Hitman: Blood Money

I wasn't a big fan the last time I tried a Hitman game, and this one took me two attempts to get into it, but once I did I enjoyed it quite a bit. The game's not without any flaws, and its sense of design is aging rapidly. Still, the series has a unique style of play that's really interesting if you have the patience to get into it.

If you've never tried it before, it's a stealth action game, but instead of lurking in shadows and around corners to infiltrate secret bases, you're ambushing guards and stealing their clothes to hide in plain sight to get the drop on various assassination targets. There are several ways you can approach each mission, although usually only one perfect one that will get you the best rating. You can garrote or shoot enemies if you like, though there's often a more subtle way you can hit your objective without it being an obvious murder, like poisoning something they'll eat or rigging a chandelier to drop on them. It can be a little frustrating at first when you're just trying to get a feel for an area and don't know how to proceed, but it's usually not too long before you get an opportunity for a better outfit and an opportunity to figure out a game plan. And you can always just shoot up the whole joint if you want to, but that's never as satisfying as getting in and out without anyone noticing, especially since you're wasting money covering it up that could be better used upgrading your equipment.

For 2006 the game doesn't look or sound too bad, with adequate characters and environments and some decent music. The silenced pistols that I used for pretty much the entire game have a nice distinctive sound to them, and the rare explosions you'll set off are satisfying enough. The voice acting is mixed, with decent voices on the main characters but some utterly inexplicable ones from random people; and while the large crowd scenes are pretty impressive with the number of people on screen, however in those situations you'll quickly notice how small the number of unique models per area is. The game has some technical issues as well, besides a few odd physics problems I also ran into a couple crash issues, one that forced me to skip a cutscene and another that occurred during a mission, losing my progress.

The game's story isn't high art, but it has acceptable twists and turns for a decent action movie, and seems to tie in well with the previous games. It's set up with a couple of guys discussing some of Agent 47's previous jobs while implying that they've finally apprehended him, although when you look at it it's hard to believe they'd have to cover all of those situations sequentially in detail to get to the point, and I'm not sure the concept blends with some later reveals well. The credits sequence is another good example of what unique things can be done with the video game medium, and the ending sets up the now-confirmed sequel that I'm up to try out. When it comes out, I hope the design is a little more open, because we're in an age of player freedom in games and Hitman's reliance on one perfect path to complete the mission feels a little stifled by this point. Still, it was a fun if not amazing experience.