Sniper: Ghost Warrior

In a strange way, Sniper: Ghost Warrior feels in tune with these credit-crunched times. Whereas most modern games vie to outdo each other in terms of providing a cinematic, complex experience, it takes a more modest approach. A first-person shoot-em-up set in an impressively rendered South American jungle environment, it eschews unnecessary frills such as arcane storylines and co-operative modes, in favour of the all-important basics.

For most of the game, you play as Tyler Wells, a sniper in an (unspecified) elite US military unit. By far the game's best aspect is its sniping engine: along with the expected cross-hairs, you're given a red dot which shows where your bullet will end up after being affected by wind and distance. Pull off a head-shot and you're treated to a very satisfying bullet-cam view of your kill. Your ghillie-suited character is also required to crawl around stealthily at times, which should please those anxious for another instalment of Metal Gear Solid. But the downside is that the impatient will find Sniper: Ghost Warrior intensely frustrating, particularly given that it is pretty unforgiving, with AI enemies seemingly able to detect you even when hidden, and enemy snipers just as well trained as you.

As the game progresses, it throws in some more conventional run-and-gun passages, in which you take over the character of one of Wells' colleagues, armed with an assault rifle rather than sniper. These appear to be unnecessarily in thrall to Modern Warfare 2 (one sequence is even set on oil rigs), and aren't enormously convincing. Things are more challenging when you play as Wells and enemies get up close and personal, forcing you to fall back on a silenced pistol and grenades. He can also throw knives and use a grappling-hook to abseil down cliffs – but only at prescribed points.

Technically, Sniper: Ghost Warrior isn't great – movement is a bit clunky, and you can get stuck between tree-roots or boulders, necessitating a return to the previous checkpoint. Multiplayer-wise, up to 12 people can take each other in snipe-fests in some decently thought-out maps.

While Sniper: Ghost Warrior has its faults, betraying the fact that it was created by an obscure Polish company rather than one of the big beasts, it will still satisfy those who naturally gravitate towards any opportunity for sniping when playing first-person shooters. And its no-frills, straight-up approach is curiously refreshing – it certainly doesn't promise more than it delivers.