The first time a pyromaniac in a sailor hat kills you with a Kamehameha, you won’t know whether to laugh or cry. It’s the type of game where soldiers blast rockets at their own feet to propel themselves through the air while bonesaw-wielding medics pump their allies with steroids. That means balls-to-the-wall, nonstop action instead of the careful positioning and precision of Valorant. Ghost Recon Online is likely to ship with a few maps initially, with more slated for release down the line, though it's unknown how many different play types will be available from the outset.Team Fortress 2 (or TF2) is arguably the first massively popular class-based shooter, which makes it the precursor to all the games on this list.īased on a mod for Quake (and later Half-Life), TF2 comes from a tradition of quick-twitch corridor shooters. The Moscow City map we played in the domination-style Capture mode offered up a large and detailed environment in which to carry out our four-on-four battle, though the actual release may support additional players (it wasn't clear from the demo). Ghost Recon Online very much looks and plays like a classic series multiplayer experience, though it's likely to feel a bit streamlined and compact by comparison. It doesn't have a single-player campaign or elaborate production values, though it is definitely a cut above what we'd expect from a game that can be downloaded and played without whipping out your wallet. This is an important caveat, because this free-to-play iteration isn't meant to replace the upcoming Ghost Recon: Future Soldier or other full-fledged premium releases.

Ghost Recon Online is the Tom Clancy-branded counterpart to those titles, and based on what we played, it's pretty seriously impressive – for a free game.

The free-to-play tag is often associated with Facebook games and social diversions, but games like Combat Arms and Battlefield Free4Play already deliver robust shooter experiences in that mold.

Modern combat versus diamons