While tactical shooter Specter Divide’s initial duality concept was promising, it was hampered by a hesitancy to take further creative risks. The results were not ideal.
There are few genres that are more difficult for new game studios to get into than tactical shooters. With the field dominated by behemoths Valorant and Counter-Strike, new players will face competition from established games with deep tactical gameplay, unique world designs, and dedicated communities. Newcomers face a demanding set of player expectations, with the list including flawless gunplay, flawless pacing, and ultra-clear level design as minimum requirements. It’s only when you get beyond that that things get really interesting. What do you have that’s new that might encourage new forms of tactical thinking? Can you provide enough hooks that the player will want to stick around to master the mechanics? Is your game simple? different Enough to stand out?
With all this in mind, you can’t disrespect anyone trying to break into the market – especially when said competitors are independent studios. Specter Divide brings a very unique idea to the party. The gameplay is based on the concept of duality: you control two separate bodies and can switch between them during a match to surprise your enemies. This also means you gain two lives each round, and if you get a sudden headshot, you’ll get a second whip. On paper, it’s an interesting idea and immediately opens up new areas of tactical possibilities. In practice, however, the implementation of this two-body concept feels rather superficial. Rather than going the extra mile, Ghost Split often plays it safe and avoids taking additional creative risks, further distinguishing it from other tactical shooters. On its own, the duality gimmick isn’t enough to keep you coming back for more. It’s a game that feels fun, but not that fun.
Speaking of first impressions, Phantom Divide doesn’t have the strongest start. When you first launch the game, a brief animation introduces you to its world: a cyberpunk future where, like Apex Legends, people are obsessed with underground blood sports. However, this is as deep as the lore goes, and I would be hard-pressed to give you any more details about the backstory. Part of the lack of exposition is due to the game’s decision to abandon an in-universe roster of characters in favor of custom player avatars. The first screen you see is the options for customizing your protagonist and ghosts – and gosh, all of these options look bland. In 2100, the spring/summer fashion season seemed to be dominated by dusty bulletproof vests and faded combat tights. The future does look bleak. If you want your character to look more interesting than your average cannon fodder soldier, you’ll have to visit Specter Divide’s store and spend £13.50 on the skin. Given that it’s a free-to-play game, it’s understandable that Specter Divide has to make money through microtransactions. But it still leaves a bit of a sour taste when the basic character customization options are so boring, and the only cosmetics you can earn through the game are obvious fillers like sprays and banners. Call me old-fashioned, but £43 seems a bit steep for a gun holster.
Digging deeper into a game reveals that Specter Divide looks a lot like other tactical shooters: it’s all offense and defense, with one team’s goal being to plant a bomb and the other trying to defuse it. The main difference is the two-body mechanic, where players must choose a “sponsor” at the start of each match. (Players have been known to quickly become attached to soulless corporate brands. I love Pinnacle International! Who needs characters or personalities?) Each sponsor gives you three different abilities: Bloom Technologies, for example, gives you obstacles , healing abilities, and swarm grenades that block vision and cause damage to players. You initially choose between four different sponsors, with four additional sponsors unlocked through play and winning matches. (Of course, Or spend money to unlock them instantly.) It’s a system that encourages players to keep advancing, despite the excessive amount of XP required to unlock new sponsors; it takes several days to complete a single challenge for a game that needs to be hooked and maintained quickly. For a game that’s of interest to new players, it’s an odd decision to make progress feel so slow.
The first few games of Specter Divide are a steep learning curve, made even more difficult by the game’s confusing user interface. Despite trying to provide a streamlined “quick” tab for newcomers, the purchase menu remains overwhelming, presenting dozens of guns in a way that’s difficult to understand under time pressure. The visuals of the abilities aren’t particularly intuitive, and it takes time to understand what each one does. For example, the Swarm is just a yellow ball, while the Smoke Bomb resembles a solid blue-gray sphere…not exactly what you imagine a smoke cloud to look like. Combat is less readable because the game doesn’t tie abilities to specific characters – you don’t know what your enemy’s abilities are just by looking at them, and therefore can’t plan a strategy to fight them. It’s a bit incredible, this is also Very It’s hard to tell the difference between enemies and teammates. This can lead to comical situations where you and your teammates may panic and shoot at each other for no reason, causing you to be alert. actual Along the way, enemies will hinder your presence. It turns out that the solution to this problem is to change the “enemy outline color” in the game settings – but since many players are unaware of this option, cases of mistaken identity occur frequently during matches. I can’t tell you the amount of vitriolic messages I’ve read in chat related to this issue.
However, once you get used to the weirdness of Ghost Divide, you’ll start tinkering with the two-body mechanics – and discover a whole host of tactical possibilities. You can park the bonus body next to a certain point and use it as a proximity alert, letting you know when an enemy is nearby. You can quickly switch sides of the map by jumping between bodies, allowing you to defend points without having to run the entire level. You can also throw ghost “ice balls” onto high places or vents and teleport there to gain a height advantage over your enemies. Because your ghost is vulnerable when you don’t control it, you’ll also need to consider how to keep it safe. This usually requires some really high-stakes nannying. Some teams will deliberately sneak behind your lines to take out ghosts, so to counter this you may want to keep your second body nearby. If you mess up in a firefight and lose a body, having a ghost on hand means you can quickly retaliate against the killer before he can move on.
There are some fun ways to play here, but once you lose a body, it’s obvious that Ghost Split is just not much else happened. These abilities may look cyberpunk in design, but in reality they’re basically what you’d expect to find in any shooter: a mix of healers, grenades, and obstacles. They didn’t inspire me to change my tactics or make me feel like a real game changer in a round. The gunplay is mostly decent, rewarding those who keep their crosshairs on target rather than those who mindlessly walk through corridors while spraying and praying. But I never got excited about any of my gear, nor did I ever get that “click” with a particular gun that I did with other shooters.
The biggest problem with Specter Divide, however, is that it feels completely lifeless – it’s a game with absolutely no atmosphere. Walking around the map is a hollow and quiet experience, partly due to the game’s 3v3 format, which means the number of active players at any one point is limited. The maps are unremarkable, and in my memory they all blend into a gray blob, thanks to some pretty mediocre world design. Considering Splinters’ future cyberpunk setting, and the initially beautiful form of character cell shading, this is a huge missed opportunity. Where are all the neon lights and colorful characters? Come on now. Slow movement speed and limited cover make you feel exposed as you move around, and I felt like my options for gunfights from different directions were rather limited. Encounters often come down to slowly peeking around corners to see who can get the first headshot, but this isn’t My idea for a fun shootout. Perhaps a more accurate name for this game would be “Twin Peeks.” Anyway, I digress: the point is, I’ll always choose a map that’s cluttered, with cover and character, over one that’s so barren that it makes me feel like a hamster in a maze.
On paper, Ghost Split’s idea of duality has huge potential, but the way it’s implemented here doesn’t work, and its ability to mix with other abilities and mechanics isn’t fully explored. In its current form, it feels like it’s been tacked on to a standard tactical shooter. With lackluster art direction and little background knowledge, Ghost Split’s world design feels like an afterthought: a space you don’t want to spend time in, while various UI, combat readability, and progression lapses Very serious. In a genre dominated by two massive games, it’s admirable that Mountaintop Studios is trying to bring a new twist to the game. I just hope the developers are ready to go the extra mile and take the creative risks needed to give Specter Divide a truly unique identity.
A copy of Specter Divide was obtained independently by Eurogamer.
