Like a fleet of Allied landing craft storming the beaches of Normandy, Sniper Elite 5 has blown me away. I spent most of my weekend with it in a state of delighted befuddlement, constantly muttering ‘isn’t this brilliant?’ as it delivered yet another incredibly designed level to creep around while turning Nazi skulls into cornflakes. I’ve enjoyed Rebellion’s infamously grisly stealth series since the middling V2, but I never thought I’d be writing about it with the kind of breathless excitement reserved for the likes of Elden Ring.
With the benefit of hindsight, there were signs Sniper Elite might turn into something special. While known mainly for its ‘X-Ray’ system, which lets you watch your bullets pass through enemy bodies in grotesque anatomical detail, Sniper Elite has been slowly unveiling its potential since 2014’s tour of Africa in Sniper Elite 3. The maps have grown larger, more open and more ambitious while the once clunky movement and combat have become steadily more refined. Sniper Elite has been dependably entertaining for a while. It just needed a spark of inspiration to make it excellent.
Sniper Elite 5 finds that spark in an unlikely place: the Allied invasion of France. Of all the second world war theatres, Operation Overlord is the most exhaustively explored by video games, replicated endlessly since 2002’s Medal of Honor: Allied Assault. I’m more familiar with the hedgerows of Normandy than I am with my own back garden, and find the idea of playing a game set there similarly unexciting. By all logic Sniper Elite 5 should feel more derivative than the previous games. Instead, the fallow fields of France force Rebellion to be more resourceful in their level design, and the studio reinvigorates the setting with inventive locations and an intricate eye for detail.
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