Enlisted review in 2026 — a smart squad shooter inside a stubborn grind

Verdict: Enlisted is worth trying if you want combined-arms World War II battles without the empty precision of a small competitive lobby. Its signature idea—each player commands a squad of AI soldiers and can switch into any surviving member—creates scale, second chances and tactical improvisation. The price is inconsistency. Bots can make a battlefield convincing one minute and behave absurdly the next, while the research economy stretches a compelling shooter across a very long free-to-play climb.

No score is assigned here because this is a researched state-of-the-game assessment, not a first-hand Clutchrig review.

Is Enlisted worth playing in 2026?

Yes, for the squad mechanic and the low cost of entry. Few multiplayer shooters let one player order a compact unit, place soldiers in cover, construct a rally point with an engineer, lose the active rifleman and instantly continue as another member. The system reduces downtime while making every human participant appear to bring a small formation into battle.

The caveat is progression. Enlisted is generous with available roles but not necessarily with the speed at which a new account reaches desired weapons and vehicles. Anyone downloading it for one famous late-war tank or rifle should expect a research path, not immediate access.

The strengths

• Squads distinguish it from ordinary FPS competition. Lives become resources, class composition matters, and a single player can contribute beyond raw aim.
• Combined arms create battlefield stories. Infantry, tanks and aircraft coexist, while engineers shape the flow through rally points and fortifications.
• Four national research trees are easier to understand than the old campaign split. The post-merge structure consolidates Germany, the USSR, the USA and Japan rather than isolating progress across separate campaigns.
• It is genuinely cross-platform. The official page lists PC, Xbox One, Xbox Series X|S, PS4 and PS5.
• Development is active. The August 2026 feed contained a new battle-pass season, events and fixes; July’s “Making Enlisted a Better Place” series continued the long-running quality-of-life cadence.

The weaknesses

• AI competence varies. Squadmates provide scale and reserve lives, but pathfinding, threat response and cover use do not always support the tactical fantasy.
• The progression horizon is long. Research, purchases for newly unlocked equipment, soldier development and squad upgrades make advancement multi-layered.
• Match quality can swing. Player distribution, battle rating, map mode and pilot or tanker dominance can turn one round into a close advance and the next into a lopsided farm.
• The store is structurally visible. Premium time, battle passes and paid squads sell faster acquisition or distinctive equipment in a game where progression affects battlefield options.
• Kernel-level anti-cheat is required on Steam. The store discloses BattlEye and notes that manual removal may be required after uninstalling.

How squad combat changes the FPS formula

In Enlisted, controlling one soldier never means owning only one life. The rest of the squad follows orders, holds a position or travels with the player. When the active soldier dies, control can pass to a survivor. This makes positioning more important than a conventional respawn counter: leaving squadmates exposed can erase the whole unit, while placing them sensibly preserves options.

Class composition gives the system purpose. Engineers construct rally points that shorten the route to an objective; anti-tank soldiers answer armor; radio operators can call support; assaulters provide close-range pressure. The best conceptual feature is that support actions remain understandable. A well-placed spawn can influence a battle even when the player is not winning every duel.

Bots are the compromise that makes this scale possible. They fill the scene with movement and give players targets, but their inconsistency affects both challenge and immersion. A bot that fails to react is a free kill; a squad that navigates badly can evaporate before the player meaningfully uses it. Enlisted should therefore be judged as a hybrid, not as a pure tactical simulation or a tightly symmetrical esport.

Infantry, armor and aircraft

Combined arms are both Enlisted’s spectacle and a source of imbalance. Tanks can anchor an approach, aircraft can break a concentration, and infantry ultimately contests much of the objective space. When counters are available and teammates use them, the interaction creates strong battlefield drama.

When a vehicle attacks from a protected position or a team lacks the tools and experience to respond, the same system feels oppressive. New players also have to learn two games at once: how to shoot and maneuver, and how the larger spawn-and-objective economy works. The squad model softens individual death, but it does not remove knowledge gaps.

Progression and matchmaking

The current national tech-tree model was introduced after Darkflow merged the old campaign progression. Research is now organized by country, with battle rating used to assemble broadly compatible equipment tiers. This is more coherent than unlocking similar weapons repeatedly in isolated campaigns, but it creates a different pressure: a lineup is only as sensible as its collection of squads, weapons and vehicles.

Unlocking an item is not always the last cost. Equipment must be acquired and distributed, soldiers and squads have their own development, and multiple nations divide attention. That is why the grind feels heavier than a single experience bar suggests.

New players can improve the experience by choosing one country first, keeping a consistent battle-rating lineup and prioritizing an engineer-capable squad. Spreading early resources across every nation makes the catalogue look larger while slowing practical readiness.

Monetization: convenience meets battlefield capability

Enlisted is free to play with premium time, a battle pass and paid squads or packs. Steam’s current DLC list includes starter packs and premium squads at several price points. These are not merely menu cosmetics: premium squads can include unusual weapons, vehicles or progression bonuses.

That does not mean a free player cannot compete. Positioning, objective play, rally placement and combined-arms awareness matter greatly, and the base game exposes substantial content. The concern is tempo and access. Paying can reduce the time between a new account and a desired lineup, while paid equipment complicates the perception of fairness even when battle rating attempts to contain it.

Treat premium time as a subscription-like acceleration, not as a permanent fix for disliking the progression loop. Buying it makes sense only if the matches are already enjoyable. Purchasing a high-tier squad before learning maps and lineup construction can place a novice in more demanding battles without supplying the required knowledge.

Technical and platform notes

Enlisted is available through its official PC launcher and Steam, as well as Xbox One, Xbox Series consoles, PS4 and PS5. Steam lists cross-platform multiplayer and an account-level BattlEye requirement. Its recommended PC specification currently names a Core i5-10400 or Ryzen 5 3600-class CPU, but prospective players should confirm the full current requirements on the storefront.

The game uses large environments, many AI entities and vehicles, so CPU behavior and network conditions can matter alongside the GPU. Clutchrig has not run a repeatable benchmark and makes no frame-rate claim here. Reports of a busy battlefield feeling smooth or chaotic should not be converted into performance data.

Who is Enlisted for?

It is a good fit for players who:

• enjoy objective play and support roles more than pristine kill/death ratios;
• want World War II infantry, tanks and aircraft in the same match;
• like managing a lineup and gradually specializing squads;
• can tolerate AI quirks and a long free-to-play progression path.

It is a weaker fit for players seeking ranked competitive purity, consistently intelligent bots, instant access to late-war equipment or a cosmetic-only store.

Final assessment

Enlisted’s squad system remains a worthwhile design idea because it changes decisions rather than merely increasing the body count. A soldier is a viewpoint inside a unit, engineers are strategic assets, and death can become a forced tactical switch. That gives the game a texture its closest free-to-play rivals do not reproduce.

The surrounding economy is less elegant. Research trees, equipment costs, soldier improvement, passes and premium squads turn clear battlefield goals into a prolonged account project. If the basic rifle-and-rally-point loop is satisfying, that project can sustain years of play. If you are only enduring early tiers to reach one famous vehicle, the grind is likely to feel like the product rather than the path.

FAQ

Sources

1. Enlisted — official game overview
2. Enlisted — official squads overview
3. Enlisted — current news and updates
4. Enlisted — explanation of the merged progression model
5. Enlisted on Steam
6. Gadget CEO — 2026 Enlisted assessment

Verdict