However, I felt that some of the facial animations left a bit to be desired. Sniper Elite 5 is quite a good looking game, with the weapon designs and textures jumping out as particularly impressive. Since I was playing the game prior to its official launch, I was only able to experience a very limited slice of Sniper Elite 5’s online features, but I wasn’t disappointed with what I played. Players can customize their loadouts, earn experience, and rank up. This includes free-for-all, Team Match, and No Cross. Sniper Elite 5 also sees the return of standard online multiplayer which lets players face off in a handful of different modes. It increases the tension and offers a legitimate challenge in between the waves of AI enemies that you go up against.Īs an incentive to invade other players, there is exclusive gear and cosmetics that players can earn from successfully eliminating other players through the Axis Invasion mode. An increasingly popular staple of online games, this allows players to invade your game mid-mission and attempt to kill you. Sniper Elite 5 adds a brand new mode with Axis Invasions. I was able to set off a string of traps with this mechanic on a number of occasions. There’s even a feature that shows the player their last known location, which is where enemies will go to search for you. From outlines around my character to different indicators and symbols in my HUD, I felt like I was always being given helpful information when deciding where to go and who to target. I appreciated how robust the UI is in Sniper Elite 5. Whether you’re infiltrating an enemy base or trying to eliminate a target in an open field, it’s all about being a ghost and staying undetected for as long as possible. In true Sniper Elite fashion, gameplay in SE 5 heavily revolves around stealth. There are also workbenches littered throughout the world that players can use to customize their weapon, adding and swapping attachments to change how the weapon performs in combat. This doesn’t just apply to the sniper rifles, but the submachine guns, sidearms, and other weapons featured in the game. Guns in Sniper Elite 5 feel responsive and tactile. Though it’s certainly not a new mechanic, it’s still extremely satisfying to follow the bullet in slow motion and watch it pierce the helmet, skull, and brain of an unsuspecting Nazi soldier.
The combat itself is exactly what fans expect from the Sniper Elite series - a lot of sniping enemies, with the iconic x-ray popping up for the most brutal kills. There were several instances where I just zagged in the opposite direction of the main objective and spent an hour screwing around with side tasks and extras. This includes a list of valuable targets that can be tracked down and killed for bonus rewards, as well as weapon caches that can be sabotaged. For example, my primary objective may be 600 meters away at a Nazi base camp, but along the way I’ll likely discover at least a couple distractions that’ll pull me off that path. Stealthy is healthyĪlthough the campaign in Sniper Elite 5 isn’t completely open-world, each mission features a pretty large level that makes the game feel a lot less linear than it actually is. I was always fascinated when side characters would pop back up and was genuinely curious to learn more about them.
Throughout his journey, Fairburne will meet and ally himself with a number of different characters, many of which I found to be pretty interesting.
Fairburne is a bit of a surface-level protagonist, but he’s got that level-headed badass quality that makes him a good enough Nazi-slaying avatar. An adaptation of true events that takes the necessary liberties to make it feel fresh and interesting, especially for a franchise that’s published multiple games in this setting. It’s more or less your standard World War 2 story. Fairburne soons finds himself in the thick of a dangerous Nazi plot that he’ll need to team up with French Resistance forces in order to stop. Players take on the role of Karl Fairburne a US ranger sent on a covert mission to weaken Nazi forces along the coast. Once again dropping players into the brutal World War 2 setting, Sniper Elite 5 centers around the infamous D-Day that took place in France in 1944. In addition to the standard franchise fixings, Sniper Elite 5 ups the ante with some new modes and features. Sniper Elite 5 is the latest iteration of that model and delivers on all fronts. There’s going to be a lot of sniping Nazis, gory x-ray animations, and a healthy serving of stealth in between. Ten entries in, the Sniper Elite franchise knows exactly what it is.