HitMan: Blood Money

[mmosu]

I just was a MASS MURDERER quite a few times. I guess I didn't want to leave witnesses.  hehe.

To leave no witnesses is fun, but to never create any to begin with is to master the hit!




fixed the quote for you / Art Blade

[Art Blade]

that's it, just hard to accomplish in the first run :) Fortunately you can try again and again

[mmosu]

that's it, just hard to accomplish in the first run :) Fortunately you can try again and again

I did it once, Silent Assassin on a first try.  Pure luck, just happened to be standing in the right place at the right time.  That's pretty much what it takes, unless you are willing to study AI patterns for hours on end during your first try, not the most fun approach. . .

[Art Blade]

The hardest missions were the Mississippi steam boat (5 gang members + captain of it) and that wedding on a ranch with crocodiles... jeez, took me ages to get those sorted :) The wedding and the boat has like a hundred plus of innocent bystanders, takes ages to kill them all  ;D And both are very tricky to manage if you want to achive silent assassin. Oh, and the opera mission... wow, that can take quite some time, this way or another :)

My favourite mission is that Vinnie Slugger mission with that FBI guarded mansion and the pool. Did it dozens of times :)

[PZ]

You mean that the mission involved killing all the innocent bystanders?

[Art Blade]

hahaha, not at all :) The game specifically tells you which target(s) to eliminate, but it is up to you how much collaterals are involved... I did kill all of the innocents so there were no witnesses left  ;D

[PZ]

lol, that's funny - no witnesses and your reputation is solid!

[Art Blade]

hehe, you can do what you want :) Your reputation might be rotten after a mayhem like the one mentioned above, but at least you had some fun  ;D

Usually a mission works like this:

- explore the area, check the escape routes
- find your target(s)
- if necessary (mostly it is) disguise yourself without anyone watching you (use syringes with narcotics, don't kill the guy whose clothes you want to borrow)
- make sure no one witnesses you when...
- ...you kill him or them...
- ...silently, if possible.
- find the only video cassette if you got caught on camera (you will see the recording in progress displayed to you if so)
- perhaps kill the witness(es) if there were any
- if possible, hide bodies (there are crates or garbage containers to do so)
- if possible, retrieve your own clothes
- escape

Well, if you were silent and unnoticed, you may walk around after your hit. And do some extra damage, if you are in a bad mood  ;) ;D

On a PC you can save up to three times per mission or have to override a savegame. Higher difficulty levels only allow a certain amount of saves per mission, up to none. So you have to be thoughtful :)

[PZ]

Sounds like loads of fun - and replay value  :-X

[mmosu]

that was the big draw for me in the beginning, the game is only limited by the cunning and creativity of the player

[JRD]

So I finished my first real assassination in HMBM...
The one at the amusement park won`t count as its like a tutorial imo...
Got that druglord and his son in Chile during the wine tasting... excellent gameplay... really, really entertaining... I`m glad I sepent 15 bucks in it.
I saw so many ways of accomplishing the both killings. Finnally I managed to do it completely undetected. Shot the son in the head at the cellar while nobody was watching and went for his father. Managed to climb to the roof of the mansion unseen, into the room through an open window and another headshot.
Escape was very easy. I just didn`t know you have to retrieve your suit for perfection (if you don`t you loose 5,000 k of you cash - no big deal)
During my investigation of the local (I really like that part) I also realized many different ways to infiltrate and assassinate both targets...
I have played the very first HM before, long ago, but never finished it, can`t remember why!! This one is much more fluid and smooth even though is clearly outdated graphicswise.
Still, I`m having a lot of fun with this one and Burnout Paradise...

I wish levels were bigger though... the big villa those guys were living ain`t that big!!!

Any chance of a new Hitman hitting the shelves one day in the near future?

[Art Blade]

glad you like it, JRD  :) I kind of knew you would  ;D

Well, if there's any sequel, count me in  :-X

[mmosu]

I am suspicious that "Kane & Lynch: dead men" was Eidos first attempt at working out their next generation gaming engine and "big crowd" dynamics for the new platforms.  Hope that's what it was anyway, it had potential but it was a real stinker from what I hear (I only played the downloadable demo personally).  If so then maybe a new hitman is not far off!!! ;D :-X

[Art Blade]

I played Kane&Lynch through two or three times. I liked it a lot after you got used to exchanging weapons with your buddies (more like, I used them as a weapon box and gave them stuff I needed later). It had a similar portion of dark humour as had the HitMan series, and it was quite funny, too.

I'll never forget that one scene when you return to the lobby of a bank where that brute buddy of yours was supposed to watch over the hostages, but all you see is dead bodies everywhere and hear him curse and shoot. Then you ask him what the hell he was doing, and he tried to convince you the lobby had been stormed by police and the likes. When you tell him there are no police at all, he excuses himself with something along the line of "it was hot under my mask" LOL - he only had had fun shooting down all innocents. Insane ba$t@rd  ;D

But it is a very linear game.

[JRD]

So I guess I made the right choice... I was between Kane & Lynch and Hitman: Blood Money.
I really like the non linear aspect of HMBM... there are several ways of accomplishing your assassinations and it makes for great replayability, which is one aspect of a game I care the most.
I said it once and will say it again... games like Crysis, beautyful but stupid linear, just sucks... a dumb FPS, a memory test with absolutely no replay value... waste of money.
HMBM is outdated, but gameplay is great and I`m sure it`s worth every cent I spent on it ($14.99  ;D )
K&L being linear is one thing that can make me stay away from it. The new GTA IV, although beautyful, didn`t hook me. I`m halfway through the game and just don`t play it anymore. Its not that linear, but it leads you by the hand to perform your tasks. You have to take the gun they give you, stay in the spot they tell you to and do as you are told!
After the freedom experienced in FC2 and now HMBM, I just can`t play games like this! Even HMBM is sometimes too obvious in hinting you as how to kill that guy, but you can always choose the other way round  ;)

So far I managed to kill all my targets unnoticed, notoriety is at zero, made my first million andstill have lots to do (playing on normal, next time will do it on Expert and face the challenge)

[Art Blade]

:)

I think a game is great if you keep playing it even after years.

[JRD]

Hey Art... what`s with that hideout with spots for lots of guns, but just one set available?
And what is that notoriety stuff... zero is the better right? I mean, if my notoriety is high, it means my face is well known and I`ll have trouble accomplishing my tasks... isn`t it?
Cheers

[Art Blade]

The hideout is where all those weapons show up that you grabbed and carried around during your missions. Usually there are special weapons, some are like on a shelf in a room, some in posession of your targets, or police etc. The tutorial has a Dragunov which is tricky to get. Took me years to finally get it: use the black weapon box on the ground floor of the house where the secretary and the boss of that theme park are. Place it inside that box there, the other boxes don't w@&k for that matter. you can grab the Deagle or Uzi and all and keep them in your jacket. They will then show up in your hideout. The hideout is also a shooting range where you can play with your guns.

The notority is bad. keep it zero. Else they may recognise you during missions.

[mmosu]

Yeah, I started a game once with the objective of raising my notoriety as high as it would go.  So I did things like walking around firing indiscriminately up into the sky while howling at the moon, dancing around in front of every camera I could find, and generally raising mayhem in as much of a high-profile fashion as possible.  I wasn't too many missions in when it had already gotten to the point where guards would fire at me on sight and civilians would run away screaming things like "it's the man from TV!" or something along those lines.  Anyway, it got frusterating very quickly.

Art, maybe I should give K&L another chance, I don't mind playing through a linear game once if the story is good.  Might be a good one to rent. . .

[Art Blade]

mmosu, I had read good critics about the game before I got it, and it was fun. You can do a lot of nonsense like shooting "innocent" people in a prison etc, so you have a certain freedom to go on rampage. The game itself is not exactly easy, just the right mixture between story, action, and lots of dark humour :) I'd definitely recommend it if you can rent it.  :)

[JRD]

HITMAN 5 DUE TO 2010?

[mmosu]

that would be amazing :-X

[Art Blade]

cool... would be great :)

did you see the last line... "Kane & Lynch 2: Dog Days"?  ;D

[Hacko]

I am downloading this game right now through Steam, it cost only $4.99. :-X Steam is having a sale this weekend on all the Hitman games they have, some good deals on there now.
I will start messing around with this game in a little while after it finishes up downloading. It sounds like it will be a fun game. I will post here with my thoughts on the game after trying it out for awhile. Thanks for the heads up on this game, I'm always looking for something new to play. :-X

[JRD]

You won't regret.. graphics are outdated, but gasmeplay is fun... lots of replay value and freedom to accomplish your targets... really a good buy for me... thanks to Art for that one