16-Jul-2004 Sam Fisher eats snakes for breakfast and poops out stealth perfection
Solid Snake must've messed his stealth suit when he first spied Sam Fisher in the original Splinter Cell. Here's a fella with an even squarer jaw than him, bigger muscles, cooler moves, better kit... plus he doesn't have a mullet!
So we can only imagine that Snake's currently curled up under a rock somewhere, waiting silently for Fisher fever to blow over. See, Pandora Tomorrow has kicked off a storm of excitement across the globe on Xbox. Now it's getting its second wind on PS2, and another hurricane of enthusiasm is brewing. This one's unlikely to die down in a hurry either. With good reason! Pandora Tomorrow is the slickest stealth actioner we've ever played. Fact!
Sam's matured for his latest espionage escapade. He's no longer a raw recruit with only a handful of deadly manoeuvres. He comes to Pandora Tomorrow armed to the teeth with even more killer skills and outrageously smart gizmos. And these extra abilities aren't just gimmicky additions that've been chucked in for show. They're crucial to how you play Pandora Tomorrow, and offer you masses of exciting ways to tackle all the rock-hard scenarios that await you in Ubisoft's arse-quakingly tense stealth thriller.
Kill Skill In Metal Gear you have to tap walls with your knuckles to alert guards and draw them towards you. Pandora Tomorrow expands on that idea and gives you much more flexibility for distracting and dealing with guards, because Sam can now whistle. It works wickedly, because you can use it anywhere - out in the open, perched on a ledge, dangling from a pipe or whatever. You're not limited by your surroundings.
This means that you can create stacks of unique guard-luring scenarios on the fly. You might be hanging from a cable and want the guard to pass beneath you - whistle him over and then let go of the cable to drop onto him and knock him out! Draw enemies into the shadows, lead them into other areas, muck 'em about! Sam's simple new talent cooks up heaps of fun distraction-style action.
Dingle-Dangle-Do Then there are the moves like the SWAT turn (where you rapidly spin from cover to cover unnoticed) and the sweet dangle-and-shoot manoeuvre! Hang upside-down from pipes, cables and beams and use your silenced pistol in this position. It's one of the slickest-looking moves around. On a little side note, we can't wait for Splinter Cell 3 where you get to pick up enemies by their heads while dangling bat-like and crack their necks.
Then there are all the new gadgets! We love the fact that you can now use your Optic Cable in almost any surveillance situation - threaded under doors, though grates in the floor and gaps in ceilings. Plus it's now equipped with thermal and night vision, both of which are regularly called upon. On the train level one of the blokes you're spying on has a wooden leg, and you have to make sure he's the right person by threading the Optic Cable under the door to his cabin on a train, and checking that only one of his legs shows up. There are stacks of class touches like this scattered throughout each mission.
Stat Attack There're some differences between the PS2 and the Xbox versions. We're not going to sugarcoat it; the Xbox version looks better! To get geeky for a moment, the textures aren't as polished and the lighting isn't nearly as dramatic in the PS2 game. That said, it still looks unbelievable and manages to conjure up just as much atmosphere and attitude as its Xbox cousin, because every level is so blindingly detailed and massively interactive.
Plus now whenever you complete a mission in this version, you get a breakdown of your performance. Time taken, number of kills, alarms triggered, that sort of stuff. Not much to rave about, but it does give stealth perfectionists an incentive to replay missions.
The gameplay's identical with the only difference being that the mission maps have been tweaked to offer slightly different routes through a level. Ubisoft has added a few small rooms to various locations, shifted doors and popped in extra ventilation shafts and moved other objects within levels. But to be honest, only hardcore followers of the series would notice these changes.
As for the multiplayer, it's exactly the same as the Xbox version and is guaranteed to become one of the most popular online experiences for PS2.
Solid Snake might as well stay under his rock for the next few years if Sam Fisher keeps this up, because Pandora Tomorrow is utterly indispensable.
Even though all of the missions see you carrying out the same objectives as those in the Xbox version, you have to go about things differently from time to time. The layout of each level has changed slightly. Plus some extra guards have been chucked in and new routes added, putting you in mildly tougher-to-handle situations.
Although the levels have been tweaked ever so slightly, the story and missions remain the same
There’s a few more booby traps too, that need to be cracked the same way as lock-picking
Extra surveillance cameras and new traps have also been added to levels, so it’s a wee bit trickier
The PS2 version has lobbed in more trapdoors and underground tunnel routes for you to slink through
// Drama King
Every mission features at least a couple of awesome blockbuster moments! Like the moment when you're doing a 200-foot zip-line down onto a submarine while guards search the night sky and torch lights criss-cross in front of you!
Bullets ping everywhere as you sprint across the roof of the train and dive for the rope
Here you’re crawling beneath the train with sparks flying. Real Hollywood stuff!
Who’s lurking in the freezing misty morgue? It’s so tense you’ll be pooping popsicles
One of your contacts is about to have his brains blown out! Time for a marksman hit!
// The Great Outdoors
Pandora Tomorrow takes much of the action outdoors and forces you to test your stealth skills in unpredictable playing fields. It no longer feels like you're just skulking through corridors. Each outside environment is crammed with detailed objects and scenery that you can utilise to conceal yourself - including natural features like trees, rivers and tall grass.
You can shoot out street lamps to create a cosy dark hiding place, just like indoors
There aren’t nearly as many shadows to slink into outside. This calls for more guile
Drag your hostage into the water and interrogate him under the bridge out of view
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