Never Too Old To Play™

Let me start off by stating emphatically that Tom Clancy’s Splinter Cell: Conviction is not a game for hardcore Tom Clancy’s Splinter Cell games. By this I mean that if you’re looking for the same rigid, trial and error, “one mistake and you’re gone” type of stealth game play that the earlier Splinter Cell games on the previous generation of video game consoles are famous for, you should just keep moving on.

If you’re one of the die hard fans who was married to that overly restrictive, old school kind of game play, you really should have taken this title off your radar the first time Ubisoft officially announced the game in May 2007. That original version of Conviction eschewed the series’ traditional game play style in favor of an alternate kind of stealth more in line with Eidos’s critically acclaimed Hitman series with Sam Fisher losing the advanced Third Echelon gear and dark hallways to instead disappear in broad daylight by blending in with crowds.

Don’t get me wrong: I love the game play style of the earlier entries in the Splinter Cell franchise. Those games were amongst my favorites of that generation, and that Microsoft’s Xbox console got the first game before any other platform did really cemented it as my system of choice.

I’m also a bit miffed like many of the Splinter Cell devotees that the game play style is seemingly missing in action in this generation so far, but I’m holding out hope that Ubisoft sees the value in perhaps branching off the franchise – or creating an entirely new one – to utilize traditional style. Until that announcement, fans at least have the rumored Thief sequel to pine after.

For now, however, fans of the Splinter Cell universe who aren’t so focused on old game play styles should revel in the new and improved Sam Fisher complete with emotional baggage and a more fiery personality. He may not do splits halfway up a narrow corridor or perform upside down neck breakers, but he doesn’t have to now that he can give Jack Bauer, Jason Bourne and Daniel Craig’s James Bond a run for their money in the marksmanship department.

Indeed, the new Sam Fisher feels a lot more bad ass with the new “Mark and Execute” feature by which the player can “tag” up to four enemies (the actual number depends on the equipped weapon and its level of upgrades) to instantly kill in very “secret agent” like ways with the press of a button. I’ve read posts by many fans complaining that the game is too easy when you can just auto-kill enemies left and right, but the fact of the matter is that you can’t even activate this ability until you’ve taken out at least one enemy in hand-to-hand combat and you have to earn it again each time you use it.

I can understand the viewpoint that Ubisoft should have used this in another intellectual property – perhaps an adaptation of or homage to 24, the Bourne series or the James Bond universe – but then what could they have done with the Splinter Cell series, which was clearly struggling at the market due to the gaming market shifting predominantly towards heavily action oriented, “run and gun” shooters?

Another new game play feature is the “Last Known Position” mechanic in which enemies focus on where they last saw Fisher should he escape quickly enough. This is realized on screen by a “ghostly” silhouette of Fisher in that location, giving the player the opportunity to circle around and take out the misinformed goons.  In some cases, this can help in escaping a sticky situation, but I’ve always used it to just set up more creative executions.

It’s this ability to mix things up between more stealthy tactics and cinematic action that makes Splinter Cell: Conviction a winner in my book. It’s still stealth, but it’s a more mainstream and more palatable type of stealth that doesn’t make this entry in the series any better or worse than the others. I, for one, would like Ubisoft to continue with what they’ve done in Conviction while also considering some sort of return to the series’ roots so that there’s something for everyone in this really cool universe that they’ve created.

Final score: 4 out of 5

Parent to parent

Sam Fisher does some pretty violent things in this game. In earlier Splinter Cell games the player could avoid killing anybody 99.99% of the time, but in Conviction the body count just keeps piling up. Fisher is a man on a mission, and he’s willing to take out anyone who stands in his way, which is probably not a great lesson to teach the youngsters. I cannot in good conscience recommend this game for anyone who isn’t at least in high school.

Experience this for yourself!

• Tom Clancy’s Splinter Cell: Conviction (Xbox 360) (Amazon)
• Tom Clancy’s Splinter Cell: Conviction (Windows) (Amazon)
• Tom Clancy’s Splinter Cell: Conviction Collector’s Edition (Xbox 360) (Amazon)
• Xbox 360 250GB Elite Splinter Cell: Conviction Bundle (Amazon)