Unpopular opinions about Hitman

[MrOchoa]

You are of course free to have that opinion, as wrong as it might be

I personally prefer the way he feels in essentially all the other games, like he has some actual bodyweight.

But i can see what you mean, i absolutely hate how in Red Dead Redemption 2 the Character feels too heavy, he needs like 2 seconds to start or stop moving…

[EvilGeniusRo]

God of War 3 - Kratos Kills Helios & Takes His Head (Sun God)

[Hichkas]

@hitman_guy

im sure norseman is terrified rn

Norse men don’t get terrified but furious, cuz they’re badass.

[scat1620]

The Eccleston Illumination is the best Escalation in the WoA Trilogy.

[MrButtons]

I prefer Contracts over Blood Money. Not entirely sure if that’s an unpopular opinion as I don’t know the community’s consensus on the subject, but that’s how it is. Contracts was a grim symphony of death, Blood Money was pop music.

[Screaming_Meat]

@MrButtons

Contracts was a grim symphony of death, Blood Money was pop music.

there is definitely a fair number of folk here that don’t dig blood money. i had some thoughts on that a while back, at least about the difference in atmosphere between them..

long ass rant

@Screaming_Meat

if atmosphere is the mood or tone of a piece, then i would argue that blood money has, if not the ‘best’, then the most interesting in the entire series so far.

it’s all about tension.

i adore contracts’ incredible gothic european-flavoured noir. it’s many things - a heady mix of rain, ghosts, blood, ruminations on death - but it is not in any way subtle.

contracts wears it’s unsettling aspects entirely on its proverbial sleeve, hiding very little from the player. almost every level immediately lets the player know how they should feel. we know, even without the brief, that there is something very off about beldingford manor simply by looking at it. precisely what it hides requires exploration, but there is absolutely no room for doubt that something is very wrong there.

blood money’s a new life, on the other hand, isn’t so obvious. on the surface, and without looking at the brief, it appears to be an idyllic north american suburb; the peak of the elusive american dream. it’s only when we scratch the surface - open the doughnut van, meet the wife, etc. - that you can see the rot brewing underneath.

it’s like looking through a beautiful lawn of rich green grass and coming across a rotting, severed ear.

that’s a reference to blue velvet, by the way, which i suspect was an influence on a new life, if not the entirety of blood money. i’ve said this elsewhere, but i’ve always felt that blood money comes across as quite lynchian in-and-of-itself. by lynchian, i mean a juxtaposition between the relatively mundane (boring, everyday, earthly) and the macabre (horrifying, gruesome, pertaining to death).

47’s deathly presence alone is enough to strain each locations’ superficiality. he is death, invading these blandly iconic american locations: theme parks, rehab, steamboats, weddings, vegas, suburbs, etc. compare this to contracts where 47 doesn’t look out of place at all ; he is very much part of that sleazy, seedy universe.

(i know contracts is all in his head narratively speaking, but that’s besides the point. we’re talking from a gameplay experience here).

this is, i think, blood money’s greatest trick: it appears at first sight to be bright, clean, colourful and even cartoonish, but the juxtaposition between its overwrought surfaces and the grim machinations underneath provide a tension contracts’ can’t.

i also think it’s no coincidence that the first hitman to explore america chooses to do so using this technique as opposed to contracts’ brooding take.

blood money is the first game in the series that really embraces its dark, satirical potential (which 2016 kind of carries on, i think), and it aims it squarely at the veneer of the american dream. it’s not exactly brass eye or swift, but it does a relatively good job, i think. it doesn’t get enough credit in this regard.

i could bang on about this and go into deeper examples, but i think i’ve blathered on way too long already.

love your avatar btw. easily one of my favourite games.

reply to post #1261

@Screaming_Meat

@MrButtons

Ok you may have won this, but hopefully I can at least cause a stalemate.

ah, it’s not about winning anything. just chucking my tuppence in.

@MrButtons

I will say, however, that Contracts focused on and captured the memories of a dying murderer with undertones of horror, misery and despair. I honestly felt more tension playing Contracts precisely because of these macabre depictions. The daringly simple plot is in itself akin to 47’s methods of assassination: to the point, perfect and in a way, artistic. Contracts is as cold and detached as the man experiencing these flashbacks.

yeah, man. i love contracts. i think it has one of the best framing devices of the series. i really dig the macabre noir vibe too. i just don’t find it very subtle.

when i talked about tension, i meant between what is presented and what is actually going on, rather than the literal tension of the scene that the player experiences (scary music, dark hallways, creeping through the upper levels of the meat king’s party, etc.). contracts is exactly as it appears, whereas bm isn’t; you have to pull the level apart to see the rot underneath, which i really like.

it’s kind of like hotline miami in some ways. there is a tension there between the neon, hyper-baroque, cartoonish presentation on the surface and the bloody violence that the player commits within it.

not sure that makes sense

@MrButtons

Blood Money reflects on his career as well, but it felt as if it was handled not by David Fincher , but by Tarantino.

lynch!

absolution is tarantino. or wishes it was.

@MrButtons

It’s bombastic, in your face

ostensibly, yeah.

it is 47’s first foray in the us, and it is intentionally bright, cartoony and colourful on the surface, much like america comes across from the outside; however, when we dig into each level, it’s much more sordid or grim than that gaudy surface initially suggests.

that contrast of mundane but iconic american spaces and the horror under the surface is more striking to me than a spooky looking mansion or a bdsm slaughterhouse party. someone like 47 belongs in those latter spaces; he doesn’t belong in an idyllic american street or at the playboy mansion expy. to put it another way, contracts, and all the games before it, were about infiltration while blood money was where the series began to be about invasion , and i find it much creepier for that distinction.

contracts is obviously horror-noir from the get go. blood money, on the other hand, is america (or io’s take, at least); ostensibly glitzy, wholesome and exceptional on the surface, but in reality as violent and nasty as everywhere else. it is a happy-go-lucky cartoon bird hiding a murderous assassin; it’s a respected vineyard as a front for a drug lab; it’s a beautiful wedding where the bride wants her family dead.

again, not sure that makes sense.

@MrButtons

Hotline Miami is my spirit animal

i take it you enjoy hurting other people?

[MrButtons]

Ok you may have won this, but hopefully I can at least cause a stalemate.

I will say, however, that Contracts focused on and captured the memories of a dying murderer with undertones of horror, misery and despair. I honestly felt more tension playing Contracts precisely because of these macabre depictions. The daringly simple plot is in itself akin to 47’s methods of assassination: to the point, perfect and in a way, artistic. Contracts is as cold and detached as the man experiencing these flashbacks.

Blood Money reflects on his career as well, but it felt as if it was handled not by David Fincher, but by Tarantino. It’s bombastic, in your face and while I get the Blue Velvet reference, I felt as though I’d find a GTA easter egg rather than a severed ear. It would have been more suited if Sinistra was a serial killer rather than an informant. Bird mascots, evil clones, and the fact that 47 is known to a degree wherein he’s an urban legend in the eyes of the general public, nearly killed it for me. Don’t get me wrong, to each their own. I suppose you could say Blood Money had more charisma, but Contracts had guts.

Hotline Miami is my spirit animal

[MrButtons]

Absolution doesn’t exist. It never happened, ok?

I hear ya amigo. However, I’ll give you Cronenberg for Blood Money, but you’re not having Lynch. I always get confused between the three Davids. Or the 3Ds as I call them. Finch, Lyncher and Davidberg.

Gotta get a grip!!!

[Screaming_Meat]

@MrButtons

Absolution doesn’t exist. It never happened, ok?

absolutely.

@MrButtons

I hear ya amigo. However, I’ll give you Cronenberg for Blood Money, but you’re not having Lynch.

[MrButtons]

Made you waste your time by clicking on this.

[Screaming_Meat]

[Norseman]

As entertaining as this can be to read, I will remind people that this thread isn’t here for you to kidnap it or apply your logical fallacies to up end others arguments. If you wish to “discuss” this further then you can do it in a pm.

[Accidental_Kills98]

Too right, I think it is time to course correct.

I think Apex Predator is a weak mission when it comes to targets. There are too many of them walking routes that vary wildly in length, many of their kills aren’t cinematic or make the best use of the setting and outside of Montgomery they are all interchangeable.

It has all of the vices of a Hitman target system and its sole virtue is semi-consistent use of small kill opportunities. Overall it feels like one big giant Featured Contract.

[v1deost]

Hitman 3 in general lacks awesome cinematic kills. Apex Predator only emphasizes that fact. at least we got to see 47 flip a table, that was cool

[Heisenberg]

47 skewering Yates through his jowls was a pretty decent cinematic, even if you don’t get to bask in the actual stab so much.

[Peterchu]

I don’t mind the lack of cinematic kills because sometimes I wanted to take a picture of a kill from a different angle but it turned out to be a cinematic one…

[Mini]

I agree. There are many kills I would have love to see with a little cinematic. Ingram and Stuyvesant with the manipulated parachutes, killing Yates with flooting the area with wine… at least the mission story kills

[MrButtons]

Let’s not forget the DJ kill.

[Heisenberg]

Vidal at least, you know. Imagine a direct overhead view of her going into the crusher, or a closeup on the squeezer when it lifts and her flesh is clinging to both surfaces. A brief look at her shivering and ice crystals forming at the corners of her eyes if locked in the freezer…