Price: £44.99 Players: 1 Widescreen: No Dolby Digital 5.1: Yes Xbox Live-enabled: Yes Tom Clancy's Splinter Cell pits you as Sam Fisher, a National Security Agency operative in black gear - a job that's all hush-hush, as you sneak around interrogating the enemy, holding them hostage when others are pointing guns at you and knocking them out when you've finished, in 9 levels that are spread out over four countries. Of course, you can try rushing in, shooting all you can see but that's not the way to get things done and you'll also soon run out of bullets. Something new I've not seen in a game is the way you can jump off more than one wall in quick succession, resulting in straddling across two close together - just right for waiting for a baddie to drop down and knock out. Lockpicking is also different to any other spy game I've played before. Instead of waiting a fixed length of time, you now have to twiddle the left analogue stick several times as you can see and feel the inside of the lock. It doesn't make for a quick exercise, so I hope I won't end up having to do this when there's someone after me, but you never know.

The graphics and sound are first-rate here. There's fantastic textures all around, particularly with fire and when you get close-ups of certain things, such as when I turned round and saw my character's hair - it was quite a surprise to see how well-detailed it was. It also has what I can only describe as the nice swishy effect as he passes by netting and curtains - similar but not quite as perfect as Hitman 2's curtains in the confessional booth. I say not quite perfect because they also have a habit of swishing through solid objects. There's also jagged edges to be spotted from time to time. When it comes to the sound, it makes great use of the positioning all around the soundstage as you turn round to find out where exactly those footsteps you can hear are coming from. The control system takes a bit of getting used to. Largely it's intuitive, but it's not configurable and, as a result, is annoying when you press buttons accidentally because they're not the same as other similar games, so when you expect to continue to creep about, you instead jump up high and pirouette, making a real ass of yourself. Why couldn't the programmers allow us to redefine the controls? Sam also seems to lurch about a bit too much as he runs.

So, where does Splinter Cell fall down? Well, it's an entertaining game, but it just doesn't feel like it has the edge over my second-favourite game of 2002, Hitman 2, as that game allows you to pretend to other enemy characters that you're part of the scenery, as you blend in by stealing someone's clothes, using their weapons or trying out several different murder implements such as fibre wire and AK-47s whereas I'm just stuck with a pistol. Apparently there are more lethal and non-lethal weapons later on in the game, but I reckon some of these needed to be brought forward as I only managed a couple of levels into the game before my interest faltered. I might give it another try after a while, and if I find it improved as I continue then I'll update this review. I'm also looking to find more freedom of movement in terms of manipulating a lot more various items than I can in Splinter Cell. Most of what I can find to play with early on is cans and bottles. You can try and fool the enemy into thinking you're on the other side of the area you're covering by lobbing it long and hard, but if you've got to wait for them to pass by at certain points for you to progress then how does that make them a useful tool all the time? That leads me on to another niggle. I know I'm comparing again, but now I'm used to being able to complete missions in a variety of ways thanks to the game mentioned above, here you have one set path and there's not really much of a way you can divert from it. I also need a stealth game that makes me feel scared while playing it and trying to evade the bad guys, but this one doesn't do that. Examples over the past few years including, yes, that one above, plus Thief 2: The Metal Age and the first Resident Evil game.

To end on a more positive note, for those that do get into the game more than I did, there are extra features to be found, the like of which you'd usually expect from a DVD rather than a game. These include behind the scenes material such as production notes, info about the staff and video footage about the cast, including Robocop's Michael Ironside talking about how he voices the main character, Sam and an "interview" with Sam Fisher, off-duty, while various people walk about behind him. I presume those are the people who created the game, getting their moment on camera. This interview is a very nice additional touch. There's also random facts about the game and trailers for other stealth games Tom Clancy's Ghost Recon and XIII. Coming later in the year will also be extra downloadable levels through Xbox Live.

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Review copyright © Dominic Robinson, 2002.