Sniper Elite 5

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Originally I heard the next Sniper Elite title was going to take place around Finland during the Winter War versus the Soviets, but I guess Rebellion changed their minds. Maybe developing new gameplay mechanics involving the snow and forests proved to be too problematic, or maybe it's just cheaper to develop a setting using their assets from the previous games? Beats me.

The next title will take place in 1944 France just before the D-Day invasion commences, and involve Karl Fairborne, the protagonist of all the previous Sniper Elite games, again trying to stop another German superweapon codenamed "Kraken" from changing the tides of the war. Looks like they're using the V2 rockets again as a plot device, but that seems a bit too safe, especially since that was more or less the plot of Sniper Elite 2.

The core gameplay will likely be identical to what Sniper Elite 4 crafted; makes sense, because it's open-map approach helped make it arguably the best-received title in the series. 2-player co-op is still a thing, only this time you can choose to play "Invader mode," which adds in a hostile human player into the campaign missions whose sole purpose is to find and eliminate the others. Wonder how they're gonna deal with spawn camping, this being a literal sniping game, after all...

Sniper Elite 5 has been released. Here's a couple of reviews about the game:

IGN's (rather short) review:

ACG's take on the game (and a much better review):

And finally, Gaming Bolt's take:

I'm not gonna watch one unsolicited review video, let alone three.

Mind summarizing their key points, or at least boiling them down to positive/negative?

• TL;DR? Sniper Elite 5 is more of the same, but better - which is something the franchise has been doing respectably well over the years.
  • More pointedly, Rebellion clearly believed Sniper Elite 4 was the game to continue emulating, because it has all the same big features: big open maps with an open approach to completing objectives, more diversity in approaching combat (sniper rifles aren't the obviously superior and "only correct choice" weapons they were in the earlier entries), and campaign co-op.
• Overall the game looks good, sounds good, and plays good, but you'll occasionally find jagged or low-res textures, janky character movements, T-posing, etc. Nothing too bad though.
• Some odd sound design choices. Namely, your character's hearing sensitivity is a bit TOO much - the guy can hear Germans casually talking behind walls from several feet away with little distortion, same with other noises you'd expect to be more muffled from a distance. Normally this would be forgivable in a louder, more faster-paced shooter, but in a stealth title where sound is a key aspect of remaining undetected, it can be both jarring and confusing.
• More precise details numbers, and far less "stat bar" ambiguity when customizing your guns, making it easier to figure out how to min-max your gear. They even added in an exact decibel measurement for the loudness of your guns when fired.
• Haven't been able to try out the campaign Pv P yet - or the game itself, really. It's still locked in my region. Will post my results once I get in a decent matchup or two.

Ok, FINALLY played the game myself. Some quick thoughts:

• The during the very first mission, in the tutorial section, after getting past the first two soldiers manning the searchlights, I proceeded forward to the small fishing hut on the path. It had a locked door, and both my character and the tutorial suggested that a nearby officer was holding a key for the door. Only... there was absolutely nobody else around. I had to restart the mission for the rest of the enemies to load in and progress, and now I'm wondering what other weirdness might occur in the future if I ran into a game-breaking bug this early.
• Non-lethal takedowns are now possible, both via a melee attack and a non-lethal mine. Probably some other gear that enables such a playthrough - perhaps even bullets? We'll see soon enough.
• Maybe it's due to the nature of the first mission in videogames always serving as a tutorial, but after playing Ghost Recon: Wildlands and other open-mission / world games it's rather jarring to see so many waist-high wall restrictions or unpassable terrain scattered throughout the map. Doubly so since Karl Fairburne is more nimble and capable of vaulting over walls this time.
• Your French resistance contact in the first mission is a Scottish woman. A black Scottish woman. Don't wanna sound racist here, but was actually a thing in that era?!
• Seagulls on the ground will remain completely unfazed by any sort of commotion, be it a human walking directly into their flock, gunfire, one of their bird buddies being shot by said gunfire, or even a dead body being thrown directly on top of them. Methinks somebody fell short programming the AI there.
• At least the gunplay is the best yet in the series. SM Gs and handguns are no longer these highly situational weapons that are godawful against anything beyond 20 meters, and you can even choose to aim directly down the sights instead of the usual third-person over the shoulder view, if you'd like.
• I'd advise playing on Sniper Elite difficulty or higher if you're a fan of the series, anything lower is just too easy.