Splinter cell blacklist

[spatular]

I had to google the title, I've been playing this quite a bit, honest. Not single player mind. Bought for spies vs mercs mode. On some of the previous games this mode has been brilliant, really different take on multiplayer. This version I'm not convinced by, not that it's bad. The setup is a bit different to previous games, there's 5v5 teams for a start, well it's definitely more than in the past. And when you start a hack you have to stay within a zone till the hack ends, the zones are quite big, the other spies have to then help protect the hacker for the duration, if the person who started the hack dies you have to hack it again quick or all progress is lost. And only one point out of 3 can be hacked at the same time. There's a lot less places to hide as a spy, but spies now have guns and are capable of cloaking and punching/killing mercs from the front, which seems to turn it into a more of a deathmach than previous games.

But really I haven't played it enough to fully comment, you really need to know the maps inside out to play this mode and I haven't learnt any of them yet. There is also a classic 2v2 mode too, so maybe that's better.

Also played some coop which is good fun. And amazingly buggy for me, a missing clif face that I was climbing along, people walking in mid air, staying stood up when dead, objectives/actions not registering etc. and the person I was playing with could see none of this.

[DANGERMAN]

I bought this on the WiiU and it seems alright but really not my sort of thing. Like not just not the sort of thing I'd play, but I'm actually struggling to get my head around what I'm supposed to do at points. It's just little things like it taking me ages to work out how to change what grenade I've got equipped if I'm using the pro controller, it taking me ages to work out how to use the snake camera. It's like there's a shorthand I'd know if I played these types of games more.

Other than getting spotted because a knockout hasn't triggered when I think it should it's not been game breaking, although counter to what I'd heard if you get spotted you are pretty much fucked, especially if the enemy is close to you. You can get in to a gun fight and survive though, it's not hugely advised because Sam doesn't believe in carrying too much ammo around, but I got spotted in a mission and ended up just blasting my way through that section.

I've only really done one story mission, bar the prologue, and it was pretty long (or I made it pretty long). There's 4th Echelon missions too, they're side missions that have really strict fail states, the two types I've had so far are either do 3 objectives without being spotted or kill everyone. The former are interesting, but it's a bit of a ballache when you complete all the objectives and are heading back to the extraction point at the start of the level, only for the one guard you didn't kill to spot you through an open window. Took me about 2 hours to do one of them last night.

It seems alright, I think I prefer the challenge maps to the main game, but then I've only done one proper level and haven't got the drone yet

[Bob]

Bought this from Blockbuster and started it the other day. So far I am not sold. In fact the game is packed with stuff I just don't like. I don't like being sent back to my spy plane to be a cunning spy, and being forced to plod around and talk to my daughter. I don't like the fact that you earn money and have to upgrade stuff. Ubisoft love locking content away behind arbitrary systems and this is no different. I don't like the way Sam doesn't sound like a fucking boss any more and I don''t like that everything you do prompts a score to appear on screen either. Most of all though, I dislike the same thing I dislike about pretty much every stealth game I have ever played. This just does it right from the very start. That thing would be the way they give you all these tools and gadgets to deal with a situation stealthily and then chuck a load of enemies or environmental hazards at you that make them completely useless. Which is why there is usually a sweet spot in the middle of stealth games that is amazing fun and then the rest is a frustrating, joyless bore.

Mark and Execute is the biggest problem. I wasn't convinced by it in Conviction on my first play through, mainly because I thought the game did a terrible job of teaching you the new gameplay style unless you gorged on every hype video the game released, which I didn't. The shift from being a ghost to being a psychotic serial spy murderer was fantastic and the game gave you all the tools you needed to play in this new style. However this time, right off the bat there are enemies with helmets on that completely negate mark and execute because if you try, their hats just go, 'tink' and then they call their buddies. Other things like enemies that are immune to being attacked from corner cover and can't be electrocuted make matters worse.

Hiding in darkness this time round isn't consistent either. Often getting spotted when behind cover and in the dark if the enemy comes at you from the right angle. Now that I think about, Conviction went black and white when you were in the dark which was a great system. This time Sam has a light on his back which flares when he is hidden. Because lens flare is just the best. Add to this drones that disable your goggles for some some reason, enemy patterns that change each time you load the game and and a load of other, minor things that I can't remember but were annoying me yesterday and it is all a bit annoying. Not immensely difficult, so there isn't that payoff of feeling rewarded at the end.

Rant.

These are just my thoughts from the first few missions. Splinter Cell has always been a bit like this, I don't think there is a single game in the series where you haven't had to take the rough with the smooth. So hopefully it will pick up a bit as it goes on, or maybe it is just going to be a case of learning how to deal with the new threats. Or maybe in an effort to accommodate three play styles in each level, they have fucked it up. Guess I will have to wait and see.