
Tom Clancy's Ghost Recon: Advanced Warfighter 2 is a Third-Person Shooter video game in the Ghost Recon series, developed by Ubisoft Paris and Redstorm Entertainment for the PlayStation 3, the Xbox 360. Grin handled development for Microsoft Windows. High Voltage Software handled the PlayStation Portable version with all the games published worldwide by Ubisoft in 2007.
Advanced Warfighter features the Cross-Com 2.0, which allows the player to have more direct involvement in controlling and commanding friendly units.
Despite the coup from the first game being foiled, unrest has continued in Mexico, which has spread throughout South America. The Ghosts are deployed back to Mexico to investigate rebel leader Juan de la Barrera and whether he's able to use dirty bombs. Due to treaties between the US and Mexico, the Ghosts must covertly operate on their own until they are able to gain the intel necessary for America to officially intervene in the conflict.
Tropes found in Ghost Recon: Advanced Warfighter 2, which also includes tropes from its predecessor:
- Always Close: At the end of the PC version, there's actually just enough time to escape the missile complex before it explodes, if you memorize the escape route and run it perfectly. The ending still has Mitchell failing to get out in time and being caught in the explosion.
- Ambiguous Ending: The Ghosts are caught in the EMP missile attack to disable the last Khasmira-II missiles as President Ballatine is not willing to use military force to raze Juarez down just to get to them. Averted in the PSP release.
- Elite Mooks: Advanced Warfighter 2 has Panamanian mercenaries hired by the rebels that show up in the latter half of the game; being members of a PMC they have access to better arms and equipment than the rebels, using many of the same weapons as those available to the Ghosts, rather than the standard G36Ks and HK21Es used by the basic rebel soldiers. They also seem to use more advanced tactics, such as faking a reload to try to bait you out of cover. They're easily distinguished from the regular rebel troops from their more informal appearance, including Cool Shades, rolled-up sleeves, and serious case of Helmets Are Hardly Heroic.
- False Flag Operation: The rebels will use anything they can get their hands on to justify and vindicate a bloody warpath against the United States. From seeing a Blackhawk chopper, which is singled out as blowing up the Loyalists when it wasn't responsible, to shooting down another chopper and capturing its American pilot solely to Make an Example of Them, the leader goes at length about trying to use these reasons to force America out of their affairs. Not that it works, since the Ghosts cover up the evidence and the Mexican President signs an agreement with the U.S. President for armed intervention because of the rebel leader trying to stop it from happening in the first place. At that point, the plan shifts from trying to take control of South America against United States influence, to lashing out and throwing everything they can in an act of prepping for mutual destruction.
- Gunship Rescue: The mission to extract a reporter from a bullfighting arena in GRAW 2 has the Ghosts fighting off waves of attacking soldiers. When two tanks show up, the Ghosts call for air support and are saved by Apache gunships.
- Hired Guns: Part way through, PMC mercenaries are brought in as Elite Mooks, and are just straight up Eviler than Thou for the amount of damage and carnage they commit in their wake with the paycheck the rebels are giving them. It's to the point that they end up continuing to try to launch the nuclear missiles on the United States even after their employer dies, as if deciding that since they weren't going to win this one, neither were their enemies.
- Immediate Sequel: Mitchell and his team are hot from the previous game's events, not even having the time for an on-screen debrief or any respite, before they're immediately sent out to Juarez with the threat of missing nuclear warheads suddenly running amok at the same time the Mexican coup starts rapidly escalating to swaths of South America dissent.
- In the End, You Are on Your Own: At the very end of the PC version, Mitchell's squad is left behind to cover the entrance while Mitchell descends by himself into the network of tunnels below the rebel base in order to locate the nuke and stop it from launching. What follows is a short Unexpected Gameplay Change segment in which you're traveling down tight indoor corridors fighting rebel soldiers, in what had previously been a squad-based tactical shooter taking place in large urban and outdoor environments.
- Landmarking the Hidden Base: A massive computer system linked to the United States' anti-ballistic missile mainframe is hidden under a dam in El Paso, Texas.
- One-Hit-Point Wonder: The "Original Ghost Recon" difficulty exclusive to the PS3 port has Mitchell die in one hit, no matter the caliber or where it hit.
- One-Man Army: In the PSP version, Mitchell is the only character who fights against South American guerrillas.
- Post-Climax Confrontation: In the penultimate mission, you fight the rebel leader in a helicopter gunship duel towards the end of the game. After killing him and recovering the nuke he stole, you learn that despite the rebel leader's death, the PMC he hired is still planning to launch missiles into the United States from the Mexican border. You then deploy to stop the PMC from launching their missiles for the game's final mission.
- Real Is Brown: The sequel is somewhat more clear, crisp, and colorful while still maintaining a realistic and down-to-earth look.
- Serial Escalation: The first game was largely a lot of boots-on-ground in Mexico taking on a variety of foot soldier missions, trying to save both the U.S. and Mexican Presidents and keep the football for American nukes out of rebel hands in the midst of a chaotic coup. The sequel reveals that the coup is far from finished, and in fact not only has taken to repurposing warheads stolen the better part of two decades ago, but expanded a push across most of South America to raise as much hell as possible, including the usage of dirty bombs, with full intent on activating nukes against the United States; all the while, the rebellion has somehow restocked their forces with loads of mercenaries. Needless to say, the stakes are way higher than before.
- Short-Range Shotgun:The PC/Console versions give you the option of selecting a M1014 shotgun as your secondary weapon (Xbox) or Primary Weapon (PC), oddly the more arcade-y console version has more range, consistently 2-shotting foes at a surprisingly long-range while the PC version has a more stereotypical short-range for a shotgun, your handgun in the PC-exclusive designated Pistol Slot will likely have more range than it, while the Shotgun is a surprisingly effective backup on Console, on PC it's a very ineffective primary weapon. The fact that it has a small magazine and small ammo reserve doesn't help.
- Surprisingly Realistic Outcome: The whole recklessness and violence of the military rebellion results in managing to get parts of South America to rise up in their own indignant cries against the influence of the North Americas.. but also results in rapidly declining recruits and numbers within mere days of the coup, because people are moving to flee Mexico in droves to get away from terrorism and warfare, and the U.S. and Loyalists already managed to wipe out the head of the rebels last game. This results in them having to bring in a PMC for hired aid, though the logistics of how they'd even pay them aren't really crossed, and things go From Bad to Worse because mercenaries out to fight a land war under another rebel leader don't exactly have any moral scruples here.
- Terrorists Without a Cause: Part way through the game, the Panamanian mercenaries enter the scene, presumably hired by the rebel forces.. up until it's discovered the PMC apparently incited a rebellion in Panama that was heard about at the start of the game, implying that they surged through South America to incite anti-American sentiment in the western hemisphere. There's never any real context given for why they decide to fight the United States so fiercely that they cross the border into Texas to try to Nukem, just that they're an evil, English-speaking faction looking to destroy as much as possible For the Evulz, without any demands, leader for the group or anything.
- Wretched Hive: If the events of the Advanced Warfighter series are anything to go by, Mexico is pretty much a hellhole of massive proportions (especially the city of Juarez, which sees more violence, plane crashes, gunbattles and deaths in two days than most other cities in the world see in a year).