SWAT 4

To simulate realistic police procedures, SWAT 4' encourages the use of non-lethal force to subdue and arrest subjects rather than incapacitating or killing them. In addition, players must follow strict…

85 5 April 2005

Shooter Strategy Tactical Action Stealth

SWAT 4 is a shooter developed by Irrational Games, released 5 April 2005 on PC (Microsoft Windows). The main story takes about 15 hrs to finish.

Verified 29 Sep 2026 Sources: IGDB , Wikipedia

What SWAT 4 is

SWAT 4 is a shooter game developed by Irrational Games and released in 2005. It was published by Activision. It is available on PC (Microsoft Windows) only. It runs on Unreal Engine 2.

The premise, in the publisher's words

SWAT 4 is a 2005 tactical first-person shooter video game developed by Irrational Games and published by Sierra Entertainment exclusively for Microsoft Windows. It is the ninth installment in the Police Quest series and the fourth installment in the SWAT subseries. In SWAT 4, the player commands a police SWAT team in the New York City metropolitan area. Unlike its predecessor, SWAT 3: Close Quarters Battle, SWAT 4 does not have an overarching plot. Instead, gameplay takes place over a series of mostly unconnected deployments of the player's SWAT team, as they are sent to apprehend criminals, terrorists, gangs, and cults in and around New York City.

Description from Wikipedia · source

How it plays

It is played from a first person perspective. Its themes are action and stealth. It is a single-player game with no multiplayer component. Available modes: Co-operative, Multiplayer and Single player.

Where it sits in the Police Quest series

SWAT 4 is the 13th of 20 entries we hold in the Police Quest series. It arrived a year after Police Quest: SWAT Generation. The next entry was SWAT 4: The Stetchkov Syndicate in 2006. Its critic score of 85 is 18 points above the series average of 67. That makes it the highest-rated entry in the series.

See all 20 Police Quest games in release order →

How it was received

SWAT 4 holds a critic score of 85 out of 100. That places it above 86% of the 3,306 rated shooter games in our database, which average 70. Games released in 2005 averaged 67, so it scored 18 points above the year average. Player ratings track closely with critics at 85, across 156 votes.

How long it takes, and what that costs

The main story runs about 15 hrs.

What it launched against

SWAT 4 launched on 5 April 2005, within three weeks of God of War, God of War I, Psychonauts and Tom Clancy's Splinter Cell: Chaos Theory. It reviewed better than 1 of the 4.

Released around the same time: God of War, God of War I, Psychonauts, Tom Clancy's Splinter Cell: Chaos Theory.

Cheats and codes

We have not confirmed any working cheat codes for SWAT 4 yet. Rather than reprint a list we have not tested, this section stays empty until one is verified.

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