On Splinter Cells

SPOILER ALERT! If you haven't played Splinter Cell: Double Agent and don't want to know anything about it before you do, don't read any further.

I've been a huge fan of the Splinter Cell series since the first game came out, and it was with some anticipation I started playing the latest addition to the series (Double Agent) a month or so ago. Well, I finally got around to finishing it up last week, and I'm somewhat disappointed. The narrative style in the first half of the game didn't make any sense to me since there wasn't nearly enough of it to convey the story right. Also, the JBA HQ timed missions really didn't really do it for me. I appreciate the effort to try to innovate, but it's Splinter Cell, not "Sherlock Holmes: Searching for fingerprints in random places". I did enjoy the regular missions though, but because a large part of the game takes place in broad daylight (or close to it), it took away some of the patented I'm-Death-in-the-Dark feeling I've come to enjoy over the years. Also, the game has a lot less of the dark humor I find so entertaining. Overall, it just didn't feel like a proper Splinter Cell game. It's a 7/10 in my book.

Now, while watching the end credits, I came to realize that this game was made by the Ubisoft Shanghai team rather than the Montreal team (who made the original Splinter Cell and Chaos Theory), and that explains quite a bit. Just as in "Pandora Tomorrow" (also made by the Shanghai team), things that are just slightly off (e.g. less dark humor, reuse of textures/sounds). The good news is that the Montreal team is working on the 5th entry in the series (a 360 exclusive, I believe), and that gives me hope for a better experience next time around.