The modern shooter has become something drastically different than when I started playing the genre with Halo in the early 2000s. With a hyper-focus on lax trigger-fingers and a need for peak reflexes, the pace in any first or third-person shooter is at breakneck speeds. As a result, when a game is based around sniping and demands patience and versatility, for modern players, it’s like using the other side of their brain. How does a game like Sniper Elite 5 fare in 2022, where fast-paced battle royales are king?

In Sniper Elite‘s fifth outing, players know the drill by now. You take out Nazis as Karl Fairburne, whether it be with carefully-timed headshots, inconspicuous stealth takedowns, or some serious run-and-gunning. You also get slo-mo x-rays of your well-placed shots tearing apart enemy organs. This time around, the maps are humongous. My average mission time was just about 60 minutes every time. Also just let me say, I couldn’t take my eyes off the screen the whole time. Let’s get into why Sniper Elite 5 is immersive, engaging, and a damn good time.

Sniper Elite 5 has a near-perfect gameplay loop, no matter what your playstyle is. Sneaking around is a breeze with ample opportunity for whistles/bottle throws. Sniping feels great as you judge how many enemies around you will hear your kill shot and move accordingly. If you’re confident in your guerilla tactics, you can even take an SMG and run your way through dozens of foes, but that playstyle presents the biggest challenge as it’s not the way the game is intended to be played. However, it can still be enjoyed as such.

Where my time with Sniper Elite 5 truly shined, though, is the Axis Invasion mode. Much like a Dark Souls invasion, you have the ability to drop inside someone’s campaign mission and take them down as an enemy. You’re given a limited equipment set and your location on the large map can be approximated with a telephone call.

The action gets seriously pulse-pounding and a ton of strategy has to be employed, but this mode had my heart beating like crazy, both going through my campaign fighting off invaders and especially doing the invading. I had to do some waiting for this mode due to the limited player base ahead of release, but every match was a serious blast.

Sniper Elite 5 really pushed me to my skill limits in several ways. Not just requiring strong aim, patience was absolutely key in several moments, whether it be waiting for a noise distraction to mask the loud sniper rifle or fighting seemingly half the map after an alarm was triggered. I only managed to die a few times when the number of enemies was too great, and the checkpoints were forgiving enough for me to keep at it.

I legitimately had to tear myself away from the screen to write this Sniper Elite 5 review. By the time it goes live, I’ll likely have spent its pre-release week glued back to the screen as I whittle down all my campaign objectives and consistently make other players’ days worse in Invasion mode. There’s no question about it. Sniper Elite 5 is a must-play. Aside from a few visual bugs, it’s a third-person shooter dream-come-true.

A PlayStation 5 Review Copy of Sniper Elite 5 was provided by Rebellion for this Review

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Sniper Elite 5

49.99

9.5

Score

9.5/10

Pros

• Incredible Level Design
• Seriously Addictive
• Huge Replay Value

Cons

• Just a Few Bugs
• Levels Too Long for Some