Paul’s an expert in Videogames, Star Trek, flannel shirts – in that order.
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My first round of Wardogs had me so confused – I travelled several kilometers to a big circle, and I was killed immediately. The concept of the FPS game is so simple on paper; it’s half Battlefield, half ARMA, and a bit king of the hill. But that doesn’t tell the full story. This is a game that doesn’t put restrictions on its players, and once I realized that, I started having a rollicking good time.
Wardogs is a realistic FPS game; I’d go ahead and call it borderline milsim and hope that I don’t annoy any hardcore gamers out there. It’s a shooter where three teams of around 30 players each fight over a central circle on a map. Whichever team holds the most players inside that circle for a set period of time gains a point. The first team to 100 points wins the game.
Battlefield has traditionally had set classes, and ARMA just does whatever it likes; Wardogs is in the middle somewhere. I wanted to test the waters first with a bog-standard infantry setup. With an assault rifle and a dream, I was nothing more than fodder inside the action circle. It isn’t small, either; I just happen to be a bullet magnet, which got quite frustrating.
Becoming disheartened, I wanted to try something different, so leant back on my true calling: being that person shooting you from the bushes 500m away. Recon class, sniper, whatever you want to call it. I was going to play for the team, of course, but do it my way.
Each side in this war had a main base, located around 3km away from the action zone. This means that to get back into the fight, you have to be ferried to the frontline in either a car or a helicopter (you can walk, but honestly who has the time). I planned to try and cut these lines, staying on the edge of the zone, so I could still score points for the team while not being in anyone’s crosshairs.
This worked a treat. I exercised patience, I ranged my rifle appropriately, and I started racking up kills. Forcing the enemy lot holed up in a big tower to think twice about the direction they were facing, I wanted to strike fear into the heart of their backline troops. This was what I was after; this was my role. Taking a look at the entire battlefield, I came to realize that every player had customized their job, too.
We had heli pilots acting as taxi drivers, ground troops rushing to take valuable positions, and engineers building makeshift bunkers. From my vantage point, I could also see the evolution of the zone as the match went on – what started as a blank lot eventually started sprouting outposts, anti-air batteries, and dangerous minefields.
Each match I played went on for quite a while, so this violent cottage industry popping up in the action circle gave me new objectives, new locations to play around, and a new aim. You would be forgiven for thinking that winning the game is the main goal in Wardogs, but it isn’t quite as simple as that. Because I’m forced to purchase my loadout each time I die, my life turned into a profit and loss graph.
In the top right corner of the screen is my bank balance, and next to that is either a green or a red number showing my current profit or loss for that life. This was the yardstick by which I measured my effectiveness. Staying in the zone, killing enemy players – playing the damn objective, basically – earns me money. If I died with the green dollar sign on my screen, I did a good job.
Giving players a monetary incentive to stay on target and be useful is genius. Tipping heli pilots for a successful infiltration, putting a bounty on your limp body so others will be incentivized to revive you – it’s proper carrot-on-a-stick stuff but in the best way. Building these positive team-forward behaviors makes for a higher-quality match, and it also means that those most helpful players can afford bigger guns the next time they’re in base.
My time with Wardogs started on rocky ground, but once I found my flow and my place in the conflict, it was a blast. It’s coming out in early access sometime in 2026, so until then, I’ll be counting my pennies and waiting for the next respawn.