Ghost Recon Breakpoint was a major flop for publisher & developer Ubisoft at release in October 2019. MeinMMO has taken another look at the military simulation and concludes: The soldiers’ playground is now a really good PvE shooter.
What is Breakpoint? The tactical shooter from Ubisoft takes place in the Ghost Recon universe and places you on the fictional Pacific island of Aurora. The island is the headquarters of the sinister organization “Skell Technology”, which has made the island a site for the research and production of its deadly drones.
Unfortunate circumstances and rocket fire lead you to want to find out what is going on on this island. Additionally, there is a classic revenge motive, as an old comrade executed some members of your Ghost team upon arrival.
The local inhabitants take you in and you start in a large open world, infiltrating hostile areas to uncover the plans of “Skell Technology” and work on your revenge plans. As a soldier of the special unit “Ghosts”, you specialize in stealthy infiltration of enemy bases, and the game world offers you countless unique environments to carry out self-planned, discreet attacks.
For this, you have a vast arsenal of lootable weapons and unlockable equipment available to refine your tactics and adapt them precisely to the combat situation and your plans.
Check out the gameplay launch trailer of Breakpoint here:
Breakpoint was a major flop for Ubisoft
What was the problem with Breakpoint at release? The tactical shooter was released in October 2019 as a AAA title and was supposed to build on the success of its predecessor Wildlands (2017). But things turned out differently, and after a somewhat decent release, the game turned out to be a major flop for Ubisoft. On Metacritic, the shooter temporarily fell to 2.2 out of 5 points on PC, failing among many players.
In a finance call shortly after the release of Breakpoint, Ubisoft’s CEO, Yves Guillemot, explained the three main problems with Breakpoint:
- The title was released too close to the long-developed Wildlands
- New gameplay elements need to integrate perfectly into the game – however, the target audience rejected many innovations
- Additionally, Breakpoint offered too few differences from its predecessor despite some innovations
After the analysis, Ubisoft recognized very similar problems with the loot shooter “The Division 2”, which also fell short of financial expectations. Ubisoft apparently changed its strategy afterward and also announced delays for 3 major releases.
The developers then presented a 5-step plan to rescue Breakpoint. Nearly a year and a half have passed since the announcement, and Breakpoint is now, gameplay-wise, in a much better state than at release. The “Ghost Recon” is now a really strong PvE shooter, and MeinMMO shows you how Ubisoft achieved this.
Ubisoft promised comprehensive development – And kept its word
Why is Breakpoint now significantly better? The developers implemented much feedback from fans during the time since the release and gradually improved the game. The biggest changes include:
- There are now AI companions that can be activated and deactivated at any time
- You can now decide whether to play with or without a loot system
- Comprehensive customization of your experience – in terms of difficulty, but also the game world in general
- The enemies are now fairer and smarter, which becomes noticeable when silently infiltrating a base
Helpful AI companions
What do the AI companions provide? Breakpoint now gives you a moody team with fully customizable AI companions to assist you in your missions. Each one is visually completely customizable like your own character and can be freely equipped with weapons.
Depending on the weapon, the companions also behave differently. A sniper will position himself further away from the enemy than a comrade with a shotgun. You can also give commands to the team, such as “go there”, “gather around me”, or “hold position”. Simultaneous shots are also possible – if you mark an enemy for a coordinated shot, the NPC soldiers will find a good position with a clear shot and inform you as soon as they are ready.
This works really well and is especially a great addition for solo players to clear enemy bases stealthily – like a real squad of Ghosts.
Optional disabling of the loot system
Can you now play completely without loot levels? At launch, Breakpoint was almost more of an open-world loot shooter than a tactical shooter. All weapons had a weapon level and rarity, which made some found items better than others. With increasing levels, you had to continually upgrade to match higher-level enemies.
This “development” was not well received by everyone, and with the “immersive experience” you can now completely turn off this system. There are no rarities, no weapon levels, and you can play exactly what you want from the start.
Furthermore, loot and immersive modes can be changed for saved games. If you want to collect some level loot with your AI buddies in a solo round today, you don’t have to choose the same settings with your friends tomorrow. You can set your save to “immersive” and start here.
Great customization options on almost all gameplay aspects
What do the customization options look like? At the start of the shooter, a lot of RPG elements and self-imposed restrictions were necessary to make the experience more tactical and a bit more “hardcore”. How such an RPG could function, I outlined shortly after release on MeinMMO.
However, the community wished for more settings options to adjust the experience to their own ideas, without constantly having to ensure that all players adhered to the restrictions.
And Breakpoint delivered. Whether it’s enemy behavior, the attributes of your character, or the interface – you can shape and customize your Breakpoint adventure via the settings. A few examples:
- Only one primary weapon is allowed because that is more realistic
- It should get really dark at night so that you need your night vision equipment
- Remaining ammo in your magazines is lost during reloading
- Syringes should no longer heal injuries
Additionally, the “world parameters” offer adjustments to the game world. In the “normal” Breakpoint experience, you constantly encounter patrols or must hide from drones while traversing the island of Aurora. Total chaos could break out at any moment if you were unfortunate enough to be discovered by reconnaissance units. These elements were perceived as disruptive in the tactical shooter and can now be almost completely turned off.
On top of that, there are event modifiers. Since the release, 2 live events have taken place (the third started on January 21, 2021), bringing special mechanics into the game world. Among them, a crossover event with the Terminator franchise (via GameStar).
After the end of an event, you no longer have access to the live event rewards, but you can still access the special mechanics. For example, you can let nasty Terminator robots roam your game world, for which you need special weapons to defeat them. The battles bring plenty of action into the otherwise ghost-tactic-based shooter.
Revamped enemy AI leads to more exciting infiltrations and battles
Why do the silent battles work better now? Breakpoint has seen improvements to enemy AI with almost every major update since release. This started with the overhaul of faulty paths but continued with smaller and bigger adjustments to their general behavior.
For example, when sabotaging the storm generator of a base, enemies will now only “raise suspicion” and not be “worried” directly. This leads to fewer enemies gathering at a location, making them easy targets for your ghosts. The developers fine-tuned this over many months.
Furthermore, the behavior upon discovery is now fairer. Instead of intruders alerting the entire base telepathically, it now takes a moment for the NPCs to communicate their situation via radio. Depending on the alarm state, you have 0.2 – 1 second to prevent the enemy from transmitting. Also, the unusually accurate mortars now have a less absurd hit rate.
In combat, many NPCs now run out of ammo. Enemies have reloading animations that you can use for an attack while they take a fire pause. However, directly attacking a base is still not very enjoyable. The AI continues to show weaknesses, sending alarmed enemies at you one by one as they run into your line of fire.
Great playground for fans of open combat – Solo & Coop
What makes Breakpoint special? Breakpoint presents you with a huge soldier playground with countless points of interest and many enemy bases waiting to be explored and/or cleared by you. You can approach all activities in the game solo or with a maximum of 3 colleagues.
The tactical shooter has an extensive story, countless weapons and attachments, a PvP mode for variety, many customization options for the appearance of your characters, and a bunch of gadgets to help you with undetected infiltration.
You can either let the game guide you so you always know where to go, or you can completely go your own way, help the local population, and gradually discover what is happening in the game world “Aurora”. You just go out, set a goal, and infiltrate everything that may turn out to be interesting along the way for hours.
As endgame content, Breakpoint also offers raids designed for four players. These particularly challenging PvE activities push you to your limits and represent the greatest challenge in the game. You can now even tackle the raids solo. In a solo run, you won’t encounter the big bosses, but the solo raid has its own challenges.
Breakpoint closes the gap between regular and hardcore shooters
For whom is the shooter worth it? For fans of the Ghost Recon series, taking a look now could be worthwhile. Breakpoint was already considered a good game but a poor Ghost Recon during beta, primarily due to the loot system, which many felt did not fit the tactical shooter.
Now that you can decide whether to have the system in the game, this criticism diminishes entirely. You still have to loot your favorite weapons and unlock some equipment, but weapon colors and levels are no longer a factor. And if you want to try it out, you can reactivate the loot fest at any time.
Fans of open-world shooters will also be satisfied. Players from Borderlands, The Division 2, Rage 2, or Mad Max, perhaps even Destiny 2, should check out the title – as long as they can adjust to the realistic setting. It makes no difference whether you prefer playing solo or in coop.
If you are into realistic military simulations and want to try something new, Breakpoint could be for you as well. With the vast customization options, you can set the game to a hardcore difficulty that provides you with a large PvE playground in a soft science fiction world.
Ghost Recon Breakpoint is often available at a low price, and fans of PvE shooters should definitely take a look at the title. However, buy it during a sale or get a cheap disc version – you shouldn’t pay full price for Breakpoint anymore.
Conclusion: Hours of self-determined open-world fun
The concept behind Breakpoint fascinated me even at release and finally works very well after comprehensive revisions. You set a point on the map and check off everything interesting along the way. This can create many hours of gaming fun, which is enhanced with coop buddies.
At first, it was sometimes very frustrating to infiltrate enemy areas stealthily due to the poor enemy AI and the direct alerting of the entire base upon discovery.
Now even inexperienced ghosts manage, with the help of AI companions, to dismantle entire bases alone. And if it should be harder, the game offers plenty of dials and settings to adjust the experience and keep it interesting for veterans.
Breakpoint now plays much smoother and more predictably. It is now the large soldier playground that it wanted to offer at release but could not. For PvE players with shooter ambitions, the game is now definitely a strong recommendation, especially since it is now available at a low price on all platforms.
Maik Schneider
Freelance author at MeinMMO
Breakpoint has made some significant strides since release and continues to be developed. Especially in coop mode and with some solid teammates, the tactical shooter delivers some exciting adventures.
If you want to read more about coop or MMO shooters, check out our list of the 14 best multiplayer online shooters 2021 for PS4, PS5, Xbox, and PC.
