Hitman (2016) - So, anyone checked it out?

CT Phipps

CT Phipps

Carbon Dated and Proud
I've got to say, I'm a fan of the franchise and this is an amazing accomplishment. It is actually better than Blood Money and easily the best installment of the series. I was initially skeptical of the division of the game into Episodes and I hate the fact Elusive Targets are one-time-only but everything else is wonderful. I've put more effort into this game than anything else this console generation except the Witcher 3.

There's no real attempt at character development for our lead or Diana but the targets are richly detailed.

Plus, there's literally hundreds of ways of killing people.

This is one of the few games to really take advantage of the technical advantages of the new system.
 
I'm planning to check out the new Hitman once all the episodes have been released. From what I've seen of the gameplay it looks really good, but I'd rather buy it when its completed. I enjoy the older Hitman games, although the series has not been at its best since the mid 2000s. Hopefully though I'll enjoy this one too when I get it.
 
The episodic stuff really puts me off, but what I've seen so far looks really nice. Seems like they learned from Hitman: Absolution. Better than Blood Money sounds really intriguing. I'll probably wait for a complete release before getting into it, though. Fuck episodic content.
 
From what I've seen it looks like a solid stealth game and a huge step up from absolution. But like @Hassknecht I'm waiting until a full release. Outsidexbox do some good videos on it showing 2 or 3 ways to play the same mission.

My only gripe (and I have this with a lot of stealth games) is the exposition dialogue "oh yeah Mr. Arms Dealer happens to be meeting with a fortune teller today" "oh yeah the one with the fog machine that means no one can see inside" "yeah that's the one" or some random shit like "we know the hacker likes jam, so poison some jam" gee thanks, I'm sure the hacker will conveniently be the only one that eats the jam. They're minor nitpicks, I just don't like it when the game holds your hand like that.
 
Onyxium said:
I'm planning to check out the new Hitman once all the episodes have been released. From what I've seen of the gameplay it looks really good, but I'd rather buy it when its completed. I enjoy the older Hitman games, although the series has not been at its best since the mid 2000s. Hopefully though I'll enjoy this one too when I get it.
Click to expand...

I'm like 100% certain that the reason they did it episodically was, essentially, to pay for the rest of the episodes since the financial troubles of IO have been fairly public knowledgeable. Thankfully, it seems to have worked out since the production quality is really good. The big benefit of episodic is the new Opportunities system means that I've played each of the levels dozens of times versus trying to race through the game.

SarcasticGoodGuy said:
From what I've seen it looks like a solid stealth game and a huge step up from absolution. But like @Hassknecht I'm waiting until a full release. Outsidexbox do some good videos on it showing 2 or 3 ways to play the same mission.

My only gripe (and I have this with a lot of stealth games) is the exposition dialogue "oh yeah Mr. Arms Dealer happens to be meeting with a fortune teller today" "oh yeah the one with the fog machine that means no one can see inside" "yeah that's the one" or some random shit like "we know the hacker likes jam, so poison some jam" gee thanks, I'm sure the hacker will conveniently be the only one that eats the jam. They're minor nitpicks, I just don't like it when the game holds your hand like that.
Click to expand...

A small consolation is that there's plenty of "red herrings" with food items. Water bottles, wine bottles, and food items are often spread throughout the levels where the targets walk but plenty of NPCs eat from them as well. During the Paris level, I decided to use rat poison on the kitchen area where the target is complaining about food and ended up poisoning his bodyguard instead who snacks on them while the target talks.

Some old school fans also hate the Opportunities system where you can just click on one of them and it will walk you through a hit by hand. You can turn those off and have to search the levels for them, though.
 
CT Phipps said:
I'm like 100% certain that the reason they did it episodically was, essentially, to pay for the rest of the episodes since the financial troubles of IO have been fairly public knowledgeable. Thankfully, it seems to have worked out since the production quality is really good. The big benefit of episodic is the new Opportunities system means that I've played each of the levels dozens of times versus trying to race through the game.



A small consolation is that there's plenty of "red herrings" with food items. Water bottles, wine bottles, and food items are often spread throughout the levels where the targets walk but plenty of NPCs eat from them as well. During the Paris level, I decided to use rat poison on the kitchen area where the target is complaining about food and ended up poisoning his bodyguard instead who snacks on them while the target talks.

Some old school fans also hate the Opportunities system where you can just click on one of them and it will walk you through a hit by hand. You can turn those off and have to search the levels for them, though.
Click to expand...
Oh cool I thought you had to just "ignore" when an opportunity happens. Still waiting for a full release.
 
From what I've seen it looks good but from what I've heard the quality of the levels is a little bit all over the place (at least to some people) which wouldn't be too big of a problem if the game wasn't stupidly episodic so if they release a shit level it's one people are gonna be stuck with for a while until they release the next. Not a problem for me though since like everyone else I'm waiting for the whole game to actually come out to try it instead of getting breadcrumbed along.
 
From the bits I've seen, the game feels, looks and plays like an upgraded version of Blood Money (which is a good thing in my books). The large sprawling levels and greater focus on actual assassinations already shows to me that the game is an improvement over Absolution.

However like many here have already said before, I won't actually get the game until all the episodes are out. I'd rather be able to play the full game in one go rather than wait for several months for a new episode. Like @Hassknecht says, fuck episodic content.
 
CerberusGate said:
From the bits I've seen, the game feels, looks and plays like an upgraded version of Blood Money (which is a good thing in my books). The large sprawling levels and greater focus on actual assassinations already shows to me that the game is an improvement over Absolution.
Click to expand...

Absolution made a lot of mistakes in terms of tone, level design, and story but I still liked it. Just not as much as the originals.

However like many here have already said before, I won't actually get the game until all the episodes are out. I'd rather be able to play the full game in one go rather than wait for several months for a new episode. Like @Hassknecht says, fuck episodic content.
Click to expand...

5 dollars for levels you can purchase individually and play individually isn't exactly screwing the gamer, especially as it allows them to play the game before its finished. They've also been releasing them fairly consistently with the only delay being a three month one where they proceeded to release a "Elusive Target" a week that gave special in game rewards.

:-)
 
CT Phipps said:
5 dollars for levels you can purchase individually and play individually isn't exactly screwing the gamer, especially as it allows them to play the game before its finished. They've also been releasing them fairly consistently with the only delay being a three month one where they proceeded to release a "Elusive Target" a week that gave special in game rewards.
Click to expand...
Fair points (though your point about playing the game before its finished sounds like you're excusing the devs for not completing their work) but personally I'd rather not show my support of the episodic release method. At least IO seems to be doing some good moves with it though IIRC their publishers, Square, has the habit of forcing the episodic release method on games they publish.

Nothing against the game: In fact, the game looks and feels like something I'd buy, play and enjoy but I'd rather have the whole game to go through in one go than merely owning one piece at a time.

I am one of those sorts who expect fully released games to have their main content be completely ready after all.
;)
 
You have a valid reason, though I actually support Episodic Content in general because it allows me a little more wiggle room with buying new games. I am not the World's Biggest BatmanTM fan but I am probably in the top 200. I will say that Batman: The Telltale Game is complete SHIT. Bad graphics, bad storytelling, bad characterization, and bad combat. I'm glad I only had to spend $5 on its first episode, though.

In the case of Hitman, they've also been surprisingly good about gamer feedback in real time. They fixed issues like the connection problems, when Challenges are registered (not just at the end of the game but whenever you do them), and other annoyances because of feedback on the First and Second episodes.

The episodic content model has also set up financially the possibility of "Seasonal" releases of Hitman which consist of the game paying for itself in development time so they can do potentially yearly releases of murder-for-hire from 47. Which could backfire by saturating the market ala Assassin's Creed but I am annoyingly dependent on AC because it's something I can look forward to playing every year.

But yes, entirely up to you when and where you'll buy it.
 
The game certainly does look very good. Watched some PS4 footage and it looked kinda shabby, but now I've seen some PC footage and it looks way better. Tempted to buy the "full experience" now... I mean, five of seven episodes are already out.
 
I'm a fan of the hitman games as well phipps. But I haven't had the chance to check this one out plus I don't like out theyre selling one game as an episodic affair.
 
R.Graves said:
I'm a fan of the Hitman games as well Phipps. But I haven't had the chance to check this one out plus I don't like out they're selling one game as an episodic affair.
Click to expand...

It's releasing in a couple of months anyway in January 2017 so it doesn't matter when you choose to buy it. However, I actually give Io Entertainment credit for the bonus episodes which wouldn't have occurred if not for the fact it was Episodic releases.

Also, Hitman is different from, say, The Last of Us in that the majority of people are not playing for the overarching plot but the individual episodes. In Hitman, you want to play for the hits. Then again, I support the option of cheaper enjoyable episodic games. It's not exactly microtransactions in terms of corporate greed.
 
Last edited:
At first sight I was kinda put off by the amount of handholding present in the game, but the sheer amount of possibilities to get to your target is pretty awesome.
Also, I like how the engine can easily handle large crowds and open areas.
Hey Bethesda, you might wanna take a hint from them.
 
Hassknecht said:
At first sight I was kinda put off by the amount of handholding present in the game, but the sheer amount of possibilities to get to your target is pretty awesome.
Also, I like how the engine can easily handle large crowds and open areas.
Hey Bethesda, you might wanna take a hint from them.
Click to expand...

IO Entertainment's reaction to fan criticism of, "Okay, remember your last game? Do the exact opposite of that" is the opposite of Bethesdas, I admit. In that when compared to their past classic game, they proceeded then to try to be like that classic game versus changing everything.

And I LIKED Absolution.

:)

Also, you can turn off the Opportunities and handholding system. I think they'd have had more luck by making difficulty levels, though.
 
That's nice. Yeah, it really sounds like they learned from the Absolution debacle. We'll see if Bethesda is capable of doing the same. It's probably another Elder Scrolls game for them, but they did get a lot of flak for Fallout 4.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top