Tom Clancy's Rainbow Six: Covert Ops Essentials

Never in the field of human conflict has one family of games given so many wannabe CTs as many clean head shots. Rainbow Six, and its sequel Rogue Spear, set a benchmark for single-player creep 'em-ups that has yet to be matched.

Covert Ops Essentials is a twin-bladed product: the Training Disc, a text-heavy multimedia frenzy, leads you through an in-depth Special Ops training program, examines you and then awards you. Admittedly, it was mildly interesting in a 'nothing on TV' kind of way, but then I liked Rainbow Six as an exciting game rather than a macho fantasy I wanted to live.

Of much greater interest was the Mission Disc. Diving straight into the campaign, the first mission in a Bolivian jungle proved a humdinger, especially on Elite level - easily one of the best R6 levels yet designed. Not so with the Arctic level, which I completed on the first go. The next level, set in a missile silo, had a tortuous level design with lots of corridors and control rooms. A quick trigger finger and assault rifles all round provided the solution, though there's a choke point where snipers in the stairwells give you grief.

As I lit my intermission fag, I was looking forward to the next six levels ('nine all new levels featuring never before seen missions' the ads proclaim), when I realised the other six are small training levels in Hereford. I completed a couple in a few minutes, but then gave up in disgust. This is why the Urban Ops add-on pissed me off: too few missions - and there are even fewer in Covert Ops.

To Red Storm's credit, this doesn't require either R6 or RS to play; and if the Training Disc is your cup of tea, then maybe you'll be ecstatic. But I play R6 for gaming, and only die-hards who have to have it all should pay $25 for three proper missions.