

These Long Shot contracts mean you’ll be making shots nearly a mile away. The game’s saving grace is the Long Shot contracts, which drop you into a similar area, but the goal is ultimately to make it to vantage points and plonk yourself down overlooking one of several target areas in each place. The Classic contracts are more akin to previous games in the series: you are having firefights at under 200m, you’ll spend a lot of time failing stealth and hiding in bushes, and it’s quite a close-quarters affair.

The game is divided into two core contract types and they have genuine differences. Credit: CI GamesĮach mission in the game has a cluster of contracts, taking place in an open-world environment that you can explore at your own pace. Distinctively shit, in most cases, but they do at least feel different. None of the guns are licensed but they are recognisable, and they are distinctive. Unfortunately, Contracts 2 seems to have been designed in such a way that you’re constantly being pulled away from the sniping and forced to scrap it out with enemies up close, where rubbish weapon-handling combines with sub-par AI and an unforgiving health pool to make sure you have a bad time. The sniping is probably the best out there. I quickly learnt the impact that windage, range and even zeroing my scope would have on my ability to hit someone, and when I was taking long-range shots, I felt genuinely empowered. Sticking with the formula, Sniper: Ghost Warrior Contracts 2 (which I’ll call Contracts 2 now, for my sanity) is also a surprisingly comprehensive sniping game, breaking down the mechanics of being a marksman in a way that is accessible and doesn’t patronise you at all. READ MORE: ‘El Paso, Elsewhere’ is ‘Max Payne’ with break-up trauma – and it wants to change the industry.

From 2008’s Sniper: Art of Victory all the way to the unfortunately titled Sniper: Ghost Warrior Contracts 2, The franchise has often been a masterclass in marksmanship, delivering on the promise of being a fun and interesting sniping game, before forcing you to slog through countless terrible close-range engagements. One of life’s great mysteries is the Sniper Ghost Warrior franchise.
