Hitman - 47 visits Haven Island “The Resort” on September 24th

[LN 910]

It's happening boyos. Hitman: Blood Money is coming to PS4 (and also Absolution).

Hitman HD Enhanced Collection
Hitman: Blood Money and Hitman: Absolution Remastered in 4K for the First Time

Today we’re happy and excited to announce Hitman HD Enhanced Collection, a compilation of two classic Hitman titles remastered in 4K resolution: Hitman: Blood Money and Hitman: Absolution. It will be available digitally January 11, 2019, for PlayStation 4 and Xbox One.

Both games can be played in 4K resolution and 60 fps, including many other improvements that bring these two classic titles into 2019 with the attention and love that they deserve.

“We’re very happy with this collection and how we were able to update and remaster two of our classic Hitman titles for modern consoles,” said Hakan Abrak, CEO, IO Interactive. “Hitman: Blood Money and Hitman: Absolution have helped us on our journey to where we are today, and we’re looking forward to players enjoying them in 4K and 60 fps.”

Hitman HD Enhanced Collection will feature:

• 4K visuals at 60 frames per second
• Increased texture resolution
• Upgraded texture formats
• Super-sampling
• Upscale support
• Heightened shadow map and mirror resolutions
• Improved lighting
• Updated controls for a more fluid experience

More about the two classics:

In Hitman: Blood Money you experience a globe-trotting adventure from the vineyards of Chile, to the Paris Opera House and even the White House itself in a face-off against a group of assassins known as “The Franchise”. When assassins from his contract agency, the ICA, are systematically eliminated in a series of hits, Agent 47 suspects that a larger, more powerful agency has entered the fray. As he suddenly loses contact with the ICA, Agent 47 senses that he may be the next target, so our merciless contract killer travels to America to take care of business himself…

Rediscover Hitman: Absolution and experience the deep and personal story of Agent 47 as he pursues redemption across 20 intense missions. Enjoy a distinctive art style that combines with rich dialogue and performances by an impressive Hollywood cast to create a unique gameplay experience.

Hitman HD Enhanced Collection is out January 11, 2019.

 

[Skeletor]

Oh man, that's sweet. I hope they make the controls on Blood Money less janky.

 

[Trans Fat 41g]

Will keep an eye out, Blood Money is a visually satisfying game.

 

[Rocketleaguer]

Isn't Hitman 2 essentially Blood Money 2018?

 

[Trans Fat 41g]

Isn't Hitman 2 essentially Blood Money 2018?

The gameplay is closer to that, whereas Absolution felt like Christopher Nolan deciding Hitman wasn't grim, dark, and linear enough.

 

[Smaug's Smokey Hole]

Codename 47 (2000)
A bald man wakes up in a padded cell with an enigmatic barcode on his neck, haunted by nightmares. He soon realizes he has a single purpose in life—he is a clone, born and bred for contract killings.

Out of all the games this is the only one I don't own, it looks cool though. One of the most interesting things about Codename, to me, is that 47's identity as a clone isn't revealed until the very end of the game.

The gameplay differs from a normal Hitman by being more like a shooter, if I remember right I think I read somewhere that it was always intended as one before some eleventh hour changes added various stealth mechanics. Some of the best level ideas from this game, get reused in future entries and in the case of Budapest that one gets remade entirely.

Yes, an old game that I can sperg about!

Spoiler

IIRC it opened with you being a clone, or it implied it because you escaped from a very shady type of facility. Maybe that facility was also the last level? Hm.

The thing you're mentioning, that it was meant to be more of a shooter, might be true but following it from reveal to release I never got that impression. But the problem with Codename 47 was that the game didn't really know what it was supposed to be, it wasn't Hitman yet because Hitman didn't exist. It had some good parts and some parts that would never return, I'll mention two of them below:

Skipping the intro level, the first three is what we would call a Hitman game.

This is the first level, a tutorial of sorts.

You sit up there with a sniper rifle, two cars stop at either end of the park and they(Triad leaders) approach each other. You're supposed to shoot one of them, so you do, then you escape. No biggie. Still, I eventually assassinated that guy with a knife, the game would let you try out ideas like that.


The second was more involved and really fun. It was about killing a Triad guy that would be at a meeting in a small Chinese cafe/restaurant, surrounded by armed guards, inside and outside. The best solution was to beeline to the restaurant, climb through the bathroom window, hide a gun in the toilet, go out the window and intercept the guy that was going to meet the Triad guy. Knock him out, takes his clothes, go to the meeting and get frisked(can't have any weapons) sit down with the Triad guy, excuse yourself to go to the bathroom, get the gun, shoot him, out the bathroom window, done. That was fun and really hooked me on the game, that mission was also short enough that I beat it again and again trying different things.

The mission after that was way longer and more complicated which brings me to a quirk of Codename 47: no in-game saves. You mess up you start doing a 20 minute setup all over again, for 10th time. (speculation: it didn't have any in-game saves because they couldn't develop an in-game save system, that's tricky stuff)

The mission after that is where it turns to shit, you're parachuted into a foggy jungle(think Turok) with a m-60 machine gun. That fucking sucked ass. That is not a Hitman mission and even then you could tell that this was not supposed to be. The jungle was especially annoying because you couldn't see anything or predict where people could be, or know where you were going, so you got shot a lot or attacked by Jaguars and died, it was just shit. At the end of the map was a mansion, a place where Hitmanny things could happen, but when you got there everyone was alerted/angry at you so... try the M-60 I guess, then reload the level and start from square 1.

One thing that really makes Codename 47 stand out was their fantastic ragdolls. Trespasser was first but the levels/landscape did not add much to it while in Hitman you would have a dead guy slowly sliding down some marble stairs, his head falling, bouncing on every step on its way down. It truly blew my mind and I was tearing things apart to see how they worked.

Hitman 2 figured out what works and what was horseshit, so it's a much improved game with the longer, more sprawling levels that opens up different possibilities for those that pay attention, yet I still miss some of the bite-sized mission like in the first game. If they ever did a Hitman Arcade with lots of 10 minute levels I would be very interested.

And hey, remember mirrors back when they didn't need a $1300 video card with ray-tracing?

 

[Skeletor]

$60 price point is was too high. Might pick this up when it's on a deep discount.

 

[Trans Fat 41g]

honestly why would they want to associate with Absolution anymore is beyond me, it's the only bad game in the entire series and I'd love a true remake of H2 and Contracts.

EDIT: if it can happen with Spyro and Crash, it can be done properly to Hitman 2 and Hitman Contracts. Maybe maybe not?

 

[LN 910]

honestly why would they want to associate with Absolution anymore is beyond me, it's the only bad game in the entire series and I'd love a true remake of H2 and Contracts.

EDIT: if it can happen with Spyro and Crash, it can be done properly to Hitman 2 and Hitman Contracts. Maybe maybe not?

Absolution sold a fuck ton of copies and normies really like it. Package it in with the game the supers get hard over and im sure someone out there is paying full price for it.

 

[Trans Fat 41g]

Yeah I get that from a business perspective, I just find going from Blood Money's gameplay to Absolution's gameplay a bit jarring. I can only speak as an honest critic.

 

[Overcast]

Huh. Decided to replay Hitman: Blood Money today and only now heard of the re-release.

Kinda weird they’re also re-releasing Absolution though. Heard nothing but bad things.

 

[Megaroad]

It's really hard to go back to Blood Money after the last two games really refined everything to near perfection.

Absolution I can tolerate now a days as a okay cover shooter, I'm at least enjoying the story. But I can't tell if there was a glitch or they censored a scene in it. In the first level you over hear a man having a great day after learning he doesn't have cancer, who you can immediately pull out a window to his death.

I went to that area twice now and it's just silence at that part.

 

[Skeletor]

Replayed my old copy of Blood Money for a bit and it’s hard to go back to the super janky gameplay. Really easy to take for granted how much the last two games got the controls right.

 

[LN 910]

They really need to bring the old games' levels into the Hitman 2's launcher somehow. I'd gladly put a lot of money down for from the ground up remakes of all of them. It's the "World of Assassination" after all, it'd be really neat to have the entirety of the locations 47's touched be all there on one roof.

 

[Skeletor]

I like how one of the franchise’s hallmarks is traveling to exotic locations and then in Absolution you travel to South Dakota for like 60% of the game. That’s a pretty good troll.

 

[LN 910]

It's not even well done South Dakota. In Blood Money the majority of the game is set in the USA, but every level is different from the last even when in the same state. The boat level in the South is different from the wedding level in the South, the Vegas casino is different from the Vegas nightclub. Then Absolution is nothing back dark alleys or dusty roads for the whole game.

 

[Overcast]

Played through Contracts after playing through Blood Money again.

Despite some annoyances and inconsistencies (the groups of civilians not reacting to what you're doing in the final level is such a massive oversight and I don't know how the devs miss that. Kind of a big blemish on an otherwise awesome final level) I had fun with the game. The soundtrack is atmospheric and creepy and I like a lot of the missions (Beldingford Manor is probably my favorite, alongside the remade versions of the original four levels in Hitman 1).

Between playing through Contracts and watching videos of the original game, you really learn to appreciate the roots and evolution of the series and how everything was ultimately refined in games like Blood Money, and from what I've heard the new Hitman games.

From what I've seen, I'm glad this series didn't die at Absolution. So many highly regarded series end up suffering horrible demises at the hands of devs and publishers who try to turn them into something they're not and ruining them. Glad to see the newer games have not only brought the series back, but also expanded and refined a lot of the best elements from the older games.

 

[LN 910]

The new ET is out and pretty damn good. Got a pretty easy solution though, but it is only #3.

Also the newest update added a limited time bonus level and removed the mandatory exit for Colorado's Main Mission.

 

[LN 910]

Jesus Christ I'm a brainlet, I forgot about the newest Road Map!

The Hokkaido ET The Fugitive, imo one of the best of Season 1, is now available in H2. Check it out, it's a treat, it's basically The Maelstrom from Mumbai but as an elusive target.

There's also a new ET next month for Hawke's Bay, as well as a game update that will remove some challenges but most likely add an SA indicator.

 

[Mr. 0]

The Winter Festival event for Legacy Hokkiado also comes to an end on Feb. 14