Ghost Recon has always been known for its tactical combat, something that Ubisoft is putting an emphasis on with Player versus Player in Ghost Recon: Breakpoint. The primary focus of the game still came across as the PvE campaign mode, which we walked away impressed with, but PvP in Breakpoint was also an enjoyable experience, arguably more so. Game Rant got the chance to play a little over an hour of PvP, formally known as Ghost War, at an event hosted by Ubisoft.
This time around, Breakpoint has unified progression across all of its modes, so all the progress players make in PvP will carry over to PvE, and vice versa. This is great, as it keeps players from feeling like their time is being wasted. While it could change before launch, progression in PvP also felt a lot more rewarding; the weapons and experience earned felt greater than what we managed to earn in PvE.
During our demo, we got to look at three of the game’s six launch maps, though more will be added in updates post-release, and its two modes: Elimination and Sabotage. Ubisoft is putting a heavy emphasis on community feedback this time around, directly resulting in a snow map that players had been asking for. The maps we got to play put a heavy emphasis on controlling key sniping positions and other raised locations throughout the map to be successful.
Communication was even more important in PvP than it was in PvE, largely due to how enemy spotting works in Breakpoint. The game features a ping system that will mark enemy players for your team, though it required a pretty hefty amount of precision to actually tag anyone. Fail to tag enemies, and the game slows down quite a bit, as both sides struggle to locate each other in the dense foliage and tight structures.
In Breakpoint, enemies can be revived after death, so it’s important to not only watch out for living enemies but downed ones as well. Fail to do so, and a sneaky adversary may be able to turn a 4v1 back into a 4v4. Some of the best moments in our PvP demo came from both sides reviving their fallen, making the game that much more intense. If the match goes on too long, the playable area will begin to shrink, forcing players to engage one another.
The single most brilliant aspect of Breakpoint’s PvP was a radar system placed in an open area on each map. Activate it, and it will mark every hostile’s location, offering a massive advantage, as remaining hidden is key to victory. However, it takes an uncomfortable amount of time to activate the system, and players will be exposed the entire time. This created incredibly tense moments in matches that would result in easy victories if successful, but would also likely lead to an intense firefight as one side tried to defend the person activating the radar, and the other tried to put them down. Many of these features were also present in Wildlands, but it’s still good to see Ubisoft build on an already solid foundation.
It took a few matches to find a groove with Ghost Recon: Breakpoint’s PvP mode, but it quickly became the best part of the entire demo experience. There’s something uniquely engaging about the player vs. player mode that many other games simply don’t have. It features the same cover-based shooting and tactical movement of a game like Gears of War, but it also had the fluidity of a game like Call of Duty. It’s a satisfying balance and was easily one of the best competitive modes we’ve played this year.
Hopefully, Ubisoft will not only continue to introduce new maps to the game after launch, but more game modes too. There are a ton of different things they could do with the PvP mode, and after such an impressive hands-on demo, we really hope they play around with the formula they’ve created. Regardless, watching the PvP portion of the game evolve throughout Breakpoint’s life span is sure to be interesting. There’s a Ghost Recon: Breakpoint beta coming soon that should help fans decide how they feel about the game ahead of launch.
More: Ghost Recon Breakpoint Will Have Multiple Endings
Ghost Recon: Breakpoint will release on October 4, 2019, for PS4, Xbox One, and PC. Ubisoft provided travel and hotel accommodations for this event.
