Game Review - Hitman – Contracts

Author:
Naiboss

Date:
2/7/2006

"When you kill for money, there are no rules, only contracts to be executed"... Or so the tag line claims! Hitman Contracts is, to put it simply, just an excuse to string together a number of Hitman missions that couldn't fit into a 'bigger picture'. There is no plot to this game... but this is not necessarily a bad thing! While the improvements over Hitman 2 are so subtle that you'll most likely miss them, the game is still great fun… there are some great locations, plenty of bad guys to kill, numerous ways to do so and some interesting set pieces. A lot of the missions did feel quite short and while I might expect this from some of the earlier missions (the first mission can be completed in just a couple of minutes without firing a single shot!) the very last mission proved to be one of the easiest and shortest!!! If you enjoyed the last Hitman game, you’ll enjoy this one but I’d recommend playing it on a slightly higher difficulty level. While there have been additions to your arsenal, I did find that most of it went unused, preferring to stick to my trusty Silenced Silverballer or Fiberwire instead. Even when the going got tough, alarms were ringing and the guards were tripping over each other to get to me, the Silverballers often proved far more effective than grabbing an MP5 or shotgun… but then I guess that depends on your accuracy as ammo for the Silverballers in normally fairly sparse. That said, it’s always fun to run round with the silenced Uzi or sit in a window somewhere with the W2000 Sniper Rifle but only certain missions contain these. A good game all round but I do worry that the Hitman series is starting to suffer the ‘Eidos Effect’ that polluted the Tomb Raider series… If you’re going to release an expansion pack (which is what this feels like a times), please make sure the price tag reflects this! How long till Hitman 4? Not long I suspect… In the meantime, you can get the Hitman Contracts Demo here -> http://www.fileplanet.com/files/130000/139974.shtml

Score: 4 out of 5