Hitman: Blood money

[Unstoppable]

Kept spoiler free,

 

So I just started playing this game and I was quite surprised. I thought it could never top Himtan 2: Silent Assassin since Hitman: Contract (Part 3 which is really a part 1 remake) kinda sucked since it was a remake. (If you played part 1 Hitman: Codename 47)

 

If there is one thing that I/O Interactive has done is recreate the immersion factor present in Hitman: Codename 47. I remember going to my local best buy( a store in the states) and picking up the box when was like 17. Anyway the point is the first level pretty much got me hooked. You end up preventing something huge from happening.

 

You started off in a hospital of sorts and all you hear is a voice through an intercome. Then you learn to do hits vs dummies and targets using guns etc. Not that anything of this was cool to me but it was kind of weird and interesting.

 

Finally you are able to escape and a few years later you're in Hong Kong, China. Cue up a cool cutscene of Agent 47 with sunlight shining through the blinders of the window. Cue nostalgic music and the first mission. Make a hit to start a war between the local triad gangs. From there the rest was history and the game went on to sell over 500,000 copies. All this from a small company in Denmark, Quite amazing I might add.

 

From there Hitman 2: Silent Assasin. This was a gem. So many missions, so many locales, so many hits. Beat it on the hardest setting and got the Silent Assasin rating all on my own. Took quite some time and careful planning. You could only save when the game saved for you. So many restarts it was crazy. Nice storyline too. You end up with a climatic battles towards the end which I won't ruin.

 

Contract was part 3 and a remake of part 1 so I didn't get into it much. Only the demo. There were extra missions and it appears 47 is injured. He heals up and this is briefly mentioned in part 4 Blood Money.

 

Blood Money itself is a masterpiece. Jespy Kyd is the composer for the franchise and his pieces are incredible. As soon as you make a hit the music cue's as you move throughout the map finding your next target. There are dozens of way to take out your target and the most elaborate would be accidents. This way the newspaper makes it look like it's not your fault. Everything you do affects your notoriety and how easy you will be picked off in the next mission.

 

Modify weapons, bribe people to lower your heat, play with the enviroment, blow stuff or people up, get into a clown suit and so much more. Have any of you played any of the Hitman games? What do you think about them?

 

Some of you might be interested in working for IO. Some of you already work for game companies that I know. Anyway one thing IO has done with all their games is either improve their engines or make totally new one's. The lip synching in Blood money is poor but that dosen't really detract from the game.

 

It's quite amazing the amount of effects they have coded. Real life blurry shower windows are in this game. I wonder how they were able to create that snazzy effect.

 

To conclude I am just praising a franchise that started from nothing. They're even making a Hitman movie which will hopefully not suck. The sequels are worth and there's a bundle coming soon for 30 buck sincluding Contract, Blood Money, and Silent Assassin.

 

The ending to Blood money is probably the best. I only read what happens haven't gotten there yet but it has quality written all over it. The nice thing is that the PC version is optimized pretty good.

 

Test machine:

AMD Athlon XP 2100+ (1.73GHZ) 2GB DDR RAM, ATI Sapphire AGP X8 x1650 PRO 512MB, 40GB HDD.

 

 

p.s.

I'm not really into senseless killing games. In Hitman you do hits for a purpose. Sometimes for outright money, sometimes for good, depending on a point of view of course. Also i'm not crazy so no worries mates. I just really appreciate the game for what it is. The art and enviroments are also really good. Hell everything about it is well done.

 

p.p.s

Today is my birthday!

Edited June 20, 2007 by Unstoppable

[Unstoppable]

Intro to game.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QwGVD_toH2E

[sparhawk]

Actually I tried to play it, but the disc was damaged. Never bothered to get a new copy. Maybe I download it later one time and see how it is.

[Unstoppable]

Actually I tried to play it, but the disc was damaged. Never bothered to get a new copy. Maybe I download it later one time and see how it is.

 

Oh sorry to hear that friend. Try to return it. If not download it via other means because you already bought it.

[sparhawk]

I can't return it. I think it was part of a mag, or something. Anyway, I can download it and try it nevertheless. After all I have the legal copy as well, so I'm not even doing something illegal there.

[Ishtvan]

Yeah I played it and liked it. It was very open-ended even with the constraint of 100% stealth. I liked how you were free to throw your weapons and items over fences and thru windows and stuff as opposed to pre-scripted actions.