturing and modeling was not quite up to current HD game standards. As with most systems early in their development life, devs receive new hardware revisions regularly, and system features and capabilities could be changed.

I noticed the New Controller screen in the Ghost Recon Online featured heavy artifacting, unlike Nintendo's Wii U demos. Some have wondered how Nintendo can stream in realtime to the controller, and it appears that they manage the feat through lossy compression such as one of the various JPEG or MPEG schemes. According to the developers, the consoles at E3 weren't actually streaming wirelessly -- they were tethered, so it's hard to gauge their performance (though FCC warnings posted at Nintendo's booth indicate that at least some devices might have been using wireless communication).

Still, the scheme provides a compelling way to play such games. There was a good mix of combat and strategy, and by moving mapping and planning to an in-hand touch screen Ghost Recon Online provides a more tactile and, in a way, realistic military experience.

For more details regarding the game and its control specifics, check out Jared's impressions.

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Genre Shooter
Developer Ubisoft

Worldwide Releases

na: Tom Clancy's Ghost Recon Online
Release TBA
PublisherUbisoft
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