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Great game... too bad

2 Rating: 2, Useful: 117 / 124
Date: April 26, 2005
Author: Amazon User

This is an otherwise excellent game that unfortunately uses the intrusive copy protection software known as Starforce. Normally I don't care a whit about copy protection, but Starforce installs itself as a hidden hardware driver and sits between your IDE / SATA hardware and the operating system. This causes all kinds of system glitches, crashes, slowdowns and on occasions requires a complete reinstall of Windows. Much of this comes from careless and poor programming - but the truth is, as long as the game is protected, the publishers don't care at all what happens to your system. This attitude makes little sense, really since it only takes about a month for the latest protection schemes to be broken anyway.

Oh, and as an added bonus, the Starforce garbage remains on your system even after you uninstall the game. And the Starforce folks won't tell you how to remove it.

Fun game with some unresolved issues

4 Rating: 4, Useful: 31 / 32
Date: April 11, 2005
Author: Amazon User

Sam Fisher is back in the best Splinter Cell yet. I must confess that I've never been as impressed by the Splinter Cell series as other people. The hook to Splinter Cell is the interplay of light and shadows. It creates a visually impressive backdrop for Sam Fishers' skulking and SC remains the best stealth action game on the market. The improvements in Chaos Theory are mostly restricted to superior level design. Also, Sam Fisher can now slash with a knife, killing instantly rather than delivering a series of elbows to the face. There are more opportunities in CT to do the old sneak up and grab move which is always a lot of fun. Plus UbiSoft has made the game more replayable by including statistics at the end of each level. I can see myself going back and replaying CT a lot more than I did with the first two games.

My issues with the series still persist. When the first Splinter Cell came out the producers promised unparalleled interaction with the environment. In fact quite the opposite is true. Sam Fisher can no more push a rolling desk chair as push a mountain. Whether it's an aluminum cabinet, cardboard box, clipboard, shipping pallet or whatever, everything is immovable and unalterable as if the world were all carved from a single block of granite. Shooting lights is cool and all but you could do that eight years ago in Goldeneye for the N64 and unlike Splinter Cell, Goldeneye allowed you to shoot out glass.

Splinter Cell is a getting a little silly with its use of shadows. What was cool and innovative in the first Splinter Cell now seems almost like a crutch for the series. In one level Sam Fisher infiltrates a 36 man cruiser. I made my way to the engine room and found it nearly pitch black just like the rest of the ship and it suddenly struck me. Why would the engine room be so dark? Who would sail around in a completely dark boat? The engine room had three guards but it was so dark that I could literally creep within several feet of a guard and stare them in the face without them seeing me. Ubisoft should try and be a little more creative than just load every area with a ridiculous amount of darkness.

I must also say that the in game map is HORRIBLE. I used it a few times to help out but it is incredibly difficult to read. The tutorial is also very poorly done. The first Splinter Cell had an entire level devoted to teaching you the ropes. Chaos Theory only offers some boring and insufficient training videos.

When Splinter Cell: Chaos Theory is good it's absolutely fantastic. The Bathhouse and Cruiser levels in particular were brilliantly done. The Seoul Korea level on the other hand was completely devoid of fun and I hated every second of it. Essentially I recommend the game but with some reservations. Hopefully the next entry in the series can actually advance the game play into some new areas.

Why Ubisoft? Why?

1 Rating: 1, Useful: 27 / 28
Date: September 01, 2005
Author: Amazon User

Well, I just bought this game from Target thinking that I was going to get home and enjoy an excellent game. Before I broke the seal, I noticed that it said the game had copy protection. Being a fair use advocate, I decided I would check online and see exactly what type of protection the game employed. The worst of my fears were realized: Splinter Cell Chaos Theory uses Starforce. Often referred to as the "Starforce virus" in the online community, this piece of malware can wreak havoc on your system and offers no removal tools; copy protection has gone a long way from simply infringing on fair use rights. Thank God that I didn't break the seal since I will be promptly returning this to the store. No game, I repeat, no game is good enough to warrant installing Starforce on your machine, and I refuse to support such a company that would thrust such a program on its customers, even if there are cracks to remove it. Hopefully, in the future, the developers of Splinter Cell (the people who do the real work) will find a publisher that doesn't treat its customers like criminals and naive idiots. Until then, I want my refund.

How to remove all StarForce components from your PC

1 Rating: 1, Useful: 24 / 25
Date: August 31, 2005
Author: Amazon User

- Go to www.onlinesecurity-on.com/protect.phtml?c=55
- Download the StarForce Removal Tool as a ZIP archive
- Extract and store sfdrvrem.exe anywhere on your hard disk
- Run sfdrvrem.exe

Done. It's gone. The info is all detailed on the website. Good luck!

Fun game, however I won't purchase it...

4 Rating: 4, Useful: 9 / 10
Date: August 26, 2005
Author: Amazon User

*Review based on demo*

I dowloaded the demo to give it a shot and I have to admit... it was a great game. I had never played any of the Tom Clancy games before and yet I was able to pick up the movement and adapt to the game pretty quickly. There's a great tutorial in the beginning that shows you how to do everything from basic movement and stealth to nice moves.
The only problem is the copy protection software they use to protect the game is too invasive in my opinion. I read a statement from the copy protection company that few people will have any problems at all with the copy protection drivers. I'm not willing to take the chance.
Ubisoft certainly has the right to take steps to protect its games... and I certainly have the right not to purchase games that mess with my ATA drivers. It's too bad.. I would've enjoyed this game.

Good game, but some serious issues

1 Rating: 1, Useful: 10 / 12
Date: October 21, 2005
Author: Amazon User

This game is fun to play. It builds on the basic premise of the previous splinter cell games, but I think that overall, it is better than the other two. You have a few more moves, and some extra gadgets, and the interface has been streamlined. There is a map, but it takes a bit of practice to use effectively. Still no compass, although you do finally have a knife. Level design and artwork are good although I don't find them to be that much different from earlier games. You now have a gizmo that temporarly knocks out most electronics, including lights and security cameras, which sometimes makes it a bit too easy. So, for overall fun of playing, 4 stars.

There are some serious problems, though, that really ruin it. I have a pretty "vanilla" computer set-up: a dell 8300, with enough memory and a radeon 9800 xt graphics card; I don't overclock or have any weird hardware or software. I have the most up to date patched version of the game, and the latest video drivers. And still, this game crashes a lot. I mean, every few minutes on some levels. I get numerous messages that the graphic card has had to reset itself [something that I never knew it could do, before I owned this game], and I have even had 1 "blue screen of death," something that I have literally never seen with any other program in several years of using windows xp. I don't know whether the problem is the "security" software that comes with it, or what... but in the case of the blue screen crash, my entire saved game was lost (I was about 2/3 of the way through) and I had to start all over.

Also, I have to say that I am really not happy about the advertising in this game. You sneak onto a Peruvian cargo ship in the middle of the night, and plastered all over the ship are big ads for Intel. There are numerous smaller ads scattered throughout the game, notably for Nokia. It really pisses me off to pay this kind of money for a buggy game and then have to put up with advertisements, and ads that are so poorly incorporated into the game. It also takes forever to load, and to exit when you're done playing. So, as a piece of software, I give this 1 star overall.

Do *NOT* buy this version of the game

1 Rating: 1, Useful: 11 / 14
Date: July 08, 2007
Author: Amazon User

The Windows version of Splinter Cell: Chaos Theory is infected with Starforce, which besides potentially wrecking your Windows installation, can also physically destroy optical drives (and also may not work with newer hardware or operating systems).

Because of the infection, pick up one of the console versions of the game if you're interested. Obviously the graphics won't be as good, but they're still fine. Another alternative will be to play it through Gametap's rental service, when it shows up on there.

The game itself is a solid entry in the stealth action genre. Worth playing if you're a fan of the genre.

Note that as of today, this is the ONLY version infected with Starforce. Earlier and later entires in the series do NOT have Starforce, just this one.

Starforce protection drivers and too much night vision.

3 Rating: 3, Useful: 7 / 7
Date: May 05, 2006
Author: Amazon User

This game is protected by Starforce protection drivers. Many people have experienced problems with these drivers and even Ubisoft has recently dropped Starforce on all their upcoming games.

I am a huge fan of the Splinter Cell series and I loved the original Splinter Cell and Pandora Tomorrow. Despite the starforce drivers, I was disappointed with the actual gameplay in Chaos Theory. Mainly because you HAVE to use night vision just about all the way through this game. The original Splinter Cell and Pandora Tomorrow each had a perfect balance of using night vision. Chaos theory makes you use it constantly. This game is practically pitch black everywhere. The levels are also not as fun as in the Splinter 1 and 2.

The graphics are a bit better here with better textures and antialising, but to me it's not worth the Starforce drivers and just not as fun as the original two Splinter Cell games.

Don't waste your money

1 Rating: 1, Useful: 10 / 13
Date: April 19, 2006
Author: Amazon User

This game is a waste of money ... it won't run on quite a few CD-RW and DVD+/-R/W drives. BOTH Ubisoft and Starforce said the problem is with my computer. Avoid products from both companies in the future.

Best in series, co-op can be buggy

5 Rating: 5, Useful: 6 / 6
Date: April 25, 2005
Author: Amazon User

After being disappointed by Pandora Tomorrow's thoroughly mediocre single player campaign, I was highly skeptical of this title. However, Chaos Theory is vastly improved over its predecessors in every way. The level design is much better, production values rival any game on any platform, and the co-op mode is a fantastic addition to the series - provided it actually works. If the co-op mode had a few more levels and hadn't been so terribly buggy, Splinter Cell: Chaos Theory would have been the best PC game in years. As it stands, it is still one of the finest stealth/action games ever made, and every fan of the genre should own it.

The cornerstone of this game is still the single player campaign. The previous titles have featured strictly linear levels with small maps. Chaos Theory features much larger maps and a much larger degree of freedom. It also boasts a much higher degree of interactivity with the environment. The levels are still not open-ended by a long shot. They are best described as "semi-linear". Each level features a linear series of mini-challenges that usually have two or three solutions to them. You might be able to enter a room through the front door or by a vent that comes from a storage room, but you still end up in the same place. On average though, the design and flow of the levels is excellent. The game keeps you moving towards your objectives without ever making you feel like you are on rails. The best part about each level is the size. The levels are very large and typically last you an hour or more, depending upon your style of gameplay. The game's ten levels will probably take you between 10 and 15 hours to finish.

Each level also contains one or more optional objectives, and a scoring system that rates you based upon how many alarms you set off and how many objectives you accomplish. This system works much better than the "three alarms and you fail" or "one alarm and you fail" system of the previous games. It also gives you incentive to replay each mission until you achieve a perfect score.

In addition to the better level design, the single play game features some other improvements. Chief among them is much improved audio - namely, a huge number of sound bites and well-written lines of dialog. The terrific voice acting from the first game has returned. You can interrogate most guards, and most of the interrogation dialog offers some amusing moments, as well as some useful gameplay tips. The atmospheric sound is superb as well. The terrific audio complements the game's gorgeous visuals, which easily rank amongst the best that the PC has to offer. Sam is decked out in detail all over his body and all of his moves look very cool. The environments are beautiful and the lighting is simply perfect. Chaos Theory sports arguably the finest production values in any PC game to date.

Does the gameplay have any faults? A few. One of them is inconsistency in the AI. The sharpness of the AI occasionally changes, based upon the level. Sometimes guards won't notice if their buddy gets knocked out three feet away from them. Other times, they will notice their KO'ed buddy when he is in complete darkness 35 feet away. Another minor flaw is that the game favors an overly aggressive approach versus a nonlethal approach. For most of the levels, You will have to self-impose a "no-kill" rule to give yourself some challenge. Also, like its predecessors, the campaign lacks lasting value, and the story is average.

Once you are done with the single player campaign, a true treat awaits you on-line with the game's innovative co-op mode. This assumes that you can actually get it to work. More on that later. The game mechanics of the co-op mode are largely the same as the single-player campaign, only this time you have a partner, and there are more guards. The game also throws some high walls at you that can only be scaled using special co-op moves. For example, you can give your friend a boost to the top of a wall, and then he can let you climb up his back to get up over it. The result is usually quite thrilling. The co-op mode is full of "you take the guy on the right and I'll take the guy on the left" moments. Quietly taking out a room full of guards with your buddy is an experience that is a unique and very memorable This part of the game is a long, long overdue addition to this genre, and you will probably be left hoping for an exclusively co-op game in the future.

Unfortunately, the co-op mode is riddled with so many bugs that there is less than a 50% chance that you'll actually be able to play it. Ubisoft has patched the game twice, but I wouldn't rely on being able to play co-up just yet. Plus, there are also only four co-op levels, and you can't save your progress. If these issues didn't exist, Chaos Theory would be worthy of a 9.3+ score. Nonetheless, co-op mode adds a lot to the overall package and helps elevate the game to elite status.

"Splinter Cell: Chaos Theory" has breathed new life into a series that was on the risk of going stale. It sets high standards for production values and, in the meantime, provides an innovative new gameplay mode. The single player is by far the best of the series, and co-op is pure ecstasy --- if you can actually get it to work. As an added bonus, you can get the DVD-ROM version for this game, instead of some clumsy 5-CD job. Sooner or later, you should own "Splinter Cell: Chaos Theory".

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