Splitgate 2 already feels like the next great shooter | Digital Trends

Back in 2021, Splitgate took me by surprise. While it had been kicking around for two years prior, I didn’t dig into it until its relaunch. Once I did, I was mesmerized. It was an incredibly tight shooter that brought me back to Halo’s golden years, but one with a truly innovative portal mechanic that made action feel more cerebral. Developer 1047 Games wasn’t expecting so many people like me to fall in love with it either. After a whirlwind year of popularity, the studio decided to end support on the viral hit and start building a sequel with a stronger foundation rather fixing a rusting one on the fly.

The result of that decision is Splitgate 2, which has entered alpha just two years after its predecessor’s support ended. As it turns out, 1047 was busy in those few years. While the sequel has the same core portal-shooter hook, it also brings a character class system that once again changes the shooter genre.

After binging over two hours of its alpha, I can already tell that those changes are going to make an impact. The dozen or so matches I played expanded the strategic gameplay that I loved in the first game in ways that push it beyond a one-trick gimmick. Considering how shaky the current multiplayer shooter scene is, it very well could be the king of the hill when it launches.

Halo Reach meets Portal

The fundamentals of Splitgate 2 are unchanged. It’s a fast-paced shooter with lightning-quick time to kill. Its defining hook is that players can fire portals on certain surfaces, allowing them to teleport around arenas to flank unsuspecting enemies. That core conceit has not lost its step. In my early matches, I was already feeling like a strategic genius as I escaped from enemy gunfire by jumping into a portal, coming out behind the team flanking me, and taking them down before they could clock what’s going on.

Rather than overhauling that, 1047 focuses on small quality of life changes that make it all smoother. Walls that can have a portal placed on them are more uniform in height now, meaning that I’m no longer left with situations where I need to jump through an awkwardly high opening. It’s also easier to put multiple portals on one surface now. Firing a portal at a wall that already has one on it will automatically shift the original over slightly to make sure they both fit. There’s also a one-button option now that automatically figures out which portal exit players want to fire. It usually accomplishes that by alternating colors, but it has a built-in logic that can switch that order under certain conditions. It sounds like it shouldn’t work, but it does. I’m already making much fewer mistakes than I do with two buttons (that option is still in the sequel).

It’s too early to get a sense of just how creative I can get with portals since the alpha only has a handful of maps. All of them feature some straightforward portal walls with little verticality or space for momentum tricks. I’m hoping some more exciting maps are in the works, as my movement strategies felt a little limited.

Splitgate 2 makes up for that with its new class system. At present, there are three different options that players can choose when they jump into battle, each with their own special ability, passive perk, and weapon loadout options. It’s not quite a hero shooter (1047 says it experimented with that format, as well as making it more like Call of Duty), but is more akin to Halo Reach. Classes have unique perks that add an additional strategy layer, but the tight gunplay is consistent across classes.

I’ve already started to feel how that can change battles, even if it took some time to remember to use my kit. The Aeros class, for instance, has a focus on speed. That includes a special ability that temporarily makes every action faster, from movement to reload time. It’s a more action-focused class that comes with a few loadout options, including a health stim, a rapid-fire SMG, and more. Meridian, on the other hand, is more of a support character who can scan the battlefield and mark nearby enemies. The strategy happens when those two classes come together. In one match, a Meridian teammate marked three enemies in a room. I popped by Aeros special and ran in to help thin out the herd before zipping away and healing myself.

There’s still plenty of fine-tuning to do when it comes to items and weapons. Shotguns feel a bit weak at present (I tried two here, including one that has to be charged with a trigger hold) and not every item feels useful. One class has a Time Dome item that speeds up all teammate actions within it, but that felt like a confusing niche option next to the class’ other item, a healing dome.

I also find myself a little torn on the fact that weapons and items are specific to classes. I can’t use a sticky grenade unless I pick the right class. That takes away some mix-and-match potential, but also has me scrambling during the loadout selection screen to remember which class has the weapon I want to use. It’s not much of a problem in a limited alpha with only a few weapons and items, but it could get confusing if 1047 is planning to have a lot more in the final game.

Of all the innovations here, though, my favorite is related to its new multiplayer mode. In addition to standard Team Deathmatch, the alpha features a King of the Hill variant called Hotzone. It’s your average hill control mode, where the twist is that capture progression is shared between both teams. If one team gets a zone to 90% control and then gets flanked, the other team could steal the last 10% and win. It’s a best of five match where teams need to take two hills to win a round. That creates some tense gameplay that encourages players to team up and strategize rather than run in without a plan.

But what I actually love about Hotzone is a very small touch that showcases 1047’s creativity. When players die, there’s a respawn timer like in most shooters. That’s only a few seconds at first, but becomes longer as a match goes on until reaching 20 seconds. That number can come down, though. Every time a teammate gets a kill while their friend is down, it takes three seconds off their timer. The increasing timer doesn’t just add more incentive for players to get careful as a match goes on but turns the heat up on living team members when their squad mates fall. It’s a smart bit of push and pull that adds some psychology to even the smallest decisions.

That’s what the original Splitgate did so well. Back in 2021, I called it the “thinking person’s shooter.” Even with its fast pace, it’s exceptionally cerebral. High-level plays are more about solving spatial puzzles on the fly than hitting opponents with pinpoint accuracy. That carries over into Splitgate 2 so far, with more on-the-fly decision-making that goes beyond where I place portals. That gives it some extra depth that should help it avoid being a flash in the pan.

It’ll be a long road to get there, though. The alpha only gives a small taste of what’s to come, acting more as a proof of concept for 1047’s new ideas. There are still some tweaks to be done with that new direction, but ironclad gunplay keeps it all anchored. The important thing is that 1047 now gets to figure this all out before the game comes out, rather than trying to fix it after the fact. That might be Splitgate 2‘s biggest tactical advantage.

Splitgate 2‘s closed alpha will run from August 21 to 25. The game is scheduled to release in 2025.