I've been mostly fine with the shift in Assassin's Creed—though there's room for
something like the earlier entries in the series—but at some point, Ubisoft has to realize the open-world RPG model can't be applied to everything; Ghost Recon, Assassin's Creed, The Division, and Far Cry need some differentiation. Meanwhile, 2017's Ghost Recon Wildlands managed to find a sweet spot between its military shooter roots and an arcade-style open world adventure.
"Ghost Recon Breakpoint doesn't have a clear vision of what it wants to be," I wrote at the beginning of
my review last year. In trying to replicate the RPG-driven success of Assassin's Creed Origins and Assassin's Creed Odyssey, Ubisoft Paris made a game that
appealed to no one. The military fans were unhappy with the addition of gear score and loot, and the RPG adventure fans decried the lack of narrative player choice. And so Ubisoft, once again, had to knuckle down and try to drastically overhaul one of its games. The publisher has built trust by committing to and improving games like The Division 2, Rainbow Six Siege, and For Honor, but they probably
shouldn't launch in such a state to begin with.
Eight months out from launch, Ubisoft Paris has delivered the Ghost Experience, known to most in the community as "Immersive Mode." It's not a single on-off switch that changes Ghost Recon Breakpoint from its loot-based launch experience into something more like
the survival-focused game marketed to players; that option is available if you don't want to dive into menus. Instead, it's a whole host of options, opening up Breakpoint to players and letting them choose how they play the game.