Very Good Game

This game was very well and artistically thought out. Overall it effectively delivers an entertaining game. It will require over a full day to complete. So what is it?

The game was very uniquely worked out. It might have some slight drawbacks here and there that some people may not prefer, but overall it should be a game for any who like shooter games rather tactical or not. It uniquely has detailed strategy involved in the game, unlike other shooter games. You can run anywhere shooting anything in the other games and seem to win quickly, but doing so in this is just too well thought. The bots are very intelligent, though repetitive (?) in some cases. Even in this case, they seem to add surprises from the bots to make you wonder if they really are intelligent or just dummies sitting. The bots are vague to comment on because they seem completely repetitive but they will suprise you when they notice you out of the corner of their eyes or when they don't even notice you because their head has slightly turned a different direction.

Levels get very difficult to figure out on what is required. In some cases, you will want to use a specific weapon of choice because different weapons not in use by bots will alert them. If you use the right weapon, you can effectively walk up to a bot and eliminate him even with another bot near by. They include a somewhat nice and modern aresenal of weapon choices that have to be found throughout each level. In the difficulty settings above easy you are not allowed a silencer....

Its challenging to do silent kills, though they fairly say it. One item that was not useful at all was the night vision goggles. These were almost blinding and completely useless. They were not, however, required anywhere in the levels. A plus is that you are somewhat required to shoot out lights here and there. If facing your opponent in a lit area, you will probably get detected easily than in nonlit areas. In addition, you could also use disguises in that if you walked or bumped into a guard you would be noticed, but otherwise be completely unnoticed.

The graphics were very well done. Each level had an entirely new set of characters with new weapons. The disguises were almost endless on some levels. On the biker level you could virtually change into any type of outfit (e.g. Jeans, Hat, Flames on jacket, no flames, etc.). They were very well done and each level did not feel completely repetitive. They worked very hard to drown out any repetitiveness. There was an interesting storyline between levels that was done as a movie. The last level was diffently worth playing and had a good build up to it. The sound and music was excellent. They use fire fight moments to pickup sound effects and music.

Though it was challenging and had a very good game concept, it seemed to be slightly lacking. It seem to have a lack of where to hit a target, though it made it interesting to find out in each level where to go. The alerts by guards seemed a little to over cautious. Often you could use a shotgun and no one would be the wiser. In other cases, you might use a pistol and guards were alerted (in a somewhat same instance) though no evidence for alertness was given. Doing stealth walking was very interesting, because you were practically undetected. There were some flaws in cases such as the last scene where you duck down and stay crouched out of sight. If you switch to check your map that tracks bot movement in unique ways, all of a sudden you might get shot at. All that happens is a slight head movement and this was seemed flaw or possibly not a correct spot to actually be at... One of the interesting levels was actually to face a military base. In addition to this you get to face up to gangs in Japan that was really interesting. Unfortanetly, you couldn't buy weapons before the level or pick the *contracts* you wanted to do. Each level was mandarotary. You might guess that it would be nice to sit at a desk and choose your mission to accept before going on it and see the money fly around as you purchase new weapons. In a way, it seems like this was part of the drawback. The map, that is available, seemed not to be well balanced for each difficulty setting. In easy mode, everything was practically a target. In higher settings, less targets were possible for kills. The hint locations seemed unnecessary as you didn't even need to use them and didn't look right in Normal difficulty. Though a map is needed and global tracking is very nice to use, it overall seemed to make the levels confusing by making it appear more easier than necessary. The flashing exclamations for hint locations just seemed like they should be toggled off.

There were voice overs as you could talk to people by bumping into them, so it was not a text based game either. Another plus that made it interesting bumbing into someone in the hotel and they snub you with something like *what do you want?*. Just all too tempting...

As far as the sound goes, it was very well done. The effects were seemingly realistic. They tried to make each level seem as real as possible and they did very good for the sound effects. The game had a feel that it was good enough that they will continously improve on the game. The music was pretty good. It could get quiet and you were not sure if that meant you were way off track or just not in any danger. When you are spotted and get in a fire fight, then the music always picks up but with the same song. Occassionaly it changes if you stay in a fire fight long enough. Other than that, the sound quality was good considering they tried to keep it all original throughout the game but not perfect. They did have an actual band do their music in levels throughout the game. Diffently a plus.

The main reason it should receive a good rating is simply because there are not too many games thought out like this. Its not possible to rate it against other games. They diffently intended to set a new trend and successfully did it. Overall, it was a very good game where you could end a level in a number of different possible ways defeating the bad guys. There were no real ways in completing a level, as you are giving the *by any means necessary* go. It can seem confusing at some points in the game, but hey *thats* the game. Each level was unique enough, that they did include different graphics making each level its own separate challenge from the rest of the levels. In this one you have different levels in different places in the world.

* This article added/inserted a new paragraph on sound and graphics per request.
** Epinions does not correctly list this item or its image icons: This is "Hitman 3: Contracts".