So...Hitman: Absolution?

[wabbbit]

While I haven't even seen anything from this game since the original trailer, I saw a poster of it today in my local shopping mall.

The tagline was "How many people would you kill to save one life?"

Now, I haven't played a Hitman game since Contracts but doesn't that tagline make fuck all sense?

"How many people would you kill to save one life?"
Lots.
I got bored of evading police men so took to the library mission (the one in the trailer) with a knife.
So.many.bodies.

I do like how if you start butchering people like I did, even if you hide the bodies, someone will eventually find a pool of blood - of course it doesn't matter what they find if a second later they have a knife flying across the room at them...

 

[distortedreality]

^^^ I did a couple of missions like that - mainly missions where the Agency was involved.

For some reason, going Rambo was a lot more fun in this game than in previous ones.

 

[Legion]

The disguise mechanic is a little weird, because you can put on a police outfit, and *Every* police officer will look at you funny. Now I know that if you work at a place you get to know everyone, but not every police officer knows every other police officer. This should have a "Chance" Mechanic instead of a instant effect. This happens all the time with other disguises as well. It's quite annoying.

This happened in the second Hitman game, and was what made disguises such a damn problem. You couldn't do anything without raising an alarm short of staying as far away from every other NPC available.

They fixed it in later games, so I can't see why they brought it back for this one.

 

[Lord Garnaat]

Most of the criticism I've heard is entirely unfounded. Personally I think this is the best Hitman yet.The stealth is much better, as is the shooting when you need to use it. Environments are huge and beautiful, but instead of every single mission having the same "you're in an area, there's a guy, kill him" formula that the previous games had there are a few missions that break the pattern by forcing you to escape from enemies hunting you.

On the disguise system, I have to say I really like it. But know this: if you are a veteran Hitman player, it will make this game much, MUCH harder, because the new system forces you to break the habits you built up in previous games of being able to go anywhere in the right disguise, and instead you have to really think about which disguises will work where. It makes the game have much more of a strategic-thinking sort of gameplay, where you really need to work out a strategy to win.

It's probably the hardest Hitman game yet, with the creative kills much harder to find and disguises needing an extra finesse to work properly. Still, I can't recommend it highly enough. A must-buy.

 

[Krantos]

Reading a number of user and professional reviews, I've pretty much come to the conclusion that many Hitman fans have pretty thick nostalgia glasses when it comes to Blood Money.

For example, I've heard people complaining about the Instinct mechanic... um, you do remember the omniscient map, right? Instinct is largely a more restricted version of that.

Another thing I've heard people complain about is that Absolution is too scripted and relies on too much "Convenient" timing. So... Like it was convenient that your target was an being executed in a play and the gun they used for the scene was just conveniently left unattended? Or how another target was in a hot tub that conveniently had a glass bottom hanging over a cliff and there just conveniently happened to be an area of the mansion that had a line of sight on said bottom but was conveniently far enough away from the party that no one notices you shooting it out? That type of convenience? Blood Money was just as scripted and convenient, that didn't stop it from being a great game.

See, the problem I've always had with the Hitman games is that they don't allow much organic gameplay. For example, at one point in Blood Money a stripper invites you into a room. If you follow, you have about 3 seconds before a cutscene starts and she kills you. No warning, no indication of hostile action prior to that. The only way to know that she's going to kill you is to have it happen and reload. And that's pretty much how most of the game plays out. The only way to get the best ratings on most missions is to know the NPC's actions ahead of time and anticipate them.

Now, to a degree, I like that. It's the whole Dark Souls idea of learning the scenario until you can do it perfectly. The problem, though, is that many Hitman Fans seem to have forgotten that. They regale people with tales of inventive kills and flawless missions. What they, themselves seem to have forgotten is how many times they had to reload before they were able to get that result.

Despite taking place in open environments, Hitman games have tended to be very structured, simply because there was typically only 1 or 2 ways to complete a mission if you wanted to be discreet. Taking another approach generally just led to you getting caught/deadified.


Another complaint I've heard people level at Absolution is that it's too silly. While agreeing that 47 getting into a chicken costume is well beyond the realm of normalcy, I'll remind you that these where some of the enemies you fought in Blood Money:

Now, I liked Blood Money. A lot. But I also think a large portion of the criticism being leveled at Absolution is the result of people misremembering the game. Many of the "It's not Blood Money 2" criticisms were actually in Blood Money. And that's so deliciously ironic.

 

[Valen_Starwalker]

The disguise mechanic is a little weird, because you can put on a police outfit, and *Every* police officer will look at you funny. Now I know that if you work at a place you get to know everyone, but not every police officer knows every other police officer. This should have a "Chance" Mechanic instead of a instant effect. This happens all the time with other disguises as well. It's quite annoying.

This happened in the second Hitman game, and was what made disguises such a damn problem. You couldn't do anything without raising an alarm short of staying as far away from every other NPC available.

They fixed it in later games, so I can't see why they brought it back for this one.

Tis a new game. I'm sure it will be patched up in a few weeks.
They can't think of every thing. Hahaha.

I don't think you should be able to walk right up to an npc, but you should at least walk past them if you're in the hallway, and the door is just open.

 

[Chrono212]

As someone totally new to the franchise I can give you a resounding:

Spoiler

It's far too silly for all the brutal violence on display and for the pathos that 47 and his story with Victoria is trying to convey to properly sink in.

There seems to be an overwhelming amount of options yet also a real feeling of railroading to how one should proceed through the levels. Experimentation is rewarded if it was thought of by the level designer and punished if not sticking to one of the, admittedly, many scripts.

These options are almost so abundant that it doesn't really reward organic, on-the-spot thinking but instead creates a reward for trial-and-error. Something that should be in the game, where one can recon a level or area without the risk of penalty so that a real plan can be formulated. Instead, I found myself looking around for what was obviously a series of events the level designer put together to allow the player to move forward, although possibly with a feeling of satisfaction.

A personal bugbear that I have are these challenges that are associated with each level and their unsubtle presentation.
It just bugs me that you, as a player, have to replay the levels to do some of the challenges as completing some will lock out others.

As I said before, the characters have no personality or establishment other than 'these guys are douches so it's ok to kill them'. The banter between NPCs varies wildly between empathetic to just freaking weird. Like no human being would talk like that, even if they were a caricature.

In fact, that's a good way to describe the characters as caricatures. They have very little establishment and are just suddenly thrust upon the player as 'voice in the ear guy' or 'evil ex-boss guy' or 'bent cop guy'.

It looks good though. The much touted Glacier 2 does deliver on the crowds, even if many of them seem to be ghosts one can simply walk through.
A lot of the levels, although stereotypical, do have a certain 'lived in feel' although they fail to carry the same kind of meta-story as many of the areas in a game such as Fallout 3 or Deus Ex: Human Revolution.

Overall, it's too silly to be taken seriously and too restrictive to enjoy the silliness.

 

[Something Amyss]

That...makes very little sense. Cops are normal people, too, so not each and every one of them would act the same way. Besides, 47, while not really master of disguises, should be at least moderately familiar with them, considering he's been using them for years. Not to mention that he's canonically a ghost - nobody has ever seen or heard of him, and most people who've heard of him, think it's no more than an urban legend. I'll understand, if some cops would be able to recognise, say, people not from the department on sight, but recognise 47 for not being cop like enough? Heck, I can put on a uniform and I bet I can get away with it, at least until I start talking to a cop (even then, I may get away with it). And I don't really have any talent in acting or disguises.

Cops may be normal people, but they tend to also have very similar demeanors. There's a reason it's relatively easy to spot a cop out of uniform and part of why undercover acts are so dangerous. A cop's probably not going to be that easily fooled by a uniform. This is why it's probably better to find someone else who should be there if you want to disguise yourself.

 

[Valen_Starwalker]

That...makes very little sense. Cops are normal people, too, so not each and every one of them would act the same way. Besides, 47, while not really master of disguises, should be at least moderately familiar with them, considering he's been using them for years. Not to mention that he's canonically a ghost - nobody has ever seen or heard of him, and most people who've heard of him, think it's no more than an urban legend. I'll understand, if some cops would be able to recognise, say, people not from the department on sight, but recognise 47 for not being cop like enough? Heck, I can put on a uniform and I bet I can get away with it, at least until I start talking to a cop (even then, I may get away with it). And I don't really have any talent in acting or disguises.

Cops may be normal people, but they tend to also have very similar demeanors. There's a reason it's relatively easy to spot a cop out of uniform and part of why undercover acts are so dangerous. A cop's probably not going to be that easily fooled by a uniform. This is why it's probably better to find someone else who should be there if you want to disguise yourself.

What is with people, and thinking cops act a certain way?
Chances are if you put on a cop outfit, and just walked down the stairs, and into the main lobby. No one is going to look at you funny for doing so.
Especially if they brought in cops from another distract.



I will agree the all the chiefs, and higher rank officers will know each other, but not lower ranks.

 

[Something Amyss]

What is with people, and thinking cops act a certain way?

I don't know, pragmatism? This is a real thing that is a concern even for police themselves. It's a demonstrated behaviour issue

Also, no comma needed, my friend.

I will agree the all the chiefs, and higher rank officers will know each other, but not lower ranks.

The first part of that is no less ridiculous than the notion about lower ranks.

 

[TheCommanders]

Mechanically (except for maybe the change to the way disguises work, I'm on the fence right now) this game is the best it's ever been. Cover works very well and augments both stealth (making it a much more viable option than in previous games) and shooting. Visually, it looks excellent, leaps and bounds beyond the previous title (at least on PC, which is what I'm playing on). The thing I like most about this new game, weirdly, is the frankly fantastic sound design. I sometimes deliberately screw up just because the dynamic score can be so damn cool. Guns both sound and feel a lot better than they did in previous titles. Honestly the only big problem I have with the game is the fact that it's linear. Not that the levels don't have lots of ways to progress through them - they do - and there are even a few (like the Streets of Hope) that are fairly open ended. The problem is that they are: 1. Broken up into stages, which makes it feel more linear than it is, and 2. they are unidirectional. You enter a building and get to the elevator. You go down a hallway and kill a scientist. You go down another hallway and destroy a computer. Don't get me wrong, it doesn't approach the ridiculously railroaded extremes of a Call of Duty or Medal of Honor title, but in contrast to blood money or contracts... well it's not the formula we all came to love. My ideal game would be the level design of Blood Money with the graphics, mechanics, and sound of Absolution. I'm hoping that playing Contracts mode (which I haven't done yet) will get some of the sandbox assassination feel back, because other than missing that, this game is fantastic.

 

[Valen_Starwalker]

What is with people, and thinking cops act a certain way?

I don't know, pragmatism? This is a real thing that is a concern even for police themselves. It's a demonstrated behaviour issue

Also, no comma needed, my friend.

I will agree the all the chiefs, and higher rank officers will know each other, but not lower ranks.

The first part of that is no less ridiculous than the notion about lower ranks.

Actually from what I seen in jobs. Is that all managers know each other, and know other managers from other stores.
But they don't know every other employee.

This is just what I experience in my life.

 

[Reaper195]

It has it's ups and downs, but unlike a large portion of Hitman fans, I was expecting the game to be very different from Blood Money. In fact, I would be slightly more annoyed if it was near the same with better graphics. The only thing I don't like is the need to activate 'instinct' (Wtf...instinct!?) to get attention off of yourself. I do miss just having other cops stare at me for a moment and then only get suspicious when I started injecting their faces with poison.

Still...it takes a while to get used to if you are familiar with the previous gameplay...but it's not bad. Different, but not bad.

 

[Something Amyss]

Actually from what I seen in jobs. Is that all managers know each other, and know other managers from other stores.
But they don't know every other employee.

Management in stores operate differently, which is why it's nonsense.

Also, nobody's actually talking about every officer knowing each other. At least, if someone did, maybe you should quote them. I spoke to the ability to make a cop by demeanor, not to know them by name. And I mean that. It's fairly easy to spot a cop because of their conduct and training. The same is not true for management.

Look, in the right situations they might not question anybody, but cops do tend to have a certain demeanor and notice other cops behaving in a certain way. The idea I responded to, that of "I could put on a police uniform and blend right it," is nonsense.

 

[Beffudled Sheep_v1legacy]

Play it on Purist with no restarts except in death, and death should be avoided even aftyer having the entire ap alerted to your prescence. If that doesn't bring forth organic gameplay then nothing will. God I love the game, so challenging, so unforgiving. So many delicious ways to murder people.

 

[Valen_Starwalker]

Actually from what I seen in jobs. Is that all managers know each other, and know other managers from other stores.
But they don't know every other employee.

Management in stores operate differently, which is why it's nonsense.

Also, nobody's actually talking about every officer knowing each other. At least, if someone did, maybe you should quote them. I spoke to the ability to make a cop by demeanor, not to know them by name. And I mean that. It's fairly easy to spot a cop because of their conduct and training. The same is not true for management.

Look, in the right situations they might not question anybody, but cops do tend to have a certain demeanor and notice other cops behaving in a certain way. The idea I responded to, that of "I could put on a police uniform and blend right it," is nonsense.

Okay. I will respect that, and here's my follow up.

But he's a legendary hit man, and i'm sure he knows what to do, and what not do.
Also.. I will give you that cops do have some training that do things in a certain way.

But if I put on a cop suit, and walked down the streets, and gave someone a ticket (Assuming I had real ones) for doing something against the law that they were actually doing. They wouldn't know any better until they went to pay the fine.

You're just walking around no cop is going to look at you funny for it. They might say. "Where are you going buddy?", or something like that. Yes I will agree to that.

But when you're out in the public at a train station with 400 people chances are that real polices officers are not going to spot you. That's all.

Also Ps.

"Management in stores operate differently, which is why it's nonsense."

What? That argument makes no sense what so ever, just because the management isn't different doesn't mean the managers don't know each other.

And how can you call it nonsense? Lol, When I worked at wal-mart most the managers there knew other managers at other stores at well. Not all of them, but some of them.

 

[Laughing Man]

It isn't the Hitman of the old days, the game has decided to walk a finer line between the options of doing things the right way and getting a silent assassin score and going bat shit all guns blazing. In previous Hitman games, at least the two or three I played, a level had to be completed a certain way, yeah you could maybe tweak a thing or two here or there but for the most part if you wanted that Silent Assassin rating (and in previous Hitman games you did) you had to go A to B to C with little room for deviation. The thing is it worked, the map of the entire level was great it allowed you to really plan routes and actions and seeing it replaced with the mini map and instinct feature really sucks hard...

...however prvious Hitman games required that you plan your route through the level, cause if you got it wrong their was very little chance for improvisation, you either ended up slaughtering everything or getting killed but the results were never really very satisfactory.

Absolution on the other hand has clearly introduced the instinct and new disguise feature as well as the removal of the full level map in an effort to introduce some more dynamic encounters, the great thing though is handle these encounters right and you can get away with being spotted and if everything does go tits up, the gun play is freaking awesome. The last few levels of my first playthrough ended up with me swapping swapping disguises, point shooting from behind cover and just generally having a blast.

On top of all this and no one seems to mention it is how good the cut scenes are, the characters are fun, the story is engaging I enjoyed them.