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Sniper Elite 5 is back to its very best. After its brilliant and brutal base game campaign, its DLC offerings to date have been a mixed bag. Its Rough Landing DLC map is a stunning throwback but lacks bang for its buck; while its French island outing is a neat switch up of the formula that's let down by middling weapons.
Operation Kraken, however – the latest mission that's part of the game's Kraken Awakes content pack – captures everything that makes Sniper Elite enjoyable. It marks the end of the Sniper Elite 5 Season Pass Two, and is a victory lap that not only celebrates the strides this mainline entry has made over its forerunners, but the momentum the esteemed series has sustained since 2005.
Attention!
Sniper Elite 5 DLC weapons underwhelm, but new island mission is as good as it gets
Your penchant for stealth or slaughter will determine just how bloody the fun is, but we'll get to that later. Operation Kraken kicks off with a signature mudslide that marks the beginning of the level. A dirt path follows, overgrown fauna spilling into the stones on either side, before a clearing conveniently situated on the crest of a hill reveals the level's target way off in the distance. Here, that target is a humongous aircraft carrier that must be boarded and destroyed. There's a sea of enemies ahead, and sweeping spotlights designed to break your cover. So far, so Sniper Elite.
I then march deeper into the woods to reach a fork in the road. To my left stands a Nazi soldier with a radio jammed against his ear. To my right is a zipline to lower ground. It's dark, but the enemy ahead stands under a lamp, meaning a direct approach is likely to raise the alarm. Beyond the soldier, I can just about trace a path towards the aircraft carrier, but I decide it's the riskier of the two routes. Never one to shy from chaos entirely, though, I shoot the soldier with a slow-motion sniper rifle eyeshot. The bullet's hardly left the poor bastard's fractured skull, and I'm swinging towards a decrepit outhouse dozens of meters below.
Now I'm in long grass, crouched down in the prone position, waiting for a patrolling Nazi truck to pass. Masked by the steady hum of its engine, I make a bee-line for cover across a gravel road thoroughfare, and over a breeze block barricade. The outhouse ahead is guarded by two enemy soldiers, but I make light work of them by stalking the shadows and snapping their necks from behind. Further ahead still, on the peripheral of the dock yard that houses the target, I spot another two foes shooting the shit. A well placed shot directed at the crane above drops a dangling pallet onto a fuel tank, and both soldiers go up in smoke. The boom from the explosion scatters the surrounding guards, which gives me ample chance to breach the boundary.
Into the breach
"You'll move back and forth between cover like a fiddler's elbow, up and down walls and ladders like a yo-yo, and you'll treat the blood-bathed third-person onslaught like a WW2-set Red Dead Redemption 2, The Division or Dead Space."
I won't spoil the specifics from here, but the rest of my stealth-steered mission saw me locating keys, setting traps, cutting power supplies, scaling walls, booby-trapping dead bodies, and essentially leaning into everything Sniper Elite 5 – and indeed Sniper Elite games of old – has taught me so far. From Operation Kraken's early stages shuttling between cover in wide open spaces, to its tight and claustrophobic close-quarters design once aboard the aircraft carrier, this is quintessential Sniper Elite, and it's almost exactly what I wanted from DLC after firing through its brilliant campaign.
Being able to sneak, and then sleuth, and then blow up a fleet of vehicles, and then shoot a Nazi from 100 meters away, and then grab vital intel, and then torch an encampment, and then hide for ages while smirking in real life at the fact you've somehow done all of this and avoided detection – doing all of this in quick succession is simply wonderful.
On the other hand, if you choose violence, you'll get a totally different experience. You'll kill everything that moves. You'll raid felled enemies for every scrap of ammo at every turn. You'll move back and forth between cover like a fiddler's elbow, up and down walls and ladders like a yo-yo, and you'll treat the blood-bathed third-person onslaught like a WW2-set Red Dead Redemption 2, The Division or Dead Space. Having played through Operation Kraken applying both styles, I can't decide which I prefer.
Of course, Sniper Elite 5's Kraken Awakes is premium content. To buy it in isolation costs £9.99 / $14.99, whereas the full Season Pass 2 will set you back £24.99 / $29.99 – which nets you two missions, six weapon packs, two weapon skin packs, and four character skins. In order to play, you'll need to already own the Sniper Elite 5 base game, which begs the obvious question: is it worth it? I can't answer that for you, but I can reiterate that Operation Kraken is the most fun I've had in Sniper Elite for some time. I love the Sniper Elite 5 base game, and this latest mission showcases the series at its very best. It's a fitting way to close out its Season Pass 2, and an enticing insight into what might lie ahead.
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