For my Sniper Elite: Resistance review, I’ve spent the past week deep behind enemy lines in occupied France, hunting down a secret superweapon, infiltrating Nazi bases, and gunning down the Sniper Elite: Resistance achievements. I love the Sniper Elite series, and Rebellion — although it is playing it safe with this sequel — has produced another fine stealth game that’s all about player choice and the joys of sniping a pair of Nazi’s testicles off from hundreds of meters away. Game Pass starts 2025 with a bang, thanks to Sniper Elite: ResistanceSniper Elite: Resistance doesn’t move the needle in terms of new gameplay features, but it’s still a blast to playRelease date: January 28, 2025Xbox Game Pass tiers: Game Pass Ultimate and PC Game Pass’If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it’ appears to be Rebellion’s design principles for Sniper Elite: Resistance. Basically, this new entry into the franchise is more Sniper Elite 5, just with a different main character and some optional, time-based missions bolted on. For the first time in the series, Sniper Elite has a new protagonist. In a story that runs parallel with Sniper Elite 5, you play as Special Operations Executive (SOE) agent Harry Hawker, who partners up with the French Resistance to locate and destroy a new Nazi super weapon. If you’ve played any of the previous Sniper Elite games, you’ll be used to the cool and cheesy Karl Fairburne taking center stage. While it is interesting to see Rebellion try and take Resistance in a new direction, the cheeky Harry Hawker is nowhere near as iconic as Fairburne, and I found his constant, repeated quips and barks quite grating — I know the long grass is good for stealth and that it makes you itchy, please be quiet now. Still, the characters and the plot have never really taken center stage in Sniper Elite; it’s all about the gameplay here. For those familiar with Sniper Elite 5, you’ll know exactly what to expect with Resistance. For the uninitiated, you are plonked down in a gorgeous sandbox with several objectives to complete. These objectives range from picking up files and gathering intelligence to destroying anti-air batteries and taking out high-value targets — the only thing standing in your way is, of course, a load of Nazi soldiers. You can approach each objective in any order, and how you complete each one is entirely up to you. Do you sit back and snipe as many soldiers as you can to thin their ranks before stealthily moving in? Or do you go running into the fray all guns blazing? Player choice is a key component in the Sniper Elite series, and that hasn’t gone away here. I love having the absolute freedom to take on a mission in whichever way I see fit. There are eight of these missions, well, technically, there are nine, but the last one doesn’t really count, and each one offers a large open sandbox to explore that’s filled with detail and plenty of opportunities for mischief. Each level has been expertly designed with vantage points for some excellent long-range sniping and more claustrophobic areas for close-quarters combat. Seriously, Rebellion needs to be commended here for its excellent level design; I didn’t once get bored exploring every nook and cranny on the Devil’s Cauldron quarry mission or the Dead Drop city level. Nor did I ever find myself bored with sniping. That gloriously gory X-ray kill cam is just so much fun, and it never gets old watching a bullet crack through a skull or explode an eyeball. What did let the experience down somewhat was some wonky enemy AI. On several occasions, I found that enemies would not walk up a flight of stairs, and despite being lured into a building with constant whistles and even gunshots, they would remain on the floor below, bewildered as to where the noise was coming from. I also had a few instances where the enemy could see through walls, stealth takedowns not connecting, and one side mission that required me to kill a Nazi officer with some rat poison, just not work (the rat poison disappeared from my inventory). Rebellion does have plans to fix a few AI bugs, so it’s possible that these will be sorted in a later update.As you move through a level, complete objectives, and dispatch enemies in whichever way you see fit, you are awarded XP. This XP can be used to upgrade Hawker’s skills and abilities. Sadly, it seems Rebellion has copied across the same skill tree from Sniper Elite 5 to Resistance, so there are no exciting new skills to mess around with here. There are a bunch of different weapons this time around, though, and completing certain objectives on a mission or finding various collectibles will unlock them and a suite of customization options for you, giving you more tools to use. This adds to the replayability of Sniper Elite: Resistance, along with finding and unlocking different starting points for each level. One new collectible you can find while playing are Propaganda Posters. There are eight posters hidden throughout the campaign, and they unlock a special Propaganda Mission once collected. Propaganda Missions are the only real new addition to the game here. In these challenges, you play as a resistance fighter and go up against the clock to kill as many enemies as possible under certain conditions. On some missions, you can only snipe from a distance, whereas on others, you can go all out with rocket launchers and machine guns. These missions are fine, if not a little uninspired. Still, they do offer a bit of replayability and will be great for those interested in high-score chasing.As for the multiplayer, unfortunately, I couldn’t test this out during the review period, as there were never enough players available for a match. I also couldn’t find players for co-op or the survival mode, but as far as I can tell, nothing is different here compared to Sniper Elite 5 — it’s all the same modes for multiplayer. What I did get to test out, though, was the invasion mode. Invasion mode allows you to enter another player’s game as an enemy sniper and ruin their fun. I love a good invasion mode, and Sniper Elite’s is always an absolute joy. Of course, if you leave the setting on, you can have other players invade your game, too. The level of tension this adds is brilliant. You’re constantly on the lookout for that enemy player, hiding in a bush on the other side of the map, being extra cautious not to give your position away. It’s great, and in my opinion, no game does an invasion mode better than Sniper Elite. On the achievement front, the list wasn’t live while I was playing, but you have your usual campaign achievements, achievements for completing certain tasks on a level, and a bunch of cumulative achievements for killing enemies with specific weapons or equipment. I believe there is also an achievement for completing the game on Authentic difficulty, which will likely prove a challenge.SummarySniper Elite: Resistance is a safe follow-up to Sniper Elite 5 that doesn’t add much in terms of new features and gameplay mechanics, and while it would have been nice to see Rebellion be a bit more ambitious, Resistance is still a fantastic game that gives the player so much choice and freedom. Each campaign level has been expertly designed to offer as much fun and replayability as possible, and the long-range sniping the series is famous for just never gets old, thanks to that gloriously gory X-ray kill cam.8 / 10* Sean spent around 20 hours playing Sniper Elite: Resistance on an Xbox Series X. A review code was provided by the publisher.
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