Splinter Cell Chaos Theory

By Kristan Reed Published 3 September, 2004

Sam Fisher's latest adventure gets its first hands-on airing at Game Stars Live. Find out what we thought of it inside...

Order yours now from Simply Games.

Sneak onto the Ubisoft stand at Game Stars Live, grab the first unsuspecting Ubisoft staffer you can find (preferably alone), and bop them over the head, Sam Fisher-style, with your armful of pointless freebies. Actually, we think you might be outnumbered and probably bundled into the back of a Police van by burly men if you tried that, but it could be a useful way of scything through those hateful queues for the eight machines at the event currently housing a bite sized chunk of the next Splinter Cell game on Xbox.

Hardly a representative portion of the game at all, this small chunk of level 10 (we're told) thrust us into what appears to be a steam bath changing room area, fighting your way through half a dozen enemies, half of which are carrying machine guns. Like you do when you're relaxing in boiling steam. With no particular instructions issued to you, your best hope appears to rest on the usual tactics of creeping through the levels are stealthfully as possible, picking off each enemy one by one, either via headshots or the more daring neck break.

Sneaky peek

'Splinter Cell Chaos Theory' Screenshot 1

With only about five rooms in the demo (which ends abruptly the second you get to a particular door, and before you get the chance to complete your objectives) there's not a huge amount to report, save for a few minor - but very welcome - control tweaks. This time, when you get your gun out, clicking the left stick changes your gun shoulder, meaning you have the opportunity to approach corners already prepared in what amounts to a peek stance. Clicking it a few times makes it immediately apparent how useful this will become at being able to pick off enemies without having to always creep up to walls first, sidle up, peek out then take your weapon out. It feels instantly more intuitive, something of a first in a stealth game, and is sure to be adopted elsewhere; it feels that well implemented.

The weapon menu has received a more intuitive overhaul too, with the Xbox's white button giving the player the chance to quickly cycle through all the various gadgets and firearms. Y button, meanwhile, activates an alternative fire mode for your guns - meaning, for example, launcher or shotgun mode for the default SC40k. Strangely, we didn't notice any difference, but that's more likely to be down to the unfinished nature of the code than anything.

The only other thing of note we came across was the ability to slice through material -an ability shown off to devastating effect at E3. In this case, you're given the chance to listen into a bizarre conversation that, out of context, seems to make very little sense at all. Anyone attending Game Stars Live care to shed some light on this?

Spot the difference

'Splinter Cell Chaos Theory' Screenshot 2

Visually, it's hard - at this stage - to really notice any improvements at all, given that all we got to see was four or five rooms, all almost completely lacking illumination; just why does everyone in Splinter Cell games hang out in the dark? The PC version we saw back at E3 looked absolutely stunning. Glorious. But you'd kind of expect that. Scaled down to non HDTV resolutions at a consumer show on a plasma screen evidently using blurry composite inputs (when will they learn that this just makes games look worse?) the effect is somewhat underwhelming, in that it feels like more of what we've seen before, as opposed to the stunning newness at E3.

Sure, the brick textures on the walls that start the level are superb, the lighting is sublime, the animation top drawer, the shadows are (again) bizarrely jagged against objects (why oh why?), and the night vision/thermal vision effects are once again essential, but the same as before. But given that most of this wasn't broken before, why fix it? It's still easily one of the best looking console games we've seen, it's just in the context of such a small interior demo (in the dark) Ubi hasn't really given the game the chance to impress people as much as they could. For example, having witnessed loads of cool things at E3, there's no doubt that the outdoor weather effects and the myriad of gameplay possibilities would have proved much more exciting than this somewhat missed opportunity to get thousands of eager consumers excited.

We'll bring you a full Splinter Cell: Chaos Theory hands-on closer to the game's launch, including the much-anticipated multiplayer mode.

Order yours now from Simply Games.

Picture of Kristan.

About Kristan Reed

Kristan is a former editor of Eurogamer, dad, Stone Roses bore and Norwich City supporter who sometimes mutters optimistically about Team Silent getting back together.

Read more articles from Kristan by visiting the Kristan Reed archive page.

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Comments (15) Latest comment 8 years ago

Comments threads automatically close after 30 days, but please feel free to continue chatting on the forum!

  • TipTop #1 8 years ago

    Given the fact they have changed the most enjoyable part of the game i.e. the multiplayer 2 on 2 games, I too am a little underwhelmed. It's almost like two developers were given a chance at doing to a sequel to the first SC and this is an alternate sequel to the first rather than a progression on from Pandora Tomorrow.

  • spidermanalf #2 8 years ago

    Still have to finish number the second one! That'll be my mission for this weekend!

    This sounds promising though!

  • perilikid #3 8 years ago

    TipTop - have they actually replaced it, or is it just another option?

    I was impressed, personally, even though I didn't play it for long, feeling that Gamestars wasn't the best environment to really appreciate it. The animation has definitely been improved, the most noticeable example being that when you make Sam Fisher stop, he'll stop on the particular frame of animation for a second or two, before settling to his standard crouch position. It makes a real difference.

  • TipTop #4 8 years ago

    According to reports both online and off and I'll quote from XBM 'No head to head multiplayer'. Hence I suspect this was developed in parallel to PT not as a sequel, after all who would remove one of the biggest improvements (and critically acclaimed) to the original.

  • Killerbee #5 8 years ago

    I've still not finished the first one...!

  • perilikid #6 8 years ago

    That seems strange though, considering the MP side of SC:pT was developed by the original developers of SC, with the SP side being developed by a different studio.

    It'd be a real shame, I agree, if they were to give up the adversarial MP - as far as I'm concerned it's one of the best games - let alone online - I've ever played.

  • Kiigan #7 8 years ago

    Was I being thick, or was there no way at all to invert Y in the Splinter Cell Chaos Theory demo? Bah. Greaty way to alienate lots of potential customers eager to check out the latest Splinter Cell.

    Snowblind also had the same problem. Just couldn't play the fucker with the default controls, no way to change em in the demo.

  • gizmo #8 8 years ago

    Bought Pandora tomorrow purely for the live multiplayer. Haven't even tried single player.

    But then this seems to be the way my entire collection is developing, buy new game, play it xbox live multiplayer, never play the single player game much at all, other than to unlock the essentials.

  • TipTop #9 8 years ago

    Kilgan - you can invert before the X and Y axis in PT

  • krudster #10 8 years ago

    You're right, the GameStars demo didn't let you invert - v annoying!

  • Syrette #11 8 years ago

    'Just to clear up the confusion here:

    SplinterCell3 will ship with an upgrade to the Pandora-style multiplayer but
    also with 2 player co-op missions.'




    who told you that?
    Edited by 2 at 03/09/04 @ 21:40

  • Kiigan #12 8 years ago

    Thx TipTop, but I know about PT. I was just referring to the Chaos Theory demo at GameStars Live.

    After elbowing brats and finally getting a non-crashed Chaos Theory pod to play on, I found that I just couldn't play it coz the options were disabled. Real shame. I saw a few other people running around staring at the floor too, a sure sign of inverse-Y being needed.

  • Nause #13 8 years ago

    Wait did they say there was no more 2v2 ?

  • #14 8 years ago

    you sure that's not supposed to be lever?

  • cheddarmonkey2004 #15 8 years ago

    yey i went 2 games stars live. it was a great experience me and uk ninja infact. we strolled round to the splinter cell 3 area aswell. isn't that a coincidence. and i picked up the xbox pad and played. now i love the splinter cell series. i have and played pandora tomorrow and the original through and thurally enjoyed them. but something has changed. this has the full potential of being a great, fab, amazing game but the demo!!!!!!!! put it this way i am greatful to have played it but (which is believable) it wasn't up to scratch. shooting their heads only to realise that wasn't enough to kill them got strangely annoying. then that would make the enemies run round like mad men, amusing maybe but not accurate which the spliter cell series has been for me so far

  • cheddarmonkey2004 #16 8 years ago

    i know wot u mean but don't get me wrong Direct168 i think i will still be picking it up. i can see the finished version being a hit