HITMAN: CONTRACTS

GAME DETAILS :-

Developer : IO Interactive

Publisher : Eidos Interactive

Engine : Glacier

Genre : Modern Third-Person Shooter And Stealth

Release Date : April 20 , 2004

SYSTEM REQUIREMENTS :-

Operating System : Windows 2000 / Windows XP

CPU : AMD Athlon Thunderbird C-Models / Intel Pentium III Processor

Memory (RAM) : 256 MB

Graphics Hardware : DirectX 8.1 Compatible Video Card with Memory 32 MB

[NVIDIA : GeForce 4 Ti Series
ATI : Radeon 8500 Series]

Hard Disk Space : 2 GB

GAME FEATURES :-

The game begins with a cutscene showing a wounded Agent 47 wandering through a dark hotel corridor and arriving at his room. Upon entering, he collapses and begins to have flashbacks regarding previous assassinations he committed, beginning with the aftermath of killing Dr. Ort-Meyer at the end of the original game. The missions are primarily focused on replays of previous missions in the original game, except played in reverse. The graphics, maps and artificial intelligence have been improved and modified, not to mention the presence of rain or snow in every level and peculiar, unnatural events occurring in some levels. In the game, 47 visits several locations, including Romania, Kamchatka, United Kingdom, Rotterdam, Hong Kong And finally Paris. While 47 suffers, a doctor sent by the Agency arrives unexpectedly and treats 47, then flees when he discovers GIGN officers surrounding the hotel. At the end of the game, 47 regains consciousness in the hotel room with an expired mission briefing. It is revealed that 47 was hired to kill a US ambassador, Richard Delahunt, and a famous tenor at an opera house in Paris but was also tasked to kill their mutual friend, Inspector Albert Fournier who has sent a team of police to capture 47 after discovering his hideout. 47 discovers the situation he is in and moves on to kill the inspector and escape the area. He then makes his way to the airport, where he boards a plane and escapes the country. His contact, Diana, reaches him on the plane and suggests that his target may have been tipped off. Hitman's creator is called Dr. Orthomeyer and not Ort-Meyer in this game. Most of Contracts takes place as a series of flashbacks. It's not terribly clear at first, but you soon gather that the assassin known only as 47 has sustained a grievous injury on one of his assignments and now lies at death's door. The new missions are certainly diverse and are quite interesting, offering ample opportunity--in the classic tradition of the Hitman series--for you to craftily make your way to your target to take him out, undetected, via some elaborate scheme (which typically involves the use of lots of disguises taken from killed or unconscious characters, as well as the use of poisons or poison substitutes). There are later missions, such as one in which 47 must eliminate two brothers who are up to no good at an international gathering in a posh hotel, and another one in which he must disrupt a Russian arms deal that is going down aboard a ship. Depending on which of the three difficulty modes you select when you begin play, and depending on whether or not you try to take a stealthy approach, you can either breeze through the linear series of missions in less than 10 hours, or you can possibly spend twice as much time doing so.

There are some nice, scripted setups for you to take advantage of, such as when characters nonchalantly walk over to the restroom so that you can strangle them, hide their bodies, and take their clothes for a disguise. But the whole disguise thing still seems rather silly, even though it's one of the main gameplay elements in the Hitman series. The tall and broad-shouldered 47 can wear most anyone's clothes as though they were tailored for him, and the way his previous outfit magically appears in a neatly folded pile may be a hard pill to swallow for those unfamiliar with the Hitman series. The behavior of most characters just isn't very convincing. Hitman: Contracts provides you with a very helpful tactical map, which you can access at the touch of a button at any time, though the action doesn't pause when you're on the map screen. Apart from the map, though, the game doesn't give you very good feedback about what's going on in your environment. You're supposedly trying to remain hidden and quiet as you sneak around, but there are no real indications of whether or not you're in a character's line of sight or within his or her earshot. There's an onscreen threat indicator, which turns red and starts fluctuating if you've raised suspicion, but it isn't terribly useful except to warn you that you're standing too close to somebody. Besides that, Hitman: Contracts still frequently displays messages to you as though you're omniscient. Suddenly, you're informed that a dead guard's body has been discovered or that guards are now looking for a suspicious man dressed as a chef, and other things of this nature. Many of the environments and ambient lighting effects are believable and great-looking, though the environments aren't very interactive. There are a few new effects, such as how gouts of blood spray into the air sometimes when bullets strike their victims. Also, when 47 runs out of health, the entire game temporarily goes into slow motion, while the color fades from the screen as he makes his last stand. The music here is electronic, rife with synthesized bass and heavy percussion. The rest of the audio is good, and the multilingual voice acting, as mentioned, is a nice touch. Hitman: Contracts delivers some time-tested and sometimes highly entertaining stealth action, which any fan of the genre might as well check out.

GAME REVIEW :-

7.5/10

Hitman: Contracts Trailer :-