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				Graphics: 7.5 Gameplay: 9.0 Sound: 9.0 Control: 8.5 Replay Value: 9.5 Rating: 8.5 Publisher:  Eidos Interactive Developer:  IO Interactive Number Of Players:  1 Screenshots
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  IO Interactive and Eidos Interactive team up to present Hitman: Blood Money, the third console installment in the Hitman franchise.

  In Hitman: Blood Money, you are Agent 47, a bald and ruthless cloned killer for hire. You are a snappy dresser with intense blue eyes and a nifty barcode on the back of your head that should make you too conspicuous to carry out a mission but somehow doesn’t. Your assignments come from the mysterious ICA, whose agents are being knocked off by a rival agency. Agent 47 may be the next target.

  Because I don’t play many games that don’t support multiplayer, I’d never played a Hitman game before this one. My original comparisons to the Splinter Cell series proved to be misplaced. Both involve missions and a certain amount of stealth, but Hitman is far less linear than Splinter Cell. In fact, the game is more appropriately compared to the GTA series with its wide-open, sandbox approach to missions.

  Wide-open gameplay

  Hitman has 14 missions that are bookended by cutscenes in which a retired government insider tells a reporter about Agent 47’s exploits and how the insider’s agency tried to take him down. The cutscenes are worth watching for the way they deepen the story.

  At the beginning of each mission, you are given a briefing and a list of tasks you are to complete, along with a choice of weapons and an opportunity to buy upgrades for them. Once in the mission you can pay for clues on how to proceed. For example, are those FBI guys a little too into donuts? Is the mafia figure you’re supposed to kill in the rehab clinic sneaking drinks beneath a heavy light fixture? The clues are just that – clues. They’re not instructions, because there are multiple ways to complete each mission, leaving a great deal of replay value.

  Some methods are more rewarding than others. A balls-out, guns-a’blazing approach might succeed (assuming the enemies’ superior numbers don’t overwhelm you), but you’ll pay a price in subsequent missions as your “notoriety” rating makes it harder for you to move about unnoticed. You can bribe away your notoriety if you have the cash, but it’s far more fun to spend your money on weapon upgrades and in-game tips.

  For example, in a mission near the middle of the game, I finally finished perfectly with no collateral damage, no noise, no witnesses and no notoriety; I was even awarded the “Silent Assassin” achievement. Unfortunately, because I forgot to save my progress, I had to play the mission again to move to the next one. This time I used my sniper rifle to take out about half the enemies from a distance, mopped up with a pistol and sprinted for the exit. Sure, I ended up with a lot less cash and a nastier reputation, but my mission was accomplished the same as it would have been if I’d used more finesse.

  Unlike Splinter Cell, Hitman doesn’t require you to creep around, especially if you make good use of disguises. In his street clothes, Agent 47 tends to attract at least a little attention wherever he goes; passersby usually give him a good hard look as he walks past, and in an early mission he so poorly blends in with a tour group that he gets shot by one of his targets just for looking suspicious. But not just any disguise will do, and a single mission might require many costume changes. A security guard might have good access to one building, but another building might be locked down tight to anyone who’s not dressed as an orderly.

  The clothes you need aren’t always just lying around. You normally will have to incapacitate an NPC to get your costume. As in Splinter Cell, it’s a good idea to hide the bodies well; most levels have plenty of dumpsters, chest freezers, laundry carts and trunks that do nicely. In fact, these items serve as not-too-subtle hints that there is someone in the vicinity whose uniform you need to proceed through the level.

  As you move around the map, a split screen pops up occasionally to inform you of key events in your mission, such as the results of a bomb you planted or the movement of a target from one area to another. A meter at the bottom left of the screen tells you your health and also shows “tension,” which is the level of general suspicion among the NPCs. If there’s nothing showing or it’s green, you’re probably okay. But once the meter goes yellow, you may need to lie low for a bit. Under some circumstances, though, it never goes back to green, and the heightened paranoia of the NPCs makes your job that much harder through the rest of the game.

  The game has four difficulty levels, and unlike with most games, you’re actually given an explanation of the differences among them. In the rookie level, you have unlimited saves, forgiving AI enemies and lots of help from Headquarters. At the other extreme on Pro, you are allowed no saves, and the AI enemies are almost paranoid. Pro is only for those who are not easily frustrated. (I found “Normal” difficulty about my speed.)

  The training mission (which also serves as the demo that’s been available from the Xbox Live Marketplace) is the only one that really directs the player from A to B, and it gives a bad impression of the rest of the game. I was convinced based on the training mission that I would hate the game, but my first “real” mission showed off the non-linearity that makes the game interesting. If you’re new to the series, the game may have to grow on you. Once it does, you’ll alternate between quitting the game in frustration and, just a little while later, plotting furiously about what to do differently the next time.

  No matter what level you’re on, there are no automatic saves or checkpoints. In-game saves also disappear if you have to quit the game before completing a mission. So if you’re going to sit down and attempt a mission for the first time, you should make sure you have a good hour to hour and a half to work through it all at once. This is an unnecessary annoyance that doesn’t make the game harder – just more frustrating.

  Not exactly killer graphics

  One major point at which the Splinter Cell comparison fails is the graphics. Hitman isn’t ugly, but it lacks the elegance of even the earliest of Sam Fisher’s adventures. Character animations are repetitive and their movement unrealistic. In fact, the game looks almost like a third-person version of The Sims, with the herky-jerky stiffness and somewhat cartoony appearance that characterize that game.

  The most laughable and annoying repeat offender is Agent 47’s costume changes. When he dresses in the clothes of an unconscious or dead NPC, the clothes magically appear on him, and the character animation is always the same, down to his tightening his tie even if he’s not wearing one. It’s a possibly necessary shortcut, but it makes the game seem a bit cut-rate.

  Clipping and glitching are also prevalent. Characters’ limbs routinely cross through one another. During one of my attacks on an NPC, I was supposed to have my victim in a headlock from behind while I injected sedative into his neck. Possibly because of the way Agent 47 and the victim were positioned, my victim was actually behind me, pantomiming being in a headlock, while I injected poison into an invisible enemy. Then when I dumped his body into a laundry cart, I could see his arm poking through the bottom of it.

  On another mission, an FBI agent investigating a crime scene walked right through a tree and ended up standing about two feet above the ground. And in the New Orleans mission, when throngs of Mardi Gras revelers are staggering up and down the street, NPCs routinely just walk through one another instead of around.

  Crowd scenes also reveal another glaring weakness – the lack of variety in the NPC player models. In an early mission, all the women literally look exactly alike except for their clothing. There were five different male player models tops. I originally thought this was all part of the game’s cloning theme, but I came to realize it was just a lack of effort. It’s tempting to consider how much better this game would be if IO had put the same effort into the graphics as it did the gameplay.

  Hitman’s sound is adequate, making good use of surround systems. Missions have distinct ambient sound that depends on your location – crowd noises on Bourbon Street, festive Latin music at the winery party. Every now and then you’ll happen upon a conversation worth eavesdropping on for the additional clues you can glean from it.

  The voice acting is competent as well. Agent 47 is a man of few words, but the actor who plays him brings just the right amount of menace to the role.

  Context-sensitive controls

  Agent 47 moves around with the left analog stick, which also controls his speed from a stroll to a jog. The camera moves independently with the right stick. The ability to view Agent 47 from every angle is especially useful when you’re trying to see if you’re being watched.

  When 47 is near an object that can be used or manipulated in some way, a menu appears in the upper left corner of the screen. The “Y” and “B” buttons allow him to pick up and drop objects, and the “A” button is an action button. When 47 is in a new room, it’s useful to walk him slowly around the room to see what pops up in the menu, such as “place bomb” or “sabotage.” It’s a bit of a gimme, but it’s hard to imagine a better way.

  The right trigger is used to fire guns and use other weapons like syringes and piano wire. Agent 47 can even engage in hand-to-hand combat if he happens not to be holding a weapon. The syringe and wire attacks are extremely iffy. 47 has to be positioned just right to execute the attacks, and if the victim sees him first and goes into a defensive crouch, it’s all over. I’ve come close to throwing the controller a few times over my repeated inability to syringe a target.

  The left shoulder button brings up a map that shows where your victim, bystanders and police are located. The right shoulder button reloads. The “back” button brings up your objectives and allows you to buy tips.

  Inventory control is perhaps the biggest shortcoming of the control scheme. To get access to inventory, you hold down the “X” button and then scroll through your entire list of items. It’s a slow process, and it’s a good thing the action on screen pauses while you’re looking for that elusive piano wire or detonator. Once you’ve equipped your chosen weapon, though, a quick tap on the “X” button allows Agent 47 to stash it back in his pocket or bring it out again.

  Controller vibration ads an element of tension. Your controller vibrates a little when the tension level ratchets up and even simulates a heartbeat when you’re hiding in a closet or trying to use a sniper weapon.

  The bottom line

  Even though it lacks multiplayer, Hitman: Blood Money provides plenty of replay value as the player explores all the right – and wrong – ways to complete a mission on multiple difficulty levels. Getting all the achievements in the game is not a task to be undertaken lightly. But here’s hoping that IO will pay a bit more attention to eliminating glitchy graphic and squirrely stealth attacks before the next installment.

6/16/2006  Tracey 'Jerri Blank' McCartney