Tech Olive

Aiming (if you’ll forgive the term) for a somewhat untouched flavor of the FPS genre, Sniper: Ghost Warrior focuses on long-range combat through your well-polished sniper scope. While most war games only feature scoped weapons briefly in their campaigns, Ghost Warrior promises to make this aspect its primary focus. With this different take on the FPS genre, how does Ghost Warrior measure up against other modern war games of 2010?

Heralding itself as the most realistic sniping game, Sniper: Ghost Warrior surprised me last week with a demo that featured solid graphics and controls with very satisfying sniping mechanics. However, as one would expect, the demo wasn’t without a few bugs and annoyances, but I expected these issues would be ironed out for the retail release. I was wrong. From the name, you’d expect that the entire game is spent far from the battlefield in a nice concealing bush. Again, I was wrong. A good percentage of the game is actually spent in (relatively) close-range sniping and/or playing from the perspective of ground assault teams as you’re being covered by snipers (who you get to play as next), which does create a nice flow, but only makes you crave your next turn on the sniper side of the battlefield.

Unfortunately, the game is cursed from the start. While the overall aesthetic and graphics are crisp and impressive, they are riddled with many clipping issues that will often allow you to see through buildings, rocks and many other obstacles. This hinders the game’s overall polish, but it’s still a mild enough issue and by no means is it a deal breaker.

However, the game’s largest issue becomes apparent when you’re sneaking through the many jungles you’ll come across in Ghost Warrior. It goes without saying that most of the game is spent sneaking and walking around in a crouched or prone stance, so one would expect a mechanic as simple as this to work as intended. Does it? No. As you’re sneaking and you come across some stairs or just a small rock that you need to step over, your character will run into it like a brick wall until you stand up and/or jump over this tiny obstacle. Unsurprisingly, this usually ruins the stealth cover you’ve been working so hard to maintain for the past hour. Of course, this fact isn’t helped by the enemies’ ability to see through what you would think is heavy cover, thanks to an annoyingly inconsistent stealth system.

Despite what you may be thinking at this point, the game’s sniping mechanics are actually its saving grace. While the missions that focus on the ground assault teams are a blemish on the campaign, the sniping side of things are actually reliable and satisfying enough to make the game very enjoyable, especially the “bullet cam” that will follow your bullet in slow motion for some shots (see above image).

Ghost Warrior does make an attempt at an engaging storyline, but it falls short of anything interesting with it revolving around a notoriously common revenge plot with no further attempt to make it more dramatic. But for anyone that actually played the pre-release demo, the game’s biggest storyline twist is completely spoiled anyway, and while it’s nice that the game makes some attempts at making it feel cinematic, most of these methods are obviously inspired or even directly copied from recent Call of Duty games.

This is a definite graphics-and-gameplay kind of game. Don’t expect much in the storyline department, but if you can handle that, then expect a great shooting experience that you won’t find anywhere else. At the end of it all, wait for this game to hit the discount bin before grabbing it for yourself, but until then, grab the 1.36GB demo and that should keep you entertained with its singleplayer and multiplayer content.

Scores

- Graphics: 8
Graphics are actually one of this game’s stronger points. Built on the same engine as Call of Juarez: Bound in Blood, the lighting and overall environment are well polished while remaining fairly easy on the resources. However, take into account the serious clipping issues and you’ve got an overall mediocre outcome.

- Storyline: 3
Sniper: Ghost Warrior relies on a very basic storyline layout, filled with typical vendettas and betrayal, but it was hard to expect much else. If you plan on playing this game, don’t hope for any depth or interest in the game’s storyline at all.

- Gameplay: 8
Here, we come to the game’s crown jewels. Despite a collection of other issues, the game’s sniping mechanic is actually very well done. Your shots are affected by many factors and having to account for those factors on-the-fly actually makes the shooting very satisfying and rewarding.

- Controls: 7
The game features your typical FPS control layout with nothing special or confusing, it’s simple enough to leave you to worry about more important issues.

- Lasting Appeal: 4
Ghost Warrior does feature multiplayer and more of the same shooting that you’ll find in the campaign, but it just doesn’t seem to offer the same appeal. At any rate, it’s clear that the developers should have spent more time focusing on the game’s campaign than implementing multiplayer.

Overall: 6 Olives