Sniper Elite 4
On target but not a clean kill
Halt! Kartoffelkopf! Ich bin ein Beckenbauer. What nonsense. This German gibberish makes almost as much sense as Rebellion’s approach to updating its latest sharpshooter. A PS5 upgrade without a dedicated PS5 version to download? Just what is that all about?
In recent months we’ve been spoilt by PS4 game updates for PS5. Many developers embraced all the new-gen features, revamping old experiences. Not in this case. This isn’t a deep reworking of the game for PS5. There’s no dedicated DualSense support or 4K textures; there’s no new content and the audio remains the same.
What this update does do is ramp everything up to a super-slick 60fps, running in 4K resolution, with SSD-enhanced load times. These are subtle improvements designed to make the game play in a smoother manner rather than blow the doors off.
The oomph from the framerate increase aids targetting; zooming down the scope for jitter-free shots feels great but doesn’t fundamentally change anything from the aged PS4 edition. The core action of scoping out targets to highlight weaknesses, spot patrol patterns, and mark enemy positions before lining up shots, timed against a background of ambient noise to mask your gunfire, and squeezing the trigger, remains fantastic.
The 4K visuals are crisper and brighter, giving some environments new vigour, but again, this is not a ground-up reworking of old assets. The scale of the maps is commendable. Spanning sunny Mediterranean coastal towns and monasteries, before leaning into a comicbook aesthetic as protagonist Karl Fairburne’s mission leads him into the bowels of a Nazi megastructure, each delivers a silent scoper’s playground. Hiding places and kill zones offer a unique tactical stealth experience, but zoom in too close and the low-res textures spoil the sense of spectacle.
SSD ELITE
Given the emphasis on experimentation – levels are sandboxes of varied objectives that you can approach in any order – it’s the use of the SSD that impresses the most. Levels are loaded in seconds making recon a breeze, as you’ll feel encouraged to make quick saves and try new tactics more than on PS4 with a restart only ever a second away. The SSD use enhances more than you’d
The 4K visuals are crisper and brighter, giving some environments new vigour.
expect, with improved menu navigation and ease of play.
Comparable to other 4K/60fps spruce-ups we’ve enjoyed, such as that for Days Gone, this enhanced Sniper Elite 4 plays better than its PS4 predecessor but it’s not a fully-loaded new-gen upgrade.