Hitman 2 (2018 video game)
Hitman 2 is a stealth video game developed by IO Interactive and published by Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment for Microsoft Windows, PlayStation 4, and Xbox One. It is the seventh major installment in the Hitman video game series and is the sequel to the 2016 game Hitman. The game was released on 13 November 2018 and was met with generally positive reviews, with critics considering it to be an improvement over its predecessor. A sequel, Hitman 3, is set to be released for Xbox One, Xbox Series X, PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, Microsoft Windows and Stadia in January 2021.
| Hitman 2 | |
|---|---|
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| Developer(s) | IO Interactive |
| Publisher(s) | Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment |
| Director(s) |
|
| Producer(s) |
|
| Designer(s) | P. Andreas Krough |
| Programmer(s) | Maurizio De Pascale |
| Writer(s) | Michael Vogt |
| Composer(s) | Niels Bye Nielsen |
| Series | Hitman |
| Platform(s) |
|
| Release | 13 November 2018 |
| Genre(s) | Stealth |
| Mode(s) | Single-player, multiplayer |
Gameplay
Hitman 2's gameplay is similar to that of the previous installment, being an action-adventure stealth-based game, as players control Agent 47, a contract assassin working for the International Contract Agency (ICA), in a third-person perspective, as he travels to various locations around the globe to eliminate high-profile criminal targets. The game features eight missions, which are set in distinct locations.[1][2] Summarily, the missions of the game take place (in order) on Hawke's Bay in New Zealand; at a racetrack in Miami; the fictional area of Santa Fortuna in Colombia; the slums of Mumbai; a fictional Vermont suburb; the fictional Isle of Sgàil somewhere in the North Atlantic; the fictional Milton-Fitzpatrick bank in New York City; and the fictional Haven Island resort in the Maldives.
The game introduces concussive gadgets, which can be used to render an NPC unconscious, and reintroduces the briefcase, which allows the player to conceal and carry large weapons, such as sniper rifles, in public without arousing suspicion.[3] The game's announcement was accompanied by the release of a cooperative multiplayer mode titled Sniper Assassin, available immediately to those who pre-order Hitman 2. This mode was also bundled with all copies of Hitman 2 when the game released.[4] In this mode, players are tasked with eliminating targets using a sniper rifle within a set time limit. In addition to Agent 47, players can play as Knight and Stone, both of whom have access to unique ammo types.[5]
As with the game's predecessor, Hitman 2 features the time-limited "Elusive Targets" missions. British actor Sean Bean portrays the first Elusive Target in the game.[6]
Synopsis
The listed chapters are those new to Hitman 2, but the game includes the content from the previous game if the player owns it or has bought the content as downloadable content for Hitman 2,[7] which allows playing it within Hitman 2's improved engine, including e.g. non-player characters being able to see in mirrors.[8]
Chapter 1: Nightcall
Following the events of Hitman, Agent 47 embarks on a mission to hunt the mysterious "Shadow Client" and disassemble his militia. His first lead is the location of one of the Shadow Client's lieutenants, Alma Reynard. 47 is able to gain some intel on the Shadow Client's activities from Reynard's home in New Zealand before eliminating her. Impressed with 47's performance, Providence authorizes him and the ICA to hunt down the rest of the Shadow Client's militia. When 47 asks Diana why the ICA would be willing to work with Providence, she replies that both organizations share interests in putting a stop to the Shadow Client, whose activities are now causing a global panic. She also reveals that Providence secretly promised to her to reveal 47's past.
Chapter 2: The Finish Line
Following the intel gained from Reynard, 47 is sent to Miami to assassinate tech giant Robert Knox and his daughter Sierra, the owner and heir of Kronstadt Industries. They secretly sold advanced weapons to war criminals and are Providence members who defected to the Shadow Client's side, presumably to protect themselves from his attacks. Meanwhile, the remaining members of Providence descend into consternation as more of their operatives are killed worldwide. Despite this, Providence manages to identify the Shadow Client as Lucas Grey, the former head of security to deceased Providence key-holder Eugene Cobb. Grey, located in Central Europe, pursues his own plans with hacktivist Olivia Hall and insists that they need 47's help if they are to dismantle Providence.
Chapter 3: Three-Headed Serpent
47 heads to Colombia next in order to assassinate drug lord Rico Delgado and his top lieutenants, who have been using their smuggling network to aid Grey and his militia. Diana reports the mission's success to Providence while visiting the graves of her family in Surrey. Flashbacks reveal that she witnessed her parents being killed by a car bomb after they attempted to bring the company responsible for her brother's death to court. Shortly after Grey steals an item from the Ether Corporation in Johannesburg, his militia use a hostage situation to publicly reveal Providence's existence.
Chapter 4: Chasing a Ghost
47 is sent to Mumbai to track down and eliminate the pirates who killed a Providence operative in Shanghai. After the mission, 47 follows Grey's trail to Romania, back to the same asylum where he was created by Dr. Ort-Meyer. He encounters Grey, who reveals that they were both previously kept in the lab to be raised as assassins for Providence. 47 regains some of his memories, remembering that Grey was Subject 6, and that they both made a pact to take revenge on those responsible for turning them into assassins.
The revelation leads to Diana meeting with Grey and Hall in Berlin. Grey reveals that Ort-Meyer, the scientist responsible for his and Agent 47's creation, was a member of Providence, who are controlled by a leader known as "the Constant" and three executive members known as "the Partners". After Grey and 47's original plan to take down the Partners failed, they decided to erase 47's memories, though Grey was able to escape before his memories were wiped. Grey's current objective is to capture the Constant, as he is the only person who knows the identities of the Partners. His only lead, however, is that 47 knew the identity of the first Constant. Grey reveals that the item he had stolen from the Ether Corporation was an antidote that may counteract 47's memory loss. Initially reluctant to work with Grey, Diana eventually abides by 47's wish to take the antidote.
Chapter 5: Another Life
The antidote allows 47 to remember that the first Constant was a legendary Cold War spymaster codenamed "Janus". In order to get close to Janus, Diana files a false report implicating Janus as the true Shadow Client while claiming Grey was just a subordinate, giving 47 pretext to infiltrate Janus' home in the suburbs of Vermont. Investigating several clues, Agent 47 finds evidence that Janus was planning to meet the Constant at a gala held by "The Ark Society", a plutocratic survivalist group created within Providence.
Chapter 6: The Ark Society
Hall is able to pinpoint the meeting location on a remote island in the North Atlantic, but they find out that the Constant, revealed as the man who hired Diana and 47 at the end of Hitman, has implanted himself with a chip that will instantly release lethal poison into his body if he is compromised. 47 is dispatched to eliminate Zoe and Sophia Washington, twin sisters and newly appointed chairwomen of the Ark Society who each hold a trigger for the Constant's poison chip. Once the Washington sisters are neutralized, 47 and Grey proceed to capture and extract the Constant to a ship, where the poison chip is surgically removed. 47, Grey, and Diana interrogate the Constant, pointing out that by being captured, his life is forfeit to the Partners. Defeated, the Constant reveals that Providence is made up of the Ingram, Carlisle, and Stuyvesant families, with each family having a representative that serves as a "Partner".
As 47 and Grey head out to confront the three families, the Constant taunts Diana about what she does not know about Agent 47. A final flashback reveals that 47 was responsible for the car bomb that killed Diana's parents.
Chapter 7: Golden Handshake
With the Constant's intel on Providence, 47 and Grey begin their mission to locate and eliminate the three "Partners" until Diana gives them an update. She tells them that Hall found recent obituaries for all three of them, and the group concludes that the Partners faked their deaths and plan on resuming their lives under new identities. The Constant, seemingly unaware of this contingency plan, tells 47 and Grey to follow their bank accounts, which leads the two to Milton-Fitzpatrick Bank in New York City. New data regarding the Partners is uploaded remotely to the bank, but 47 and the group have a limited opportunity to gather that information. 47 must eliminate Athena Savalas, the bank's director and a Providence operative, in order to contain the data breach without the Partners finding out.
To retrieve the data, 47 can either infiltrate the vault and retrieve a data core or he can retrieve three backup data disks carried by Savalas and her subordinates: Head of accounts, Fabian Mann, and head of security, Mateo Perez. Once 47 has completed the objectives, he meets Grey outside the bank. Grey says that Hall found something interesting and that he will tell 47 on the way. When 47 asks where they are traveling, he replies "to paradise".
Chapter 8: The Last Resort
With the data acquired from the Milton-Fitzpatrick bank, Hall discovers that the Partners paid transactions to HAVEN; a corporation based in the Maldives which presents itself as a reputation management service but secretly creates new identities for wealthy criminals. In order for Hall to successfully breach HAVEN servers, 47 is sent to infiltrate the HAVEN Island's HQ as a potential client to eliminate the resort's owners, who reset access to the servers at 10-hour intervals.
Once Hall gains access to HAVEN's files on the Partners, she discovers that the Partners' controlling business shares have not been allocated to their new identities, but rather to the Constant himself. Alarmed by this development, Diana rushes to the room where the Constant was being held, to find that he is no longer there. Meanwhile, Grey receives a cellphone call. He informs 47 that he received a message from Hall, that everything is going to plan, and that they know the locations of the Partners. The two prepare to continue their mission to eliminate the Partners.
Release
The game was announced on 7 June 2018 during a livestream by Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment.[9] Hitman 2 was released on 13 November 2018, although those who have pre-ordered the game's gold edition or collector's edition directly through the WB online store gain access to the game four days early: on 9 November.[10] Unlike its predecessor, Hitman 2 is not episodic.[11]
The game has two planned paid expansions following its release, adding locations, missions, sniper maps, outfits, and weapons. Gold edition owners get both expansions included while silver edition owners get only the first expansion.[10] The first DLC location, set in a bank in New York City, was released on June 25, 2019.[12] A second DLC location, set on an island in the Maldives, released on September 24, 2019.[13]
| Features | Standard Edition | Steelbook Edition (Europe and Australia only)[14] |
Silver Edition | Gold Edition | Collector's Edition (Only for Europe PC edition) | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Hitman 2 | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | |
| Digital content | Sniper Assassin Mode | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| ICA 19 Black Lily pistol | No | No | Yes | Yes | Yes | |
| Italian black leather briefcase | No | No | Yes | Yes | Yes | |
| Expansion 1 | No | No | Yes | Yes | Yes | |
| Main Game Early Access | No | No | No | Yes | Yes | |
| Expansion 2 | No | No | No | Yes | Yes | |
| Concussive rubber duck | No | No | No | Yes | Yes | |
| Midnight Black suit | No | No | No | Yes | Yes | |
| Physical content | Gun case replica | No | No | No | No | Yes |
| Steelcase | No | No | No | Yes | Yes | |
| Bullet keyring | No | No | No | No | Yes | |
| Rubber duck | No | No | No | No | Yes | |
| Signature coin | No | No | No | No | Yes | |
An early bug in Hitman 2's release, often referred to as the "homing briefcase", occurred when a briefcase was thrown at a target, the briefcase would spin and fly towards the target slowly, even if the target moved around the level.[15] The homing behaviour is an intentional feature of all thrown mêlée items in Hitman, but the speed was unusual.[15] While IO patched the speed out in update 2.14 (about four months after release), the developers acknowledged the bug later on, and added a special briefcase item, the Executive Briefcase MKII, that has the slow-homing speed restored, and was released on August 8, 2019 as part of the "Best Case Scenario" challenge pack. This briefcase item tracks the target it is thrown at a slow speed, slower than it originally did.[16]
Reception
| Reception | ||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
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Hitman 2 received "generally favorable" reviews, according to review aggregator Metacritic.[18][19][17]
GameSpot gave the game a positive review writing, "Hitman 2 is a familiar experience, but in the Hitman world, familiarity is an incredible strength".[20] The Verge praised the game writing, "Hitman 2 is the most refined and rewarding game in the series" noting it was a flawless execution.[21] The Guardian gave the game 4/5 stars, writing, "Assassination missions that reward subterfuge – such as wearing a giant flamingo suit or loosening a racing driver's wheel – make this a surprisingly creative sequel."[22]
Sales
Hitman 2 debuted at tenth place in the UK's all-format sales charts.[23] It released in a competitive week that saw the launch of new releases including Pokémon: Let's Go, Spyro Reignited Trilogy and Fallout 76.[24] In Japan, the PlayStation 4 version sold 10,162 copies within its debut week, which made it the fifth best-selling retail game of the week in the country.[25]
Awards
The game was nominated for "Control Design, 3D" and "Game, Franchise Adventure" at the National Academy of Video Game Trade Reviewers Awards.[26]
References
- Jones, Gary (7 June 2018). "Hitman 2 release date and first trailer revealed, no 2018 Season 2". Express.co.uk. Retrieved 8 June 2018.
- Grubb, Jeff (28 June 2019). "Hitman 2's first DLC level is a quirky and thrilling bank heist". venturebeat.com. Retrieved 10 July 2019.
- Wales, Matt (7 June 2018). "IO Interactive unveils Hitman 2, out in November". Eurogamer. Retrieved 8 June 2018.
- Gartenberg, Chaim (7 June 2018). "Hitman 2 will introduce co-op assassinations this November". The Verge. Retrieved 8 June 2018.
- McGregor, Collin (7 June 2018). "Hitman 2: Sniper Assassin Is Deep, Fun and Full of Potential". IGN. Retrieved 8 June 2018.
- Phillips, Tom (17 October 2018). "Sean Bean will be killed off again, this time as Hitman 2's first elusive target". Eurogamer. Retrieved 18 October 2018.
- "HITMAN Legacy Pack FAQ". ioi.dk. IO Interactive. 8 November 2018. Retrieved 20 June 2020.
- Thielenhaus, Kevin (11 November 2018). "Hitman 2 (2018): How To Download The Legacy Pack DLC | Free Hitman Levels Guide". Gameranx. Retrieved 20 June 2020.
- Khan, Imran (7 June 2018). "Hitman 2 Revealed, Coming November". Game Informer. Retrieved 8 June 2018.
- "Hitman 2". Hitman 2. Retrieved 7 June 2018.
- Singletary, Charles (7 June 2018). "Hitman 2 Confirmed, Scraps Episodic Release Format". Shacknews. Retrieved 8 June 2018.
- Gilliam, Ryan (24 June 2019). "Hitman 2's first expansion takes Agent 47 to New York". Polygon. Retrieved 27 June 2019.
- Wales, Matt (17 September 2019). "Hitman 2 gets tropical next week in new Maldives resort DLC, Haven Island". Eurogamer. Retrieved 8 April 2020.
- "Hitman 2 Steelbook Edition ~ PS4". Mighty Ape NZ.
- Wilde, Tyler (13 November 2018). "I can't stop laughing at Hitman 2's homing briefcase". PC Gamer. Retrieved 9 August 2019.
- Good, Owen (3 August 2019). "Hitman's heat-seeking briefcase is officially a weapon in the next update". Polygon. Retrieved 9 August 2019.
- "Hitman 2 for PC Reviews - Metacritic". Metacritic. Retrieved 14 November 2018.
- "Hitman 2 for PlayStation 4 Reviews - Metacritic". Metacritic. Retrieved 14 November 2018.
- "Hitman 2 for Xbox One Reviews - Metacritic". Metacritic. Retrieved 14 November 2018.
- Tran, Edmond (25 November 2018). "Hitman 2 Review - A Boy And His Briefcase". GameSpot.
- Statt, Nick (13 November 2018). "Hitman 2 is the most refined and rewarding game in the series". The Verge.
- Lane, Rick (13 November 2018). "Hitman 2 review – virtual violence takes a stealthy turn". The Guardian.
- Phillips, Tom (19 November 2018). "Spyro sold more physical copies at launch than Fallout 76". Eurogamer. Gamer Network. Retrieved 19 November 2018.
- Dring, Christopher (18 November 2018). "Pokémon and Spyro top hyper competitive week at UK games retail". GamesIndustry.biz.
- Romano, Sal (21 November 2018). "Media Create Sales: 11/12/18 – 11/18/18". Gematsu. Retrieved 4 October 2019.
- "Nominee List for 2018". National Academy of Video Game Trade Reviewers. 11 February 2019. Archived from the original on 13 February 2019. Retrieved 14 February 2019.
