In this review
The big picture
Ghost Recon Wildlands gives a squad drones, vehicles, customized weapons and a large open world, then trusts it to make responsible decisions. This is optimistic. Four friends may be perfectly capable of agreeing on a quiet approach, but only one of them needs to notice the helicopter for the briefing to acquire a different tone. The game provides the equipment; judgement remains a local resource with uneven availability.
Ubisoft Paris and supporting studios released Wildlands on 7 March 2017. Its fictional Bolivia places the Ghosts against the Santa Blanca cartel, with solo play and campaign co-op for up to four. The free Last Rites update, developed by Ubisoft Bordeaux and released on 6 August 2026, adds a story mission and extensive settings. That gives returning players more to investigate than whether their old squad has finally learned to park sensibly.
Reasons to look closer
Reconnaissance, vehicles and equipment choices give a team several ways to approach an objective. Solo players can use AI companions and now choose the squad's size, while Last Rites offers more control over difficulty, weather and other conditions. The appeal is strongest when you enjoy planning little operations yourself, especially with friends who agree that “quietly” describes the approach rather than the volume at which somebody announces an explosion.
Start by considering the entrance that isn't the entrance
A drone encourages observation; a helicopter opens routes and helps position the team. Land, air and water travel make the map something to work with rather than merely cross. The useful question is how reconnaissance, equipment and movement fit the objective. A coordinated assault and a careful infiltration can both be entertaining, provided the group knows which one it thinks it's doing.
That freedom needs some self-direction. Repeating the easiest familiar approach can make an enormous campaign feel smaller than its map. Changing a loadout or agreeing on a modest constraint gives an operation a different problem to solve. You don't need a briefing lengthy enough to qualify for office expenses. “Let's look at the place before we arrive inside it” is already a valuable contribution. Preparation is part of the entertainment here, rather than simply a delay before someone gets to pull a trigger.
Agree on what kind of evening this is
Four-player campaign co-op gives friends room to divide responsibilities and develop routines. Individual operations provide useful stopping points, and small decisions become shared problems. That can make a regular group's evening feel purposeful without requiring everyone to approach it like a military examination. There is still a substantial difference between the player quietly observing a patrol and the player wondering whether that patrol would enjoy a very direct introduction.
Solo play lets you set the pace without negotiating those differences. Last Rites allows one, two or three AI teammates instead of the previous all-or-nothing choice, alongside adjustable revive limits and weapon-carrying options. You can tailor the squad around the kind of challenge you want. Ghost War also offers 4v4 competitive multiplayer, which is a separate proposition from the cooperative campaign. Decide which part interests you before assuming that everybody using the same game title has arrived for the same activity.
The scenery comes with a framing problem
A recognizable country and travel across its landscape give the military fantasy a strong setting. Vehicles make distance and approach matter, while character and equipment customization let players shape how they participate. There is a clear attraction in planning a fictional operation around terrain and tools. The helicopter can be genuinely useful when treated as transport rather than a referendum on the pilot's confidence.
The broader premise deserves a critical eye, though. Wildlands turns a real country into the backdrop for an American special-operations power fantasy, organizing complicated problems into targets for an armed squad. Its tactical freedom shouldn't be mistaken for a nuanced account of Bolivia. You can enjoy working out a fictional raid without accepting the surrounding worldview as an explanation of the place being borrowed. The systems are the stronger reason to investigate.
Last Rites lets you arrange the conditions
The new story mission introduces La Llorona and the Los Penitentes cult. More broadly useful are settings for fixing the time of day and weather, adjusting enemy patrol behaviour and tuning difficulty through specific parameters. A group wanting a particular atmosphere or level of pressure has more say in creating it. If your plan requires certain conditions, you can now arrange more of them instead of giving an increasingly persuasive speech about what the weather ought to be doing.
Ubisoft announced 4K and 60 FPS support on PS5 and PS5 Pro with the update. Those are developer-stated enhancements, not independent performance results. The PlayStation Store still lists the underlying application as a PS4 release playable on PS5. Improvements can be welcome without inventing a separate native edition to explain them.
Get everybody onto the right version of the briefing
Native releases cover Windows, PS4 and Xbox One. Windows access is available through Ubisoft, Steam and Epic. PS5 and Xbox Series X|S run the previous-generation applications with the relevant enhancements; neither is listed here as a separate native current-generation release. PlayStation online co-op requires PS Plus. Steam Deck is rated Playable, with manual launcher, input, keyboard and exit handling, plus internet requirements; this isn't a native Linux edition.
Xbox cloud routes can reach supported Macs, mobile devices, Chromebooks and specified Fire TV models, subject to eligible access, subscriptions, regions and connection requirements. Streaming remains a different route from installing a native port. With those details settled, Wildlands suits groups that enjoy devising their own small tactical challenges and solo players who want control over preparation. Its scale rewards initiative, its setting needs perspective, and its newer settings help shape the experience. Bring a plan, share it briefly and make sure the helicopter pilot heard the same version.
Sources
Information checked on 16 October 2026. Features, platform compatibility and editions can change.
- Xbox: cloud gaming ↗Cloud access requirements and current availability caveats.
- Xbox Wire: supported cloud devices ↗macOS, Android, iOS/iPadOS and ChromeOS browser routes.
- Xbox: cloud gaming on TVs ↗Supported Fire TV models; cloud-only access.
- Steam: Ghost Recon Wildlands compatibility ↗Current Valve Deck rating: Playable, with launcher/input/internet caveats.
- Valve: Steam Deck compatibility ratings ↗Playable category and Proton compatibility context.