Lost Light

Lost Light, developed by the Chinese company NetEase, is an extraction shooter game that bears a striking resemblance to Escape from Tarkov, though it has a simpler game design. In this game, players can choose between four maps and their objective is to gather as much loot as possible and complete various quests before successfully extracting at designated extraction points.

As players venture through the Operation zone, they may encounter other players known as “fireflies” or AI-controlled bots called “marauders.” The marauders are generally easy to defeat and serve as a good source of starting loot. However, some of them, especially boss bots, can present a tougher challenge.

Moreover, players have the option to enter a match as a marauder themselves, equipped with preset gear. This approach is advantageous for money farming without the worry of losing one’s own gear in the process. The mode is especially fun because you can train to fight without the risk of loosing your equipment.

Quests grant money and items and are given to you by various NPCs. Items can upgrade your shelter or be used to craft new gear. Money becomes more important if you aim for the ranked mode and leaderboards.

The game offers a wide array of weapons that can be customized to suit your playstyle. Some attachments are rare, making loot from defeating other players valuable

I’d recommend this game for playing with friends, especially the pc mobile crossplay team function after you reach level 5. Cheaters are still an issue, despite developer efforts. Nonetheless, the game holds great potential for the future. I do hope that the “pay to win” aspect with the premium subscriptions for more storage space, etc doesn’t take overhand.

Arena Breakout

Arena Breakout is a mobile first person extraction shooter published by Level Infinite (part of chines mobile game giant Tencent Games) and developed by Morefun Studios. This is, atleast for me, the best extraction shooter for mobile devices at the moment. There is just nothing that’s so similar to EFT and so realistic to compare it to.

In Arena Breakout, your goal is to extract with maximum loot while taking out enemies. Plan your gear, raid duration, and playstyle – stealth or full confrontation.

Choose between Tactical Ops or Militant in Covert Ops mode. Tactical Ops allows gear from storage, while Militant offers preset gear with no risk of loss (similar idea to Lost Light). Covert Ops has a 15-minute cooldown, providing risk-free looting and potential encounters with real players.

There are 4 maps, each offering unique raid environments. Snipers excel in open maps like Valley or Northridge, while SMGs shine in Farm, the smallest map. Some maps have a “Lockdown Zone” mode with entry fees, valuable starting gear, and better supply spots.

The game also offers a detailed weapon customization feature, storage system and a quest system. The only downsights are the missing skill based matchmaking brackets. This can lead to frustrating skill differences but most of the time you just end up meeting people with better gear.

Pubg Mobile

After venting my frustrations about the PC-version of Playerunknown’s Battlegrounds due to cheaters, bugs, and skill issues to my friends, I decided to revisit the mobile version another try. That was around 1 year ago. Surprisingly, I had a lot more fun there. PUBG: Mobile, being one of the most successful mobile shooter games with massive esport-tournament prizes, is impressively optimized and runs smoothly even on older phones. Especially the fact that the basic game installation doesn’t require much space and all gamemodes can be optionally installed is really good for older phones.

The game offers classic multiplayer mode, various versions of the Battle Royale experience, and an extraction shooter mode. Like many mobile games, skins can be purchased, but you also receive cool-looking clothes or chests as free rewards for completing weekly events.

Compared to the PC-Version, the mobile version is much more accessible for newcomers. For advanced mobile shooter players, ranked matches provide more challenging gameplay. Playing with friends enhances the experience and allows for better strategy coordination.

PUBG: Mobile can also be played through emulators on Windows devices but you won’t get matched into the same ranked brackets as mobile players.

Call of Duty: Mobile

CoD:M is, as the name suggests, an adaptation of the popular console and PC games. The game offers different multiplayer modes such as Search and Destroy, Team Deathmatch and Domination but also has a battle royale mode and a time limited zombie event mode.

Unlike the game mentioned above Cod:M has a very simple weapon customization feature but because of this is a game for the average mobile player. If you want more of a challenge, both multiplayer and battle Royale offer a ranked mode where you can play against players of your skill level.

The game is regularly updated with new seasons. They offer a battle pass (BP) with skins for both characters and weapons, ingame currency and other rewards. The premium BP can be purchased to earn more rewards. In addition to the BP there are also seasonal events that reward free skins. Skins can also be acquired by just playing the game through the completionist skin system.

Another way to get rewards is through the clan system. Each week you play against other clans and compete in challenges to see who can earn the most points. The winner earns more of a clan currency that can be later used to purchase weapon skins in a special store.

In general CoD:M is one of the best, if not the best performing shooter on market at the moment, especially because they earn so much money from gambling like ingame chests or lucky draws that are basically rigged against you. If you ignore this huge money aspect of the game, the gameplay is really fun and won’t get repetitive if you play with friends.

Sniper Elite 5 is a third person sniper shooter that can be played on any skill level. As the last parts of the Sniper Elite series this one also comes with the slow motion detailed kill cams that can be quite disgusting to watch. Sniper Elite 5 is mainly focused on the campaign (9 missions + 1 DLC mission) but also includes a coop mode, some multiplayer gamemodes and the new “Axis Invasion”, a feature where you can switch into the role of a German sniper hunter and join another player in their campaign missions to take them out.

Every mission requires you to complete a main target but also offers multiple side targets that can be completed. At the end of every mission you have to extract to get back into a safe space. Throughout your mission you are equipped with a sniper rifle, a submachine gun and a pistol. Take out enemy soldiers in a preferably stealthy way to make your way towards the targets on the map. If you get spotted it can get uncomfortable really fast as more German soldiers will make their way to your last know position.

NOTE: As the language of Sniper Elite 5 is set to the system language all screenshots are in German. Sorry about the inconvenience.

Campaign

The story takes place after the events of Sniper Elite 4. You’re playing as Karl Fairburne, a special forces sniper that is tasked to help the Americans land in France. Later he is asked to stop “Operation Kraken”, a German submarine project that poses a risk at the safety of the Allies.

As mentioned above there are 9 missions that can be completed and 1 mission that can be purchased with a DLC. The main goal of each mission is to stay undetected as getting spotted basically means death, especially on higher difficulties (there are 5). To avoid getting spotted you either need a silenced weapon, subsonic ammunition or you shoot during another loud sound from a cannon or a generator that can cover up your shot.

Enemies can be spotted via binocular or just by hearing them walking around you. If you’re sneaking around they don’t instantly notice you until an attention bar fully fills up. If that’s the case, they start shooting, alerting all other enemies in the area around you. Some enemy soldiers can even activate an alarm that calls even more backup.

If you eliminate enemies you can loot them for ammunition, keys and other items or take their weapons. If you want to avoid any suspicion you should place their bodies inside tall grass or boxes around the map. The German soldiers have different equipment and also different ranks that reward different loot.

You can switch between 3 weapons: one primary sniper rifle, one submachine gun and one pistol. The last ones are best used inside or when sneaking around. The sniper rifle is best used for long range shots when no one is around or you have enough environmental sound protection. In addition to those weapons you also get access to multiple explosives like grenades or mines and medical supplies to regenerate health points.

By completing missions, earning medals and generally eliminating enemies you earn experience points that unlock ability points. These can be invested into a skill tree that improves your character in multiple aspects of the game.

Axis Invasion

This feature enables you to join another player’s campaign mission. Your goal is to eliminate the player. The more eliminations you get in this mode, the more equipment options you have.

I enjoyed this mode as it adds an additional layer of pressure for both the sniper hunter and the sniper as you never know where each other is unless you use an “invasion phone”, a gadget which let’s you and the enemy sniper know where each other is on the map.

Multiplayer

Sniper Elite 5 offers a multiplayer with modes similar to Call of Duty. I tried playing Free for All, a mode where you fight alone against other players and the first to reach a certain number of eliminations wins. Although I quickly discovered the enormous skill gap I had against the other players I think this is a cool way to practice fast aiming and situational awareness for the campaign mode.

Conclusion

In comparison to Sniper Elite 4, the game offers fewer starter weapons but shows a much simpler entry to the series in my opinion. Although I really enjoyed the Axis Invasion mode I didn’t noticed many new features in comparison to the older game (not talking about graphics or story). I would recommend picking up Sniper Elite 4 from a third party vendor like MMOGA (~8€) to try out the experience before you spend a bit more money.

If you really want to play Sniper Elite 5 I would high recommend purchasing it during a steam sale as the base game only offers around 50 hours of gameplay if you stretch the missions out and collect every little item. You can of course invest many hours into the multiplayer.

Get Sniper Elite 5 here