FPS General

I've been spending a lot of time this week playing Sniper: Ghost Warrior 2, the latest game from City Interactive. As I've been following the game's launch since last week, Istarted coming across some reasonably negative or sarcastic reviews. Some writers have gone so far as to talk about how Sniper: Ghost Warrior 2 focuses too much on sniping. 

Complaining about sniping...in a game called Sniper: Ghost Warrior 2. 

I have to wonder what they were expecting when they purchased a sniping game. A submachine gun simulator?

Ultimately, the bad reviews have bothered me. Sniper: Ghost Warrior 2 isn't the best game that has been release in 2013, but it's far from the worst (in other words, it's no Aliens: Colonial Marines). Right now, the game is sitting at 53 on Metacritic for the PC release. While I don't typically go in on traditional game reviews, I would put it much higher than 53. If I did traditional reviews, I would peg Sniper: Ghost Warrior 2 at around 70 out of 100.

Here's why I think it's better than most reviews would suggest.

Sniper: Ghost Warrior 2 has officially launched on PC, Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3.

The follow-up to the original, multi-million unit selling Sniper: Ghost Warrior puts players into the role as an elite sniper, one of the military's finest. It's up to you to use all of your stealth, cunning and accuracy to snipe your way through the games singleplayer and multiplayer offerings. We'll have more hands-on coverage with Sniper: Ghost Warrior 2 this week.

In the meantime, developer City Interactive has announced that Sniper: Ghost Warrior 2 will receive the Siberian Strike DLC pack at the end of this month. This inaugural DLC add-on will expand on the singleplayer story in the game with new missions set in the frozen wasteland that is Siberia. Sibera Strike will also include new winter-themed weapons to use in the game.

Marek Tyminski, CEO of CI Games had the following to say in regards to Siberian Strike:

From the suspenseful tactical sniper experience and multitude of real world locations to the incredible visuals, advanced AI and intelligent physics using Crytek’s, state-of-the-art, CryENGINE® 3, Sniper: Ghost Warrior 2 is a game built for the modern military video game enthusiasts. 

With several hours of new content, Siberian Strike is just the first step in our plan to continue to build upon the single player campaign and support the Sniper: Ghost Warrior 2 experience for our fans and gamers after launch.

Stay tuned to FPS General all week as we continue to cover Sniper: Ghost Warrior 2 post-launch!

Just heard from the com center, intel's spotted a Sniper: Ghost Warrior 2 trailer approaching from one click north. This report will debrief you on everything you need to know about the situation and a few terrible sniping puns that you didn't.

The official launch trailer for City Interactive's upcoming stealth, sniping game Sniper: Ghost Warrior 2 has been released and it's a good one. The environments in this game are absolutely stunning and we can't wait to explore them in person. You know, in between slow-motion headshot destruction.

The trailer touches on the single player story a bit, which is something that hasn't actually been stressed a whole lot over the course of the last few months. In a game like this, we think that the story doesn't have to be exceptional because the gameplay and environments can hold it on their own.

Still, we're hoping that it's a good story.

Focus your optics on the trailer above and make sure you visit our Sniper: Ghost Warrior 2 hub for more! Are you planning on picking up Sniper: Ghost Warrior 2 next week? Let us know why or why not!

Earlier this month, we had the chance to speak with Michał Sroczyński of City-Interactive on their upcoming, stealth-based first-person shooter Sniper: Ghost Warrior 2. Michal discussed the challenges of following up on the success of the original Sniper: Ghost Warrior as well as what the team's goals were for multiplayer in the game.

Check out the interview below!

Thanks for taking the time to chat with us! Can you briefly introduce yourself and your role on the Sniper: Ghost Warrior 2 team for our readers?

Hi, my name is Michał Sroczyński. I’m the producer of SGW2 and I’m involved in most (if not all) of the processes that touch Ghost Warrior 2’s development.

City Interactive recently announced that Sniper: Ghost Warrior 2 has gone gold. How is the team feeling about the finished product?

We’re very excited and can’t wait until gamers get their hands on it! It’s been a long road full of unexpected twists and turns but we’ve made it.

There’s a lot of heart in Sniper 2 and I’m really convinced that gamers will see that.

With the original Sniper: Ghost Warrior selling over 3 million copies, was there ever any sense that you had to ‘live up to expectations’ at all?

There are two kinds of goals you want to achieve with a game. Sales are one of them but what’s more important to us, as developers, is the other one – we challenge ourselves. If your goal is to make a game that “just has to sell better”, you lose the bigger perspective and the game itself starts to play a secondary role.

CI Games loves making video games, we love to put the bar higher with each title. When you look at the question from this perspective… yes, we had to live
up to expectations. And we did!

City Interactive is gearing up for the big release of Sniper: Ghost Warrior 2, releasing a rather gruesome trailer last week and following it up with today's video called 'Tactical Optics'.

In today's trailer, we get a look at some of the optic equipment that players will have at their disposal when the game ships on March 12th. These optics come in the form of a handy pair of binoculars and a thermal scope. If you've played shooters in the past, you'll be familiar with the thermal zoom scope. Essentially, this scope simply shows heat signatures of whatever you're looking at. Things like foliage and buildings will not have a very high heat signature, so they will show up as a cooler color. Enemies, however, with their warm shootable bodies, will show up as orange or red making it easy to see their outline. 

This is particularly handy in dark environments where the enemy blends in neatly with his surroundings.

The binoculars will help you paint targets on your HUD, allowing you to place a marker over them that will stick around when you pull out your rifle. This is a great tactic to use before the actual shooting begins. Mark your targets, get in place and take them down.

Check it out after the break and remember, Sniper: Ghost Warrior 2 launches next Tuesday. Stick with FPS General as we cover the game up to launch and beyond!

City Interactive is literally releasing Sniper: Ghost Warrior 2 on March 12th, 2013. The game has been pushed back more than a few times, but we're hoping it's going to be worth the wait.

In this latest trailer for the game, we're plunged headlong into a sniper's paradise, showing off the physics with a little bullet drop action coming into play. Keen observers will notice that the shot is lined up with the head and often ends up taking the target in the upper body area. It's external ballistics at its finest thanks to the powerful CryEngine 3, take a look above.

Word on the street is that this trailer features one headshot for each release date postponement. You heard it here first!

Bad news, again, out of the City Interactive camp as Sniper: Ghost Warrior 2 has once again been delayed. The game, originally scheduled for an August, 2012 release date was pushed back to January of this year, but unfortunately won't be seeing the light of day until March. Interestingly, City Interactive isn't announcing this as a delay but rather simply announcing it as if it were the target date all along.

The official announcement reads:

Sniper: Ghost Warrior 2, follow up to the best-selling sniper game of all time, is on target to hit store shelves on March 15^th.

Sniper: Ghost Warrior 2 is the only multi-platform, first-person, modern shooter exclusively designed around the sniper experience.  Taking advantage of the advanced capabilities of the CryENGINE3, it delivers striking graphic environments; more diverse sniper challenges; a rebuilt AI system and the thrilling “one shot; one kill” precision that made the original a huge hit, selling 3 million copies worldwide. 

And so on and so forth.

At any rate, the game is now scheduled to release on PlayStation 3, Xbox 360 and PC on March 15th, 2013 so make sure you stay tuned to FPS General as we get closer to the launch date!

Things have been pretty quiet lately in the City Interactive camp, since the announcement over the summer that Sniper: Ghost Warrior 2 would be delayed to January of 2013. It looks like that silence is now broken, however, as the team has released the very first gameplay trailer for the game.

We've seen some cinematic trailers for the game prior to this, but in today's video we are pretty much just looking at raw gameplay. Clips appear to have been captured directly from the game and simply spliced together in a teaser montage. Nothing in the trailer looks to be computer generated or anything other than actual gameplay. This is very promising, because you might have noticed that Sniper: Ghost Warrior 2 is beautiful.

That's probably because of CryEngine 3 - the game engine created by Crytek and used in such games as Crysis 2, Warface and the upcoming Crysis 3.

City Interactive is making the most out of CryEngine 3 and it shows in these gameplay clips. The environments, the characters, the weapon mechanics and the ballistics are some of the best we've seen.

Sniper: Ghost Warrior 2 is due to hit shelves on January 15th, 2013 on Xbox 360, PlayStation 3 and PC. Check it out at http://www.sniperghostwarrior.com/.

Sad news today for fans eagerly awaiting City Interactive Sniper: Ghost Warrior 2, as the studio has announced that the game is being pushed back - again. This time, delayed to a January 2013 release date. 

Originally scheduled for an August release date, Sniper: Ghost Warrior 2 was pushed back to October of this year. Now, sadly, it's being delayed even further and will not likely launch in 2012 at all. There hasn't been a very solid reason given for this push-back, although Namco-Bandai PR representative Lee Kirkton did say that, "It's key we all want this title to be fantastic in the genre and the leading SNIPER game for sure. The engine is fantastic and the level of polish is also key to the title's success. As soon as the official announcement through the publisher is available I will provide it."

With Sniper: Ghost Warrior 2 hoping to grab as much attention in the first-person shooter market as possible, it's likely that City Interactive and Namco-Bandai did not want to go head-to-head with other fall releases, which include the likes of Medal of Honor: Warfighter, Halo 4 and Call of Duty: Black Ops 2.

Stay tuned to FPS General for more Sniper: Ghost Warrior 2 news as it rolls out!

Thanks to @KillingSpree8 for the tip!

City Interactive has released an awesome new trailer for Sniper: Ghost Warrior 2, otherwise known as the other sniping game this year.

Ghost Warrior 2 takes place in a modern setting, whereas Sniper Elite V2 took place in World War II era. Perhaps the most exciting feature of the game is that it makes use of Crytek's CryEngine3, one of the most impressive and awe inspiring game engines out there right now. Sniper: Ghost Warrior 2 follows the story of modern snipers through multiple environments including jungles, mountains and the focus of today's video, urban areas.

City Interactive has announced some pretty awesome limited editions for their upcoming sniping game, Sniper: Ghost Warrior 2.

The game comes in three different bundles. The first, of course, is the bog standard, plain old Sniper: Ghost Warrior 2 with no extras. If you're looking to pick up just the base game, then this is the copy for you. If you're looking to get a little more, however, you'll want to look into the two limited editions that City Interactive unveiled this morning.

Collector's Edition

This is the ultimate Sniper: Ghost Warrior 2 bundle, and is pictured above (click to enlarge). This bundle includes:

• A steelbook copy of Sniper: Ghost Warrior 2
• A ‘Sniper Tactics and History’ hardback book, developed in collaboration with military experts with combat experience
• A lavish artbook with never before published illustrations of environments and characters from the game
• An official soundtrack CD
• The DSR-1 in-game sniper rifle for multiplayer modes
• The Vintorez in-game sniper rifle – AKA the ‘Thread cutter’ – for use in multiplayer modes
• Four exclusive multiplayer playable characters (Diaz, Medox, Marinov and Marine Team Leader)

And all packaged inside its own 'prestigiously produced folded box.' If you're not looking for all that extra content, City Interactive also have a mid-range bundle to offer...

City Interactive has released a huge batch of screenshots for their upcoming sniping game, Sniper: Ghost Warrior 2, showing off some of the environments and shot lethality in the game.

Sniper: Ghost Warrior 2 takes place in a modern setting, where you play as one of the world's most elite snipers. Much as in real life, the best snipers in Ghost Warrior 2 will be experts at keeping themselves hidden while they move from point to point, ensuring that they can get in position and provide overwatch for their squad.

The screenshots released this morning showcase some of the power that Sniper: Ghost Warrior 2 is able to utilize thanks to CryEngine 3, Crytek's proprietary game engine that City Interactive is using in Sniper: Ghost Warrior 2. CryEngine 3 is capable of some truly amazing things and easily rivals Battlefield 3's Frosbite 2 as one of the most powerful and exciting game engine's on the market.

City Interactive has nailed down a release date for their upcoming sniping game, Sniper: Ghost Warrior 2, a follow up the the popular 2010 sniping Sniper: Ghost Warrior.

Sniper: Ghost Warrior 2 has us pretty excited for a handful of reasons, but at the forefront is the games use of Crytek's proprietary game engine CryEngine3. This is the engine that powered the gorgeous Crysis 2 and has been leased for use in a handful of games since. The engine is powerful and capable of creating some truly gorgeous environments and gameplay situations. Sniper: Ghost Warrior 2 will compete directly with Sniper Elite V2 for the sniping simulator throne, although in our books, there is always room for both - particularly as they visit two entirely different eras.