Splinter Cell: Chaos Theory : Games : Web Wombat

It's like asking a rock fan who Ozzy Osbourne is. Although Sam fisher has never had a reality TV show he has all the traits of a proper gaming icon: rugged good looks, deadly skills, a vicious sense of fashion and an attitude that whispers in the ears of all: "Don't freak with me homeboy, I'm dangerous!"

Maybe it's about time Sam did settle down? Bow out of the secret service game, and just relax at home in front of the tellee with the wife and two mini Sams. Freak no!

Sam's too cool. For a start what sort of woman could satisfy Sam? Jenna Jameson? Too kinky. Nicole Kidman? Too stupid. See what I mean...

Sam needs action, he needs darkness and hi-tech weapons, not fluffy pillows and futuristic kettles.

For Sam to settle down now would be like he's selling out, selling out the fans. His best work is still yet to come, and he just keeps getting better with age.

Version three for the Splinter Cell series, called Chaos Theory, is a finely tuned continuation. The wheel wasn't broken to begin with, so the key elements still illuminate the structure.

Lambert is still in control, providing info on the mission at hand. And for those who have not had the Splinter Cell experience, standby for briefing at 0600 hours soldier.

0600 HRS:

Splinter Cell is a stealth-based assault game, which puts you in the big black boots of Sam "the Man" Fisher. Fisher works on solo operations for a top secret organisation and his missions have him travelling around the world nipping (and sometimes gashing) the heals of big shot terrorists. Your basic goal is to shut down their sophisticated operations of ultimate evil.

How can one guy shut down a whole terrorist operation? Well Sam is equipped with a truckload of hi-tech gear which is essential for this type of deal. Standby for equipment briefing at 0800 hours.

0800 HRS:

"Don't freak with me homeboy, I'm dangerous!"

1x Black stealth suit: looking very similar to a jet black wet suit, this allows the player (Sam) to become like a ghost in the dark shadows. You become near invisible when sticking to the dark areas and the suit also has a light meter installed, which allows you to monitor your own visibility.

1x Pair of night vision goggles: darkness is Sam's best friend. More bullets are spent on taking out the lights then the enemy in this game.

Night vision goggles give you the advantage over enemies who stumble about lost in a lightless room, whilst Sam has almost full vision with these little babies. They are also equipped with a thermal vision mode to see when your enemies are blushing.

1x Silenced pistol: You use this weapon the most, to take out the lights with a quiet "shrrrt" sound and the party begins!

1x Silenced sub machine gun: much like the silenced pistol except it fires a heap more bullets and has a zoom-in capability for taking out long range targets. Very popular in Japan at the moment.

1x Optic cable: Allows Sam to peer under doors and through keyholes to see what awaits him on the other side Can also be used as a trendy headpiece.

1x Flash grenades: Yet another way to blind the victim before you put an end to their career in high level trouble making. Also comes in handy at all-night raves when the ferals get too close.

There are a few other little doohickies such as sticky camera's, sticky shockers and fixtures for you sub machine guns, all of which even out the odds a bit for Sam when he's in the field. And he's in the field a lot, so it helps.

Sam is also in great athletic condition, despite his old-sounding voice, allowing him to be quite the gymnast. The key to success lies in your ability to attack the target in an unexpected way. The usual and most commonly used way is just to stealth up (a.k.a sneak up) quietly behind and grab the victim in a sleeper hold, but this won't work all the time and it gets repetitive and boring.

So to spice things up you can make Sam perch himself up high in narrow corridors using his expanding legs as support, and the enemy is none the wiser to his presence. You can pop a bullet through their brain or just slam down on top of them from this position. Sam can also dangle, cling, climb and shuffle himself along pipes and railings - he really is a very effective, self contained Splinter Cell.

We've surgically highlighted Sam Fisher on the left,
who is about to open a 700g can of hurt on his foes

NB: Sam can also whistle to attract victim's attention, cut through material to come at victims from behind, throw objects to make noise, switch off stereo's when he doesn't like the choonz, the list goes on.

These extra features keep the game interesting as there is usually more than one way to attack your target, either from up high or down low.

A statistics sheet is presented to you at the end of each mission, and these comprise of finding hostages, lobotomising insurgents and generally doing what the government tells you to.

This stat sheet informs you your overall percentage of success and this percentage is calculated by how many alarms were raised, how many bodies were found, how many innocent people were killed. In contrast, factors such as how many terrorists you topped and whether you completed any of the secondary priorities can help increase your chances of success as well.

The secondary priority might be something like "locate ten crates and place a tracking device on them, we want to see were they go". Cool huh?

As for the visuals I was quite taken aback by this cool covert, subversive anti-terror game. I am always impressed by the artist's use of lighting and textures, although I feel like (and most games do this) they start strong with some fantastic visuals in the early levels, but tend to get weaker throughout the game. Will Barker reckons this is because as deadlines for the game's release approach, they have to rush.

The Music for this game was done by Amon Tobin, who is quite well known and respected in the digital music world for his crazy and innovative style of beats. The marriage between Tobin and Kaos Theory certainly is a positive one.

Longterm? You get very good value from this game. Very good value. On top of a brilliant co-op mode (the strategies increase greatly when there's double trouble), which can be played online or split screen on the one teevee, there's also the massive single player campaign and another multiplayer mode called Versus.

2100 HRS:

This new Tom Clancy game is very good, there's not many bad things I can comment on. It's a fun game to play whatever mood your in, the music is top notch, the graphics are very high quality with superlative lighting effects, and with the added multiplayer modes Splinter Cell: Chaos Theory becomes one of the must-have games for 128-bit consoles. Great game.

Game: Splinter Cell: Chaos Theory
System: PS2
Players: 1-4
Online: Yes
Developer: Ubisoft
Distributor: Ubisoft

Rating: 85%

(Ratings Key/Explanation)

Splinter Cell: Chaos Theory is on the shelves now.

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