Ordered and received the Rothco Special OPS Tactical Soft Shell Jacket in black. Shipping and packaging were great, the product on the other hand, not impressed. The Rothco Special OPS Tactical Soft Shell Jacket is a poor copy of popular "tactical" jackets made by such companies as Triple Aught Design's Ranger model ($219). The Rothco Special OPS has a number of major design flaws, as many have mentioned, the hood being the primary, which is so epic in design failure, there's no way this was tested prior to manufacturing in any kind of wet weather.

Here's the dirty: The hood of the Special OPS jacket is removable via a long zipper, which in itself is not a bad idea. However, there are no protective flaps what-so-ever to cover the long zipper from the upper rear shoulder section of the jacket body. Any amount of rain/snow will bead directly down into the shoulders of the jacket thru the closed zipper, regardless if the hood is attached or not. Adding some hook and loop might help, but the angle of the zippers and slot they are sewn in will leak, directly into the core of the jacket. Big problem. If you're not familiar with non-polartec fleece, if it's wet, it ain't keeping you warm.

The second issue with the hood is it attaches via 3 points: the rear zipper(as mentioned above), and 2 elastic drawstring cords that are run thru un-anodized boot eyelets in the collar, and simply tied in knots to crudely "attach" the front of the hood chin/sides to the front collar of the jacket. There are no hook and loop attachments, or tension retainers attached to the elastic cords. The cords really, and I'm not joking here, are just overhand tied into knots to prevent them from re-entering the boot eyelets. I would think a gust of wind, at the strength of a mouse fart may dislodge the hood. I don't know about you, but overhand knots tied in cheap elastic "paracord" just does not say anything remotely "tactical" to me about weather protection, or hood attachment. So poor is this design aspect that even my girlfriend noticed right away how lame this looked without me saying ANYTHING about the jacket. It screams "cheap" louder than a chickadee on meth.

Other failures on this jacket I feel are: cheap non-rated non-polartec fleece, inadequate un-insulated pitzips that draft (c'mon you can't add a flap of fleece over them on the inside?), and front zipper (non YYZ).

Other then the failures, the wrist closures are well thought out, but rubber, which might be an issue if you live in cold climates. The jacket exterior seems weather resistant, and wind resistant, and is comfortable. It's sized pretty large. I'm 5'9 175lbs with wide shoulders, and the Medium was a good fit overall. The large would have been gigantic.

In summary, the hood design is so poor, and not protective in any form of wet weather, that it just wasn't a good option for me. The addition of the boot eyelets in the collar, and knotted elastic as attachment points, just looked...well, mega cheap, and unfunctional. Would probably look great if yer getting it for a youth who's into airsoft in a dry climate, but then again, there are plenty of jackets around $80 that would do better. If you really like the style, I'd suggest saving your money for something designed and put together better.
My $0.02? Rothco Special OPS Tactical Soft Shell Jacket = Tactifail.