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Definitely one of the best

5 Rating: 5, Useful: 38 / 39
Date: October 14, 2002
Author: Amazon User

Hitman 2 is, without a doubt, one of the most superb shooter games I've ever played. However, it should be duly noted that it, like its predecessor, is not a normal shooter. If you like melee games like Unreal, Hitman 2 may not be for you. It's all about stealth. On the harder levels you cannot win if you just go around shooting everyone.

That said, this game excels at being a thinking man's shooter. You can make it through many missions and only kill your targets if you're careful. You can now drug people, so that they wake up later but you can still steal their keys, guns, etc.

Hitman can assume disguises if he finds them, or he can change into the clothes of dead adversaries. This allows him to infiltrate enemy territory without raising an immediate alarm. Unlike in the original game, however, guards now see through disguises quickly if you stay near them too long, or carry a gun they wouldn't normally carry. They're very smart.

The weapon selection is top-notch. Old favorites like the fibre wire, Hardballers (now called Silverballers), army m60, and the WA2000 Sniper are back, along with some new additions like the SPAS auto-shotgun and the hunter's crossbow. You can even get a silenced pair of Ballers if you beat the first mission without firing a single shot (think: anesthetic or fibre wire).

Controls are pretty much the same, with one crucial exception: you now hold a key down to toggle run/walk. In Hitman, there were 2 separate keys for run and walk. Now there's a forward key and a key you hold to run. Much more intuative, I think.

The only thing that detracts from the game is the overall interface; by this I mean the system of choosing missions. In Hitman, the player created a profile which kept a list of previous missions for easy replay. This is gone. Hitman 2 keeps track of games simply through saves, so a list of 30 save games mixed among 3 difficulties can get confusing when they have only the name of the mission. However, if you just stick to loading the top game, you're pretty sure to have all the weapons you had when you stopped playing the night before.

Overall, this game is extremely fun. Better graphics than the original, beautiful levels, awesome weapons, and an amazing soundtrack that sounds straight out of a spy movie. If you like espionage/assassin games, games that require stealth not slaughter, then this is the perfect game for you. And even if you like killing everyone and everything that moves, this game has lots to offer (I like whacking pigs with a golf club or picking doves out of the sky with a crossbow).

Buy this (and the original, if you don't have it) and enjoy! You won't regret it.

Hitman 2 - A New World in the Life of a Hitman

5 Rating: 5, Useful: 13 / 21
Date: February 28, 2002
Author: Amazon User

If u have ever played the orginal Hitman - Codename 47, then your gonna love this game. the plot is that following the Hitman's disturbing ordeal in Professor Ort-Meyer's Sanitarium, he is welcomed in the care of Father Vittorio and spends his days within the walls of a Sicilian Monastery. After spending a great deal of time there, the sequel kicks off with the Hitman being drawn back into his ill-born profession by an ex-Spetsnaz assassin. Some great new add-ons will be the ability to save, and said that a program will be made to edit levels in the game, new weapons include: Pistols (Colt Python, PSM, & Ruger .22 Silenced), Same submachinguns, & SnipeRifles (Crossbow, Dragunov SVD Sniper's Rifle, & Barrett M95). This truly is a big step for the Hitman Community.

Big Improvement from first

5 Rating: 5, Useful: 13 / 14
Date: January 10, 2003
Author: Amazon User

After playing and finishing all twenty-one levels in Hitman 2: Silent Assassin I feel confident that I can write an honest review. I'm one of the few who have played the first (Hitman: Codename 47) in the series and because of that I was curious to see Eidos and IO Interactive work on this sequel. The original contained many flaws and short comings so I was curious if the manufactures fixed all these flaws and if they truly this time made a great game.
The original crashed almost repeatedly and with the no game save feature you found yourself repeating the level over and over again. Hitman 2 never crashed on my machine and ran smooth and fluid throughout all the levels. The game adds in-game save features besides just the auto save presented in the original. Hitman 2 also added difficulty levels so people can adjust and play on the skill they believe that their on. The original did not contain in-game saves and difficulty levels. (4.75/5)
The music in the original only really accomplished of bringing the atmosphere of being a Hitman to life. For that I applaud it but the sound usually did not bring out the atmosphere of the many exotic locations and failed to be entertaining. The sequel not only matches the atmosphere of the place and being a Hitman but also is very entertaining. The downside is if you find yourself in the same part (like Russia, Japan, etc.) you will find they recycled a lot of the music. The sound effects in the sequel are sharp when you download a file off the hitman website. (4.5/5)
The graphics in the original were revolutionary; the graphics in the sequel are not. They are of course better than the three year-old game but could have been better. They did do a nice job of creating rain, snow, and other natural effects but with the games out already, their not revolutionary, just good. There are more exotic locations in the sequel than the original (go figure since the sequel contains eight more levels than the original). In the sequel you get to visit Sicily, Russia, Malaysia, Japan, Nuristan (where ever the hell that is), and India. All of these contain nice graphics and all except two levels located in Japan look original enough to actually feel like there is a new location every time and not just a rehash of the old levels. (4.25/5)
The game play was a lot better in the sequel than the original. The story line was more addicting and did not throw in many sci-fi elements to completely blow the game. This time you had a bigger purpose instead of money. You also got additional skills topped to your old ones to increase the fun factor (the ability to pick locks, to knock out people by using anesthetic, the ability to peek through key holes, and the ability to knock out people with the back of your gun). The map is nicely improved in the sequel, becoming a valuable tool to finish the job. The missions are much more open ended with even more exotic hits. This time a disguise will not carry you far calling for some more thinking. Carrying a wrong weapon, running, lingering around, moving to close to the guard, or simply acting suspicious by picking locks, crouching, or going in a wrong room will get you shot. To combat this the creators added a threat meter, if the guards gets suspicious it will show up on the meter. This allows you to get out of a situation fast before it becomes a gunfight. The creators also added a first person view in the addition to the already existing third person view. (4.75/5)

Overall great game, a big improvement from the original: (4.56/5) A-

I can't believe Eidos outdid themselves even MORE!

5 Rating: 5, Useful: 12 / 25
Date: March 04, 2002
Author: Amazon User

I was a loyal fan of Hitman-Codename 47. The game was interesting, original, and above all, great. However, I am proud
to announce that Hitman II is even BETTER than the original. There are many more weapons available, and the already awesome
graphics from part I have been dramatically improved. This game
is absolutely amazing, and the missions and administrations of death are by-far the most excellent in video game history to this date. I played Hitman I for hours a day for two years--now I have another game to keep me entertained for another two!

It's a hit!: The best stealth/shooter I've played

5 Rating: 5, Useful: 12 / 15
Date: November 12, 2002
Author: Amazon User

When I got my XBox, Hitman 2: Silent Assassin was one of the first games on my list that I wanted (I had read reviews everywhere, but at the time it had not yet been released). When I finally did buy it, it did not disappoint.

The game is set-up with an interesting storyline, but one that you will soon forget as you progress through the game. You are Agent-47, a retired hitman who has gone straight. But when a priest whom he had befriended is kidnapped, he goes on the hunt for his captors. Along the way though, Agent-47 picks up right where he left off, and several missions into the game you forget why you're offing people because the priest is no longer even mentioned.

The missions take you to several different locations, and Agent-47 has many ways to accomplish a task (at the end of a mission, you will be rated on kills, stealth, aggression, etc). He can kill someone, drag the body into a hiding place, and change into the person's clothing as a disguise. You can also take any weapons they may be carrying. This gives the game a whole new depth: you're not just stuck walking into a scene and shooting everyone within your sights. Instead, you can walk undetected past a guard, as long as you keep moving and are wearing the right diguise. It doesn't always work, but that's half the fun, right? No tactic is guaranteed to work in this game, so sometimes you have to try multiple tactics to complete your mission.

The controls are fairly simple to use. You can access your map or mission objectives fairly simply, and can also holster or swap weapons with just several buttons. Unfortunately, when you first start out there's a tendency to hit the wrong button when you're in a shootout and drop your gun, but you'll soon learn not to do that. :-)

On screen, you also have several guides. There's the crosshairs of your gun, which will appear whenever you are carrying a gun (as opposed to having one holstered, for more covert operations). There's also a damage meter (a shot in the head hurts you a lot more than a grazing blow to your leg), and the heartbeat monitor. This is a GREAT tool. When an enemy is suspicious (such as when you're trying to sneak by him), it will pulse, and eventually flash red. This gives you the opportunity to lay low and wait for it to stop, or open fire before he does. This is invaluable in the stealth missions, and a really unique feature. This will also tell you to a reasonable certainty if guards have been alerted to look for someone suspicious milling around their compound.

There's a host of weapons and tactics available in this game, from your typical guns to crossbows, piano wire, and ether rags. Each gun takes a different type of ammo and can hold a different number of rounds, and true to real life, once your clip is empty, it takes precious seconds to reload. The sniper rifle is probably my favourite of the weapons. You can switch into the scope view and get such a surprisingly detailed view, it's just an amazingly lifelike option. You will have to use this on several missions in order to complete your assigned tasks. The map is an invaluable tool, as it shows in real-time the location and movements of everyone, including VIP targets and innocents (like hotel maids or deliverymen).

The missions themselves are also very diverse. Some of them require a very specific sequence of events to do them properly (change into officer's uniform here, pick up sniper rifle there), but others can be completed in a variety of ways. You can sneak into an area undetected, or walk in firing and shoot down everyone in your path. Having since played games (such as Silent Hill 2) where things MUST be done a certain way and in a certain order to see results, I really appreciate this flexibility.

Pretty much the only bad thing I have to say about the game is the lack of saves, which all things considered probably is not THAT terrible. Basically, once you get into a mission, you can't just save on a whim, meaning that if you get shot or muff something up, you've got to start over (and over, and over). Considering some of the missions are long (and if you screw up at the end, you're in trouble), this can get annoying. It's not so bad on the easier missions, but some of them are downright difficult, and you can get frustrated. Also, walking is a bit difficult at first (you use both thumbsticks to control where you look/aim and where you go). Several tries into it, I found that inverting the aim in the options menu helped tremendously.

All in all, "Hitman 2: Silent Assassin" is definitely one of my favourite games on XBox. The flexibility and difficulty are just about right for a game like this, and it makes other "stealth/shooter" games (like "007: Agent Under Fire") look downright foolish. Bottom line, this is a must-have for anyone who wants a serious shooter game with a real plotline and believable background to it.

I don't have the literal game I just go the demo of it....

5 Rating: 5, Useful: 10 / 18
Date: August 25, 2002
Author: Amazon User

SO FAR ITS GREAT! I mean...improved graphics.....same good gameplay...new missions....didn't run too bad on my pentium 4 1.7ghz 256 mb of ram geforce 2 mx....etc. The rest of the review and the detailed version is next up:
Graphics: 9.7; highly superb. The textures look much better as well as other added effects!!And the shadows look a hell of a lot better as well-there are also a lot of other effects that u can enable not available in the original hitman-including enviroment bump mapping!(Though not supported by my video card so its inacessible....)Also, the sun looks very realistic!Now they are using volumetric complex real-time suns!And clouds.
Sound Effects:7.6 Same old sounds-same quality. But good enough!
Music: 8.9: Excellent! Same quality-but very good and kool new songs and sound tracks!
GamePlay: 9.5: Superb! There's a lot more gameplay-and a lot of the old gameplay-which I defnitley like! There's a hell of a lot more places to explorer-and u can do a hell of a lot more things, like for an example-I'm pretty sure you coudn't pick up grociery bags and nearly not as much gameplay or places to explorer. Much more realisim in gameplay as well. There's defnitley somewhat improved gameplay!
KeyBoard control:8.1, not any different from the last 1-just you can zoom in with your eletric binoculars-but besides that- they are great and comfortable from my opinion!

Overal Grade: 9.0. Slammin' defintley a must have-can't wait to get the real full version-its gonna include a lot more final improved qualities and futures and add ons!:). I defintley reccomend this for any gamer!

Played the Preview Version - Good Game

5 Rating: 5, Useful: 9 / 14
Date: June 16, 2002
Author: Amazon User

I have a copy of the preview version of Hitman 2 and it really is shaping up to be a wonderful game. Like the first Hitman it brings tons of action and enjoyable missions to the table. The preview is obviously beta because EIDOS still has some flaws to work out, but when the final version comes I think it's going to be a big hit.

GOOD THINGS IN THE GAME
-Amazing Graphics
-Numerous Fun Missions
-Ability to Skip Missions
-Great Weapons

FLAWS IN THE GAME
-Not able to save often

-Difficult
-Not very "player-friendly"

By September I think the flaws will be worked out and we will have a truly beautiful game!

Excellent game and very challenging.

5 Rating: 5, Useful: 6 / 6
Date: October 10, 2002
Author: Amazon User

I played the first Hitman a lot. I liked its style and it did have some well-done aspects. However it did have some glaring mistakes that kept it from being a hit. Thankfully most of those have been done away with. And what was good before has been refined in to an even better game. If you did like Hitman, the sequel is much better. If you did not like Hitman, the sequel is much better.

There are many things to like. The sound stands out in my mind. The weapons all sound good. Some I liked more than others just for their sound. And the music is top notch; a real symphony adds much more atmosphere than the usual video game background noise. The voice acting is good enough and is kept short and to the point.
The graphics are good with some notable lighting and shading effects. The physics are also above average for a video game. The models vary in detail but are generally good. Lots of cool particle effects, from the lingering smoke of automatic weapon fire to the flash of a bullets smacking off metal pipes as well as some impressively gruesome blood spattering. But the many guns look great. They are highly detailed even out of first person mode. And the addition of a first person view is great since there are many indoor areas. While it is not the newest engine from Id, it can hold it's own.
The AI on the other hand is a mixed bag. It is not too quick, but just smart enough to offer a challenge. While the enemies you will face are competent enough to detect you if you act suspicious they will not use much in the way of tactics. In one instance a few bad guys came running straight at me in a line down a corridor firing away. It was easy enough to now them down. It knows how to locate you and to shoot at you, that is about it. However when not going in Rambo style you can admire some of the more subtle aspects of the AI. Even when using a silenced gun a guard near by can still hear the bullet hitting the wall. If a civilian sees you do something suspicious he/she will run and find a guard, even tell them what you look like, who will then investigate the location of the disturbance. Yet after games like SOF2 and NOLF2 this AI fails to impress but it is still not bad.

Of course the core of any game is the gameplay. Here Hitman2 uses what worked before and refined it. It also improves or drops what didn't work the last time. Stealth is still rewarding but not required. Hitman2 let's you set the pace, either to the beat of automatic weapons blazing away or the steady footsteps of a silent hunter. Usually you will end up in the middle. Either method works, and works better in some cases than others. While it's fun to whip out an Uzi and waste anyone standing in your way, I also enjoyed the professional hit by keeping my body count low. It's this dynamic with great sound and good graphics that make the game worth playing.

Unfortunately I found some parts of the game less than impressive. The story starts out strong with some great cut scenes, but drops off by the mid point of the game and really doesn't appear again until the final two missions. For the most part, it serves as a thin reason to send the player off to some exotic locations. But these locations do little or nothing to support the story. I can live with out a story to a game, just that his one started with one that seemed promising. Thinking of the later part of the game, I found the last few missions (before the final two) to be dull and tedious. There were not as good looking as the previous ones or as well designed. I got the impression that they were tacked on to fatten the game. They were not bad, just not as interesting and mostly repetitive.

What my biggest complaint is that the map is still near worthless, making any real pre-planning pointless. I had to screw up a couple times each mission just to get a good feel for the layout of the level. An early mission has you knock off a Russian general and local crime boss in a public park. I decided the use a sniper rifle to take them out. I studied the map and saw a building marked radio tower. I thought a tower would be high enough to have a good view of the target. So I planned my way and it was going perfect until I got to the tower to find out that it had no line of sight at all with the target. Why couldn't this have been indicated on the map? In another mission I had planned an elaborate route to my target based off of what the map indicated were walled off alleys. Only when I got there I found out that I could get through some of them since some were not really blocked off. Yet the map leads me to think so. Other things like windows or where stairways lead are not clearly marked. I like thinking; I don't like guessing at what the map is telling me. It should be helpful, not confusing.

Still the rest of the game is a great experience. Whatever flaws are quickly out done by the many strengths. If you are looking for a slick and stylish "thinking shooter" with an action movie quality, look no further.

Please read this review.

5 Rating: 5, Useful: 4 / 5
Date: October 16, 2005
Author: Amazon User

This game, no denying, is a breath of fresh air from all this non stop action games, like Halflife, Counterstrike, Doom 3. But it is fun none the less. Many people call the controls clunky and bad. So go change them you idiots. And there is always a way to do a way quietly, unlike that Peter Shaub guy says. The sniper is in the subway. So? But if you just check your map, you find a point of interest. Go to it, you find a truck loaded with soldier uniforms. Don one on, and go back and get the rifle.
Really a no brainer.
Unfortunately, there are some idiots that want every thing layed out for them. Well, then it wouldn't be good because it would be too easy. However, some idiots feel that that is necessary. What, do you want a huge arrow pointing at where you need to go? Idiots.
But aside from them, this game was FANTASTIC. Almost the same thing as contracts, in fact. Basically, you roam around as a Hitman, your origin unknown (unless you played the first one). You've retired to a Scicilian Monastary and have donated your fortune to it and now work as the gardner there. Your suit lays dusty and forgotten in your wardrobe, and your hardballers are just sitting in the suitcase under the shed you live in, not having been used for years.
For the first time, you have a friend: The priest that lives at the monastary with you. But one day, he's kidnapped by the mafia. You're given a ransom note demanding 500,000 dollars. So you go and dig up your suit, hardballers (you get dual now), fiber wire, anaesthetic (for nonlethal takedowns lasting anywhere from 1 second to 5 minutes depending how much you apply to the victim) and binoculars and lockpick.

Time to go to work.

So you go, assassinate the don at his mansion, and... well, no spoilers. But needless to say, i was impressed by how many ways you could do the mission. There's a mailman walking up: you wanna take him out and steal his clothes? sure. The delivery man's delivering groceries. Want to ambush him to get into the mansion? Or just put your guns into the grocery cart so when you're frisked as the mailman, you're not caught and the guns go into the mansion, 1st class mail. Or maybe that guard thats pissing on the tree should get choked into oblivion and his clothes taken. Any way, after you're in, you got another bunch of choices.
Say, there's a sniper rifle in the garage. Want to grab it and go back out up a hill and snipe the don? Fine, but it's loud, and his body will be found, and you need to get to him anyway to get the key to his dungeon to free the priest. Or maybe you could just pay him a visit as the guard and blast him with a silenced pistol. Or go around the back, use the ladder to climb up to the roof and strangle him from behind? Your choice. Then there's the extraction plan. Want to take out the don's brother to get the car key for that nice red sports car in that garage? But he's always walking around with the don's son, so it means 2 extra kills. Maybe you could shoot your way out. Too messy. Or maybe you could just run back to the insertion point.

That was just the first level. Intriuged? If you aren't you aren't human. Not to mention you got some other hitman tailing you that makes some failed hits on you on the last couple of levels.

Weapons: wide variety-9mm pistol, 9mmpistol silenced, dual silver ballers, smg, uzi, ak, m4, m60, 5.45 pistol, .22 pistol, shotgun, sawnoff, spas 12, blaser r93, w2000 rifle, m195 rifle, deagle, revolver, golf club, poison, custom sniper rifle, silenced smg, dragunov, etc etc could go on forever.theres even a scapel for you guys wanting to be doctors. and a crossbow for really silent kills.

cons: wheres the sniper in the suitcase? Where that minigun? i need it on the last level. Conking people on the head with ur gun butt should be more effective. Guards are stupid one second (not seeing some other russian secret agent threaten this guy with a gun in the middle of a huge party) while they start shooting when you pull out your bottle of anaesthetic taht they cant see (DUDE... OUCH ... ITS... OWIE STOP SHOOTING... OUCH ... TYLENOL!). Then, how can civilians here me pull out pistols when they know i'm there but when i'm uncorking a big green bottle of anaesthetic, they dont hear a thing if they dont know i'm there. There was also one instance where i had to really howl in laughter.
In one level, in a huge party, i tail this dude. He opens a safe. When he does, i blast him with a pistol. At that moment, a guard walks in and sees the dead body, my pistol, blood on the ground, and me standing there, he saunters out and leaves. When i leave the mission, i just reach the extraction point when it says: WARNING GUARDS FOUND DEAD AMBASSADOR

About time too.

So for the last time, BUY BUY BUY BUY THIS GAME. BUY IT. NOW. DO IT YOU WILL NOT REGRET. AT WORSE RENT IT. IF YOU LIKE GAMES LIKE DOOM DONT GET IT. ITS ALL THINKIN AND STEALTH. so if you want to go in, kill everyone, this is not your game. If you however, like games like splinter cell or metal gear solid but thought they were too "one pathed", then this is the game for you. GET IT. NOW.

47, signing out.

engrossing

5 Rating: 5, Useful: 3 / 3
Date: May 29, 2003
Author: Amazon User

I never played the first HITMAN, although many friends liked it a lot. So I picked up this a few weeks ago. So far I am an addict. The slow pace of it may put some gamers off - you don't run in blazing away a la DUKE NUKEM (buy DELTA FORCE: BLACK HAWK DOWN if you want to pour hot lead). The scenery is beautiful. The point in mission 2 when 47 emerges from the sewer into downtown St. Petersburg made me gasp. But of course it's very violent. Missions have a similarity to them. Choose your weapons, sneak in somewhere, kill your target, and get out without raising attention. Hiding, crouching, dragging dead bodies, etc are all part of the game if you want to survive. This game gives you the satisfaction of walking away, as if nothing happened, from a perfectly carried-out killing. Highly recommended!

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