
Two Splinter Cell super-fans are recreating the franchise's iconic Spies vs Mercs multiplayer component in a new game, Spectre.
Speaking to IGN, Jordan Crawford and Fred Toms, founders of Symbiosis Games, outlined their debut title. Spies vs Mercs was a multiplayer mode that featured in four splinter Cell games; Pandora Tomorrow, Chaos Theory, Double Agent, and Blacklist. Objectives differed over different iterations, but each time, stealth-focused Spies fought against action-based Mercenaries.
Symbiosis Games says it's aiming to recapture the mode as it appeared in Splinter Cell: Chaos Theory, telling IGN: "We both feel that Blacklist steered the Spies vs Mercs genre [...] away from what made it really special. When you were a spy in Chaos Theory, stealth was exhilarating. Watching an unsuspecting Mercenary from afar and surreptitiously planning your next move was thrilling."
- "Stealth is the engine that makes this": Thick as Thieves is putting a multiplayer spin on everything we love about immersive sims
- Split Fiction director Josef Fares says Ubisoft is "struggling" and should make a co-op Splinter Cell game: "Don't chicken out to do single-player; just say this is split-screen only"
"I feel like Blacklist took some of that magic away by making the spies a lot deadlier and making the gameplay a lot faster. I feel like it removed some of that classic, slower-paced, nail-biting experience that stealth games used to offer. We aim to have that feeling return in Spectre.”
Spectre will refer to the two sides of the conflict as Spectres and Reapers, and will let players fight across three maps and two modes. Each side will have an arsenal of seven gadgets to help them out, as well as abilities named 'Edges', which offer temporary perks, such as reducing the amount of time you're stunned by enemy abilities.
Spectre is planned for a release on Steam by the end of this year, but Crawford and Toms say they also hope for an eventual Xbox Series X release. While it's multiplayer-only right now, the pair says they would be "absolutely thrilled to offer single-player content" if the project succeeds. With the Splinter Cell community desperate for a new standalone game but Ubisoft somewhat unwilling to return to the franchise, Spectre is a fascinating prospect, and it'll be interesting to see whether Symbiosis Games can recapture what made Spies vs Mercs so impressive.
Feeling sneaky beaky like? Check out our list of the best stealth games.
Sign up to the GamesRadar+ Newsletter
Weekly digests, tales from the communities you love, and more
I'm GamesRadar's news editor, working with the team to deliver breaking news from across the industry. I started my journalistic career while getting my degree in English Literature at the University of Warwick, where I also worked as Games Editor on the student newspaper, The Boar. Since then, I've run the news sections at PCGamesN and Kotaku UK, and also regularly contributed to PC Gamer. As you might be able to tell, PC is my platform of choice, so you can regularly find me playing League of Legends or Steam's latest indie hit.



















Hideo Kojima knows fans thought Metal Gear Solid 5: Ground Zeroes was too short, as he thinks back to negative comments: "'Why would they sell a trial version even at a low price?'"

Genre giants Metal Gear Solid and Splinter Cell might not be kicking like they used to, but underrated stealth gem Styx is coming back for another game