Ghost Recon 2 is easily one of the most spectacular games of the year. Spectacular, because it's been a long time since we've reviewed anything that gets so much right, only to self-destruct thanks to one catastrophically inept piece of design. We'll skip straight to it and say that whoever decided a game with enormous levels - where instant death is over ever a couple of bullets away - didn't need some sort of checkpoint system is a moron who hasn't so much shot Ghost Recon 2 in the foot, as shoved a genade up its arse and pulled the pin.

Harsh words maybe, but we're shaking with disappointment. Until this point, everything we'd seen had been uniformly positive. The previously skanky textures had been replaced by opulently detailed environments. The old control system had also been dismantled, with a sexy ergonomic one fitted instead. Most encouragingly, there was no more dicking around on a map screen that looked like a mental patient's attempt at cross-stitching. So the buzz was very much 'easier' and 'more enjoyable'. Nothing could go wrong now.

Then this happens. The finished code arrives and, sure enough, it looks ace. The visuals - fom the immaculately animated soldiers to the sweeping Korean landscape itself - are on apar with anything the PS2 has to offer. The premise is the usual Clancy blah, but although the objectives are largely predictable, the graphical splendour makes Ghost Recon 2 feel fresh - and, initially, we loved strolling the Korean countryside democratising people with extreme prejudice.

The controls are also a vast improvement. Using the D-pad, you can crouch, crawl and lean around corners, neutralising hostiles before ducking back and reloading. It's a remarkably satisfying mechanic that makes for genuinely tense gunfights. Usually an accurate burst is enough to kill, which makes the assorted pistols, bazookas and assault rifles seem thrillingly powerful. And thanks to the now ubiquitous Havok physics engine, grenades will flip ruined bodies like half-cooked burgers. The pace is still very deliberate, but Ghost Recon 2 is significantly more action heavy than its predecessor and all the better for it. The only thing we're not keen on is the way colour drains from the screen (an effect lifted from Black Hawn Down) to replicate the shock of being shot at, but it's no biggie.

On most missions you're accompanied by a trio of Ghosts who can be commanded using the simple menu system.. Okay, so for the most part they seem reluctant to get involved with the business of actually shooting people - even when the Koreans are standing a couple of ping pong tables away. But, in their defence, the other Ghosts look cool, prevent loneliness and do occasionally manage to hit something. For the most part we used them like coal miner's canaries, sending them into hostile territory and waiting to see what happened next.

There are also a couple of excellent 'lone wolf' missions where you're dropped in on your Jack Jones and left to get on with it. So in terms of its component parts, Ghost Recon 2 frequently nudges excellence. But spin back a few paragraphs. The line you're looking for is "an accurate burst is enough to kill". That applies equally to you and your enemies. Now trawl all the way back to the beginning... There's no saving during missions. Seriously, none whatsoever - it's just death or glory. The upshot is that the game doesn't just feel unfair, it feels like it actually hates you. This might be acceptable if the diffciulty level was balanced like a particularly nimble cat. Which it most certainly is not.

The problem is apparent as early as the second level - an attack on some North Korean hangars. (Bear in mind we're playing on the babyish 'recruit' setting.) We tried and failed dozens of times, often with the end heartbreakingly in sight. Having finally conquered the mission, there were high fives all around, but a few levels later we hit another impasse during a night-time attack. It's no exaggeration to say that it took us the best part of an entire day racking up failures before we finally lucked out. Then, bizarrely, we breezed through the next couple. Had we cracked the magic formula? No. Christ, no. We were soon stuck again, and this time fatally so. So, with a bugle sounding in the distance, we conceded defeat.

Maybe the designers were worried about ditching the franchise's hardcore credibility. In which case they should've been overruled, because they've hamstrung an otherwse fine game. The nightmare is compounded by crooked artificial intelligence. Like Clancy's other squad-based games, enemies are 'triggered' once you cross an invisible line - making it like a military-themed haunted house, because you know exactly where the bad guys will appear. So you get blase and start to play sloppily, further increasing the likelihood of big mess-ups.

There are other niggles too. Like the way your Ghosts are incapable of climbing the most shallow of inclines. This means flanking manoeuvres are often ruled out because your team refuses to walk up a small hill. The online mode does little to repair the damage either. Ghost Recon 2 should've been the best squad-based game on the PS2, but, sadly, it's been blown to pieces by friendly fire.

Graphics 80%
Easily the best-looking game in the genre.

Sound 70%
Authentic effects, but a pompous score.

Gameplay 60%
Undermined by the lack of saving.

Lifespan 80%
Only die-hards and masochists will persevere.

Overall 60%
Ghost Recon 2 comes within a bullet's width of brilliance, but the inability to save during missions is a total nonsense!