Pandora Tomorrow ships, multiplayer PC demo coming

In addition to shipping the PC, Xbox, and GBA versions of Splinter Cell Pandora Tomorrow to stores in North America today, Ubisoft has announced that it will be releasing a multiplayer PC demo of the game tomorrow. The demo, which weighs in at around 60MB and is scheduled for release at 18:00 GMT (10:00 PST), will allow players to face off against one another in the game's Mount Hospital level in 10-minute "neutralization" games. The default gadget arsenals for both the spy and mercenary factions will be featured in the demo, thus providing players with access to smoke grenades, chaff grenades, sticky cameras, alarm snares, frag grenades, Tasers, mines, and spy traps, depending on which side they're playing.

"Once again, gamers will credit the Splinter Cell franchise with changing the face of gaming," said Tony Kee, Ubisoft's vice president of marketing. "Once hardcore game fans taste the intense spy-versus-mercenary, hunt-or-be-hunted gameplay in Pandora Tomorrow, plain old deathmatches will be like watching a late night talk show--something you do to fall asleep, not the thing you crave most when you need a hit of pulse-pounding gameplay!"

The PC, Xbox, and GBA versions of Tom Clancy's Splinter Cell Pandora Tomorrow are expected to arrive on store shelves by March 27 but may show up as early as today. The GameCube and PS2 versions of the game are currently scheduled to follow in July.