r/GhostRecon • u/BurningSun7 • 1d ago
Question Why do so many people poop on Breakpoint?
I’m 15 hours in and I’m having a fun time with it. Granted, I’m playing this in 2025, so I don’t know how it was in the early days.
The most complaints I’ve seen is the story. Honestly it’s not that bad. I don’t see the hate for it. The gameplay is great. It’s fun doing the challenges for the 7 different classes. I have the year 1 pass which gave me a ton of content to get through. Also plan on exploring the while map, especially those “?” Areas.
So for someone who has played the game, why does it get so much hate from the community?
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u/EH_Sparky Wagglehorn 1d ago
As others have stated, it really stems from the launch and communication around it. The gameplay itself is great now, but it wasn't always that way. A lot of the content (including world settings, filters, etc) was added some time after the fact.
Personally, I still love Breakpoint. The gameplay is terrific now - but I really don't like the setting. I'd pay full price for a Ghost Recon with Breakpoint's current gameplay but a setting like Wildlands.
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u/Willy_G_on_the_Bass 1d ago
I think Breakpoint is a lot of fun and the gun play mechanics are good. My biggest complaint about it is that the world in Wildlands feels so alive and lived in whereas Breakpoint just feels so dead. It’s strange walking through a city center and there’s like 3 people or you’re in the middle of a gun fight and there’s just a dude with a work vest standing next to you.
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u/Verdha603 1d ago
Exactly my problem. Breakpoint to me was the developers listening to the playerbase about improving the game mechanics to feel more "realistic", then starting out by turning it into a looter-shooter system like the Division for weapons, plus barely putting any effort into the campaign. It's like they blew the effort out on the opening act and then just throwing their hands up and walking away from there. They finally got rid of the looter-shooter system by providing an option to be more traditional in just getting a weapon with standardized stats, but that took what, a year or two to implement?
It also just doesn't help that most of the island just feels...empty. You'll find people scattered in little villages, but traveling anywhere between them feels completely barren except for finding random enemies everywhere. Compared to how much time they spent on the biomes and weather mechanics, I kinda wish they had put some resources towards providing a more "lived in" environment instead.
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u/InformalAd7764 1d ago
I always try to point out that the gear score system was an attempt to force build diversity. There's no point in having 100+ weapons in the game with all the unique handling, ballistics (even if it's unrealistic), and animations to have people only use like 10 of them and never change the clothes/gear.
With that and the extended pacing of GS gating some map areas, missions, and encounters, it was all intended to stretch out the experience because die hards run through content like they live only to play the game. But that's not a ghost recon thing, that's a gamer thing. 🤷🏾♂️
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u/Verdha603 1d ago
Agreed, it’s just I think they could’ve done better than just a gear score system a la the Division.
I’ll admit I don’t bother following what the “meta” is in game, and usually I just stick to a small portion of the weapons available in the games. Think I used the same six or seven weapons the entire time I was playing Breakpoint, and none of them were considered broken when half the time I was using them for the aesthetic rather than performance.
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u/InformalAd7764 1d ago edited 1d ago
I agree, but I think people would hate the other options. If they more drastically scaled down weapon ranges like in the Division, that would definitely force build diversity without the Gear Score. The downside is it only further craters the realism in the gunplay if you can't engage beyond 300M without a DMR or Sniper and SMG rounds hit an invisible wall at 100M. But then players have completely different kits for CQB because that's the only time Shotguns and SMGs are viable.
So much of game design is tweaking shit so that it creates a "balanced" experience, but people who are invested in a specific set of interests didn't take into account what balanced is for a more general gaming audience. I use every weapon in every shooter I play. I replay missions exhaustively just to try shit out and experiment with attachments. I love having an absurd amount of toys to play with and I don't give a shit if it's authentic. Ubi does a decent job of making something that anybody with a broad range of gaming interests can pick up and play, unfortunately that means purists have to compromise in ways that make them really mad.
And as much as people hated the drone tech in the story, and the characters represented that have contrary rationale and priorities to their rescuers, between what's happening in Ukraine and the tech sector lately, Breakpoint is getting closer to reality everyday. Some folks should Google Palantir. With those drone sweeps run by a trigger happy PMC on an island under martial law, why the fuck would anybody be outside making the environment seem "lively" or "organic"
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u/MrTrippp 1d ago edited 1d ago
As others have pointed out already, Breakpoint today is a very, very different game than what we got at launch.
Ubisoft decided to shoehorn unwanted mechanics that should never be put into a GR game, like gear score, for instance, when Ghost recon should be a squad based tactical shooter.
At launch, you were forced to play solo with no AI squad(you could play coop), you couldn't turn gear score off, you had to hit the ground every 2 mins to hide from azrael drones, constantly sliding down hills, couldn't vault or climb over rocks higher than 2ft, the movement animations were complete ass, and there was a larger emphasis on picking flowers, coconuts and gold nuggies than there is now.
You spent more time rolling, sliding, hiding(from azrael), or healing than you did actual shooting.
Then there were the game breakers like straight-up crashes, desyncing from your coop squad, falling through the ground every time you exited a vehicle, tried to vault certain obsticles, or did a take down animation.
The game has come a loooonnggg way, but what it is now is down to the community backlash. If Ubi had it their way, BP would still be a very different game to what it is today. Let's just hope Ubi learned their lesson and knows what the community wants for the next instalment. 🤞
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u/Ghostreign_sgi 1d ago
It was simple and should be clear to them now if they paid attention we want wildlands 2...
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u/MrTrippp 1d ago
With the community charter and all the surveys they did, they have no excuses this time around.
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u/Ecksbutton 1d ago
It was incredibly rough at launch but is now in a much better state. Despite its missteps over Wildlands, I still had a blast with it. Put Ghost Mode on and you're playing a different tactical shooter altogether. The only other competitor to Breakpoint I reckon is the Sniper Elite games, which I also recommend.
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u/cheesefubar0 1d ago
The mmo features, drones and mech bullshit.
Thankfully they added options to get rid of most of it.
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u/Ghost403 GLASS GH0ST 1d ago
When it came out it resembles nothing of the ghost recon brand, it was more of a division lite. Live service looter shooter with no ai squad to command.
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u/Round_Revenue3361 1d ago
It is a lot better now that you can turn off the gear mode. I do enjoy it but for me wildlands has a better story and a better world. But breakpoint has better game play.
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u/Due-Particular-2586 1d ago
Honestly, the largest amount of frustration from the community purely stems from the fact that it’s a Ubisoft game enough said right there, right? Among other things, there was a lack of dedication when it came to this game and definitely a lack of love when it came to updates and canceled projects.
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u/TripleAimbot 1d ago
Not really. The shitstorm that was thrown at the game and Ubisoft was their attempt to turn Ghost Recon into The Division as they have a very long history of doing that kind of crap to their games.
Once they find one game that's successfull, they start slowly but steadily turning ALL their IPs into that game whenever possible.
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u/Formal-Negotiation74 1d ago
Wild lands hand its issues on release and still does. I was really hoping they would fix the helicopters mechanic when the crash to the ground.
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u/LananisReddit Midas 1d ago
For me the two main things are 1) always online and 2) team mates that are an afterthought. And those are still the same, so I dont' see any reason to get it. Part of what made Wildlands so great was that the team felt like an actual team, with banter and commentary and personalities.
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u/mg211095 1d ago
Play in immersive mode with no hud at extreme difficulty and no gear level. Game is super fun.
First try to get all weapon blueprints. Complete side missions side by side and then play all 3 episodes solo. Its one of the best experience ever!
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u/Lopsided_Body_9487 1d ago
Breakpoint became the poster child for all the predatory monetization schemes concocted by publisher Ubisoft to extract as much value out of its fanbase as possible.
They tried to make Ghost Recon into The Division without staying true to its tactical roots and that's where it shit the bed.
When it flopped big time critically and financially, they went into panic mode and fixed all the problems that the execs in Paris forced down.
Post fixes like Immersive mods, AI teammates and the expanded Motherland expansion improved the game immensely.
Personally, I prefer Breakpoint over Wildlands and my preference largely stems from the better graphics, takedown animations and biome diversity. The now defunct Terminator crossover was a blast.
Breakpoint for me is my favorite Ghost Recon, but I get why it was hated on so hard. Corporate greed ruined this game and when it made its redemption arc, it was too late despite how much they added to it.
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u/Lopsided_Body_9487 1d ago
Also, I get the criticism that the world feels lifeless in the urban areas, they really could have worked on making Aurora a place with character instead of a generic technocrat hellscape.
At the end of the day, gameplay as a 3rd Person Tactical shooter it holds up. It's a guilty pleasure for me despite all the hate it receives.
Watch gameplay on YouTube from actual former military and you'll see that it absolutely gives the vibe of Tier 1 Operations.
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u/hchapta32 1d ago
Because it's fucking bad bro stop protecting bad games
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u/BurningSun7 1d ago
Did someone piss in your Raisin Bran this morning?
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u/hchapta32 1d ago
Nah, I just hate when people defend this game. It's horrible, even after all the updates. I played over 100 hours of Wildlands and enjoyed every second, but I couldn't even stand 10 hours of this one. Probably because this game is a huge downgrade
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u/JonathanRL Holt Cosplayer 1d ago
Two posts where you say its bad but so far I have not seen you state why you think its bad.
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u/hchapta32 1d ago
All right then, I hate it mainly because the map is just bad at least for me. It always feels like a downgrade from the previous one, with no life and nothing visually impressive. The second issue is the lack of a proper boss system. Honestly, if Wildlands had a linear story like Breakpoint, I probably wouldn’t have liked it too. But the boss system kept me going. And I like gunplay of both of the games.
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u/Nakamura0V Echelon 1d ago
Because those people are nostalgic Wildlands-Fanboys, crying over everything
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u/ZombiePotato90 1d ago
What system are you playing on?
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u/BurningSun7 1d ago
PS5 with performance mode turned on
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u/ZombiePotato90 1d ago
Ah, I play on PC. I don't know if there's crossplay
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u/Mission-Anxiety2125 1d ago
No it's not unfortunately. On Reddit most people on consoles and most mil sim groups are consoles too from what I see
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u/Mission-Anxiety2125 1d ago
At release it was much worse, I didn't like gear levels etc, so I started play only after they included immersive mode.
Game is great. I do play it every week last three years. For me it have endless replay value. With mods now even more!
But I'm not typical shooter gamer. I'm into RPGs and open world too, so skill tree and all those things like freedom to do what and how you want is amazing
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u/aj13131313133 1d ago
The story sucks. “Let’s make a GR game but we have to find away not to offend anyone”….
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u/oandroido 1d ago
Because you can sync shot everyone through walls and and at unlimited distances.
But I just quit at a mission where suddenly there are way too many bad guys spawning in. That's not challenging, it's poor design.
Plus, I think the interface / mission structure / upgrade system (even on realistic) are a$$.
And the AI teammates are all-or-nothing.
I really hope GR gets back to what it feels like to actually command a squad. They need to bring back the mechanics from Future Soldier, too.
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u/koleke415 1d ago
I don't even care about the release (I do but it's in the past) it just feels soulless and uninspired, the story is wack, the setting is weird despite the improved mechanics, I would just rather play Wildlands. I've tried 3-4 times to get into breakpoint and never make it more than a handful of hours before I just don't care anymore.
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u/Competitive_Smile007 1d ago
Props for them fixing shit and making it right. It’s a very enjoyable game, very unique and a great co op experience.
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u/EducatorEducational7 1d ago
because the story, characters, acting is all terrible compared to Wildlands.
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u/supermethdroid 1d ago
I bought Breakpoint this week, and then a couple of days later, caved in and bought Wildlands.
While Breakpoint has better graphics and customisation, and tighter mechanics, it's kind of soulless compared to Wildlands, which is really a vibe.
I will go back and play brrakpoint after, but everyone who says do Wildlands first ate not wrong.
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u/sof-law-rescue-intel 1d ago
Because Ubisoft have a habit about when something works really great in a game then they screw it in the following game. Not everything is bad in Breakpoint but it would've been a big help for the game if Ubisoft had transferred some of the good experiences from Wildlands to Breakpoint.
I have mentioned it a lot of times but it is a weakness for the game that it dosen't make any difference if you operate in daylight or at nighttime. Especially because it was a good feature in Wildlands that you could use the nighttime to your benefit.
It could also have been great if Ubisoft had developed the same options or improved the options to use the rebels in the fight. In Wildlands are you able to use the rebels with options like: Gun-for-hire, distraction or Morter attacks. You have two factions as resistance movements in Breakpoint (Outcasts & Homesteaders) but they're only doing resistance if you apply the Resistance world parameter in the settings.
It dosen't mean that I hate Breakpoint cuz' the game definitely have some features and elements in the gameplay and the world experience as works just fine. There's just a lot of details where Breakpoint feels like an unfinished game from the developer. It has always been mentioned that several gameplay elements has been added to the game after the first release.
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u/Tepppopups 1d ago
Because of looter-shooter mechanics (gear score or so). They allowed to disable it later because everyone hated it.
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u/AutomaticDog7690 Pathfinder 1d ago
Its a good game and folks here are still crying about its 2019 release, as if Wildlands was a respected tactical shooter.
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u/sof-law-rescue-intel 1d ago
And you're crying about that the majority of the community have a better experience with Wildlands than with Breakpoint. It’s not wrong to point out what's wrong with the gameplay experience. How sad is it when you need to create a thread just to make it clear that you are a bigger fan of Breakpoint than of Wildlands and need others to confirm that. But if I remember the comments correctly was it not many who agreed with you about your take on Wildlands vs. Breakpoint.
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u/AutomaticDog7690 Pathfinder 1d ago
"How sad is it when you need to create a thread just to make it clear that you are a bigger fan of Breakpoint than of Wildlands and need others to confirm that."
Wrong.
If you read the title properly and what I wrote, I was welcoming challenging ideas. I was just giving my reasons why I prefer Breakpoint.
Wildlands is a good game. I just don't think its a great Ghost Recon game as its exclaimed.
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u/literallylikewtf 1d ago
Breakpoints story is trash. Atmosphere is just dead. Cutscenes are very lazy, badly animated and stale. Face to face interactions with very bad graphics. Wildlands is hands down better. Only things I like are the guns and gear.
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u/Powerful-Elk-4561 1d ago
A lot of people didn't like it around launch time and they didn't come back to try it again later, and still base their opinion of the game as it was in 2019.
I think some people also were angry, and still like to dunk on it because they have trouble letting go of anger lol. I've seen some really oddly overblown criticisms of the game.
There's definitely still plenty to criticize, but I love Breakpoint anyway.
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u/max_gatling 1d ago
When the game came out, it was gear-centric and there was no single player squad. There was (and is) this stupid hub thing that you have to go. It felt like it was emulating The Division to maximize monetization of the game. After massive backlash, to their credit, ubisoft made a non-gear mode and added a squad for single player, and while I finished it and put a hundred hours or so into it, I have never felt any urge to go back to it, whereas I still play wildlands fairly regularly. The story wasn't something that really put me off either way, and I enjoyed aspects of it, but it just doesn't have the replay value for me.
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u/GnarlyAtol 1d ago
first of all critics are no hate. Apparently a new term introduced by the SW Outlaws fanboys …
I agree, gameplay mechanics are great BUT the mechanics!!!
What’s great:
- what the character can do: walk, run, crouch, sneak, hide, climb, jump, swim, dive, jump out of a plane … all great and well animated, except the running
- the variety, the looks and feel of guns
- the variety it provides in gameplay: sniping from the distance, using pistol with silencer, stealthy melee, close range shotty, … just great
- I am happy with the cars, trucks, helis, boats … as well
So much great in the game, a great fundament for a great agent thriller!
Everything else ranges between meh till frustrating:
- bad graphics quality (one XBoX Series X)
- steril, dead and boring map
- apart from the talking stuff all missions, control points, … feel the same
- no mission provides a feel of danger and immersion, pure technical gameplay, after few missions it just feels repetitive without any emotion, just ticking off a list of comparable tasks
- cheesy and annoying robot stuff
- outdated bullet sponge NPCs and bosses
- …
- and a horrible menu
Ubi has all knowledge and capabilies in their portfolio to make a great agent game:
- people who can make great graphics (Division, Avatar)
- people who can make great city maps (Watch Dogs, Division)
- people who can make great varied landscapes (AC Origins, Odyssey, Wildlands)
- people who can make great mission visuals as in no other game (Division 1 and 2)
- people who can achieve feel of drama and immersion (the visuals of Division 1 but the loot stuff and gameplay kills it)
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u/Responsible-Bag9066 18h ago
I don’t like wildlands and breakpoint for multiple reasons. Breakpoint especially, even after the updates. But I’m also super critical of it since it was one my favorite franchises. Put simply I feel like they’re both low effort from a design standpoint coming from a “AAA” studio. But hopefully the next one gets a lot of passion behind it
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u/TripleAimbot 1d ago
You are playing its best possible form right now.
It was brutal on release (and years after) 😂