Unlocking Achievements in Rainbow Six
Vegas 2

Published April 18, 2008

Tom Clancy's Rainbow Six® Vegas 2 holds a treasure trove of achievements, all of them ready and waiting to be unlocked. Even a casual gamer can hope to score several hundred Gamerscore without too hefty a time commitment. With that in mind, the following tips should shave a precious hour or two off your time unlocking some of the game's most challenging achievements.

Working on Come Closer, I see.

Freedom Shall Prevail: Complete the Story Mode on Realistic difficulty (75 Gamerscore)

There's no one surefire way to breeze through Vegas 2 on Realistic difficulty. It's tough no matter how you look at it, but like Halo® 3 and Gears of War® before it, playing cooperatively makes all the difference. Where on your own you would be forced to restart back at a checkpoint when you die, you can respawn next to your buddy when playing cooperatively (provided they survive the required ten seconds). That change alone makes this 75 point achievement much, much easier to attain.

Consider the following co-op specific tips as well to further increase your survival rate:

• Separate zones: Keep your distance from your co-op buddy whenever it makes sense, such as taking the opposite side of a room when breaching. A single grenade or overzealous turret-gunner can wipe you and your friend out simultaneously if you're too close together, so keep a safe distance from one another.
• Safely respawn: In the event that one of you dies, the other player should stay safely behind cover, even retreating if necessary until the other player respawns. There's nothing to be gained and everything to lose if you stick your neck out and get killed while the other player is waiting to respawn.
• Opposite arsenals: As long as you're playing cooperatively, you may as well complement one another with your weapons and gear. For example, one player should sport a light-machine-gun and sniper rifle while the other makes use of a shotgun and assault rifle. Likewise, one player should make use of frag/incendiary grenades and flash bangs while the other boasts C4 and smoke grenades. Cover all your bases.

Rappel King: Kill 25 enemies while suspended from a rope (20 Gamerscore)

Whether you finished the game without scoring this achievement (like me) or you just want to get it over and done with early on, here's a quick solution. Play through the first training level, Pic des Pyrenees, until you find the first rappelling moment.

Rappel down, take out the three enemies and then select Reload Checkpoint from the Start menu. Simply repeat the process until the achievement unlocks. It may seem like it's taking longer than it should, but trust me, you'll get it.

Looking like a possible Cluster Bomb situation.

Weapon Achievements

Whether it's One Shot, One Kill, Spray and Pray, Come Closer or any other weapon-based multiplayer achievement, you can unlock them sooner rather than later if you tailor your weapon choices to the map at hand.

For example, the largely indoor Villa is a haven for shotgun surgeons, whereas the vast sight lines from the rooftops on Streets or Kill House make sniper rifles a worthy choice. Likewise, submachine guns and assault rifles work best in balanced, indoor/outdoor maps like Murdertown or CQB Training.

If you give the pistols-only Sidearm Frenzy achievement a try, allow me to suggest that you break out your sidearm only when facing a lower grade of competition. You can rack up the kills with your pistol when you or your team are dominating a match, but give it a try against legitimate competition and you'll likely frustrate yourself, and draw the ire of your teammates as you sacrifice victory in the name of pursuing Gamerscore.

Don't forget also that there must be at least six players in a room in order for the kills you accumulate to count toward any of these achievements. It's worth it to stay patient that extra minute or two in the lobby and wait for that sixth player to join.

Hunter Achievements

The Novice Hunter, Veteran Hunter, Extreme Hunter and Bring it On achievements are no joke (well, maybe Novice Hunter), but with a bit of preparation you can scale back the difficulty considerably. First, fill the room with four players. With only one respawn allowed you'll need all the extra lives you can get. Secondly, while you have to play on Realistic difficulty for the Bring it On and Extreme Hunter achievements, you don't need to fill the map with terrorists, so set the Density to Low.

One more notch for Rappel King.

It's worth noting too that Vegas 2 doesn't track which maps you've already completed, so start from the top of the list, work your way down and note which map you ended on. Also, there's no need to finish the downloadable Streets or Comcast Event maps for any of these achievements.

I Like the Sound it Makes: Kill 150 terrorists with a Shotgun (25 Gamerscore)

It's easy to misinterpret this achievement at a quick glance, but to be clear, I Like the Sound it Makes refers to single-player and Terrorist Hunt, not multiplayer adversarial matches as the Come Closer achievement does.

If you don't dig on the shotgun in single-player or you just want to unlock this as quickly as possible, try playing Terrorist Hunt missions on Normal difficulty with the terrorists set to High Density. Let the carnage begin.

Cluster Bomb: Kill 3 enemies at once using explosives with at least six players present (10 Gamerscore)

Sure, there's a good deal of luck involved in attaining this explosive achievement, but that doesn't mean there isn't a tip or two to tilt the odds further in your favor. Look to score Cluster Bomb when you've got the opposing team pinned down in their own spawn area.

Once you've got them pinned, keep your eyes peeled for when three or more of the opposing team die in quick succession, and then plant some C4 (it's more precise than grenades) right outside one of the entrances to their spawn location. When the first enemy sprints out the door, detonate the C4 and hope that their buddies were right behind them (they will be more often than you might imagine).

With the preceding tips combined along with your own skill, you should find yourself significantly richer in the Gamerscore department in short order. Congratulations and good hunting!

Article by Ryan Treit