Hitman: Codename 47

The Hitman series are one of the fundamental games in the stealth genre, and we can witness the birth of the iconic Agent 47 in this game. But as for the gameplay, it aged horribly. I have one major complaint with this game - the lack of mid-mission saves. Some says it makes the game more challenging, but I say it makes it a frustrating, trial-and-error ordeal. I know this is IO Interactive's first game, but saves were invented already back in 2000. How about limited number of saves? Like 2 per mission? Would that be good? No, one single mistake, and you have to start the whole mission from the beginning. Oh, and there is no "restart mission" feature. You fuck up, and you have to quit to the main menu, then load the mission from the mission selection every single time. The stealth rules aren't clear - you don't know whether someone will hear you or see you. You'll never know the potenital dangers, unless you played the crap out of that level. This doesn't make the game fun, this makes it frustrating - it just artifically prolongs the game time. And most of the time it isn't even your fault, the AI is very inconsistent- sometimes they see through your disguise for no apparent reason, sometimes they don't get suspicious even if I stand next to a pile of corpses, and I am the only one left in the room. Half the levels are not even promote stealth gameplay, but force me into shootouts with overwhelming number of enemies, like in the Columbian levels, which all suck big time. The UI and controls are clunky too. To say something positive, the music is great, and it creates a nice, dark atmosphere. And to be honest, when I FINALLY finish a level, it's immensely satisfying. But it only make me wanna skip the whole "gameplay" part, and see what happens next. Every other entry in the series is far superior, so I only recommend this game if you have the nerve and patience to endure the crap that the game throws at you. Otherwise, start with Silent Assassin.

Some missions can't be done in the intended way because the game ist buggy. For example: The elevator in the tutorial or the un-placeable bomb in the second mission. These bugs are well known if you google for it. It could be a great game, but you should calculate in the price for the hardware you will break while playing, or you could use it as a part of an anti-agression-therapy (nothing can frustrate you if this game doesn't frustrate you).

Someone needs to remake this game and fix alot of things. Like adding a checkpoint system or an ability to skip mission intros so it loads directly. The controls are horrible. Selecting anything is a chore. When switching to the sniper case, if I accidentally select it I have to wait and go through the entire setup before I'm allowed to pack it up and move to the spot I want. Using the sniper is next to impossible. I can't even line up a shot. When looking down the sights it has this unrealistic up and down breathing motion. If I could turn it off the game would probably be better. Looking over ledges with the sniper, makes it look like they're 5 feet tall and you're only allowed to put your nose over, greatly limiting your view of the shooting area. Bullets seem to have a mind of their own. Guns have less accuracy than a paintball gun. I was expecting a strategy shooter where stealth and accuracy are key. But the very mechanics of the game make either impossible. Even after watching a walkthrough of the first mission I still couldn't do it. All it takes is a single sniper shot. I uninstalled after it forced me to miss over a dozen tries. Being patient and attempting to line up my shot wasn't going to work.

This game is one of the hardest I played, nice gameplay for game of its age, had some texture bugs but it was good game to play.

IO would perfect the formula with Contracts and Blood Money, and vastly improve it with Silent Assassin, but it would never have arrived there without that first, extremely flawed attempt, Codename 47. I would not replay this for anything frankly, as it was a mess with some extremely poor execution, some overly hard levels, and some extremely bad levels (the jungle missions). Great series, wait for the later titles.