The Sniper Ghost Warrior series of sniper stealth shooters from the Polish studio CI Games has been in the shadow of the Sniper Elite series from the British Rebellion Developments for too long. The last installments of both franchises were released almost simultaneously, with Sniper Ghost Warrior always losing this duel to Sniper Elite. But now, while Rebellion was distracted by the strange and never demanded by the public Strange Brigade , CI Games had a chance, which she took advantage of. In the absence of a competitor, the new Sniper Ghost Warrior Contracts, which has borrowed many elements from its counterparts over the years, looks quite good. Plus, unlike the already somewhat boring setting of World War II, the Polish stealth shooter exploits modern political realities.

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So, in the near future, the Russian Federation broke up into several subjects of international law. Under the slogan “Stop feeding Moscow”, Siberia separated from Russia, taking with it all the natural resources. It’s just that the Siberians traditionally failed to build democracy, instead, as always, an oligarchic-gangster godfather came out, who borrowed all the bad habits from the neighbors. The Siberian government began to put pressure on the dissatisfied, to fight with its neighbors (Mongolia was the first to be dealt with), and to threaten the United States, China and what was left of Russia. Of course, no one will like such behavior, and a certain agency that hides its affiliation has placed a number of contracts to eliminate the first persons of Siberia. You, as a nameless sniper with a military background, respond to this contract and must thin out the top of the Siberian “establishment” consisting of bandits, former KGB agents, mad scientists and dishonest politicians. No remorse, it’s just a job that pays well.

Unlike Sniper Ghost Warrior 3 with its three large open levels, the ability to drive around in a car and a lot of additional secondary tasks, Sniper Ghost Warrior Contracts has six levels (one of them is a practice shooting range) in slightly smaller sizes, comparable in size to the levels in Sniper Elite III and Sniper Elite 4 . On each of the maps there are four to six tasks that can be completed in any order and using different approaches. All targets can be approached from different sides, and eliminations are possible both from a long distance from sniper positions, and close, in quiet or loud modes. True, some tasks require you to pick up a certain object from an eliminated target, find records or data, so you still have to climb into a protected area, even if you prefer sniper weapons. After completing all tasks in one level, you move on to the next one.

In addition to the main tasks, each level has challenges that bring you extra money and tokens needed to get the most powerful skills. As a rule, these are requirements to complete all tasks without raising an alarm, take out certain targets within the allotted time, perform a given number of long-range kills, etc. Plus, there are collectibles on each of the levels, as a rule, these are posters (yes, the “Stop feeding Moscow!” poster is also there) or notebooks of one of the characters that you have to eliminate.

Earned money and two types of tokens are needed to open and buy new types of weapons and powerful hero abilities. The fact is that our nameless character, at the request of the employers, must wear a special high-tech mask, reminiscent of the mask of Corvo Attano from Dishonored . With this device, employers can monitor the activities of their agent, plus it makes it easier to navigate difficult areas.

A pumped mask can mark opponents within a certain radius from the owner, show their traces, places where you can hide yourself or hide your body, vulnerable points of machines and mechanisms, electrical panels, allows you to see camera view areas and hack automatic turrets. Cheating device.

In addition, your hero has a lot of additional gadgets at his disposal, however, it is not a fact that, having upgraded the mask, you will want to use many of them. A micro-drone that allows you to mark opponents, hack cameras, turrets and burn out electronics is a really handy thing, only jammers are installed near most of the primary targets, making the drone useless. The same stationary sensors can, of course, be used to protect your sniper position, but it’s easier to pump up the mask or scatter jumping mines on the approaches. And here is a really interesting and useful thing – a remote-controlled sniper turret, which can be installed, for example, in a completely different sniper position in order to shoot through the entire level, preventing the enemy from hiding in shelters.

However, the enemy in Sniper Ghost Warrior Contracts, traditionally for such games, lends itself, although since the previous part of AI it has undergone some upgrade. No, in the same way, after ten minutes, the enemies forget that an evil sniper is wandering around the base, and resume patrolling, stepping over the corpses of their comrades. And yes, they, as always, periodically peek out from behind shelters, substituting themselves for your bullets. But on the other hand, AI soldiers have learned to calculate and come to your sniper position, which causes some trouble, especially at the first levels. So yeah, don’t forget the mines.

Traditionally, the Poles from CI Games did not have enough money to license real rifles and machine guns, so get ready to guess the guns by their outlines. There are eleven sniper rifles in the game (ten in the base version and one more in the Deluxe version), five submachine guns/submachine guns (one from the Deluxe version), and eight pistols (one from the Deluxe version). Moreover, only one sniper rifle and one pistol are equipped with silencers, and only one machine gun can be conditionally considered quiet, and even then, in enclosed spaces, opponents perfectly hear his shots. Moreover, the quiet sniper rifle does not do the most damage, and the quiet submachine gun and pistol are generally only included in the Deluxe version. This is VERY weird for a stealth game and, frankly, not very fair to the players.

The ballistics of weapons, primarily for rifles, has changed slightly since the last part, but the process of aiming, especially at the highest difficulty level, has become more difficult. You must first measure the distance to the target, set the range on the scope and take into account the wind correction. Considering that jammers work in some places on the level, the rangefinder data and the target mark will quickly disappear, so you need to make corrections quickly. On medium difficulty, trajectory drop and wind drift are given as hints, but not on the final difficulty level. You have to explore the penetration of obstacles by various types of rifles and various ammunition on your own.

In general, the gameplay of Sniper Ghost Warrior Contracts is very similar to Sniper Ghost Warrior 3 and Sniper Elite 4. Find a sniper position, explore the level, take out snipers and individual enemy sentries, look for an entry point, infiltrate the object, removing those who meet you on the way or hiding from them, take what you need and leave. It is not worth entering into an open confrontation with opponents, although at an average difficulty level it is quite possible to clear a checkpoint with a machine gun in your hands, but, I repeat what was said in the review of the previous game in the series, this is still a sniper stealth shooter, and you should play it in quiet mode . Yes, like all such games, Sniper Ghost Warrior Contracts is slow, methodical and even somewhat monotonous, but if you like this type of gameplay, this should not confuse you.

Like the previous installment in the series, Sniper Ghost Warrior Contracts uses Crytek’s CryEngine engine, and, apparently, the same CryEngine 4, and not the newest CryEngine V. The game shows a good picture, but sometimes one gets the impression that it was released two years ago Sniper Ghost Warrior 3 was prettier. But no brakes and reloads, even on a PC three or four years ago. Again, as in the previous part, the visualization of murders here is inferior to the proprietary X-Ray kill cam from the Sniper Elite series.

The developers at CI Games have come a long way. From frankly under-AAA Sniper: Ghost Warrior and Sniper: Ghost Warrior 2 , through a good but underdeveloped Sniper Ghost Warrior 3 to Sniper Ghost Warrior Contracts, which can finally compete on equal terms with Sniper Elite 4. Well, Let’s see how Rebellion Developments responds with Sniper Elite 5, which was announced in March 2019. Before the release of the fifth part, the British studio should also release Sniper Elite VR for the PlayStation virtual reality system, so it’s really worth waiting for the full-fledged next part in 2021 rather than in 2020. By then, CI Games may have time to prepare a sequel to Sniper Ghost Warrior Contracts.

PS “Quite by accident” the developers painted the main character’s parachute and places where you can replenish ammunition and change gadgets in the colors of the Ukrainian flag. In addition, footage from the Maidan is used several times in the video sequence of the game.