Hitman Absolution showcases Agent 47 on his road to find redemption against The Agency.
This isn't a bad thing, far from it, it's actually very important for the industry. Games like this show that gamers are smart enough not to be told how to kill, where to go and how to do it. Absolution drops you into levels, sometimes small or big, and gives you up to 3 targets to kill how you choose. Sometimes it can be in public places like Chinese New Year, or you're a ghost as you expertly break into buildings and kill within.
Agent 47 uses everything to his advantage. Whether that is taking his victim's clothes for a disguise, or using the environment to blend in, you will feel like a real bad ass playing this. The game gives you "instinct" which is used by the RB button and lets you walk by enemies unnoticed at the cost of the instinct. This can be very useful in tight situations when you need to get into a heavily guarded door or into a building. Instinct is gained by completing objectives, headshots, hiding bodies and basically just playing the game the right way. Yes, you can go in and shoot everyone with no regard for being seen but your score will be in the negatives and you won't get to experience the game the real way. But there's sometimes when there's nothing you can do but openly shoot people in the head.
Every level has an exit where you have to get to after killing your targets or completing your goals. Once you reach your exit, you recieve your score which is based on being seen, how you kill and the weapons you use. It's not out of place to replay levels to beat a friend's score or the national (or world's) average. There is a huge miss though as there's no way to see all your friends scores on each level, because you only see your top friend's score at the start but there's no way I could find to easily compare your score with friends. This is kind of annoying as you'll want to do this after you perfectly run through a level and get the ultimate reward of Silent Assassin.
The campaign has a pretty interesting story that keeps the game going at a nice speed. There isn't any "filler" levels and the game clocked in at very respectable 15 hours on my first play through. The voice over work is very commendable, especially in the main villain Dexter. There are many hilarious conversations throughout the game you'll encounter if you like to stalk your targets. One of the funniest was a guy getting a call saying his cancer results were negative and he was saying "this is the best day of my life!" beside a window. That is until I threw him down to his death. This is just one of the many hilarious encounters you'll come across the game's campaign.
While you won't be using your guns in intense gun fights very often, the guns feel great. You can gently press on the RT button to get precision aiming, this is especially useful for your sniper rifle. There are many different guns you can find in the game, but you'll find yourself mostly using your silenced pistols, which is kind of a shame. Again, you are heavily penalized for openly shooting people, so it's not like you'll want to take that assault rifle very often.
Another nice addition to the game is the many challenges that are offered. There are over 250 of these, which usually range from how and what you kill your targets with to finding evidence and different disguises. Signature kills offer the biggest point reward, these are the environmental and other hilarious kills you can do, the amount of different ways to kill targets is staggering. Each challenge adds to your level score, and finally doing that signature kill you failed many times feels very rewarding.
Immersion is a huge part of the game. The game lets you feel like a badass and you feel like you're in the world as you search for deadly traps to kill your target. The immersion can be easily lost if the graphics didn't hold up, but that's not a worry here. Cut scenes are especially nice, as they have impressive lighting, models and lip movements. There is a couple times it went to game and I didn't even notice I could move, that's how smooth the transition can be. The in game graphics are very impressive, each model looks excellent and the different locales are nicely represented. From a little town to a bustling city, the game always looks and play smooth.
Once your done the campaign and you want to do some more murdering, there is Contracts mode. This lets you pick a target in the level, and basically set up how they can be killed and other bonuses such as weapons. You can also search for other Contracts if you run out of ones from friends. I never played too much of this, as once I was done with the campaign I was happy enough to walk away from this excellent game.
Hitman Absolution offers a challenge to gamers who are sick of being told where to follow, what to do and how to do. Absolution drops you in dangerous situations and lets you figure out how to get out of them. You can be a ghost or you can go full blast in, if you don't mind the penalties for doing so. This game might be one of the last great stealth games of the generation, and might even be the last of the series. But one thing is for sure, Agent 47 always goes out in style.