It’s crazy there haven’t been really great James Bond spy video games.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Npa-9M3v3PA
I worked on this teaser at Rhythm and Hues before there was any real game to even understand. We were winging it off of the most basic of info and concept art for a E3 presentation. There were some actual good ideas as a spinoff, but that teaser was the last I had heard of it for the longest time.
* rages in 64-bits
@mrcopilot I'm afraid to watch this. (But I'm totally going to watch this)
@virtualbri Hitman 3 is the best we got for actual spy stuff
@mattgriffin Yeah, I'm going to have to get around to that one.
@virtualbri it's AMAZING. then you realize it's also a slapstick comedy murder game and it becomes even more...
@virtualbri Sid Meier took a crack at one, way back when. He's held it up in interviews as an example of a design that he felt didn't really come together, but I enjoyed it a lot.
@jalefkowit woah, Sid Meier? That’s one I did NOT know about.
@virtualbri With Bruce Shelley! A real product of MicroProse's "murderer's row" era.
Jimmy Maher did a good write-up of "Covert Action" (and Meier's self-criticism of it) in his Digital Antiquarian blog a few years ago.
https://www.filfre.net/2017/03/whats-the-matter-with-covert-action/
@jalefkowit Definitely going to read this; love a post mortem on a project. There’s always something to learn afterwards.
@virtualbri Another flawed-but-interesting attempt is Activision's "Spycraft: The Great Game," from 1996. It's from the mid-'90s CD-ROM era, so it's FMV-heavy. But there's some intriguing ideas in it, and it tells one relatively solid story instead of telling a zillion procedurally generated ones like "Covert Action" did.
@jalefkowit Dang, these are amazing write-ups and story analysis. Thank you for introducing me to such a cool website.
@virtualbri No problem! It’s so good, and he’s been at it for so long. It’s the kind of little gem you don’t find on the web so much anymore.
@virtualbri Today I was reminded of this thread by this sale. hope it is of use.
![Screen Snippet from Good Old Games Spring Sale
Buy series (5)
Hitman: Codename 47
Hitman 2: Silent Assassin
Hitman 3: Contracts
Hitman: Absolution (In library)
Hitman: Blood Money
[All boxart images are of the Hitman character a bald white man with a barcode tatooed on the back of his head in a smart black suit and a pistol or two in his hand(s).]
Buy all games in the series. If you already own a game from the series, it won’t be added to your cart.
Retail 55.95 -90% On Sale $5.55
Add series to cart](https://files.mastodon.online/cache/preview_cards/images/071/559/981/original/087ae008517145d9.png "Screen Snippet from Good Old Games Spring Sale
Buy series (5)
Hitman: Codename 47
Hitman 2: Silent Assassin
Hitman 3: Contracts
Hitman: Absolution (In library)
Hitman: Blood Money
[All boxart images are of the Hitman character a bald white man with a barcode tatooed on the back of his head in a smart black suit and a pistol or two in his hand(s).]
Buy all games in the series. If you already own a game from the series, it won’t be added to your cart.
Retail 55.95 -90% On Sale $5.55
Add series to cart")
@mrcopilot Yeah I'm bummed Hitman 3 doesn't run properly on my machine. Got it for 89 cents from Steam, so it wasn't a big loss. I'm just in a "sneaking around" mood for gaming :)
@virtualbri I had to reread the thread to see no one brought up
NOLF
Which I remember having a really good time with.
RIP #Monolith
@mrcopilot Oh yeah, I had totally forgotten about this game! 60s super spy is a great genre
@virtualbri The Deus Ex games might scratch that sneaky itch if you haven't played any of them, should run on most toasters.
@virtualbri Purchasing this game is nigh on impossible short of second hand. There are 77k upvotes to preserve it at GOG
For anyone interested in it here is the PC demo at archive.org It was released on at least the PS2 as well.
https://archive.org/details/TheOperativeNoOneLivesForeverDemo
@mrcopilot @virtualbri I loved NOLF. I need to attempt to getting running under WINE again. My last attempt was only partially successful.
@virtualbri @mrcopilot If you like sneaking-around games, Rebellion's "Sniper Elite" series is also great. Moving from hidey-hole to hidey-hole, picking off bad guys from a distance, timing things so nobody hears your shot because you pulled the trigger when a car was backfiring or a plane passing by.
IMO the series' peak was 2017's Sniper Elite 4, which is $5.99 in the current Steam sale. (You'll probably want to check the system requirements if you had problems running Hitman 3, though)
@jalefkowit @virtualbri TBF
GeforceNow doesn't run it either on their super fancy cloud RTX machines.
@jalefkowit @mrcopilot Yeah I think the Hitman problem might be game specific; Splinter Cell: Chaos Theory which was recommended here too is running fine. I'll check out the Sniper series. Old games on sale on Steam is my jam :)