As we progressed through Dante's soon-to-be casino, we found that the different visors were absolutely required equipment. Alternating between thermal view and Night Vision, we tore our way into the innards of the complex, and quite a few terrorists as well. We preferred the thermal view due to its ability to highlight darkness-shrouded enemies, but as we approached the Dante's boiler room, the ambient heat forced us to go with the less precise Night Vision. Unfortunately, it seemed as though every terrorist we came up against had exactly the same goggles, only their had a much larger range - as sneaky as we tried to be, they were always ready for us... usually with a grenade. Unlike Rainbow Six Vegas' cousin Ghost Recon Advanced Warfighter, we didn't get much of a warning when these deadly time-bombs were hurled nearby, and that cost us many a life.
Inverted rappelling down the side of the building was a game-defining moment, and quietly tagging the oblivious terrorists for efficient execution made us felt like we really were elite. The sense of urgency of the entire situation is ever-present, driven by the base-heavy thrum of the background music and by the occasional discovery of hostages with guns to their heads. In the latter situation, you'd better use your snake cam to peek under the door and formulate some kind of entry plan (you get three options: breach and clear, smoke and clear and frag and clear) or those hostages won't be an issue for long.
While still a little rough at this stage, there is much promise in Rainbow Six Vegas - although, the action was a little too choppy for us to truly see all of the motion-captured character animations (and we rush to reiterate that the version of the game we played was far from finished, so there's no indication that the stuttering we experienced would carry over into the final retail game). Still, it's not quite the mind-blowing experience that Ghost Recon Advanced Warfighter was, but it will definitely scratch any left-over tactical shooter itch.
