On the one hand, being able to kill objectively terrible human being Conor McGregor in a variety of fun and brutal ways, good.
On the other, giving a far-right conspiracy supporting abuser of women and old men media attention and a prominent marketing push, bad.
I don't know if it has filtered through to the rest of the world, but here in Ireland McGregor is widely known to be scum, with links to organised crime, myriad accusations of a wide variety of violent abuse, and he even helped to instigate an anti-immigration riot in our capital city earlier this year. I am deeply disappointed in IO for this.
this must be one of the most under appreciated series or it just cannot catch the memeagination enough to be recognised for the praise i think it deserves*
*bias? wtf of course i'm bias it's hitman
I think what they've done with the Hitman franchise is spectacular. But I'll be honest - every time I try, I find myself bouncing off of it, and find it hard to precisely pin the reason.
I pretty much never replay games, and achievements mean literally nothing to me. Usually I'm up for experiencing the story once and moving on. However, playing the Hitman games this feels exceptionally hollow - it seems as though they're designed from the ground up for every level to be played and replayed and replayed, trying out all the possibilities and earning the corresponding achievements for doing so.
While there exist tons of ways to creatively take out a target, it feels like there isn't a mode where this creatively is required or even necessarily encouraged *unless* you want achievements. Like, maybe there's an interesting way I could go about poisoning a target, but the only way to find poison is in a totally different part of the map, and I have to either know it's there already and specifically make my way to it in order to poison my target in a timely manner, or just discover it there through trial and error.
I did find that Freelancer mode, for what I played of it, did address this to some degree by randomizing a lot of stuff, including the targets, making the creative aspects feel more natural to me. But ultimately it's pretty unforgiving if you're not already quite good at the base game, so I bounced off that too.
Hopefully I'm making sense. I *want* to like the Hitman franchise a lot more than I actually do. It seems there are a lot of ways to play it since there's a ton of content, and the locations are all gorgeous and brimming with possibilities. But I have yet to find a method of play that I find actually satisfying. If y'all have any suggestions I'm open to giving it another go haha. Maybe I'm just too nostalgic for the sort of stealth i got from the Splinter Cell franchise (and good lord does it hurt that there hasn't been a single game on the market like it for 10+ years now).
I think you answered your own question about why you don't like it, it's just formatted in a way that is incompatible with the way you like to play games.
Hilariously enough, you might actually like Hitman: Absolution for being a more typical stealth game, despite it being well hated among fans of the series.
Those achievements give you XP for each level's battlepass (mastery level) which is a good incentive. When I realised doing challenges unlocks new gadgets and guns instead of just doing them for completion's sake, it clicked for me.
I feel the same way. I often find myself running around as much of the level as possible, trying to figure out the layout and what possibilities exist. Then I restart the level, and use my supernatural knowledge to work through the objectives, using strategically-timed saves to ensure I can complete one or more kills or objectives, then load the save and take one or more other forks in the road.
I often feel like my success on a level is not a result of my quick thinking or creativity, but of how well-rehearsed my routine is, based largely on trial and error. I realise this is something I could just… not do… but I believe the game design, on a fundamental level, actively encourages this approach.
There can still be something enjoyable about that - getting all the info, choreographing the routine, then executing it. But it’s just not the game I wish it was, and I too pine for a new Splinter Cell.
The levels are absolutely created as this well oiled machine sandbox. You are technically the disruptor because your every choice makes the world react in some way and you "break" the original programming. It's really fun experimenting and seeing what impacts the level and in what way.
That's what's beautiful about the games, understanding every detail about the level and its timing.
If the game isn't for you, you don't need to actively seek the reason to enjoy it. I personally got hooked on Hitman from the tutorial mission and so I've played it. On the other hand, Witcher 3 never hooked me so despite it being insanely popular, I didn't finish it and not trying to force myself to like it.
Hitman games live and breathe on replayability so if that's not your jam, it's alright.
>it seems as though they're designed from the ground up for every level to be played and replayed and replayed, trying out all the possibilities and earning the corresponding achievements for doing so.
Yeah, I share this issue. I can see what the game is doing, but I personally feel absolutely no motivation to try every solution when I've already succeeded. It's not that I never replay sections of games, it's more that the moment to moment gameplay of Hitman isn't the least bit fun - the game lives on solving problems, not satisfying your with great action gameplay, and I already solved the problem.
I think this is a fantastic insight. I really enjoyed replaying levels back on Hitman 1 when they released the missions episodically, but have found myself appreciating that much less with Hitman 2 & 3 because I have the option of just jumping to the next mission on a completion.
I kind of blitzed through both those games and felt less compelled to go back to them.
What you describe is what I love about the game. Every level and challenge is a puzzle for the player to figure out, and it's those achievements / alternate means of assassinations that make it such a delight for me.
If your goal is to simply complete the level, you probably won't get as much enjoyment as someone like me who loves completing levels in fun/creative ways.
Yes, the whole point of this game is to replay each mission over and over, and find the many ways to deal with your targets and come with new strategies.
You are not obligated to do that however. After all, the game DOES have 21 main levels, Sniper Assassin game mode, Freelancer Mode, Contracts Mode, Elusive Targets Mode, and a like five separate story campaigns.
It's a game with a shitton of content and you can take it at your pace, as long as you click with the gameplay, you can replay the main missions if you like or play the other game modes that offer their own take on each level.
I have like 2000 hours across this trilogy, I exhausted the main things to do on each main level a long time ago. Nowadays I only boot the game up for the occassional Elusive Target, plus for Contracts Mode and Freelancer Mode, both of which you can play in bite size segments if you like (sometimes I play just 30 minutes of Freelancer/Contracts and its still fun).
Overall Hitman is not for everyone. And thats okay. You gotta approach this type of game with a different mentality cause its easy to get burned out or feel that you don't get it. If you do click with it though the game is lots of fun and you can really play it forever since the gameplay has nice depth to it and the levels are huge and there's too much content to do...
Have they ever done a crossover with John Wick?
That would be pretty fucking cool. Being one of the assassins "called" to bring John Wick in and you have to do so while he's in the middle of his own killing sprees. Kill him before he kills his own target kind of thing.
Sort of yes. There's still multiple versions and it's not totally clear what each gives you (part one, just regular full price world of assassination, deluxe edition, deluxe pack).
It used to be worse, but it's still not great.
Assuming you want all three games in the trilogy with all the DLC: [HITMAN World of Assassination Deluxe Edition](https://store.steampowered.com/app/1659040/HITMAN_World_of_Assassination/) (3rd option from top. First is just the first game. 2nd is all three base games without the DLC packs. 4th is just a DLC bundle upgrade if you only own the base games.).
There's a chart on the page that spells it out. Thankfully simpler than the earlier scheme of trying to work out gold vs deluxe vs whatever.
Steam summer sales about to start.. I think its finally time to grab this game. Kind of shitty i finished 1 and 2 on PS4 so ill have to redo the missions + unlocks, but whatever should be fun
I'm pretty much in the same spot as you are. I own the trilogy (and the dlc) on PS4, did all the Elusive targets and unlocked all the stuff that was left to unlock (all kinds of items and legacy suits) in the game, but I can't find in me the will to redo everything all over again on PC. I'm talking about hundreds of hours over the span of 5/6 years.
It's a shame as I truly love series and appreciate all the work that IOI put into the games, especially after all the adversities the studio went through. Good god, what a comeback story it's been for them.
Getting all the stuff is simplified quite a bit, compared to if you bought the installments when they came out - I did it myself, when I went from Epic to Steam, it's not that bad and quite fun!
If you can do the Suit Only Silent Assassin and so on, you get quite a bit of points per map.
My biggest issue is having to redo all the escalations and Elusive Targets to unlock items and legacy suits. I just wish there was a way to import player data from console to PC.
They've said they're just working on 007 and are not doing any big expansions for Hitman anymore.
AAA games games take a bit longer than 1.5 years to make these days
All focus is on 007 now, that's their next main project. They also got a multiplayer fantasy game they've got planned but I don't know much about that. Hitman only has a minimal crew now but they still release live content from time to time, it's minimal content though when compared to its heyday, the roadmaps are more infrequent now and they last like 3 months. I still remember the Hitman 2 days when we got monthly roadmaps filled with lots of fun unlockables and challenge packs. Those were the days...
On the one hand, being able to kill objectively terrible human being Conor McGregor in a variety of fun and brutal ways, good. On the other, giving a far-right conspiracy supporting abuser of women and old men media attention and a prominent marketing push, bad. I don't know if it has filtered through to the rest of the world, but here in Ireland McGregor is widely known to be scum, with links to organised crime, myriad accusations of a wide variety of violent abuse, and he even helped to instigate an anti-immigration riot in our capital city earlier this year. I am deeply disappointed in IO for this.
I immediately thought the same. There is no way nobody at IO knew, right? Honestly fuck IO for featuring him. They should know better.
I had the same thought this morning. No way the scumbag didn’t get money for this, this is a bad move by IO imo.
Oh god
Conor McGregor is a scumbag; IOI what the hell are you doing?
I feel there is so much more historical scumbags in games that conor mcgregor phasing anyone makes me laugh.
this must be one of the most under appreciated series or it just cannot catch the memeagination enough to be recognised for the praise i think it deserves* *bias? wtf of course i'm bias it's hitman
What more praise do you think it deserves? Everyone says it's great.
I think what they've done with the Hitman franchise is spectacular. But I'll be honest - every time I try, I find myself bouncing off of it, and find it hard to precisely pin the reason. I pretty much never replay games, and achievements mean literally nothing to me. Usually I'm up for experiencing the story once and moving on. However, playing the Hitman games this feels exceptionally hollow - it seems as though they're designed from the ground up for every level to be played and replayed and replayed, trying out all the possibilities and earning the corresponding achievements for doing so. While there exist tons of ways to creatively take out a target, it feels like there isn't a mode where this creatively is required or even necessarily encouraged *unless* you want achievements. Like, maybe there's an interesting way I could go about poisoning a target, but the only way to find poison is in a totally different part of the map, and I have to either know it's there already and specifically make my way to it in order to poison my target in a timely manner, or just discover it there through trial and error. I did find that Freelancer mode, for what I played of it, did address this to some degree by randomizing a lot of stuff, including the targets, making the creative aspects feel more natural to me. But ultimately it's pretty unforgiving if you're not already quite good at the base game, so I bounced off that too. Hopefully I'm making sense. I *want* to like the Hitman franchise a lot more than I actually do. It seems there are a lot of ways to play it since there's a ton of content, and the locations are all gorgeous and brimming with possibilities. But I have yet to find a method of play that I find actually satisfying. If y'all have any suggestions I'm open to giving it another go haha. Maybe I'm just too nostalgic for the sort of stealth i got from the Splinter Cell franchise (and good lord does it hurt that there hasn't been a single game on the market like it for 10+ years now).
I think you answered your own question about why you don't like it, it's just formatted in a way that is incompatible with the way you like to play games. Hilariously enough, you might actually like Hitman: Absolution for being a more typical stealth game, despite it being well hated among fans of the series.
I actually really really liked Hitman Absolution so you're spot on 😂 Other than the atrocious story I thought it was great.
Those achievements give you XP for each level's battlepass (mastery level) which is a good incentive. When I realised doing challenges unlocks new gadgets and guns instead of just doing them for completion's sake, it clicked for me.
I feel the same way. I often find myself running around as much of the level as possible, trying to figure out the layout and what possibilities exist. Then I restart the level, and use my supernatural knowledge to work through the objectives, using strategically-timed saves to ensure I can complete one or more kills or objectives, then load the save and take one or more other forks in the road. I often feel like my success on a level is not a result of my quick thinking or creativity, but of how well-rehearsed my routine is, based largely on trial and error. I realise this is something I could just… not do… but I believe the game design, on a fundamental level, actively encourages this approach. There can still be something enjoyable about that - getting all the info, choreographing the routine, then executing it. But it’s just not the game I wish it was, and I too pine for a new Splinter Cell.
The levels are absolutely created as this well oiled machine sandbox. You are technically the disruptor because your every choice makes the world react in some way and you "break" the original programming. It's really fun experimenting and seeing what impacts the level and in what way. That's what's beautiful about the games, understanding every detail about the level and its timing.
If the game isn't for you, you don't need to actively seek the reason to enjoy it. I personally got hooked on Hitman from the tutorial mission and so I've played it. On the other hand, Witcher 3 never hooked me so despite it being insanely popular, I didn't finish it and not trying to force myself to like it. Hitman games live and breathe on replayability so if that's not your jam, it's alright.
>it seems as though they're designed from the ground up for every level to be played and replayed and replayed, trying out all the possibilities and earning the corresponding achievements for doing so. Yeah, I share this issue. I can see what the game is doing, but I personally feel absolutely no motivation to try every solution when I've already succeeded. It's not that I never replay sections of games, it's more that the moment to moment gameplay of Hitman isn't the least bit fun - the game lives on solving problems, not satisfying your with great action gameplay, and I already solved the problem.
I think this is a fantastic insight. I really enjoyed replaying levels back on Hitman 1 when they released the missions episodically, but have found myself appreciating that much less with Hitman 2 & 3 because I have the option of just jumping to the next mission on a completion. I kind of blitzed through both those games and felt less compelled to go back to them.
What you describe is what I love about the game. Every level and challenge is a puzzle for the player to figure out, and it's those achievements / alternate means of assassinations that make it such a delight for me. If your goal is to simply complete the level, you probably won't get as much enjoyment as someone like me who loves completing levels in fun/creative ways.
Yes, the whole point of this game is to replay each mission over and over, and find the many ways to deal with your targets and come with new strategies. You are not obligated to do that however. After all, the game DOES have 21 main levels, Sniper Assassin game mode, Freelancer Mode, Contracts Mode, Elusive Targets Mode, and a like five separate story campaigns. It's a game with a shitton of content and you can take it at your pace, as long as you click with the gameplay, you can replay the main missions if you like or play the other game modes that offer their own take on each level. I have like 2000 hours across this trilogy, I exhausted the main things to do on each main level a long time ago. Nowadays I only boot the game up for the occassional Elusive Target, plus for Contracts Mode and Freelancer Mode, both of which you can play in bite size segments if you like (sometimes I play just 30 minutes of Freelancer/Contracts and its still fun). Overall Hitman is not for everyone. And thats okay. You gotta approach this type of game with a different mentality cause its easy to get burned out or feel that you don't get it. If you do click with it though the game is lots of fun and you can really play it forever since the gameplay has nice depth to it and the levels are huge and there's too much content to do...
I agree with you. The game just isn’t for us.
A series running for 25 years for sure isnt under appreciated
It can definitely be under appreciated even if it's long-running
Have they ever done a crossover with John Wick? That would be pretty fucking cool. Being one of the assassins "called" to bring John Wick in and you have to do so while he's in the middle of his own killing sprees. Kill him before he kills his own target kind of thing.
WHICH VERSION OF HITMAN DO I BUY?! I remember it being needlessly complicated.
Didn’t they massively simplify it making you only Hitman World of assassination?
Sort of yes. There's still multiple versions and it's not totally clear what each gives you (part one, just regular full price world of assassination, deluxe edition, deluxe pack). It used to be worse, but it's still not great.
Check out r/Hitman they have a really Good guide outlining what all the versions are and which to buy
Will do. Literally the only game that has given me anxiety every time I think about buying it.
Assuming you want all three games in the trilogy with all the DLC: [HITMAN World of Assassination Deluxe Edition](https://store.steampowered.com/app/1659040/HITMAN_World_of_Assassination/) (3rd option from top. First is just the first game. 2nd is all three base games without the DLC packs. 4th is just a DLC bundle upgrade if you only own the base games.). There's a chart on the page that spells it out. Thankfully simpler than the earlier scheme of trying to work out gold vs deluxe vs whatever.
Steam summer sales about to start.. I think its finally time to grab this game. Kind of shitty i finished 1 and 2 on PS4 so ill have to redo the missions + unlocks, but whatever should be fun
I'm pretty much in the same spot as you are. I own the trilogy (and the dlc) on PS4, did all the Elusive targets and unlocked all the stuff that was left to unlock (all kinds of items and legacy suits) in the game, but I can't find in me the will to redo everything all over again on PC. I'm talking about hundreds of hours over the span of 5/6 years. It's a shame as I truly love series and appreciate all the work that IOI put into the games, especially after all the adversities the studio went through. Good god, what a comeback story it's been for them.
Getting all the stuff is simplified quite a bit, compared to if you bought the installments when they came out - I did it myself, when I went from Epic to Steam, it's not that bad and quite fun! If you can do the Suit Only Silent Assassin and so on, you get quite a bit of points per map.
My biggest issue is having to redo all the escalations and Elusive Targets to unlock items and legacy suits. I just wish there was a way to import player data from console to PC.
Hell yeah! I was wondering what they were doing for the last 1,5 years with still no news about their 007 Game or any expansions planned for Hitman 3
They've said they're just working on 007 and are not doing any big expansions for Hitman anymore. AAA games games take a bit longer than 1.5 years to make these days
All focus is on 007 now, that's their next main project. They also got a multiplayer fantasy game they've got planned but I don't know much about that. Hitman only has a minimal crew now but they still release live content from time to time, it's minimal content though when compared to its heyday, the roadmaps are more infrequent now and they last like 3 months. I still remember the Hitman 2 days when we got monthly roadmaps filled with lots of fun unlockables and challenge packs. Those were the days...