HITMAN Review
By Lee Marcussen
Agent 47 is Back in Action
The first installment of this Hitman game places you into the prologue which features two training missions. First mission gives you a short intro to the series and gives you some training which has you prove that you’re ready to get into the assassin life. The first mission of the prologue features a sort of makeshift yacht where you have to assassinate another spy who is throwing a party on the yacht. The final training map features a Russian air craft hanger where you must assassinate a cold war chess player who is working for the Russians. These first missions act as training and give you the necessary training to start with the featured first episode. These first missions really give you a guide and sort of hold your hand on the simpler ways to assassinate, cause distractions, and many other necessary skills to get through the main episodes.
The first episode takes place in Paris, France at a fashion show. There are two targets you must eliminate (husband and wife) who are spies selling government secrets to the highest bidders. You’ve been ordered in this mission to take them out. With this new Hitman it introduces Hitman Online which produces new challenges that aren’t just kill the people and escape, but these challenges make it more difficult. The challenges range from killing both with piano wire, shooting both with a sniper, or poisoning both of them, the list goes on and on with all the possibilities. Challenges also pop up at random times in game, from over hearing a conversation to finding information on documents. Some of the challenges give you a tracker to help guide you to the right places to complete these while others just give you a brief description which gives a helping hand but also adds a level of difficulty. While you complete the mission in whichever way you decide you gain points which level you up. Raising your level up does many things for you and unlocks different outfits to wear in game, starting points for missions, and the best new guns. Unlocking new things help make completing challenges easier and accessible. The biggest problem that I have noticed with this new episode and I’m hoping this is fixed by the next one, is Hitman Online brings in challenges while you’re in the mission but at random times it loses the server and kicks you all the way out to the main screen. This is super frustrating when you are feet away from coming up behind for an assassination and lose all your progress due to servers.
The first episode takes place in Paris, France at a fashion show. There are two targets you must eliminate (husband and wife) who are spies selling government secrets to the highest bidders. You’ve been ordered in this mission to take them out. With this new Hitman it introduces Hitman Online which produces new challenges that aren’t just kill the people and escape, but these challenges make it more difficult. The challenges range from killing both with piano wire, shooting both with a sniper, or poisoning both of them, the list goes on and on with all the possibilities. Challenges also pop up at random times in game, from over hearing a conversation to finding information on documents. Some of the challenges give you a tracker to help guide you to the right places to complete these while others just give you a brief description which gives a helping hand but also adds a level of difficulty. While you complete the mission in whichever way you decide you gain points which level you up. Raising your level up does many things for you and unlocks different outfits to wear in game, starting points for missions, and the best new guns. Unlocking new things help make completing challenges easier and accessible. The biggest problem that I have noticed with this new episode and I’m hoping this is fixed by the next one, is Hitman Online brings in challenges while you’re in the mission but at random times it loses the server and kicks you all the way out to the main screen. This is super frustrating when you are feet away from coming up behind for an assassination and lose all your progress due to servers.
Hitman operates very well. All the controls are nicely streamlined and easy to operate. One of the first things I noticed that I thought was a really cool feature is that normal third person games the camera is pointed over their right shoulder. In Hitman there is a control to move the camera to look over the left shoulder making looking around a bit easier. Every action that can be performed from opening a door to choking someone behind has a pop up button action which helps lower your risk of hitting the wrong button at the wrong time. In game AI is very intelligent and good at recognizing your actions in game. The endless ways to complete the missions is my favorite part and why I think I enjoy this game so much. You can snipe them from a far or drop a chandelier on top of them, the possibilities go on and on. The actions and effects of the game are very well detailed. An example of this is when you kill someone and go to drag their body it shows you literally dragging a dead body like how it would be in real life. When it comes to hand to hand combat I really like the interactive fighting, the button mashing and timed button hitting as well, it gives it that feeling of extra involvement.
Hitman really provides a solid stealth game that has many expanding opportunities for different gameplay styles. The in game cinematics are excellent graphically, and the game is very well developed. This first episode was really enjoyable. I really liked how you could enter from all aspects and disguise yourself as so many different characters. All the different methods of assassinating the targets makes it so much more enjoyable. There is a high replay value in this episode and I’m very excited for the next one to come out.
*Note: A copy of the game was provided for the purposes of the review
Hitman really provides a solid stealth game that has many expanding opportunities for different gameplay styles. The in game cinematics are excellent graphically, and the game is very well developed. This first episode was really enjoyable. I really liked how you could enter from all aspects and disguise yourself as so many different characters. All the different methods of assassinating the targets makes it so much more enjoyable. There is a high replay value in this episode and I’m very excited for the next one to come out.
*Note: A copy of the game was provided for the purposes of the review
Final Score: 8/10
|
+Challenge updates make the game more expandable
+Replay value is very high +Unlockable outfits and new weapons +Episodic Framework |
-Long load times
-Hitman Online Servers need improvement |
Release Date: 3/11/2016
Developer: IO Interactive
Publisher: Square Enix Ltd
Developer: IO Interactive
Publisher: Square Enix Ltd