Especially if you have already played Hitman 2, or Hitman: Contracts, do not buy this game. Perhaps it would have been fun, or less frustrating, had I -not- played the other two awesome games. This game is riddled with bugs, flaws, and just stupid design decisions.

The first is that it does not work on a great many newer computers. Fortunately, it works on mine, but I have tried lending it to two different people. Neither one could use it, and the Eidos Support page is very helpful, essentially saying it's Microsoft's fault, and they have no intentions of releasing a fix to make Hitman more compatible with newer systems.

The map is useless, showing only you and your exit point. It is even more frustrating than that, but there aren't enough words to describe everything, so I'll move on.

You cannot save; you must complete the entire mission before it will autosave for you.

You cannot check during the game to see if objectives have been completed; if you're unsure, for example, if you've properly hidden a body, or placed something at the scene of the crime, or maybe if you went on a rampage and aren't sure if you hit your target or not, you need to go all the way back to your Exit point to see if the objectives are marked as complete or not.

Many of the buttons and commands require you to be in a very specific location to access them. You can be looking directly at a button, moving the cursor around in front of it, but it may be that you need to be standing a few feet away, facing in the opposite direction to use it. Time-wasting trial and error is wonderful, especially when you can't save the game.

Finally, the AI is just great. I loved pulling a silenced gun a ways behind a civilian, sending him immediately running, as he obviously heard me pulling the gun from my coat. The old man then soaked three shots to the body. So these civilians are psychic -and- sporting body armor!

In conclusion, Hitman 2 was amazing fun. I opted for the Silent Assassin style myself. Hitman: Contracts was not as good as Hitman 2, but still great. The original, Hitman: Codename 47 shows me that the design team was lazy, the support team ineffective, and the game ended up being more frustration than it's worth to play. Buy one of the other games, and play it twice. Skip this one.

For years, gamers have been crying out for a game which forces you to think rather than shoot first. Hitman has attempted to answer the prayer. You play as 47, a Hitman who has no-idea who he is. Your job is simple, kill the target(s) and get out with little fuss.

Simple?

Well no it isn't, because you never know what to expect. Your job takes you to distant places like the Rotterdam, Japan and Romania. Plus you have to make sure there are no witnesses to the crime. Then you have to get out and OH MY!

This game has many a path through it. Sure you can simply shoot anything that moves, but where's the fun in that? The idea of the game is to use stealth. To help you, you can change your clothes and blend in with the crowd, just make sure you hide the body afterwards because if a guard finds it, then your in trouble!

If you start acting suspicously, I.E if you steal a key in the view of someone, then the guards will be notified ad they will hunt for you. I could go on forever, but I think I'll move on now...

You have many a weapon at your disposal, such as rifles, SMG's and a laughably lethal Minigun which can tear through the
target(s)like scissors to paper!

The graphic detail is quite graphic. If you shoot someone, then a red bullethole appears on them and they start to bleed. Same for slash marks etc.

But there are some truly dissapointing bits as well.
The A.I isn't good. And you can run in most places where there are plenty of armed guards. And sometimes the difficulty is off the roof. That and the fact that there is no mid-save option means you get really fustrated if you mess up in the final stretch and have to restart the whole thing.

This is a decent game but it lets itself down with silly little mistakes which can ruin the gameplay in places. But that doesn't stop it getting a decent score...

GOOD BITS
It's different
Lots of options
Detailed gore
Hard, very hard

BAD BITS
Hard, very hard
Stupid A.I

The verdict: 4 out of 5
ALTERNITIVE'S: If you like this sort of thing, then get Thief Gold for the PC.
Happy hunting

The Hitman (code name 47) was cloned by a scientist for the purpose of assassinating worldwide terrorists, gunrunners, and drug lords. Mr. 47 works under cover of a mysterious agency that assigns him on missions around the world to takeout the most wanted criminals, and is rewarded with large sums of money per hit that can exceed thirty thousand dollars. But this is no takeoff of any James Bond movie. 47 is much too inhuman to thrill-ride all the ladies, and was designed to feel no emotion, or desire in an underground laboratory.

Now some details on game play itself. Expenses at times are taken out of your income if you accidentally-or purposely-kill unnecessary targets such as police officers or civilians that often stand in your way (can't buy all the best guns if you blow all your money on just killing people, which includes sniper rifles, and an assortment of automatics, some of which come with silencer attachments to further improve your performance as a professional killer). The game encourages you to find alternate ways that are not always so obvious to make your hit. Encouraging stealth and perfection. Hence, the game's primary challenge. Besides, if you just open fire on anything that moves in this game (like what we see with too many other games) you'll maybe live 10 or 15 seconds after the first shot. Stealth is the key. Every mission can be beaten without you ever getting shot, or spotted (I know people don't believe that, but believe it or not I can make those Columbian levels look as easy as the very first mission). Ways to avoid detection include hiding the bodies of the people you kill, dressing as the enemy (gangs and terrorist groups alike often have certain dress-code and you can take the clothes of any person you kill in this game) poisoning, waiting for certain patrolmen guarding your main target to separate and taking them out one by one with a silenced pistol. And many other ways, depending on the situation.

The AI of all moving people in this game is superb. You can literally hide behind any given object (dresser, tree, bookshelf) after you have been discovered, and the enemies won't know where you are until they see you, even when they are in the same room. In most games they just come right to you. If their backs are turned you can sneak up on them to either slit their throat or strangulate them, which I've seen in a few other games, but not to this astounding degree. If you sniper someone from afar, people will gather around the body (which could be helpful if the congregated group of people are all people you prefer dead). Your un-silenced weapons will be heard if fired and frighten civilians or alert the enemy. People turn their heads to look at you if you walk by. If one yelps too loud in the instant it takes you to pull out your gun and shoot him, others will come. The thing is, they REACT! They are not just mindless, close-knitted colored pixels on the screen. They react to sound, to your presence, and to the things you do. In fact, the AI is too good. There have been incidents where I was following someone too close and the draw of my weapon was actually HEARD, causing the person I pursued to turn around, to see the gun in my hand, and to draw a weapon of his own in the second it took me to shoot him smack-dead in the face.

Close one. Amazing how many miles per hour your heart can accelerate in a matter of seconds...

This game can be sick, challenging, exciting, and most of all, engrossing. You can just kiss all the hours of a whole weekend away playing this beautiful game. The only drawback is that there is no in-game save. It saves automatically after you complete each mission. Hitman 2 is just as good, if not better (some of the quirks in the AI in Hitman 1 was corrected in Hitman 2, the graphics are ten times better and there is in-game save in Silent Assassin). Hitman 3 is out this Spring. Don't neglect this series. Buy it now. Hitman 1 is available for PC only. I would have never played it if it were not for playing Hitman 2 on playstation, the best game console ever.

...At least 25 weapons, able to take "corpse clothing", strangling and slitting throats, and many scenes of you pumping some major lead!!!! You know what, don't trust me, buy it...

To begin this review I would like to state that I became aware of this game when I purchased Hitman 2: Silent Assassin. I asked the Best Buy staff to show me the prequel which I immediately bought. I decided to play Hitman: Codename 47 first and here's my take on this game.

The difficulty is intense through most of the game. Even the training which is required might take the average gamer several attempts to complete it. Top this with a no save feature and a game that crashes for seemingly no good reason and you might annoy the average gamer. I'm proud to say that I used no cheat or hint Manuel to complete this game. Though there were times when I actually went searching for one and luckily did not find one (right now in 2002 the Manuals are out of print). I believe a save feature (limited) should have been added, at least when the game crashes you will not have to re-start. There are thirteen levels (training, plus three parts(each part contains four levels)) which might seem kind of short but not when you have to repeat each level a horrendous amount of times. Eidos and IO Interactive also added a lot of puzzle solving in Part three which will lengthen playing time a lot. I found that you can beat most levels in one try by referring to the briefing. The information in the briefing is quite good, providing list of objectives, map, and other useful information. On average the briefing contains two-thirds of the information needed to beat the level; the rest can be done by simply playing the level and making quick decisions. (4.5/5 We all have been asking for tougher games - 0.5 for no limited save feature)

The level design is both genius and flawed throughout the game. You encounter a lot of exotic locations (Hong Kong, Columbia, Budapest, Rotterdam Harbor, and an Insane Asylum) with the ultimate task to kill these six bosses: Lee Hong, Pablo Belisario Ochoa, Arkadij Jegorov AKA "Boris", Dr. Odon Kovacs, and Professor Ort-Meyer. Obviously not every level will give you the task of whacking the boss but usually these levels do a good job by tying in with the story. For all you sharp shooters out there I saw only one level where using the sniper rifle was really beneficial (big disappointment) but the use of car bombs, poison, and other cool odd ways to kill your mark make up for that short coming. Not every level can be accomplished stealthy (I thought this game was about a Hitman?) some you have to go Doom style to succeed, or maybe I just didn't see another option. The levels that I witnessed that can be accomplished stealthy are one, two, three, eight, nine, and eleven. Four and ten can be done mostly by using stealth but in some instances you have to resort to Doom style. While five, seven, and thirteen are pure Doom levels. Six in my opinion was a filler all you had to do was run from point A to B, this can be done without firing a single shot and this is by far the easiest level in the game. (3.75/5 could have been easily a perfect 5 but the Doom style missions brought it down)

Storyline is weak; throughout most of the game you pay very little attention to the story until it turns totally bizarre and spoils the Hitman motif. Turns out you're a clone among 48 (you're the 47th) and the bar code on the back of you're head is a quick way to identify you. This conclusion left a sour taste in my mouth. At least while the story was weak it went with the Hitman motif but the last two levels turned this into a Sci-Fi game. (3/5 I took two off for the terrible concluding storyline and the weak storyline at the beginning)

Game play is very addictive. The designers actually make you feel like a Hitman. The suit the atmosphere is one of the best you will see in a game of its kind. The bugs though quickly overshadow this wonderful aspect of the game. A game that crashed more times on my PC ( 3 GHZ, Radeon 128mb DDR 9700 Pro, and 1034 DDR Ram, and Windows XP). I do not usually see problems, no game but this has even crashed on my PC. Other bugs included elevators that make your body disappear, small leaves from plotted plants that prevent you from going forward, and other glitches. To enjoy and successfully finish this game you got to not pay attention to the abundant flaws but work at the good aspects of the game. (4.5/5 took 0.5 for the bugs this was very generous of me)

The music is mediocre, several good songs are present but the rest is just ordinary. All the songs though do a nice job contributing to the theme of Hitman. (4/5 the songs did a good job of setting an atmosphere of being a Hitman top this off with two good songs and you get an okay rating; the rest of the songs were okay)

Final Verdict:
3.95/5 Stars
B -

I would not recommend this to everyone, only to a gamer looking for a challenge, a gamer who is patient and is willing to dedicate his time to this project. Also a gamer who has always dreamed of becoming a Hitman.

Look forward for Hitman 2: Silent Assassin. :)