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Historical shooter games fill a very interesting niche in the realm of PVP-focused, immersive games, and are often the ground where hardcore FPS and historical grand strategy game players meet. These games are ultimately middlegrounds: set and focused on a rich and immersive history while also offering accessible and competitive gameplay to keep their playercounts fresh. For any novice looking to begin their journey into historical shooters, this guide will provide you with 3 key recommended starting points. While we will begin with a game that is likely a household name, as we go further and further down the historical shooter rabbit hole, we will enter territory that often seems to niche and nerdy for the average gamer, to simulate the pipeline effect this kind of game can have on you.
For a franchise with no real base in historical shooters, being an explictially-modern, PVP-focused game for the vast majority of the brand’s lifespan, Battlefield I was an ambitious leap for DICE. As a game with a primarily FPS-game condition audience, the kind of fan who likes similar gimes like Call of Duty or Apex Legends (not at all to hate on those games, but simply to indicate how much of an experiment Battlefield I was), to move away from their core gameplay mechanics of fast-shooting, powerful guns with vehicles to match, moving towards a trench warfare simulator- and arguably one of the best depictions of World War One anywhere in the gaming industry- was a big jump.
What makes Battlefield I such a great game overall, and by far the best introduction for a player migrating from an FPS game to the realm of historically-based shooter games, is the intricate and authentic attention to detail. Battlefield I has a vast range of time-appropriate weapons, straight out of the pages of history and ready for use on the battlefield. These weapons look and feel like something youd find in the trenches: they feel powerful and have a sense of balance, but yet genuinely feel totally divorced from the assault rifles and machine guns of DICE’s other games. The exact same can be said of the vehicles: while flying a biplane might not be as thrilling as an Apache attack heliocopter, they both still feel powerful and unique.
That said, I would be a fool if I didn’t also talk about the story. While Battlefield I makes no concerted effort to focus on the historical subtext throughout multiplayer, with it largely being simply a FPS WWI reskin, the campaign goes deep into elements of the First Wolrd War, from the massacre at Gallipoli to the Battles of the Isonzo. The fact that DICE knew their playerbase might have prefer the Call of Duty: Cold War approach- that being a campaign that simply drops in and out fo the historical subtext to support a game’s narrative- the fact they went for an immersive, moving and tragic series of stories to show in detail in their campaign really shows how much faith they put in their playerbase, and it totally paid off.
Battlefield I is essentially a historical shooter by stealth: feeling in many ways like a generic FPS but rooted deeply in its rich historical context. For many, it will be a prime way to fall down the pipeline of historical shooters, that grow less FPS-y and more historically authentic as the list goes down.
Moving further away from the traditional FPS dynamic but still feeling equally fast paced and chaotic is Rising Storm 2: Vietnam. Despite arguably being closer to the era of Call of Duty weapons than Battlefield I, RS2 feels distinctly different, with far more realism put into the gunplay. From guns with unstable recoil, difficulty aiming and slow reload times, spraying and praying wont suffice in this Vietnam milsim, and with the most powerful weapons gatekept to first-come-first-serve classes, often times you’ll be slugging it out with basic infantry gear and a prayer.
Rising Storm 2: Vietnam’s gameplay loop is simultaneously repetitive yet infinitely replayable, with modes ranging from simple point control to campaigns centred around offensive or defensive campaigns. Each map has a large variety of areas so that no match ever really feels the same, as while one minute you might be tearing up an urban hellscape, and the next you find yourself crawling through the massive open grounds of the American embassy. The map range on RS2 is really something, and from the trench systems used by defenders to the Foward Operating Bases of the attackers, each game almost forces you to plan your assault according to the map.
As for the dynamic of combat, RS2’s combat is certainly punishing. Being as true to life as possible, RS2 punishes any kind of damage severely, with most shots whether from a 1911 pistol to a M40 sniper rifle having the potential to kill. Indeed, throughout the entire game it often feels like, true to the real Vietnam experience, everything is trying to kill you, from chopper gunners and napalm strikes to mine fields and RPGs. RS2 feels unpredictable and chaotic, as no matter how good you get your kill streak can easily be toppled with just one hit to the skull.
In short, when you pair an incredibly satisfying and thrilling combat mechanic with maps and gamemodes that keep the game feeling fresh and new every single time, you’ll quickly find the need for bhopping and slide sprinting will subside as you find yourself not only immersed in a genuinely realistic historical shooter game, but having equal amounts of fun- if not more!
Now for a final pick that moves totally into niche territory is the American Civil War game War of Rights. The first unique thing about War of Rights is obviously the gunplay, being centred around muskets! Muskets take ages to reload, are incredibly inaccurate and are often just used for the bayonets anyway, making it an odd choice for a videogame setting as on paper that kind of gunplay doesn’t sound fun. However, when you consider evey foe is facing the same limited opportunities this means you have every opportunity to play tactical, from standing in line battles to engage opponents with your comrades to playing as a ranger, waiting in hiding to ambush with a quick shot to the face before retreating into cover, War of Rights’ limited gunplay is arguably where the thrill comes from, as every bullet counts and a missed opportunity or a bad setup are often a death sentence.
From a broader perspective, War of Rights is very immersive. From the music authentic to the American Civil War to maps that directly parallell with real battles, the entire game cultivates a real sense of immersion. If you pair that with the fact that many communities exist within the game that provide you the opportunity to engage in real re-enactment, to enlist within fictional divisions, work your way up the ranks, find a specialised role that suits you and even participate in large-scale line battles with other divisions!
In short, with a game that is totally true to the reality of the American Civil War in every possible way, from the maps to the guns, and then a community that actively makes re-enactment more enjoyable by providing whole new elements of gameplay through line battles and the potential for rank progression within a division, War of Rights may be niche but certainly seems to be a historical game we’d recommend.
In short, ranging from Battlefield I which is very much mainstream to the more obscure War of Rights, these 3 games are excellent choices for anyone looking to move into games that provide a more immersive historical experience but pairing the fun elements of a shooter game, instead of those purely looking for a dopamine rush as one might suggest certain FPS players might be.
