Boring narrative aside, Sniper Elite Ghost Warrior Contracts 2 is superb at delivering its bread and ballistics gameplay. Focused purely on the art of the kill, CI Games has crafted numerous detailed sandboxes to become the ultimate long-distance predator inside of, resulting in a game that forges ahead and doubles down on its own unique brand of hold-your-breath gunplay. Pure cathartic and exhilarating action with every squeeze of the trigger.

Developer CI Games has confirmed that Sniper Ghost Warrior Contracts 2 will be out in the Northern hemisphere fall season, which would mean that this title arrives less than a year after the last game.

Sniper: Ghost Warrior has always seemed like the bastard step-child to the super Sniper Elite franchise. Polish developer CI Games’ last game, Sniper: Ghost Warrior 3 did little to change that perception. While the tactical shooter offered an open world, it offered little interesting or new and suffered from a raft of technical issues. With that in mind, I didn’t really expect to enjoy Sniper: Ghost Warrior Contracts at all.

That slide of the bolt, the satisfying click-clack of a bullet being loaded and the joy of perfectly hitting the mark makes for some tremendous action when all the pieces align correctly. It’s a focus that CI Games lost during the lengthy development of Sniper Ghost Warrior, a bitter pill that was swallowed as the studio is now coming back with a bang in Sniper Ghost Warrior Contracts.

Finally breaking their silence, CI Games has confirmed that not only is Lords of the Fallen 2 still in development, but it happens to have a new partner in crime to help out with completing the sequel: Defiant, a new studio that happens to have plenty of veteran talent within its ranks.

It seems that Lords of the Fallen 2, which would have had an increase in scope has had that scope reduced. The team working on it has sadly also been hit with layoffs.

"Instead we spent too much effort trying to catch up with other AAA titles in terms of their production values and features. That was a big mistake," says Sniper Ghost Warrio developer CI Games.

Sniper Ghost Warrior 3 should have been a better game. Disassembled, it had all the parts needed to give the thrill of the one-shot one-kill calibre that it deserves. The assembled game however, completely misses its target as it comes off as a mismanaged product that fails to deliver on its promises.