Any fan of sniper-based video games knows that Silent Scope, released in 1999, is the birth giver of the sniper FPS sub-genre. Hell, maybe you've played it in the arcade. For its time, and still today, its use of a peripheral life-size model sniper rifle that housed a screen within its scope has been one of the most innovative creations in gaming history. The game did eventually get ported to home consoles, and from it spawned two sequels that weren't very well received. Absolutely nothing beats the original arcade Silent Scope.
Why am I talking about a game that has little to do with Sniper: Ghost Warrior, though? A game that was released in 2010, five years after the first Sniper Elite came out. Well, hunting games aside, these are literally the only franchises that deliver a primarily sniper-based experience to the gaming audience. Sure, you have one-offs like Hitman: Sniper Challenge and Sniper: Art of Victory, but only Sniper: Ghost Warrior, Sniper Elite, and previously Silent Scope, offer up a consistent stream of releases for this niche sub-genre.
As is the norm for most military-centric FPS titles, Sniper: Ghost Warrior takes you for a walk in the shoes of various characters. Throughout the 16 chapters, which are split up into 4 acts, you will play as Sergeant Tyler Wells (Razor Six-Four) when it comes to long-range and stealth missions, a rebel known as El Tejon for direct firefight missions, and Private Cole Anderson. As is also the status-quo for these games, the plot is a somewhat convoluted web that involves infiltrations, assassinations, and a government that has been overthrown by a hostile force. There's really nothing special about the storyline, it's extremely basic and at its best, very dry.
To its credit, the game does offer up a good mixture of missions. Even though it's supposed to be a sniper game, there are a lot of chapters that require you to run-and-gun, as well as participate in direct firefights. Other missions will have you crawling around enemy base camps to avoid detection, as raising one alarm will fail the mission. There are also times where you will be sniper support for ground troops, or acting as a spotter for them. As well, there are a couple of assassination missions; one with a ludicrous goal of killing someone from some 200 meters away with a pistol. However, through it all, the ending is abysmally anti-climactic and not worth the trouble that the notorious AI puts you through to get there.
For some reason, Sniper: Ghost Warrior doesn't like anything newer than Windows 7, so when you first load it up the introduction cinematic and menu are in black and white, and upside down. The mouse sensitivity is far too high, but it can be lowered in-game; though some people have had to actually change their own DPI. As well, the title refuses to adhere to any refresh rate setting that you put it on; expect outrageous frames per second like 300-2000. I cannot comment on whether or not the online portion of this game is still alive, mostly because you have to go through a bunch of hoops and sign up for an account to do so; I am lazy, and I definitely did not feel like going through the trouble for a game of this caliber.
To sum up Sniper: Ghost Warrior, imagine taking all that the original Sniper Elite offered, butchering it with terrible AI, awful bullet physics, a cliché story, sometimes completely stupid objectives, and all the while injecting graphics that are entirely outdated for a 2010 release, and then stapling bits of Call of Duty to it; even the "secret" intel pick-ups are a direct rip off of Modern Warfare. All of that combined makes this release a poor man's Sniper Elite that's just entirely worth skipping. It's mediocre at best, horrendously boring yet simultaneously infuriating at worst. This is one to skip, even if it comes to you from a bundle or bargain; but hey, the soundtrack is decent.
Rating: 3.0/5.0 - Average, can take it or leave it.Enjoyed this review? Join my Steam Group!http://steamcommunity.com/groups/bhhreviews