Tom Clancy’s Ghost Recon: Wildlands – Europe (Ubisoft Connect)

Ghost Recon: Wildlands for PC plays over the South American country of Bolivia, battling the Santa Blanca Cartel and destroying drug stashes as you interrogate, fight and storm your way ever closer to the defeat of the drug trade.

About the Game

Ghost Recon: Wildlands boasts one of the largest games’ maps ever seen, giving players a huge world to explore.

On the beta version, there was only one province for players to test out, the final version has a massive twenty provinces, each of which could be a standalone game featuring challenges that include learning and using new skills, different modes of travel, raiding fortified cartel bases, and conducting interrogations, amongst other things.

Each province contains at least one Santa Blanca Cartel boss to give you even more of a challenge. You can explore the entire map right from the beginning, and UbiSoft’s version of Bolivia is fantastically rendered, offering a glimpse inside caves and under jungle canopies as well as taking you to deserts, salt flats, mountains, swamps and lakes and quarries.

Play for Terrain

These differing terrains are more than simple stage dressing, just as in real life, you will have to alter your way of playing in order to navigate the changing textures and challenges presented by each geographical aspect.

In the desert there is little cover to hide in, so you will have to flee from your enemies, preferably in an escape vehicle of some kind, while in the mountains you can hide and ambush your unsuspecting foes.

Wildlands – for which the game is named – is perhaps the most fun, giving you plenty of options to use your own initiative, with the awkward terrain changing from a handicap to an advantage depending on how cunningly you think!

The game premise remains fairly static for all twenty provinces. Being able to use innovative thinking to move the game along different paths means that it is never dull or ‘samey’.

Play It Your Way

The player is also allowed quite a lot of leeway in their actions which results in almost infinite combinations of play: each decision changes outcomes, sometimes slightly, sometimes quite significantly.

For example, deciding to drive out with a high-profile prisoner, rather than have them flown out by helicopter seems to be a tame decision – right until the car rolls away down the hill, taking your target with it and leaving you in apparently futile pursuit.

Weapons and More

Weapons and upgrades are scattered throughout the game and you can customise your weapon to suit your own tastes which is satisfying, as is the ‘boss weapon’ that is unlocked upon the successful defeat of a cartel boss. These beautiful weapons cannot be modified, but they do not need it – they are perfect as they are!

More Ways to Play

• Solo

You can play solo, in which case the game gives you three AI (artificial intelligence) companions who are good at obeying instructions – you could, for example, use them to lay down a certain firing pattern to shoot up an enemy troop.

• Co-op

The other way to play is co-op, which is when you team up with other players to work together. This is both more dangerous and more fun because people are unpredictable! Play with your friends or make new friends from strangers.

• Unaided

A great way to boost your skills is to turn off as many of the on-screen aids as you can. Learn to navigate without the mini-map, and instead, drive about to learn the terrain. This is a surprisingly fun way to add even more excitement to the game.

Ghost Recon: Wildlands for PC is available for purchase on Instant Gaming for a fraction of its retail price. You will receive an official key and be able to play the game in seconds. Play smart. Pay less.