The more "mainstream" last game somewhat divided the community. Its not my favorite entry either, but the negativity is a bit overblown and Absolution certainly proved to be a clear stepping stone for this refresh of the series. The old canon still stands btw. but I noticed that a few of the targets aren't "evil", which was nearly always the case in previous games. The game is a bit more "goofy" too and could easily be reworked as a spy caper. The story is less focused on this time around. Not that Hitman games ever managed to tell a good one, but this tale is overall fine. The main selling point is obviously the finely tuned gameplay and the levels are now more open than ever. The huge crowds are another plus and now feel less of a gimmick. The game is actually a huge technical accomplishment, outside of the again janky animations, and the levels all feature astonishing attention to detail. The levels may even be a bit too huge and I would have broken some of them into 2 separate ones. I understand that the developers want the player to replay them multiple times, with changing conditions but less is sometimes more. The way the game locks away the new weekly targets after that very week is clearer misstep. Especially as you only get 1 try but the high amount of user created level remixes somewhat makes up for that. There is a lot of content to be enjoyed in this first "season" and playing though the game over 2 days felt like binge watching a Netflix show. I have full trust in the developers to deliver another quality follow-up and the retail version of the game is the best Hitman entry yet. I just hope that the "Bonus Episodes" will rely on more levels, as Sapienza ended with with 3 separate missions assigned to it. The game is lastly a great entry point to the series. 9/10
Review of Hitman
