4/5 ★ – Fannfell's review of Tom Clancy's Ghost Recon: Breakpoint.

(I am reviewing the Jan 2023 version of the game on PS5, many changes were made since its launch) A great tactical shooter with smooth and brutal gameplay. The gameplay is the star of the show with this game, if you like "tacticool" games and/or modern military combat games then you should definitely give this a try. The gameplay feels very smooth even when transitioning between stealth and going loud, whether this be on purpose or accident. The guns feel different from each other and attachments make a real difference for many of them. There are a wide range of weapons available and I found myself going out of my way to try out as many as I could. I played on "realistic" mode with some customized settings, I highly recommend this mode as it takes out the Division style gun ranking system and reverts to how it was in the previous game. Also the sound design of the guns is some of the best I have witnessed in a shooter game. The guns sound like they hit hard and different guns have different volumes so when you switch from an SMG to a sniper rifle you can really hear the boom without blowing out your eardrums. This effect makes the heavier guns feel more powerful as well. There were a few issues every now and then where the reload sound would not play when I initiated the animation however this only happened a handful of times throughout my 31 hours of play time. The character customization is alright with some options, but where the customization really shines is with your character's gear. I found myself spending a lot of time making cool outfits for different kinds of environments and doing the same for my teammates. The story gets the job done and thats about it. It feels barebones and the cutscenes have an "unfinished" feel to them, each scene is always in a single location and it feels weirdly isolated. The voice acting and dialogue writing were abysmally bad at points but gets the job done. The gameplay can get very repetitive as there is only one or two types of engagements throughout the whole game. What I mean by this is you are always doing something like eliminate this enemy by assaulting this base or get this intel by assaulting this base or save this person by assaulting this base, etc... You can assault said bases in any way you like, including a mixture of stealth, combat, and tech. Also there are some unique and interesting buildings and bases that you attack throughout the game including a mixture of environment types. But I can see how this can get old for many, but if you are like me and you love this kind of gameplay thats not going to be a problem and you can pretty easily get at least 30 hours out of the campaign alone. There has also been quite a bit of content added and if you enjoy the core gameplay you could get a lot of time out of this game, and even more so if you have friends to play with. Visually the game is fine, not terrible but nothing to write home about. The next gen upgrade does help this a but though and the 60fps is a game changer. If you want some smooth tactical gameplay and wanna look cool while doing it then this is the game for you!