Tag Archives: Hitman

Thoughts: Hitman 2

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I don’t think the Hitman series really clicked for me until I played Hitman 2. I really enjoyed Blood Money, and I really enjoyed what I played of the 2016 Hitman, but they were both one-and-done games for me — I gave Hitman’s Paris level a few replays, but otherwise I just completed all of the levels in order and then called it a day.  Which is a bit of an odd thing to say about a game because that’s how they’re usually supposed to be played, but Hitman is a series that rewards replaying individual levels again and again to find alternate routes, assassination methods and background information about the people you’re assassinating. Playing through the levels just once meant that I arguably was doing it wrong, but for whatever reason I never really felt much of an impetus to do it right — until Hitman 2.

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Thoughts: Hitman

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Specifically the Paris level, as Sapienza isn’t out until later this month.

Hitman is receiving a bit of a drubbing in its Steam reviews. It seems people are upset about the fact that its online and offline play modes are segregated, with different saves for each and a game system that will somewhat over-zealously yank you back into the menu whenever you lose connection. And I can definitely see how this would be annoying if you have a poor connection, although it’s not like Hitman takes the infinitely-worse step of forbidding offline play entirely. People also seem to be a little upset about this new Hitman’s episodic structure whereby it’s been split up into chunks of game consisting (essentially) of a single level; this first episode consists of two training levels plus the Paris Showstopper mission, and has no doubt been shoved online in order to fund the development of subsequent episodes. I’m a little less empathetic about this complaint, however; since each Hitman level is entirely standalone an episodic structure could definitely work, and so all it has to do to succeed in my book is to provide enough content per episode to justify the asking price.

So: is episode one of Hitman worth £12?

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The Difficulty Of Difficulty.

Difficulty is one of the hardest things for a modern game to get right. Because games are catering for a much wider range of players than they were even ten years ago, deciding what level you should pitch your game’s difficulty at is very tricky and potentially very risky. Make it too hard and you’ll alienate the coveted “casual” gamer market that makes up the bulk of game sales these days; too easy, and you’ll piss off the hardcore gamers who are most vocal about their hobby and generate most of a game’s buzz. Either outcome hurts sales, and pleasing both camps is nigh-on impossible. This is why the difficulty setting exists.

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Thoughts: Hitman – Blood Money.

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Blood Money is an astonishing game, and after playing it I understand why the developers packed in the Hitman franchise temporarily and started crapping out Kane & Lynch games. After Blood Money, there was simply nowhere left for the series to go. It had reached its peak. I should stress I’m not saying Blood Money is astonishing in terms of raw quality. It’s a very, very solid game, to be sure, but its strength lies in the game’s major stylistic choice. Blood Money isn’t a Hitman game. Blood Money is a parody of Hitman games.

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