Enlisted Review

Enlisted Overview

Enlisted is a free-to-play World War II tactical shooter that puts an entire AI squad under your command inside large cross-platform battles. Darkflow Software and Gaijin Entertainment build the action around infantry, armored vehicles, and aircraft sharing one crowded battlefield. You control one soldier directly, while the rest of the squad follows orders and waits to become your next body if the current trooper falls.

It is available on PC through Steam for Windows and Linux, the Gaijin.Net client, PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X|S. Cross-platform matchmaking connects those communities, while Valve rates the Steam Deck version Playable rather than Verified. Pick your preferred machine, grab a squad, and try not to park the tank in a trench.

Enlisted Gameplay and Core Loop

Enlisted works because every firefight combines direct shooting, light squad command, and the constant possibility of switching to a completely different battlefield role. It lands between a conventional multiplayer FPS and a military simulator. You still aim, fire, capture ground, and get shot at, but one death does not necessarily send you back to a distant spawn screen.

Your squad is a pocketful of second chances

The core Squads mode places AI soldiers under your control. They follow you, and you can order them to hold at an objective rather than dragging the whole group into the same stream of bullets. When your active soldier dies, you can switch to another surviving member. That gives each squad a rhythm of its own: one fighter goes down, another takes over, and the push keeps moving.

A 20-minute slice can shift from rifle fire to clearing a trench with a flamethrower, dropping mortar rounds, breaking defenses in a tank, or covering allies from an aircraft. That variety is not tucked into separate genre boxes. The official pitch is hundreds of soldiers, armored vehicles, and aircraft participating in battles inspired by major historical operations, including the landing at Omaha Beach.

Combined arms keeps the front moving

Tanks and aircraft are more than scenery. They let you trade close infantry pressure for armor or air support within the same wider battle. One minute you are thinking about where to leave your squad near an objective. The next, you are inside a vehicle trying to crack a defensive line. Subtle.

That structure gives the chaos a purpose. Infantry matters because objectives still need bodies nearby, squad orders matter because those bodies can be positioned, and vehicles widen the tactical picture beyond whichever doorway currently contains trouble. If your ideal World War II shooter lets you change jobs before the mud dries on your boots, Enlisted has plenty of work waiting.

Is Enlisted Pay-to-Win?

Enlisted is primarily pay-for-speed and pay-for-options rather than pure pay-to-win, but premium squads give paying players enough flexibility to keep the label contested. The free path provides the core battles and research progression. Spending money shortens that road, expands your available lineup, or hands you a prepared squad sooner.

A premium account doubles research, squad XP, and soldier XP. It also adds one infantry squad slot and one vehicle squad slot per battle. Gold can accelerate progression, while premium squads arrive fully equipped with unique equipment and earn bonus XP. Battle Pass tiers and Steam squad packs add further purchase routes.

The sharp edge is flexibility. Extra slots and ready-made squads create more tactical options, so some players consider premium squads pay-to-win even without a rule that paid equipment automatically outclasses free equipment. Battle Rating matchmaking groups equipment from BR I through BR V, which helps limit extreme gear mismatches.

The smart free-to-play approach is simple: treat the store as an accelerator, not an entry ticket. Learn the squad system, work through a nation’s research tree, and spend only if the slower pace starts pinching. The battlefield itself is free, and that is the part with tanks on it.

Enlisted Progression and Long-Term Play

Enlisted’s long-term hook is building four national armies through research trees, then taking increasingly advanced equipment into Battle Rating I to V matchmaking. The former campaign structure has been merged into four nations, giving each army its own development path rather than splitting progression across separate historical campaigns.

Research drives the longer arc. New equipment moves your roster forward, while the Battle Rating system places that gear into broad matchmaking tiers. Climbing therefore changes both what you can field and the equipment bracket surrounding each battle. It is a clear ladder, even if filling four separate national trees asks for serious time.

That grind is the main thing to know going in. Premium XP bonuses exist because the standard route is slower, and scattering your attention across every nation will naturally spread that research even thinner. Focusing on one army first gives the progression a cleaner sense of momentum. You should also choose a main platform early, since progress is not advertised as shared across platforms even though battles support full crossplay.

Darkflow continues to support the game with updates, premium squads, and Battle Pass seasons. There is always another branch to research or lineup to refine, which suits players who like their multiplayer shooters with a persistent military cupboard to organize.

Is Enlisted Worth Playing?

Yes, Enlisted is worth playing if you want large-scale World War II action with squad command, combined arms, and a free route into every battle. Its defining idea is strong: you are responsible for a group rather than a lone rifleman, and switching among surviving soldiers keeps pressure on the objective. Tanks, aircraft, mortars, and flamethrowers make sure that pressure rarely looks the same twice.

You will love it if large battlefields, historical equipment, and long research trees sound like a fine evening. You should skip it if paid progression boosts or managing AI squadmates spoil your preferred style of pure competitive shooting. For everyone else, the free entry removes the guesswork: pick a nation, send the squad forward, and try to keep at least one soldier out of the crater.