Sony Playstation’s “State of Play” event was broadcast yesterday, announcing games and showcasing trailers for PS games set to release in the next few years.
Despite lots of cool teasers only one trailer has got me fully invested in the hype-cycle; 007: First Light.
Initially teased five years ago as of writing with the codename Project 007, First Light is…well, the first look at the newest James Bond game since 2012. I even wrote a post speculating what we might see in the final game back when all we had to go on was the teaser.
Developed by IO Interactive, the studio behind the Hitman series, First Light looks to be giving us a radically different Bond to any we’ve seen before, but with a few classic references for fans to find.
And as a fan of both 007 and Hitman, I wanted to dissect as much as I can from it. If you haven’t seen the trailer, here it is!
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On His Majesty’s Secret Service – Dissecting the 007: First Light Trailer
I think anyone that would glance at the trailer for a second could mistake it for the trailer of a new James Bond film. It’s that good.
The pacing, the music, the mix of character charm and action set pieces, it all blends together and hits all the points to get fans excited. It even has the product placement, with Omega watches and Aston Martins being given prime real estate time on the screen (probably courtesy of Amazon’s acquisition of the Bond license back in 2021).
Despite hitting several Bond motifs and references, IOI have stressed in all their statements about the game that it will be an entirely new “origin” story for the character, disconnected from all previous works. It’s the right way to go, cutting off any preconceived notion of who or what James Bond to build him up for a new generation.
The opening dialogue between M and a new character, Greenway (played by The Walking Dead’s Lennie James) sets up our hero excellently, taking Bond’s original backstory from the books and giving it subtle tweaks; witnessing his parents die in a mountaineering accident, bouncing from private school to private school, then enlisting in the Navy and acting with reckless abandon.
It all adds up the M describing Bond as a “bullet without a target”, very similar to how Judi Dench’s M described Bond in Casino Royale, “a blunt instrument”.
And then we see our new James Bond for the first time. It’s a good reveal, seeing his silhouette to begin with, him stepping out into the light, his hand shielding his face for a second, before the corner of his mouth twitches into a grin.
Supposedly modelled and voiced by Irish actor Patrick Gisbon (most well-known as playing Dexter Morgan in the television series Dexter: Original Sin), he’s the youngest Bond we’ve ever seen (IOI list him as 26 in their press-release), yet he still has a few of the marks of Bond from the original text such as the thin vertical scar on his cheek and blue-grey eyes.
The settings look stunning, matching the high-quality of the Hitman trilogy, with locations such as South-East Asian beach resorts, French chateaus, rooftop chases and fireworks shows, and if my eyes do not deceive me…James Bond in a nightclub!
Speaking of the locations, one of the most exciting teases in the trailer is Bond barreling down country roads behind the wheel of an Aston Martin DBS, last seen in 1969’s On Her Majesty’s Secret Service.
I speculated in my previous post that driving missions would make their way back into the series and I hope that IOI have done their homework on previous Bond games. Other 007 games have excellent driving missions giving players a small open world to complete their objectives rather than just simple chases.
Another prediction I made of the game would be the return of gadgets. During Craig’s tenure as Bond in both films and games there were less about the individual gadgets of Q Branch, instead cramming all the agent’s needs into his mobile phone.
But two scenes stand out in the trailer; Bond using some sort of dart device to put a guard to sleep, as well has using his laser watch to temporarily blind a bad guy. The laser watch is a staple of the movies and so I’m happy to see it replicated here. I hope we have more gadgets on show with each one being its own item rather than just being interchangeable parts.
Alongside gadgets, the rest of the gameplay loop looks solid, as anyone would expect from the creators of Hitman. Hand-to-hand combat looking nice and weighty (I think I see a Judo hip throw at one point) and Bond looks effortlessly cool catching guns in mid-air or kicking them into his hands.
IOI have also teased that players can use “charming wit” to overcome challenges, so maybe their will be short dialogue sequences or wry comments to choose. There are a few jokes in the trailer along with Bond smiling, so it seems we are getting a more light-heartened Bond that we have in the most recent films.
One final part I want to point out in the trailer is MI6 as an organisation. We get the usual suspects of M, Q, and Moneypenny sprinkled through the trailer, as well as scenes of Bond taking part in combat and firearms training amongst other recruits.
One scene later features M speaking to a group of people that look around Bond’s age, saying “I need all my pieces on the board”. Another line later in the trailer says “009 is a master manipulator. Whatever the endgame is we won’t see it coming.”
In both the books and the films the other 00 agents are only mentioned in passing, usually dying early on and spurring MI6 to send in Bond to clear up the mess. But here it seems that Bond might be working with and also against other agents, which is a unique scenario both for new and old Bond media.
Hakan Abrak, CEO of IO Interactive stated in an interview that they are aiming for a trilogy of 007 games and so I hope that with this cast of potential co-workers we get to see them grow too and interact with them in gameplay.
Either way, this is just the first teaser with the game aiming for a 2026 release date. I am excited to see more as First Light looks like its shaping up to rightfully take the mantle from GoldenEye of being the best James Bond game ever.
With the announcement in 2020 that IO Interactive (makers of Hitman) were working on a James Bond video game, I became curious about the past games of 007.
A lot of these games, Nightfire, Everything or Nothing, even the poorly received Goldeneye: Rogue Agent, were staples of my gaming childhood.
I hadn’t played these games in fifteen to twenty years and there was a dual sense of familiarity and moments lost to memory when I went back to play them.
But one game in the back catalogue of JamesBond really took me by surprise. Even now, looking back at the games that come before and after, it seems like the odd-one-out, a possible start to an entirely new franchise.
In 2005, Electronic Arts, creators of the 007 games, were in a bit of a jam. Pierce Brosnan, the main lead in the past four Bond films and of the game Everything or Nothing, had been let go from the role. EA still had a license to develop 007 games but they had no 007.
While one of their efforts in 2004 put the player in the role of a Bond villain (Goldeneye: Rogue Agent), in 2005 they took a remarkable leap of courage and got another actor for the role of James Bond…Sean Connery.
Yes, 2005 saw the release of Sean Connery’s video game debut, From Russia With Love.
Red Wine with Fish – From Russia with Love: The Game
It’s very strange looking at the entire filmography of James Bond and thinking From Russia with Love would be chosen to be a video game. Even Sean Connery’s later 007 films, Goldfinger, Thunderball and You Only Live Twice are much stronger on the action and could deliver bigger set pieces.
From Russia with Love, while being an excellent film (usually ranked high in fan ratings and being Sean Connery’s favourite) is much more of a slow-burn thriller than an action film, with large parts of the film being set on smoky Istanbul streets and Bond using stealth and subterfuge rather than blasting baddies away with a gun.
According to Executive Producer at EA, Glen Schofield, the film was chosen because “it’s one of the more popular films”. It makes sense, and as a name, From Russia with Love has the same association as Casino Royale or The Spy Who Loved Me, so ingrained in culture that even if you have never seen a Bond film you could probably associate the title with him.
And yes, the other strange thing being Sir Sean Connery is on voice acting duties for 007. These aren’t clips from the film or a soundalike, it’s the man who got so fed up with the role he once said, “I have always hated that damned James Bond, I’d like to kill him.”
Sean Connery, recording his lines from his home in the Bahamas. (Source: jamesbond.fandom)
But Sean Connery decided to return, partly because of his love of the film, partly because his grandkids were big fans of video games, and that it was a whole new and interesting creative vision.
In the lead up to the game, Connery said, “As an artist, I see this as another way to explore the creative process. Video games are an extremely popular form of entertainment today, and I am looking forward to seeing how it all fits together”.
And in fact, it was a bit of a different creative process than the film. EA described the project as a “director’s cut”, expanding on the action and story of the film. Only eight of the fourteen levels can be tied directly to the original and nearly every action set piece ramps up the enemies and explosions.
I understand From Russia with Love was chosen for name recognition, but there is enough new material here that could have been a wholly original Bond story.
The game delivers its own pre-title sequence, of 007 fighting terrorists at the UK Parliament and protecting the Prime Minister’s daughter (surprisingly portrayed by pop star Natasha Bedingfield). It’s an exciting and explosive start to the game, watching Connery take down baddies with his classic silenced pistol, leaping across chandeliers, and finally climbing onto the roof, where he commandeers a jetpack and fights enemy helicopters around Big Ben.
The first if many jetpack rides in the game, with huge arenas for destruction (Source: eurogamer.net)
Speaking of the jetpack, a few of the non-FRWL levels are based on later Connery films, and fan-favourite vehicles such as the gadget-filled Aston Martin DB5 from Goldfinger and jetpack from Thunderball appear throughout. The final mission is Bond dismantling the villain’s base inside an island volcano, taking the setting from his fifth film, You Only Live Twice.
Alongside the items and design choices taken from the 1960s, a lot of Connery’s acting quirks make it into the game.
There is a quote attributed to Dana Broccoli, wife of the 007 film producer Cubby Broccoli. When they were first casting for the role of James Bond, after Sean Connery left the audition the producers weren’t too sure on him. But Cubby’s wife Dana convinced them, saying that Connery, “moves like a panther”. He’s confident, measured, quietly powerful. I feel the animators really went to great lengths to capture that essence.
They way the character runs at a constant beat, the slight body tilt while strafing, holding a machine gun in one hand and braced against his hip, the judo roll to cover ground quickly or dodge incoming fire, it’s all fluid and conveys the idea that this is man who is confident in his abilities as a secret agent.
The designers also talked about much detail they went into their animations, such as modelling how Connery would hold his gun in the films, as well as in his fighting style. Connery’s Bond was more of a grappler, throwing enemies to the ground or dealing them a swift Judo chop, which was added to the game.
Each move is mo-capped excellently, with Connery using several Judo throws (Source: imdb.com)
The game takes the standard third-person shooter conventions of the time. Cover mechanics, lock-on shooting, it’s smooth in animation and snappy in its combat, putting greater emphasis on character movement that on shot placement. One article I read in research compared gameplay to the film series John Wick and I definitely see the comparison.
One facet of the combat I really like is creating cover. If Bond is in a room with a table, he can knock it over and automatically ducks behind it. It’s a nice touch and feels very Bond-like.
And since the game is primarily a third-person-shooter, we get to enjoy the highly detailed model of Sean Connery throughout the game.
The model is a tremendous feat of artistic wizardry, incredibly detailed and expressive, all on the sixth console generation, machines not known for their technical power. It’s the perfect balance of facial scanning and artistic license.
One aspect of the game that I unexpectedly loved is the fashion of Bond. When exploring the levels, players can find outfits that Bond can wear.
These are all outfits that Bond has worn at some point; his Black Tuxedo and Grey Suit from FRWL, his White Tuxedo and Stealth Suit from Goldfinger, and a Snow Suit (a possible reference to On Her Majesty’s Secret Service). At one point Bond has to wear an enemy uniform to sneak past patrols undetected.
None of these outfits give bonuses like a certain tuxedo giving more armour or whatever, but it’s a taste of role-playing, of getting to play our version of Bond.
A secret infiltration, the perfect opportunity for a stealth suit…or white tuxedo, you choose. (Source: denofgeek.com)
The role-playing aspects are further exemplified by the Upgrade Shop, ostensibly Q’s Workshop in MI6.
Earning points throughout the game, the player can invest in technology for their weapons and gadgets, improving their abilities as they go. As the player collects and keeps weapons and gadgets over the course of the entire game, the investments work almost like an RPG, finding your preferred way to play and upgrading with your favourite weapons.
It’s not a full RPG character builder such as putting skill points into being stealthy or non-lethal, but for the time this was new territory for Bond games.
The upgrade points can also be used to unlock new characters in multiplayer. The multiplayer here is solely bad guys, almost like a SPECTRE civil war (seen in the previous game Goldeneye: Rogue Agent). It’s here where the the “director’s cut” approach to the film is full realised. Characters like Kronsteen and Morenzy, who are major players in the film but are absent from the game, are playable characters and modelled on the actors.
The cast of the film return in digital form, including Bond’s nemesis Red Grant, modelled on actor Robert Shaw, (Source: jamesbond.fandom)
Dr. No and Goldfinger show up (the villains in the previous and following films in the series), along with a few normal enemy soldiers, but there are three characters that only exist in multiplayer and do not appear in any media form, be it the film, original book, or the game story.
Three female characters, Leyla Karistarin (an exotic mercenary), Portia Lovejoy (a mercenary from the English upper class) and Zora Casonovic (a volatile Russian enforcer), each are given a simple one-line description and nothing more.
I’ve been obsessed with these characters for fifteen years; where did they come from? Were they meant for the game and never got added? Are they just to boost the male/female ratio in the multiplayer?
They have so much character to them just in their designs, I’m captivated with finding out more. I’ve been searching for images of them to show here, and I can’t. These character have no presence outside of the game. That is fascinating, that these visually striking characters are just there, it speaks to a care and dedication for the creative work.
Really, that care and dedication is emblematic of the entire game. Based on a film over forty years old, tweaking aspects, adding dashes of modernity, yet staying true to the basic beats and themes of the story, I’m beguiled by the fact that this thing actually got MADE.
As I mentioned at the beginning, you could almost see it at the start of another franchise. After Connery could be Lazenby and a retelling of On Her Majesty’s Secret Service. Next would be Roger Moore with Moonraker (come on, you know it would have to be that film). And after that would be Timothy Dalton and License to Kill. Think of an expanded version of the 007: Legends game, where key movies from each Bond were adapted and the lead Bond actors returned, instead of Daniel Craig standing in for all of them.
007: Legends re-created several films from the series, but was met with critical and commercial failure (Source: demonews.de)
But sadly, From Russia with Love was a one-and-done, marking the end of Electronic Arts’ work on the franchise.
Speaking of, that run of EA 007 games will probably never be bettered. Mixing different gameplay elements and styles, enthusiasm and care to representing the series, by talented teams at the height of their creative output, EA managed to knock out nearly one game a year for half a decade and all of them (even Rogue Agent), deserve to be remembered for what they brought to the genre.
And From Russia with Love, while it might not be the best of the bunch, deserves to be remembered for its artistic and technical feats, its fast and frenetic gunplay, and the creative confidence to adapt a story from nearly half a century ago. It’s weird and wonderful and a game I will continue to treasure, pining that one day it will be backwards compatible.
I recently finished Hitman 3 and absolutely loved it. The game, no, the entire World of Assassination trilogy, starting in 2016, has been one of the greatest gaming experiences I have ever had.
IO Interactive really pulled out all the stops for this trilogy, with stunning locations, unique scenarios, and one of the most personal and human stories in the AAA gaming scene. The reboot, which is now over five years old, still looks beautiful even when running off an ageing PS4.
Today I wanted to talk more about the locations Agent 47 visits in his grand tours around the world. The series is known for creating some of the most breath-taking and intricate levels in gaming, so I wanted to rank the best locations from every single game, starting with Codename 47 from 2000 up until the most recent game from 2021. Let’s start!
Hitman: Codename 47 – “Traditions of the Trade”
Despite being over twenty years old, theoriginal Hitman has one of the best levels the series has ever devised, containing a perfect blend of location and eliminations.
“Traditions of the Trade” sees 47 head to the Hotel Galar in Budapest (based on the famous Hotel Gellért) to take out Austrian terrorists Frantz and Fritz Fuchs and collect a chemical bomb Frantz has planted in the hotel.
The level is absolutely stunning, giving the players an entire hotel to explore. In comparison to the other levels in the original Hitman, this one values player freedom and non-linear gameplay as the highest priority. There are zero waypoints to your targets, but the game gives you clues to where to start searching.
For example, what would be the first thing to do in a hotel? Maybe check-in at the front desk. When you sign the guest book, you see one of the target’s room numbers. It’s so simple but perfectly logical, and the entire series has made a habit of including details like these.
The hotel is a nice and calm setting, you’re not immediately being hunted or needing to be stealthy. But that doesn’t mean the level is easy to beat. Security is tight (the hotel is about to host the UN, hence the threat of a terrorist event) so players have to work within the limitations set.
Metal detectors are placed at the entrance of the hotel, meaning you can’t bring any weapons with you. That’s something quite revolutionary for the series, you can complete the level without firing a single shot.
Some unique kills and scenarios (staples of the series) are present here, such as trapping Fritz in a sauna and turning up the heat, and jumping from balcony to balcony to reached Frantz’s bathroom, the only place he isn’t surrounded by guards.
Despite its simple premise, “Traditions of the Trade” is a quintessential Hitman level, with it being the template for many locations throughout the series.
“Traditions of the Trade” is so iconic it was remastered for the 2004 game, Hitman: Contracts, almost unchanged in terms of gameplay. (Source: hitman.fandom.com)
Hitman 2: Silent Assassin – “The Jacuzzi Job”
A short level, but a fun one due to the location alone. “The Jacuzzi Job” is the final section of three missions that see 47 head to Kuala Lumpur in Malaysia, chasing a hacker who has stolen a valuable missile software programme.
I absolutely love this set of missions purely due to the setting, the Petronas Towers, which at the time were the tallest structures in the world. And while the first mission set in the towers takes 47 to the basement, “The Jacuzzi Job”takes place in the penthouse suite.
To reach his target, 47 first has to traverse the roof of the skybridge between the two structures, before using a window-cleaning platform to reach what is, essentially, the top of the world. Taking place during a horrendous thunder storm, with rain lashing down the windows, the location is dark and creepy.
47 must make his way through a series of work offices before the penthouse, with the soft glow of the computers casting shadows across the smart yet mundane work spaces. This is then contrasted with the penthouse suite with its dark-red lighting fixtures, ostentatious architecture, and tacky signs of luxury.
The target, Charlie Sidjan, is surrounded by his female bodyguards (you could call them is ‘Angels’?), chilling in the jacuzzi as the level implies.
To not arouse suspicion from the authorities following Sidjan’s death, 47 has to make his hit look like a robbery gone wrong by stealing some tasteless yet expensive art. It’s an interesting inversion of the standard Hitman trope of being a ‘silent assassin’, leaving no evidence you were even there, making it stand out amongst the rest of the series.
Charlie with his ‘Angels’, with 47 waiting for the right moment to strike. (Source: hitman.fandom.com)
Hitman: Contracts – “The Meat King’s Party”
Hitman: Contracts took a series already known for its dark tone and turned it up to eleven. While some fans think the mission “Beldingford Manor” is the better level, I think the “The Meat King’s Party” is the more iconic.
Set in Romania, 47 is tasked with killing slaughterhouse entrepreneur Campbell Sturrock, and his lawyer, Andrei Puscus.
Sturrock was accused of kidnapping the daughter of an ICA cilent (the International Contracts Agency, 47’s employers), but because of legal technicalities and a few bribes, Sturrock got away scott-free. 47 infiltrates the celebratory freedom party being hosted at one of Sturrock’s slaughterhouses to rescue the daughter and eliminate his targets.
The party is absolutely wild. A BDSM-inspired rave with leather-clad guests fuelled by opium pipes and dancing to a dark techno beat, strobe lights dancing off the clinical white walls and machinery, the location alone would be enough to grant its place on this list.
The main target is another highlight. Campbell Sturrock is absolutely grotesque. Morbidly obese, unable to leave his bed due to his size, and eating entire roast chickens with his hands, he is disgusting and vulgar, and one of the stand out targets of the entire series.
But the detail that makes “The Meat King’s Party” stick in the mind is The Girl. Kidnapped by Campbell before being handed over to his psychotic brother Malcolm, 47 finds the girl hanging upside down, her eyes gouged out and her severed arm on the floor under her. Car tree air fresheners hang from the ceiling with her. To one side is a shrine of sorts, and to another is a gramophone playing Paul Anka’s “Put Your Head On My Shoulder”.
And the most chilling part…despite Malcolm being the girl’s killer, Diana, 47’s handler, tells him the mission hasn’t changed. To get the perfect rating, Malcolm must survive. Even in Hitman’s twisted world, sometimes the bad guys still escape justice.
47 collecting ‘evidence’ of The Girl, truly ones of the most chilling moments in a series known for its dark tone. (Source: YouTube, Willzyyy)
Hitman: Blood Money – “A House of Cards”
Hitman: Blood Money is widely considered to be the best game of the series. With improved AI, greater flexibility with kills, and a story that takes 47 all across America, it is still the benchmark for every subsequent game to compare itself against.
With levels such as “A Dance With The Devil” (a Heaven/Hell themed party filled with rival assassins) “Curtains Down” (killing the lead tenor during an opera house rehearsal) or “Amendment XXV” (killing the US Vice-President INSIDE the White House), it takes something special to stand out in Blood Money. For me, “A House of Cards” reaches that peak.
Set in a giant, Arabic-inspired hotel and casino, “A House of Cards” has three targets for 47 to eliminate, each one working on a different schedule, but crossing paths at set times. It creates a tense atmosphere when trying to juggle all the moving parts and manipulating events, making it that much more rewarding when the plan goes right.
It’s also remarkable how many ways you can take out your targets; catching them alone in their hotel suite, sniping them from the roof, strangling them in the elevator shaft, or even impersonating one of the targets and heading to a secret meeting with the others. With everywhere from the casino floor to the penthouse suites being available, it is truly one of the greatest of Blood Money’s stellar levels.
The Shamal Hotel & Casino sets the stage for one of the most intricate and layered missions in all of Hitman. (Source: hitman.fandom.com)
Hitman: Absolution – “Attack of the Saints”
While Absolution is seen as a lesser game in comparison to its franchise, it still has a few stand-out levels.
Some favorites include “Run For Your Life”, with 47 on the run from the police, ending with him having to wait in a crowded metro station without being spotted, hiding amongst the civilians, before slipping away onto an incoming train.
Another is “One of a Kind”, where 47 visits his blind tailor, Tommy Clemenza, to fix him a new suit. It’s a small level, but adds so much to 47 and his world.
But the one I chose for this list is the big one, “Attack of the Saints”. First seen in a promotional teaser trailer, the Saints are a team of female assassins who are dressed in BDSM-inspired nun outfits. It’s a little out-there, but it fits into the grindhouse aesthetic Absolution goes with.
The Saints hunt 47 down to a seedy motel he’s laying low in, and proceed to blow up the entire complex. It’s the first time 47 has ever been caught completely off-guard, dressed in nothing but a skimpy bathrobe and having none of his gear, as the Saints close in to make sure the job is done.
The setting of the motel and surrounding landscape including Tiki bars, a mini-golf course, and cornfields, are the perfect variety of locations, giving us everything from tight hallways to open plains. The cornfield especially, it’s so much fun stalking through the long grass, silently taking out one Saint after another, with bonus points for dressing up as a scarecrow in the cornfield and hanging from his post.
It’s one of the few levels in Absolution that reaches to Blood Money’s success, giving us a variety of targets spread across the map and lets us get on with it, taking them out how we see fit. The Saints are touted as the best agents below 47 and are all heavily armed, so it does feel suitably badass to see 47 take down the people gunning for his job as top of the ICA.
The Saints in their debut appearance, the E3 ‘Attack of the Saints’ trailer, gearing up to take down 47. (Source: gamezone.de)
Hitman (2016) – “World of Tomorrow”
To anyone that has played through Hitman (2016) the choice of this level is no surprise and for good reason. The second level of the World of Assassination trilogy takes 47 to Sapienza, a small fishing town in Italy, which hides a dark secret.
While the first mission of the reboot, “The Showstopper” (set in Paris), was an excellent first step for the game, “World of Tomorrow” was the perfect follow-up. The location is amazing; a beautiful sea-side town, complete with cafes, winding narrow streets, and even beaches.
The targets, two bio-engineers, are housed in an impressive manor built amongst ancient castle ruins, with spectacular gardens and walkways and even an observatory dome complete with giant telescope.
But the location that makes “World of Tomorrow”such a memorable level is the almost sci-fi chemical weapons laboratory underneath the small town. Hitman has always had a little dash of sci-fi (I mean, 47 is a result of a Cold War cloning experiment), but this feels like something straight out of a James Bond film (funnily enough, IOI are now working on a 007 game, which I have previously written about).
Along with the two targets, 47 is tasked with destroying the virus they had been working on. It’s always fun when the levels ask us to do more than just kill targets, such as crack safes or even destroying organs ready for transplant surgery. What’s even better, there is more than one way to destroy the virus, one remotely and one more up-close and personal, catering to different play styles.
Player freedom is at an all-time high in “World of Tomorrow”, with several ways of killing the targets, anything from shooting down a plane using a cannon (from the castle walls), to using an explosive golf ball when a target practices their drive.
The location, tied with the signature eliminations, makes it one of the best levels the series has to offer.
Death and destruction are always an inch away in Sapienza, where 47 hunts down the greatest minds of their generation. (Source: hitman.fandom.com)
Hitman 2 (2018) – “The Ark Society”
Hitman 2 expanded on its predecessor’s work with more intricate level design, distinctive scenarios for each location, and more unique ways to eliminate a target.
Levels such as “The Finish Line”, set at a Miami racing event (with one target driving their prototype vehicle), “Chasing a Ghost”, set in the Mumbai slums (where 47 has to deduce who one of his targets is), and “The Last Resort”, set in the Maldives (with targets hiring you mid-mission to enact their own schemes) are absolutely stunning and worthy of taking 2nd place on this list. But for me, the top place has to go to “The Ark Society”.
Set on a remote North Atlantic island off the coast of Scotland, “The Ark Society” is mesmerising as a location. The main complex is a medieval castle with burial sites, chapels, and a maze of sewer tunnels underneath, yet has a giant glass meeting box perched atop the keep, a dash of modernity clashing with the ancient.
The Ark Society are a collection of wealthy elites, plotting how they will survive the apocalypse, designing remote cities to flee to, researching new ways to extend their lives, and checking out the newest and most lucrative tech companies to invest in.
And because it’s a party, everyone is donned in formal wear and domino masks, aside from the higher level members, who have ceremonial robes.
It’s all pomp and circus, pageantry and playing at running the world, yet it is the perfect hunting ground for 47.
The two targets, the leaders of The Ark Society, are twin sisters coming from a nouveau riche family. To prove they belong with the old money members, they enact crazy schemes like placing themselves inside a phoenix effigy or putting prospective members through a polygraph test and electroshock torture.
The great twist on this level is the VIP, The Constant. 47 wants to extract him for later interrogation, but the twins are under strict orders that if The Constant becomes compromised then they have authority to use a “kill switch”. Inside The Constant’s head is a poison chip, and each twin has a detonator on them to use at any point. Before 47 can secure The Constant, he needs to be in possession of both switches.
It’s a cool theme, taking away a small amount of freedom to make players feel tense, having to ‘protect’ someone from the other targets has been done before but not to this extreme.
“The Ark Society” is an amazing level and the perfect crescendo to Hitman 2.
The blend of the old and the new makes The Isle of Sgàil one of the most memorable and unique locations of the entire series. (Source: hitman.fandom.com)
Hitman 3 – “Apex Predator”
Some fans of Hitman 3 will say that “Death In The Family” is the best mission of the game. It’s a good candidate; set in an old country manor in Dartmoor, England, and featuring a Knives Out-inspired murder mystery that the player can solve…but for me “Apex Predator” takes the top honour.
The set up; 47 is on the run from his own people and the shadowy Providence faction. It’s not the first time that 47 has been hunted, but after being possibly betrayed by his long-time handler and friend, Diana, 47 is at rock-bottom. He plans to meet his only other contact, Olivia, in Berlin, but just as he zeroes in on her location she tells him to abort their mission.
47’s employer, the ICA, has found the duo, with agents having orders to shoot on sight. Olivia is ready to cut and run, but 47 calmly tells her to keep her head down, signing off with, “I’ll take care of this.”
“Apex Predator” has one of the best locations of the entire series. IO Interactive love setting missions in clubs. We’ve had “The Meat King’s Party” in Contracts, “A Dance With The Devil” in Blood Money, and “Hunter and Hunted” in Absolution.
“Apex Predator” builds upon Blood Money‘s club setting, even keeping the Hell motif, with the name of the nightclub being Club Hölle, and expanding the rival agents from two in Blood Money to twelve in Hitman 3.
Set in a disused nuclear power plant and based on the infamous and iconic Berghain nightclub, it is disorientating and imposing. Between the three separate dance floors, coat rooms, smoking areas, juice bars, back rooms filled with gun-toting bikers, and even the DJ booth, it is an excellent sandbox for the player.
The best part though, the player has no idea who the enemy agents are. Disguised amongst the party goers, club security, bar staff, and more, it is a real unique and discomforting experience, not knowing if the next person you bump into is one of your hunters.
As the level goes on, 47 gets hold of an earpiece and listens in on the handler controlling the operation and the cocky agents who don’t realise they are in way over their heads.
As 47 picks off each agent, the handler, Jiao, becomes more and more panicked, eventually calling off the mission once enough agents are dispatched. If the player manages to kill all twelve, Jiao remarks, “Expertly done, 47. Expertly fucking done.”
It’s a small moment, but paired with 47’s line, “I’ll take care of this”, it elevates the level into iconic territory. Despite being hunted by some of the ICA’s most accomplished and battle-hardened assets, 47 is…well, the apex predator.
The variety of kills is astonishing, with everything from dropping lighting fixtures onto the dance floor, to arranging a closed door meeting with several assassins, where 47 reveals his identity before getting into a raging gun fight.
The location, paired with the excellent set up and loop of hunting and being hunted, make it quite possibly my favourite level of the entire series.
Death awaits 47 on the dance floor of Club Hölle, the main location of “Apex Predator”. Source: pcgamer.com.
James Bond games used to be a major force in the licensed game industry.
Starting with Goldeneye in 1997, players were blessed with a fantastic new game every other year, featuring different play styles and genres as the years went on.
We had the excellent first-person shooter Nightfire, the superb third-person shooters Everything or Nothing and From Russia With Love, and even a remake of the classic Goldeneye, which updated the 1995 film to the modern day, complete with Daniel Craig instead of Pierce Brosnan as the iconic superspy.
But after a few years in the 2010s, with only the poor Quantum of Solace adaptation in 2008, the okay Blood Stone in 2010, and the abysmal 007: Legends in 2012, the series has been dark for nearly a decade. That all changed in the tail end of 2020.
The trailer, which is just under one minute in length, shows someone loading a bullet into a gun, before the camera sweeps around to show the iconic gunbarrel, accompanied by the James Bond theme. IO also posted a press release on their website, saying the that the story will be a “…wholly original Bond story…” where players will “…earn their 00 status in the very first James Bond origin story.”
While it is still early days, as a James Bond fan, I’m already hooked on a new game being on the horizon.
With nothing less known about the project, let’s do a bit of speculating, and create a wishlist of things that I would like to see in the game.
For Your Eyes Only – What Would I Like to see in Project 007
A New Bond
With IO’s phrase, a “wholly original Bond story” in their press release, and Daniel Craig stepping away from the role after the film No Time To Die, it seems like IO’s 007 will have nothing in connection with the most recent incarnation of Bond films.
I think this is a good thing. While the mid-2000s were the peak of licensed games, with Spiderman 2, The Chronicles of Riddick, and The Simpsons: Hit and Run, nowadays the market has shrunk to a mere fraction of what it once was.
Sure, every now and again you’ll get an Insomniac Spiderman, Telltale Walking Dead, or WB Shadow Of Mordor, but these are few and far between. However, these games smartly take their setting and characters, and create an alternate universe that stands apart from the more famous media. Project 007 should work on the same factor.
But with no cinematic Bond to base the main character on, what would he look like? In IO’s press release, it says “…players with earn THEIR 00 status”, could we take this to mean that some character customisation could be involved? To take the customisation point further, players could be awarded experience points to make Bond quicker, stealthier, tougher, better with gadgets or weapons, in essence, making their Bond entirely unique to them. I think this would be a fun angle for players, and would be cool to see the different variations that we could make.
However, even though the game is named Project 007, the name James Bond comes up many times in the press release, so sadly I don’t think we’ll be seeing any playable female agents in the main story.
A New (Old) Era
IO’s main series, Hitman, is a thoroughly modern game, always full of hi-tech gadgets and settings. While it would be easy for IO to slip in 007 to these locales, I think it might be fun for the developers to leap back in time. It would be something not just interesting and original for IO by setting it apart from the Hitman series, but would also be new for the Bond license. The majority of the games have been set around the Pierce Brosnan/Daniel Craig era, with one outlier, From Russia With Love, an adaptation of the 1963 film, complete with Sean Connery voicing 007.
Setting the game in the 1950s and 60s means the game would be full of tense East vs. West standoffs, with Bond going against his KGB contemporaries. Being hunted and hunting enemy spies or double agents is a perfect scenario for any spy media, and I hope Project 007 has at least one mission based on this idea.
The 1960s also gives us new weapons, unique architecture, and snazzy suits (we know how much IO likes their suits). Being set in the past, the game also deals with the ‘smart phone’ problem. In more recent 007 games, especially ones based on Daniel Craig’s interpretation of Bond, 007’s smartphone is his primary gadget. It’s a camera, a tracker, a communication device, a codebreaker, it does EVERYTHING. Having the setting be the early 60s means the game can be creative with a range of gadgets, like a laser watch, sonic cufflinks, and coins as grenades to name a few.
From Russia With Love has been the only James Bond game to be set in the past. Maybe Project 007 could be the same? (Source: denofgeek.com)
A Mash Of Genres
Many James Bond games are straight-up shooters, but I think that loses a lot of their character. It’s less 007 and more CoD. To alleviate this, I think a 007 game should have a mix of styles.
Just like the new Hitman games, 007 should be able to shoot his way through to his objectives, but stealth should also be a viable option. It would also be quite refreshing to have a few levels where killing is forbidden or highly discouraged, and we have to focus more on a simple Judo chop or our gadgets than our trusty silenced pistol.
It might also be good to take some inspiration from what previous games got right. The great granddaddy of James Bond games is Goldeneye for the Nintendo 64. While it is chock-full of baddies to blast away, Goldeneye tasks Bond with sending messages, escorting Soviet defectors, installing gadgets, and photographing evidence. These simple tasks made the game stand out since we are doing actual spy work.
Another staple from previous games that was always a joy were the driving sections. IO have never done a driving game, but they could take the same approach to vehicular gameplay as they did for Hitman, using the 2001 game Agent Under Fire as a reference.
In many James Bond games, the driving sections are little more than linear or even on-rails affairs, where players just have to maintain speed and not crash to continue. In Agent Under Fire, Bond is given an open world to drive around in and complete his tasks. These are everything from tracing a suspect vehicle, delivering codes to MI6, to shooting down enemy helicopters. The open approach gives the player so much freedom, where even if they crash or go a different way, they aren’t immediately thrown to the ‘Game Over’ screen. IO should really take inspiration from the past 007 games and recreate what made them fun.
Multiplayer?
Multiplayer deathmatches have become a staple of James Bond games ever since Goldeneye, with players being able to choose from a rogues gallery of prior Bond characters, in iconic locations, and blow each other to pieces.
While IO could implement a fun third-person shootout, I think they could also reuse their multiplayer aspect from Hitman, having two agents (say, MI6 and KGB) race to complete their missions, all the while trying to stop the other from completing theirs.
If we added the customisation aspect I mentioned previously, I think this could be a really fun way to see how different players work with their unique versions of Bond.
IO also have little modes in Hitman such as Contracts (players select a target and test others to kill them in a specific way) and the Sniper Challenge (players have to eliminate certain targets but only with their sniper) that with a little tweak could easily slot into the world of 007. These mini games don’t even have to be connected to the main game, but can be a fun offshoot for players to mess with.
The Hitman Sniper Challenge from Absolution. Something like this in Project 007 would be cool. (Source: ioi.dk)
Conclusion
As I said in the opening, it’s been nearly a decade since we last had a James Bond game. Games have moved on, not just in terms of trends and graphics, but with new gameplay modes and interactivity.
Back in the day, James Bond used to help push the games industry forward, from experienced and lauded developers such as Rare, Eurocom, EA Redwood Shores (later known as Visceral) and Bizarre Creations.
With Goldeneye in 1997, it showed that an FPS could work on home consoles. Everything or Nothing and From Russia With Love are still marvels of artistry and design, with insanely detailed models of Sean Connery and Pierce Brosnan. With its new Hitman trilogy, IO have built upon their previous success and made something that is completely unique in the market.
If they can bring the same level of craftsmanship and detail that they bring to Agent 47, I think Project 007 would be well on its way to being not just one of the best games of its year, but the best James Bond game ever.
TOM CLEMENT | GAME PRODUCER | NARRATIVE DESIGNER 