Paintball games on the PC don’t exactly have a glowing track record. In fact, the popular sport has given rise to some of the worst shooters ever made, games like the plodding and inane High Impact Paintball and the infamously wretched Extreme PaintBrawl. Finally someone has gotten it, well, close. Splat Magazine Renegade Paintball won’t make anyone forget the Unreal Tournament or Quake franchises, but for a straightforward budget shooter, it’s not too shabby. In fact, in short bursts, it can be pretty fun.
Renegade Paintball features two capture-the-flag variants, a king of the hill mode, standard and team deathmatch, and an arcade mode. The latter features power-ups like rapid fire, invulnerability, and a speed boost. None of these modes breaks any new ground, but it’s hard to argue with proven classics. You can play these game types online or offline in a skirmish mode that lets you choose team sizes, time limit, friendly fire, and so on. Online, there are no chat capabilities, and we experienced some connection problems and lag/warping.