Despite its initially promising duality concept, tactical shooter Specter Divide is held back by a hesitancy to take more creative risks. The results are disappointing.
For a new game studio, there are few genres as difficult to break into as the tactical shooter. With the space dominated by giants Valorant and Counter-Strike, newcomers take on established games with deep tactical gameplay, distinctive world designs, and dedicated communities. Newbies face a demanding set of player expectations, with a checklist that includes immaculate gunplay, perfect pacing, and ultra-clear level design at the very least. And it's only when you go beyond that that things become really interesting. What do you have that is novel and that can encourage new forms of tactical thinking? Can you provide enough of a hook to make players want to stick around to master the mechanic? Is your game simply different Enough to stand out?
Given all this, you can't help but respect anyone trying to enter the market, especially when said contender is an independent studio. And Specter Divide brings an idea to the party that's unique. The basis of the game is 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 get two lives per round, effectively giving you a second hit with the whip in case you get headshot out of nowhere. It's an intriguing idea on paper and immediately opens up a realm of new tactical possibilities. However, in practice, the implementation of this two-body concept seems rather superficial. Instead of doubling down on its hook, Specter Divide often plays it safe and avoids taking the kind of additional creative risks that would further separate it from other tactical shooters. On its own, the duality trick simply isn't strong enough to keep you coming back repeatedly for more. It's a game that seems almost fun, but not quite.
When it comes to first impressions, Specter Divide doesn't get off to the best start. When you first start the game, a short animation introduces you to its world: a cyberpunk future where, like Apex Legends, the population is obsessed with an underground blood sport. However, that's about as deep as the story can get, and it would be difficult to give you any more details on the backstory. This lack of exposition is due in part to the game's decision to forgo a roster of in-universe characters in favor of custom player avatars. One of the first screens you're presented with is the option to customize your main character and specter, and all of these options seem bland. In the year 2100, it seems like the Spring/Summer fashion season is all about dusty body armor and desaturated combat leggings. The future looks truly bleak. If you want your character to look a notch more interesting than a generic cannon fodder soldier, you'll have to visit the Specter Divide shop and spend £13.50 on a skin. Since 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 in your mouth when the basic character customization options are so boring, and the only cosmetic items you can earn through the game are obvious fillers like sprays and banners. Call me old-fashioned, but £43 for a pack of weapon skins seems a bit excessive.
Diving into a match reveals that Specter Divide is quite similar to other tactical shooters: it's attack and defense, with one team aiming to plant a bomb and the other trying to defuse it. The main differences are the two-body mechanic and that players must select a 'sponsor' at the start of each match. (Players are famously quick to become attached to soulless corporate brands. I love Pinnacle International! Who needs characters or personalities?) Each sponsor gives you access to three different abilities: Bloom Technologies, for example, gives you a barrier, a healing ability and 'Swarm Grenade' that blocks vision and damages players. You initially choose from four different sponsors, and there are four other sponsors that can be unlocked by playing and winning matches. (Or spend money to unlock them instantly, of course.) It's a system that encourages players to continue advancing through the ranks, although the amount of XP required to unlock a new sponsor is excessive; It takes days to complete challenges to unlock just one. For a game that needs to quickly capture and maintain the interest of new players, it's an odd decision to make progression feel so slow.
The first few games of Specter Divide are a steep learning curve, made even more complicated by the game's disorienting user interface. Despite the attempt to provide a simplified “quick” tab for newbies, the purchase menu is still hugely overwhelming, presenting dozens of weapons in a way that's difficult to understand when time pressure is on. The skill visuals are not particularly intuitive and it takes time to understand the function of each one. The 'bee swarm' is just a yellow ball, for example, while smoke grenades resemble a solid bluish-gray sphere…not exactly what one would imagine a cloud of smoke would look like. Because the game doesn't tie abilities to specific characters, it makes combat less immediately readable: you have no idea what an enemy's abilities are just by looking at them, and therefore can't plan strategies to counter them. Somewhat incredibly, it is also very It is difficult to distinguish between enemies and teammates. This leads to ridiculous situations where you and a teammate could throw panic bullets at each other for no reason, alerting your team. current enemies to your presence in the process. It turns out that the solution to this 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 quite frequently during matches. I can't tell you the number of snarky messages I read in chat related to this issue.
However, once you get familiar with the quirks and eccentricities of Specter Divide, you start messing around with the two-body mechanics and discover a ton of tactical possibilities. You can park your extra body next to a point and use it as a proximity alarm to alert you when enemies are nearby. You can quickly switch sides of the map by jumping between bodies, allowing you to defend points without having to run around the entire level. You can also throw your spectral 'disk' up a high ledge or vent and teleport there to gain a height advantage over your enemies. Because your wraith is vulnerable when uncontrolled, you should also consider how to keep it safe. This often requires high-risk childcare. Some teams will deliberately try to sneak behind your lines to take out wraiths, so to counter this you may need to keep your second body close. If you mess up a shootout and lose a body, well, having a wraith on hand means you can get quick revenge on your killers before they relocate.
There are some fun plays here, but once you lose one of your bodies, it becomes clear that Specter Divide simply doesn't have much else to do. The abilities may seem cyberpunk in design, but in practice they're largely what you'd expect to find in any shooter: a mix of heals, grenades, and barriers. They didn't inspire me to change my tactics, nor did they seem really revolutionary in one round. The shooting is fine overall, rewarding those who aim their sights rather than those who carelessly run through the hallways while spraying and praying. But I never got excited about any of my setups and never “clicked” with a specific gun the same way I do with other shooters.
However, Specter Divide's biggest problem is that it feels completely lacking in juice – this is a game with absolutely no vibe. Walking through its maps is an empty and silent experience, in part due to the game's 3v3 format, which means there are a limited number of active players at any point. The maps are nothing special and have all blended into a grayish blur in my memory, thanks to a really boring world design. Considering Specter Divide's futuristic cyberpunk setting and an initially pretty form of character cel shading, this is a huge missed opportunity. Where are all the neon signs and colorful characters? Let's go now. The molasses-slow movement speed and limited cover make you feel exposed while walking, and I felt like my options for approaching firefights from different directions were quite limited. Encounters often came down to slowly peeking around corners to see who could get a headshot first, which they don't. My idea of a fun shootout. Perhaps a more accurate name for this game would have been Twin Peeks. Anyway, I digress: the thing is, I always prefer a map with clutter, cover, and personality to one so sterile it makes me feel like a hamster in a maze.
On paper, Specter Divide's idea of duality has a lot of potential, but the way it's implemented here just doesn't take off, as its ability to mix with other abilities and mechanics is underexplored. As it stands, it feels like it was just added to a standard tactical shooter. With lackluster art direction and minimal story, Specter Divide's world design feels like an afterthought: a space you simply don't want to waste time in, while the various user interfaces, combat readability, and bugs of progression are important. In a genre dominated by two gigantic titles, it's truly admirable that Mountaintop Studios is trying to put a new spin on the scene. I just wish the developer had been prepared to double down on its idea and take the creative risks necessary to give Specter Divide a truly distinctive identity.
Eurogamer independently obtained a copy of Specter Divide.