Now, before everyone starts to go on me. I don’t mean, or wish, to retire agent 47.
A bit of a disclaimer : none of this will ever happen. I know it. But I like musing about.
The Introduction
Allow me to illustrate my wish :
This is from the start of Dishonored 2. The game is a level based stealth/action game with an emphasis on NPC and environement manipulation and an even larger emphasis on replayability and mastery. Not the most alien concept around here.
Contrary to Hitman, Dishonored is in first person, in a fantasy world. Also, as a small detail, it’s mostly played with a pletora of magic/eldritch powers.
More importantly for this wishlist point, the game can be played as one of two protagonists. Emily, and Corvo.
Each have their own powers and abilities. And if the game will have the same levels, the same missions between them, the game experience and possibilities given are very different.
It’s actually rather interesting to look at. The gameplay variations are not that large, but they are enough to encourage a double playthrough of the game.
It works great for the game.
The Actual Point
This brings me to the actual wishlist post, best illustrated by the following mock-up :
(As a bit of an aparte, I’m actually rather proud of the mock-up. It’s like a dozen screenshots of the game menus and of other pictures blended together. The lettering was a bit of a pain to do, and the whole thing took me way too long to do, mostly because it was made on a phone. But I think it’s rather good, isn’t it. Nevermind…)
Now, I chose to illustrate here with Victoria.
One, because it’s surprisingly effective to find a symbolic representation for her (the isotope necklace), like the tatoo is for 47. Two, and mostly, because I love canon-welding.
Yes, the whole concept resides in a male/female protagonist dichotomy.
Obviously, there is no powers in Hitman. So I don’t really wish for a whole new gameplay experience here. Maybe a few tweaks here and there.
Maybe have the instinct exclusive to 47, and the point-and-shoot system for Victoria. It was in the beta in 2016 after all.
Much more importantly, and this is the reason I think the idea could be a genuine good one for the future of Hitman when IOI goes back to them. This would completely overhaul the social (and disguise) dynamic of the level. Without having to recreate a new one, from the map to the NPCs, passing by the items, the interactive props, and other intels.
The largest change is the lack of security disguise for a woman protagonist. At least in the current games. I’m partially writing this for a hypothetical future continuity. Mostly because the level are definitively not designed around this kind of possibilities.
Not only are NPCs not placed for it, but the one that are, are not placed in a intuitively discoverable manner. The joy of User Experience.
The other side of the carefully crafted coin of the current level design.
Could still work in the current trilogy though as a “completely stranger, rough, inhospitable and unhelpful missions, it won’t be fun”. A good challenge.
An Illustration : Dubai
To illustrate in practice with Dubai.
I will start by continuing on my previous point. Because surprisingly Dubai is in some place a counterpoint to it.
There are multiple places where distractions (fuse boxes, vacuum cleaners, radios, or simply the closest NPC to a corner when coined) will first attract a woman NPC. Some are even conveniently isolated near a hiding spot. (I’m sounding way too creepy and stalky here, isn’t it. It’s for a genuine pure reason, I swear).
Generaly speaking, Dubai proposes the usual disguises. All with a few easily identifiable and doable possibilities to put them on.
In addition to them, there are a bunch of new unique NPCs that would wield with them new and interesting gameplay. Both on cornering them, to use their disguises, and on their respective authorized areas.
Kelly To (the NPC talking to the Vulture, the one in yellow clothes) regulary drinks a water bottle that can be tempered with after some acrobatics. And she is one of the few NPCs from the public side of level 1-2 to have open access to the level 3 (penthouse reception, server room). Maybe even the penthouse. Even if I would presume that quite a lot of enforcers would exist for her disguise. It would be interesting in gameplay.
In an ideal scenario, this would arrive with new story missions. Maybe to showcase a different stance, a different personnality.
But if I go toward “this could be done in the trilogy”, well the mute protagonist trope exist for a reason.
Besides making use of the “they don’t want to hear you and you will be ignored as an individual with autonomy” to assassinate them is always a “fun” possibility to narratively explore.
Freelancer ?
I know it won’t happen. I know of more than a dozen reasons why it won’t. From the technical, to the workload, passing by the animations and the lack of return on investment from prototyping.
But, well… Freelancer might be lighter on the “the protagonist is talking” and “narrative is central to the level” side of things. It might be more toward pure freeform gameplay. It definitively is when 47 is independant and with only the ones he trust and close to him.
A certain character, now in her mid twenties, highly capable, close and trusted by 47 and Diana, with no ICA in her horizon, whose presence double the gameplay variations…
If any devs, community/communication manager sees it. Allow me to be subtle here.
Wink Wink Nudge Nudge
End
I have a grand total of none, zero idea of the technical side of this. Certainly it cannot be done in the current games. But in the future, integrated/thought on from the start of the game design, of the level, of the map, of the mission design…
What do you all think of it ?
) there ya go, easier to pretend now.
