Sniper Elite 4: Italia. It's okay so far. Is a pure game, when your game starts with some narration over film and ends with you going back to mission select screen, does not give a shit about presentation, like an old Call of Duty. Having to wait for noises to shoot is a pain in the ass so far. Definitely a better implementation of stealth (more realistic and punishing) than other stealth games I've played.
I might have to give up on this shit, I only have three missions left to go but it's so bland. Soulless is one way I hear it put. You get some shitty cutscenes with Great Value brand BJ Blaskowicz looking smugly arms-crossed while a caricature of an Italian, or that weird-voiced American fuck, rambles. Then you drop into a map and sneak around until you get so bored of it you have to start a shootout, and then you get so bored of the shootout that you stop trying at all.
I think it is possible to make a map so large that it actively worsens the game. In this case, the runtime for the game is perfectly standard, about 16 hours. But the individual levels are too big, they're like two hours each, and that's with me going somewhat fast and not really soaking it in. It matters to me because while a person COULD save and quit, I feel like the nature of a mission is that you expect to finish it in one sitting.
There's also so many enemies everywhere, and the terrain isn't suited for sniping. I would have expected more dynamic noisemakers (like church bells and flying bombers, as you see in earlier missions) and high towers/mountains to get to, that you could spend a mission just working your way to a position to take one long-distance shot. Instead, the game is frequently asking you to infiltrate close-quarters buildings to blow things up in very conspicuous ways, and there's no shooting your way through that many troops, and you'll never be able to get those super long-range shots because everything is so tight and closed in. It's visually accurate to Italy but thoughtlessly put together for what it's supposed to be.
The AI is fairly impressive. Best stealth I've seen yet, in the sense that enemies do pick up on small sounds other games would totally ignore, and then use tactics. Unfortunately, their tactics often frustrate my attempts to sucker them into traps, I'd mine up a house and hope they'd come inspect it, but the AI is smart enough to just hang back and try to wait me out. It's a case where if anyone gets into a fight with you you're in a fight with everyone, because they're smart enough to respond to gunfire. But they're not smart enough (game's not designed for) you clearing a whole area and then going on to genocide the next area.
Very disappointed.
10/10 can shoot a panzer to death by shooting the gunner/driver through the window
Tried Star Wars: Squadron with EAPlay, too, just because it's one people talk about playing with the joysticks. (I got a new joystick.) It's apparently a dead game. I don't like Star Wars - boring, childish storytelling and world, warfare that has no weight to it - but I did enjoy Battlefront as a kid, and fleet actions against bots are like the space battles from that (without the best part, launching a boarding action to internally disable systems). It's okay for being free, I suppose.
Since I can only stand SE4 in short bursts, I started up We Happy Few. The gameplay seems a little thoughtless so far, but I am VERY pleased with the setting and presentation so far, it really feels like a AAA game on AA budget (I mean that as a compliment) and is compelling from the start.