Ubisoft’s Ghost Recon Future Soldier had been in development for many years, stricken by delays and several different directions, before it finally made its way onto store shelves. Naturally fans of the series were worried about the way the game would turn out and whether it would be influenced too heavily by the current stream of action heavy shooters. Worry no longer, Ubisoft has hit a close to perfect balance between action and tactical gameplay with Future Soldier.



We live in an age where the so-called ‘Bro-Shooter’ has taken center stage and has players dispatch countless enemies while breezing through levels with ease. Ubisoft has managed to develop a game which brings a welcomed change to the battlefield. Ghost Recon is set in a future where a Russian uprising has the world in worries and fear - Team Ghost is setting out to alleviate some of the tension in its typical fashion.



Ubisoft’s Future Soldier is straddling the line between action as well as careful thought, requiring stealth mechanics that should please even hardcore fans. The team work element is taking center stage in the latest Ghost Recon which can be played in 4 player coop as well. When taking on missions the team works together smoothly and it really feels like a well orchestrated mission when using all the gadgets Team Ghost has at its disposal in Future Soldier. The game allows players to utilize active camouflage, drones and countless unique weapons to take on any situation. While most objectives can be reached by going in guns blazing as well as using the stealthy approach, the game has several missions where being detected is a fail state. Yes, it has hardcore elements as I said before.



Playing Ubisoft’s new tactical shooter was really an absolutely enjoyable experience as it had some very action packed scenes and dynamic rail sequences as well as the usual stealth situations requiring plenty of patience and skill. Pulling of a 4 man synchronized kill in coop or with AI team mates is one of the cooler things we have done in a game this year. The story is well written and performed most of the time but has its moments of weakness, while it doesn’t take one out of the experience, it could have been handled a bit better. The same goes for the visuals, Future Soldier can look gorgeous and almost breathtaking but also suffers from some poor textures and pop-in. In a certain level I did experience an AI glitch where a team mate didn’t want to follow the rest of the group, this had to be solved by rebooting the system. Apart from this instance, the AI was smart, smooth, intelligent and felt like support rather than a hindrance.



The gameplay itself has great pacing, giving orders to teammates and orchestrating missions and movement is very engaging, I really wanted to pull off the perfect kill or complete the objective without being detected. Multiplayer within Ghost Recon Future Soldier has several modes but lacks matchmaking which was frustrating. The mode players will likely choose the most is ‘Decoy’ which sets teams against each other chasing 3 different targets with two of them being a decoy, this makes for some dynamic and fun scenarios with real life players.
As I said before, all my worries about the state of the game were gone within a couple of hours. With the exception of some story and visual issues I had, Future Soldier was hitting all of the Ghost Recon hallmarks we have come to know and love. Ubisoft was able to develop a Ghost Recon title that stayed relevant in today’s landscape of shooters but also managed to stay true to its past.

Score: 8.5 / 10

Ghost Recon Future Soldier was developed and published by Ubisoft for Xbox 360 and PS3 on May 22nd. A retail copy of the Xbox 360 version was provided to us by Ubisoft for reviewing purposes.