One of my favourite settings for a video game is World War II. I know that might sound macabre, or a bit grim. There is something I find entirely fascinating about that theatre of war. I studied a lot of 20th century history and what gripped me throughout was how something so seemingly fantastical happened.

From the horrors of the concentration camps and the Holocaust, to the sheer determination of defeating evil, and not to mention how it got to that point in the first place, it is the most stark reminder and influencer of how we should conduct ourselves. So much of modernity and coming together as a civilization came out of something so terrible. It’s why “Never again” and “Lest we forget” are such powerful phrases.

Apply this to the video game genre, and your tasked with something quite simple. As the good guys, you must do all you can to fight against difficult odds to overcome an incredible evil. You must defeat this enemy in any way possible. You’ll work as part of a wider effort. Even though you may be one small part of a much larger machine, you can make such a difference.

Enter Harry Hawker, the protagonist of Sniper Elite: Resistance.

Shot Through the Heart (And You're To Blame)

Sniper Elite: Resistance focuses not on legendary sniper and series’ protagonist, Karl Fairburne. This time the story is wrapped around lesser known, but equally impressive sniper, Harry Hawker. A British member of the Special Operations Executive (SOE).

As a Brit myself, I enjoyed Harry’s inclusion. Often in war games when there’s an American viewpoint, the British are often well-spoken General types. You know the ones, those who don’t get their hands dirty. And we know full well that the rough and ready Cockneys, such as Harry, more than get their hands dirty. That being said, he isn’t much different in his character to Karl in the mainline Sniper Elite games. I like to learn more about the characters I play as, and both Karl and Harry carry the hardened mercenary vibe. It certainly works for this series, but I’d love to learn more about them.

Harry’s task is to assist the French Resistance deep within France. Though not on the frontlines of the war, their role is no less important. The Nazis are planning something big, a new Wunderwaffe (wonder weapon) that could end the war! Sniper Elite: Resistance takes you across a variety of locations of war-torn France. You will snipe, sneak, shoot, sabotage, and severely blow up (I wanted the alliteration) anything that stands in your way. You will seek intel, take out key targets, and learn more about the Nazi’s real plans to end the war.

I found it odd that you don’t particularly see the game’s main antagonist, Otto Kruger that much through the game. He’s the head of Special Committee C, who would go to any means to ensure victory, whatever the cost.

I really liked how the story evolved over the course of the game’s nine missions. It remains interesting throughout, and I like the cat and mouse at play in keeping up with the Nazis. Not to mention the ever-ticking clock of the D-Day Landings fast appraching. It was largely as you ‘d expect for a Sniper Elite game. That being said, there were a few poignant moments that I wasn’t expecting. I know it’s not the game’s core vibe. Even so, I must commend Rebellion for some of the storybeats, particularly the whole feel of Mission 8. I would like to see more of that in future iterations of Sniper Elite. That gave me some of that character depth I wanted to see.

This is My Rifle, This is My Gun

Sniper Elite 5 players, you won’t find much in the way of surprises or evolution of the core gameplay loop. That’s not a bad thing, at all, the gameplay in Sniper Elite 5 was super satisfying, and worked so well.

Each mission has you dropped into an open map with multiple objectives and side missions to complete. How you go about that mission is entirely up to you. How thoroughly and meticulously you want to make your way through the enemy forces is up to you too. The missions are littered with multiple opportunities to turn the odds in your favour.

What I love to do in Sniper Elite games is take out every last one of these Nazi scumbags. Thankfully, Rebellion know how to do this in as many different ways as possible. Between them and MachineGames, they’ve really cornered the market on Nazi evisceration. There is something so, so, so, sooooo satisfying about creating a multitude of ways take them out. Especially when you throw in the often hilarious slow-down x-ray kills where you see the damage you’re doing. There’s even achievements awarded for some ‘below the belt’ shots.

Use the sound of an overhead airplane to headshot an enemy, undetected. Then rig his body with a grenade booby trap. Place him in the sight line of another enemy. Then watch him dash over to help, only to be sent to Gott in Himmel (God in Heaven, though we know it’d be Hölle really). That action does run the risk of alerting enemies. They could sound the alarm and call for reinforcements, so perhaps a stealthier approach is needed.

Check out some gameplay in the video below:

Each level is scattered with different ammunition types, traps and weapons. These give you lethal, quieter, and non-lethal in their options, meaning you can tailor your approach to your preferred playstyle. You want to go all guns blazing? Go for it, you might have a trickier time though when you get swarmed. You want to pick them off from as far away as possible, hell yeah! Watch the confusion on their faces.

Find workbenches that are hidden thorughout each mission to unlock new customisation options for your weapons, and tailor them to your approach. The more you find, the more you’ll unlock. Want new weapons, take out each missions ‘Kill List’ target, to exterminate a high-profile member of the Nazi order. Killing these targets using a specific method unlocks you a new weapon to use. I did find myself not straying too much away from my ‘keep it quiet’ approach, but it’s nice to have options.

The sandbox playgrounds you get in Sniper Elite: Resistance are excellent. No direction, other than ‘do the mission’. How you tackle each level is down to you. If you find some of the games collectibles in the map, you may unlock new pieces of intel that helps you complete your mission in easier, or different, ways. It’s worth exploring all nooks and crannies, as the levels tend to have all sorts lying around, including new views and vantage points for your sniping.

You unlock perks and extra space for more equipment as you play. Earning XP for your kills, completing objectives, and blowing up enemy vehicles etc. The more stealthy or complex a kill, the more XP you get. Going for a sound mask kill, from a further away distance will nab your more XP than a pointblank murder.

The sniping feels great, and although it certainly gets trickier at higher difficulties when you introduce bullet drop and the wind influence, it’s even more satisfying when you do land those headshots from afar. I am looking forward to my Authentic playthrough for a proper challenge.

Art of War

Don’t come into Sniper Elite: Resistance expecting a new engine, overhauled graphics, and new assets. It uses the same engine and soundtrack as Sniper Elite 5. It looks great, and does the job, for sure, and it’s impressive to look out over the beginning of a mission and see all those moving parts at play and take in enormity of the task at hand.

The details on the enemies is impressive, when you zoom in with your binoculars and see the spades hanging from their uniform and the other accoutrement, it’s nice to see. Similarly, when you’re sniping and killing, and land headshots, the bullet do ping off different parts of the body, like the helmet.

There is some great variety in the presentation of levels too. From sunny French vinyards, to cloud covered coastal bunkers, with your view impeded by rain providing different challenges, particularly being able to see your targets perspective. It’s a great way to mix up the levels and ensure that it doesn’t become tedious or repetitive.

There’s plenty of character in the levels too, from destroyed villages, to the Resistance graffiti and posters across the levels, though I did spot a Resistance poster in a secret underground Nazi bunker which I thought was funny. There’s even a whole load of British Gnomes scattered around one of the levels (and an achievement for finding a French Resistance one too).

Gut Shot

I wonder if the idea started off as a DLC for Sniper Elite 5 and evolved into a fully fledged game. The game runs simultaenously against the events of the 2021 game, so it works for this entry. But with that comes a few persistent niggles in Sniper Elite: Resistance from the preivous title.

I didn’t experience much in the way of issues or glitches. One I did experience previously in Sniper Elite 5, and again in Sniper Elite: Resistance revolves around the ‘Kill List’ targets. As noted previously, if you kill the target in a specific way, you’ll unlock a new weapon, but also get a unique kill opportunity. These can include dropping someone from a dam, poisoning them, blowing them up with a rat bomb, and other contextual weapons that you find in the mission. In some instances, even if you set up the kill, the target won’t follow the right route, or the prompt to setup the kill isn’t there. This happened on a couple of occasions and was a little frustrating. Even reloading a save didn’t correct it. I expect restarting the mission will allow it to happen.

Another gripe, and it’s not a major one, and it’s not specific to Sniper Elite: Resistance either, is how easily forgotten you are. Enemies can go from ‘calm’ to ‘cautious’ to ‘in combat’, and after a period of time, these drop down back to calm. I always find this mechanic a little odd in stealth games, I wish there was some more nuance.

If the enemy ‘spotted something’ but it wasn’t clear what it was they might be more curious, but equally more likely to return to a normal state of affairs. Conversely, if they spot a moving shape that is clearly something alien, then they remain cautious but not in the ‘running around the map hiding behind everything’ state of play. I appreciate it is a tricky balance but I hope a Sniper Elite 6 or future iterations look at evolving the enemy response systems and make it more complex.

Fully Loaded

Sniper Elite: Resistance is bursting with things to do. You get more than the full-blown campaign. Most missions have nearly 20 collectibles to find, some of these are documents you find hidden away that give you intel. Others are hidden-in-plain-sight, ‘dead-eye targets’ that are stone eagles that you need to find and snipe. You’ve also got personal letters from characters in the game that paint a picture of the mindset of Sniper Elite: Resistance‘s enemy.

I’m nearly 25 hours into the game and although I’ve completed the main campaign once, I’ve still got an Authentic playthrough to do as well as mop-up the remaining collectibles. You can also play in co-op if you wanted too.

Once you’ve done with the main campaign, you can turn your attention to the other modes:

• Propaganda missions – unlocked by finding Propaganda posters in the main campaign, these extra missions, accessed from the main menu, provide you with either a stealth, sniping or combat challenge. You play as a Resistance member and you’ve got a set time limit to succeed, can you get all three stars on Authentic difficulty?
• Invasion mode – fancy taking on another player in an ‘Enemy at the Gates’ style snipe off? Then invade another players single player campaign as a Sniper Jager and see if you can take down their Harry. Equally, keep an eye out for invading Jagers looking to cause an upset. Like Deathloop, I always love these invasions modes, they’re super tense and really encourages you to be creative.
• Multiplayer – take on other players in more classic multiplayers modes including Free-for-All, Team Deathmatch, Squad Match (smaller teams) and the unique to Sniper Elite “No Cross”, with teams on two sides of the map and you can’t move from your half of the map.
• Survival – similar to horde modes, your aim is to capture command posts and fight of waves of enemies who are also trying to capture said command posts.

There’s also going to be extra content coming to Sniper Elite: Resistance in the form of new DLC missions, including the hilariously named “Lights, Camera, Achtung” mission, where in true Sniper Elite form, you must assassinate Hitler, and you’re encouraged to find as many ways to do that as possible.

Hell, why not see if you can get as many brutal shots using the game’s photo mode?!

Mission Debrief

Sniper Elite: Resistance is the definitive Sniper Elite experience. Not being a numbered sequel, it doesn’t add many new things, but with a fully developed, compelling campaign, and an incredibly satisfying gameplay loop it is the most comprehensive way to experience a Sniper Elite game. Packed with satisfying kills, and a variety of ways to play, you’ll be hard pressed to find a better Nazi killer out there.

Viva La Sniper Elite: Resistance!

Sniper Elite: Resistance was reviewed on PC.

It is available on PC, PS4, PS5, Xbox One, and Xbox Series consoles. It launches on 30 January 2025, and launches day one on Xbox Game Pass. Purchases of the Deluxe Edition grant you up to two days early access on 28 January.

Many thanks to Rebellion for providing a review code for the purposes of this review.