More from @TheRealRidge on the Eurogamer Expo last weekend, where he checked out Hitman: Absolution:
On to a game that has largely shot itself in the foot due to the negative publicity it’s already received, mainly due to the company behind it releasing a video of nuns undressing to reveal skin-tight PVC fetish gear and weaponry before being brutally murdered by the protagonist. Ill judged for sure but not something that should affect the games merits (I dunno, sexism in gaming is a long-standing bugbear of mine, Ed).
I’ll admit I’m not the worlds biggest Hitman fan having only played the demo’s for two of the games in the franchise but I have to say I liked it to some degree. I don’t think it helped that I played this on the PS3 at the show so the tiny pad and thumb sticks felt weird, which was strange considering I used to play PS2 loads before the Xbox came along (Disclaimer: TheRealRidge is an Xbox fanboy! Ed).
Mainly the issue I had was the camera as it was too over sensitive making moving around the environment very tricky. It wasn’t such a problem on the way to the hit but after completion and it came time to hide it got me killed. Cleverly the mission I played pointed out the various ways that you could kill your mark, as did the leaflet the staff at the show had left by every console thus taking some of the joy of discovering things for yourself (There seems to be a recurring theme of gamers being hand-fed by staff at these events, I wonder if it’s to do with the short time frame people have with which to absorb the game? Ed).
In the end I went for a sniper rifle approach and made my way to the perfect hiding place, albeit very slowly and rather awkwardly due to the aforementioned camera problems. It also didn’t help that I kept pressing square when I was told to press X by the game. All because the X is in a different position on an Xbox pad. So really my experience didn’t go that well. Especially when it came time to run and I couldn’t get out of the door quick enough due to the camera issues.
From the friends I spoke to who also played it but on the 360, their experience was a lot more refined, so maybe that was my problem (being shit? Ed). I know a friend of mine when asked by the staff if he’d like to play it again after dying once said ‘No thanks, it’s a bit shit isn’t it?’.
All I can say is I didn’t care for it a great deal, although I should stress my unfamiliarity with the PS3 control system, having not played a Playstation much since the days of the PS2. Maybe a fan of the series will enjoy it more, especially considering that it looks pretty much like more of the same from previous Hitman games but I thought the game was boring as toffee.
