Aliens: Fireteam Elite 2, out now on consoles and PC, is a bigger and, in many ways, better follow-up to the original Fireteam Elite. Like that game, Fireteam Elite 2 is a third-person co-op shooter built around completing levels, fighting off waves of aliens, and improving your space marines with upgrades, perks, and new gear. This time around, however, four people can play together instead of just three. Also, there’s a lot more dialogue and narrative. That last addition is a problem.

I enjoyed the original Fireteam Elite, but it felt a bit small at launch. Over time, with updates and DLC, it expanded, but it never felt quite as fleshed out as it could have been or as deep as it needed to be to make sinking a lot of hours into it worthwhile. This time around, developer Cold Iron Studios has added a lot more to the formula. You can now fully customize your marine, apply all sorts of decals wherever you please to your guns, and there are more ways to upgrade and tweak your gear and character. On top of that, you can now crouch, there are new enemies to fight, and you even have a handy-dandy sidearm option that features unlimited ammo, which is useful for when it’s nearly game over, man.

All of this is great. I’ve been playing with friends and randos and solo and have had a good time. Some performance issues have been annoying, and they seem worse on the game’s first mission, which is a long, tutorial-like prologue mission, but the game is definitely playable.

Source link