by: The Button Man | November 23, 2002
Why do I think these items aren't here? You've probably guessed yourself! With
the exception of the last point, I think that this is all due to pandering to the
console market. Consoles are a tricky market to break, but when you do, you're
rolling in the money. It's not surprising that some aspects of the game were changed
to help it fit onto a console.
Excessive violence can hurt games sales. What parent
will buy a game for a kid-with-a-console in which you can put bullet holes in a peoples'
heads? Remember, this may well be played in the room with a family TV, so all will
get to see it on Christmas Day, and it might not go down too well. However, the PC
market is a grown up market. This is not to say that PC owners are any more responsible,
nor mentally stable than our console owning friends, but we've always been more on
the more cutting-edge game content.
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Mommy doesn't want to see carnage like this.
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I think the third and fourth points can be covered by the fact that the game was
designed not only for PC, but also for the console market. For whatever reason,
crossover games tend to be less detailed because of their console links. The reason
for this often escapes me since modern consoles are powerful machines. Because they
have a fixed low resolution (hence the laptop), game designers have the ability to
put higher levels of detail in their games. Despite this, it appears that games that
appear on both platforms seem to have a lower level of detail than games specifically
designed for either one independently. It is a shame that IO-I didn't buck this trend,
and re-introduce these features into the PC game. After all, removing features that can
only enhance the experience of the player seems a touch foolish.
It Isn't All Bad!
I think I've given Hitman 2: Silent Assassin a fairly good roasting over the last
few pages. I feel that these are all inexplicable mistakes and omissions, and
despite the fact that Hitman 2 is getting far better reviews than the original, I think
these make it a poorer game. However, I am not saying that it doesn't deserve such good
press and reviews. There are so many good things about Hitman 2. Highest on the list
is the fact that IO-I made the game at all. Hitman: Codename 47 was a bit of a cult outing.
It did reasonably in the game reviews, and it sold fairly well. However, this can
often be the death knell of a game, so hats off to IO-I for carrying on, and developing
such a fantastic character and genre. This could be a major franchise.
Most of Hitman 2 shows a level of professionalism that can only be hoped for
most new releases. The Glacier Engine goes from strength to strength, showing that
it can display high polygon count, high texture count levels efficiently, even on
low level graphics cards (GeForce 1 works like a dream). The amount of work that
has gone into detailing the levels is astounding, the sound effects are superb, and it
all goes towards creating an atmosphere that is not only realistic, but on a par with
the most popular games from the biggest names in the business.
They've also created a game that is extremely replayable, partially due to the pure
fun of it, but also helped by the new rating system, and the sheer number of ways of
completing each level. On top of this, there is the excellent character animation,
taking what was started in the original and improving on it. The slumping bodies, and
the way that the physics engine handles them is something to be amazed by (don't you
just love getting those bodies in obscure places)!
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Ragdoll physics were toned down - but not too far.
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Need I even mention the soundtrack? Yes! Jesper Kyd has done a stunning job yet
again, not only learning from the original soundtrack, but producing a completely new,
original, and ambitious score for the new game. This is how game soundtracks should
be done.
I'd also like to point out that, unlike most modern games (even Mafia, which did
an amazing job of this), the load times are completely insignificant. Despite the
amount of data that must be loaded for each level, rarely do I have to sit for more
than two or three seconds before the game starts. This is something to be envied by other
game developers, since there are few things that can kill tension than having to wait
for two minutes for it to load (well, it works on a different kind of tension).
All in all, I love Hitman 2 - I think it's a brilliant game. Why have I tried to blast
it like this? It's because there are definite problems to be addressed, perhaps for
patches, but more importantly, for Hitman 3 (if there is to be such a game).
IO-I are not only sitting on a gold mine, but also on one of the finest series of
shooter games released for PC. What we must hope for is that they will continue
to innovate, develop and improve the series, and show the gaming world that there are
few who can match our favourite bald, bar-coded protagonist.
What do you think? Is Hitman 2 an improvement on the original or a step in the wrong
direction? Talk it over in the forums!
