Sniper Elite 4 review – bloody and good-looking but generic

Rebellion's long-distance shooter brings the action to second world war Italy, but refuses to depart from well-known conventions

The act of shooting a gun - occasionally dull, frequently unsatisfying, universally overused - has become gaming's primary interaction. Rather than using firearms as an emotional release or a tense show of force, games often feature the firing of a weapon as a formulaic means of earning progress; to fight your way from A to B to earn a new cutscene, a better weapon or a climactic boss.

Few games nowadays succeed in making the actual act of shooting the main reason to play. But Sniper Elite 4 does a superb job of that. By putting you behind a scope, tracking your target from 300m away, the game creates a sniping experience that's so good the rest of Sniper Elite 4 - a serviceable, visually impressive open-world shooter akin to Far Cry - feels generic in comparison.