Well anyone one on Steam who actually made the mistake of adding people to their friends list, has most likely had a bombardment of suggestions, for them to get this game's demo.
Sniper elite does exactly what it says on the tin in the fact that
A. You are a sniper and...
B. You are (supposedly) Elite
You are so elite infact that you have rushed ahead of the rest of the British army! Or at least that is the only logical conclusion I can think of to explain the lack of allied troopers in this game. It's as if they developers honestly believe that there was only 1 super soldier on the british side and it was Hitler who quickly wrote in his diary in his darkest hour, that it was an army, rather than admit that he was over thrown by 1 guy...
I then came to the conclusion that you play as Jimmy Mcperson the unknown war hero only described in history exams from students who don't read books.
Anyway back to the point...
The game focuses on you, a lone sniper who must take out the entire German army in world war 2 IE: 5 guys effectivley in a pretty world war 2 environment. This is my main problem with this game, it focuses too much on being pretty when it is infact not much more than a sniper simulator. Remember in Metal Gear Solid (the original) where you had those VR training sessions? Where you played on tiles made out of ones and zeros and had to dispatch diamonds? Well that is honestly how this game feels.
It tries to be somewhat realistic but with no (or very little) atmosphere it doesn't achieve this, which would be sad if it wasn't madening at how much it makes the fecking game lag! I amazingly cannot get this game to run smoothly on quality higher than medium. Now I'm running this on a PC which can pretty much run Fallout: New Vegas on full graphics (if that gives you an idea about it's specs.)
This doesn't feel much different than New Vegas and it still lags out on most PCs that weren't developed by Nasa. This wouldn't be a big deal, however, if the game wasn't what it was a small bargain bin Steam game, but it is and so it should be able to run on any PC owned by a ten year old who doesn't check the specs of a game before buying it.
So as for gameplay itself? It mainly consists of shooting enemies with a sniper (who would have guessed?) Although to achieve this you must master your heart (daww) beat (oh) or your crosshair will be flailing all over the place like George Michael's cock infront of a police officer.
The game rewards you for well placed shots, however, with a bullet time kill cam where it either just shows the bullet penetrate your victim or shows you damage done to internal organs. This makes being accurate slightly more enjoyable (If you are a sick far right wing gun nut who is stroking a shotgun while playing and humming his national anthem).
My main complaint about this is that it only works on headshots (few) and chest shots which makes it so you've seen everything by your third kill. I kind of like doing this when you can shoot an injured Nazi who is being slung over his mates shoulder and is being carried off, (it's ok they're Nazis so they aren't people like us).
Anywho I shot through the injured guys head and shot the other guy through the back! Although, this is great and all I cannot help, but feel that they could make normal kills more sexy? Imagine if everytime you shot an enemy in the knee, he fell to the floor screaming about how his career as a soldier was over and how he will now have to become a guard in Whiterun (ok that old joke isn't and never was funny). The point is this, this kill cam is somewhat exciting at first, but you can only guess that this is going to get old later on in the games life.
The main reason for this feature, however, is simply this: If they didn't do this then everyone would just use a Tommy Gun and storm the enemy (missing out on sniper points, but who even cares? We aren't on Atari) Not only is the Tommy gun more accurate but it's fully automatic.
My main problem with the sniper rifle is half the hits don't count. For basic "Oh look an enemy!" (Points gun) *bang* kind of shooting, it's not bad, nor is it bad aiming at an enemy who is just stood in no man's land picking his nose.
No I tend to struggle when I start actually thinking (thinking with portals if you like...) For example when I see a guard stood behind a car, but I can blatently see his feet sticking out from underneath it. I'm obviously going to aim at the feet, but, you see the problem here is the car is rendered to be a square block! Causing you to miss and I'm not even going to start on the ammount of times, where I shot an enemy 2 times in the chest and neither of the shots counted...
This game feels like 1 of both and it's hard for me to decide, is it...
A. A bargain bin game that tries too hard?
B. A blockbuster game that doesn't try enough?
And this is the conflict that I think of while playing this game, it's not bad for killing time, but it won't be memorable next week. It isn't a bad game per say as it starts off satisfying enough, but this is one where I would suggest getting it either just as a demo or maybe buying it if you spot it under £20 (or £10).
