I purchased JO and the expansion over winter break and have been playing for about 2 weeks. The game is generally fun, but there are times you'll be highly infuriated. On the outside, it certainly looks like footage of battle. Tracers, NVG, tanks, aircraft etc all paint a nice looking picture. Of course, beneath the surface it is a game and many things are not realistic. The common realism is there, vehicles don't move too fast or too slow and bullets will kill you. The unrealistic things are that sometimes dancing around can get you to survive faster, and it's very annoying when some button-tapper kills you in a shootout. However, I consider that a fact of gaming and there's not much you can do about it. Perhaps Novalogic is reworking the damage model, many complain about bullets not registering. It's also about running speed. Acceleration from stop to run is instant, and this helps the dodgers. You also run pretty fast. Due to this, close-range battles are dominated by the knife. Sometimes there's nothing you can do when you're close to a knifer. They can take whole control points if you don't have a way of stopping them, like a mine or your own knife ready. Many times you're not prepared for them. Shoulder-fired missiles are a common weapon and are sometimes used for anti-personnel duty, much to the anger of some. Personally, I figure they waste a missile doing that. I also have a hunch that the players who dress as generic Pilots, Indonesian Special Forces, and Indonesian Ex-Military do so in order to make you think twice before you fire, as they might look like teammates. Most of the time teamkill is not enabled, so fire away. You might blow your cover though.


Teamwork is there, mostly at a low level. There's no serious tactical communication, and vehicle raids are often "get in before the guy drives away". You had also hope that you didn't get into a sniper's vehicle, as he'll take you to the middle of nowhere. Other armed vehicles are used as stationary defenses by single players who'll get mad if you take them. There's usually enough vehicles to go around. Higher levels of teamwork do win games, however. People will stick together, and many of the most skilled players are medics. These will soon be your favorite teammates. A team of skilled medics can be a team's entire offense, and it often gets the work done. There are squads, but don't expect to run into 30 squadmembers in a coordinated blitz. I haven't seen that yet. Teamwork can be disrupted by a few things. The recon bikes of Escalation are fun to ride around on like Evel Knievel, and that's the problem. A ride on one of them can separate you from your teammates. Teams in Escalation get diluted because of this. Also, spawn snipers will draw out a bunch of people. The snipers' want for kills inadvertently becomes a diversionary tactic, drawing people away from objectives. I prefer to think of them as a fact of life, something to be ignored. Most often than not they won't get you.

I've named a lot of individual annoyances, but when I die, hindsight always finds a mistake I made in combat or preparation. You can usually keep your life out of the hands of a glitch if you want to. It will be a fun game, but you need to know what you're getting. It's not a complex military simulator. If you do get it, take the training missions. They can help you learn the controls, there's a lot of them. They're even narrated by a guy who sounds like a really strung-out Spike Spiegel.

Hope I could help. If I missed something, ask about it.