Splinter Cell: Chaos Theory

9 out of 10 - The Pinnacle of Stealth Gameplay

Chaos Theory wasn't just another entry in the Splinter Cell franchise - it was a seismic leap forward in nearly every way. Released in 2005, it redefined the standard for stealth action, refining the series' mechanics while adding an edge that felt darker, deeper, and more immersive than its predecessors. It's the entry where Sam Fisher didn't just survive the shadows - he owned them.

Gameplay: Stealth Refined to Perfection

The stealth in Chaos Theory is not just an option - it's a finely-tuned instrument. You're given tools, gadgets, and weapons, but your biggest weapon is choice. Want to go non-lethal? Use the OCP (Optically Channeled Potentiator) to disable lights and electronics, then choke enemies out. Want to go loud? The SC-20K can make noise when it has to, though it always feels like a last resort.

The enemy AI was smarter than ever, reacting to sound, light, and movement with surprising intelligence. This wasn't a game you could run-and-gun your way through - you had to think like a ghost. And every decision had weight.

Tone and Story: Darker, Sharper, More Personal

Unlike the more clinical approach of Pandora Tomorrow, Chaos Theory brought a grittier tone and a sharper edge to Sam Fisher himself. This Sam is more seasoned, more sarcastic, and far more human. The writing - especially Sam's banter with Lambert - hits that perfect balance of dry humor and razor-sharp realism.

The story itself - a geopolitical thriller with Japan, North Korea, and private military corporations - taps into early 2000s post-9/11 paranoia with unnerving accuracy. But it never becomes overwhelming. It's grounded. It's tight. And most importantly - it works.

Multiplayer & Co-op: Way Ahead of Its Time

The co-op mode in Chaos Theory deserves special praise. Two agents, working together to navigate levels built specifically for teamwork - it wasn't just an extra mode, it was a full experience. The communication, the coordination, the tension - it laid the groundwork for what stealth co-op could be.

Versus multiplayer returned with spies vs. Mercs - and for many, this mode alone justified the purchase. It was unique, intense, and demanded skill, patience, and strategy.

What Keeps It from a 10?

Only a few things hold it back from perfection: The story, while tight, doesn't always match the emotional resonance of later entries like Double Agent or Conviction.

Some mechanics, like quick saves, made the challenge feel less intense compared to the hardcore stealth ethos of the earlier games.

A few levels had slightly uneven pacing, especially for players wanting more variety beyond tech-based infiltration.

But these are minor critiques in a game that redefined its genre.

Final Verdict

9 out of 10. Legendary stealth.

Splinter Cell: Chaos Theory is the game where you set the pace. It gives you the sandbox, the tools, and the enemies - then says, "figure it out." It's slick, smart, and serious. A stealth masterpiece that aged better than most of its contemporaries.

If you love tactical thinking, strategic execution, and a cold, calculated protagonist who can crack a joke and your neck - this is the one.

This is based upon the PC version. In this third outing they take care of how pitifully poor at unarmed combat Sam was in the first two(seriously... a elbow to the head of a foe, and so weak that it takes two to knock anyone out, the second one being so slow that they'll fire off numerous rounds at you before it hits them?). Not only can you now render someone unconscious in one hit at close range from any angle, you can knife them, with the one difference being that they'll die. The blade can also be used to cut through fabric, and thus make new openings to tents and the like. You can now(due to all the new ways of taking out opponents at short range), drastically different from the ones before this, actually complete the majority of the game without firing a single round, if you please(!). For the first time in the series, you can get someone to go over a railing, in a couple of ways(my favorite? Pulling them over it, whilst hanging on it... oh yeah). That, along with hiding bodies, is made unnecessarily harder, though, by the changed, and now rather awkward, direction controls. Frankly, it usually doesn't make much of an impact, but when trying to Grab, or choose where exactly you're throwing or ditching enemies, it can get on your nerves. You can now travel through air ducts and the like. You get a few cool pieces of new equipment, such as EMF Vision, which reveals electronics, and is useful for figuring out where you can use your OCP, an attachment to your pistol, which temporarily disables cameras, lamps, etc. Speaking of things that go with your guns, the trusty SC-20K is changed around... though it still has the scope, there is now a genuine Sniper to turn it into, as well as a Shotgun, a precise one, and finally the one we know, that launches stuff. Hacking plays a bigger role here, and it's actually something you *do*, not just one click and it's done. It's not tough to get used to, and it isn't overused, I was never bored with the feature. You can now also use the ability to circumvent Retinal Scanners and Keypads, instead of coercing someone, or finding the code, respectively. The Split Jumping is the simplest and, actually, most awesome-looking of the three. Sensibility to light and sound is still the cornerstone(however, I could swear that there were times where I was in darkness and I, myself, could see Fisher, maybe it was for aesthetic reasons). There is now a Noise Meter, and while that might seem redundant, it's helpful in that it gauges how loud the surroundings already are, and thus lets you know very accurately how silent you have to be to not be heard. The graphics and animation are beefed up once again, and this has more elaborate cut-scenes, almost invariably fully rendered(one or two are in-engine), and they all relate directly to the story(apart from, like that of the original, the intro), which is very interesting and well-told, by the way. This time, especially near the end, they don't steer entirely clear of clichés, and the twists are good, if not all the way unpredictable. The Clancy fingerprint is yet again a strong positive of this, and the realism is high as a sky-scraper. This expects that you have tried the first two, and remember what happened in them. It doesn't do the "disappointing sequel" thing, nor lets up on difficulty, particularly(there are now three settings). It does spike up incredibly suddenly at some points, then again, it is mostly even. There are still faked news reports, and now, before each mission, you get a nice, detailed briefing, describing the situation, with every member of your team, and potentially ones you're working with temporarily, and you can listen to each, individually, again, if you missed anything, after which, you Load Up, where you select one of three(or only two, once or twice) configurations of what you bring along, depending on how you intend to handle it, Recommendation, Stealth, and Assault. That brings me to a very welcome new aspect to this... it actually has a reasonable amount of freedom(not as much as others, but they tried, and they succeeded as far as they went with it), as far as how you get through it. The varied objectives sometimes have more than one way to solve them(several computers, as well as people you can Interrogate, may hold the same bit of info that you are to collect, for example), and there are sometimes several ways to get to a spot. Apart from that, there are of course still many ways of getting rid of(or outright avoiding) the guards. This goes further in the streamlining of stuff that was there before in the franchise, and although one or two places, it maybe goes a little too far, it's almost exclusively a great thing. They bring back the map, and actually try to make it genuinely useful this time. It's a 3D model, and you can rotate it 360 degrees, it just has no specifications on anything, and doesn't tell you exactly where you are, it highlights that area. They were kind enough to add red squares to where your goals are, and this has the least "trying to figure out where you're supposed to go and how" of the trilogy. This can be frustrating. Sneaking is fun, as is fighting. While I haven't tried the multi-player, I can say that it sounds entertaining. There's Co-Op(two people, similar to single-player) and Versus, the latter of which has Extraction, Neutralization, Bombing, Disc Hunt Mode and Deathmatch. Music is nifty, not sure it's the same level as the predecessors. Audio is excellent, voice acting and effects alike. There's finally re-playability, with Unlockables, optional assignments and a rating system that gives a percentage readout of how well you did. I recommend this to any and all fans. 9/10

(Title: Splinter Cell Trilogy - remastered in HD)

Setting: Korea, Japan, U.S.

Graphics: Big step up from the first two remastered games. It impressed me almost as much as Deus Ex for the Playstation 2 on my 34 cm colour TV! It often looks terrific…like a PS3 generation game, although some of the character modelling still looks PS2 standard. The bad guys often have a sleepwalker/zombie/Cliff Young shuffle to their walk, although it slightly improves later on in the game. Very impressive visuals. Sam Fisher also looks different in the game, as you play him…he seems bigger on the screen, so there is some adjustment to the new look of the game.

Sound: Didn't notice it too much, but it is annoying how the sound you make in the game alerts the bad guys…in a silly way…e.g. if you creep to fast, e.g. a lighthouse on a stormy, windy day, the guy inside, on the ham radio will hear you! Hmm. Stuff like that.

Good about the game: * I don't usually give credit to Ubisoft, finding their games sucky in one way or another, but big plaudits to them for the way that you gave revisit any mission you've played and try and improve your % score. That gives replayability to the game. I replayed a few missions or parts of missions in order to unlock trophies and it did not affect my score in bad ways. E.g. I had one save for the very end of the game and I went redid an earlier mission to get the trophy for getting at least 80% in every mission. I did that, and when I went back to my end game save, all my later mission successes were not altered, so I got my trophy. Not sure if that cuts both ways…I'd hate to do WORSE in a replayed mission and have that show up on your save for the finale…especially if you did not save that replay.

* I actually had fun early on in the game coming to grips with the new look and feel of the game. I'd laugh if I got into trouble with the bad guys as I was adjusting to the new dynamics of the game.

* Humour is back in the game. There are some 'cute' easter eggs too, I suppose that you would call them…checker boards with 5 black and 5 red squares for each side; TV screens showing promos for the previous Splinter Cell game (the apartment mission, I think). The security firm mission has a newspaper mentioning Ubisoft! Sometimes you get a Vincent Price type voice saying "Darkness" when you endarken an area.

Bad about the game: * Has some bugs like: quickloading a game can quit the game! The game seems to save more than once sometimes when you save…either that or there is delay between you saving and the game acting on it…so that you are surprised when the game stops to save. This could potentially be very bad…as in you saving when you are in good position and the game acting on that when you are bad position…you might find yourself in an impossible spot and need to restart the entire mission again. Fortunately, this never happened to me.

* Stupid trophies! Loads of trophies for just basically playing the mission or the game. I got sucked in to a certain extent (e.g. one for getting at least 80% score for every mission) but some I just can't be bothered chasing.

* There is a new sound meter which shows how much noise you are making…it's unrealistic.

* In the apartment mission, once you reach the helicopter, the noise of that helicopter keeps going, even after you have moved across the road…and inside another building! Just annoying to hear that noise.

* The game has bodies to find. Not sure what the Hell that is all about. If there's a trophy in it, I can't be bothered with it. One body that I found was actually invisible, initially! WTF? All rather silly, really.

* Sam dying when he doesn't auto-grab edges.

Misjudgements in the game: * The BIG one: the horrible hacking mode in the game. It is utterly baffling! When I did manage to hack a computer or whatever, it felt quite random…I had no idea why it worked. You really need to be able to do this in the game. Eventually I consulted the training tutorial for this (I pretty much knew how to do everything else or could work it out myself…which is GOOD about games!) but that wasn't much help. Had to go online for the trick to hacking. It's mind numbingly simple once you know how to do it. It's just a pity that it's so incomprehensible to work it out or have useful advice in the tutorial video to help you. I actually had FUN with the game once I knew the trick to hacking…getting to actually enjoy the gameplay! How about that? For the unitiated, the hacking puzzle just overloads you with information which I found impossible to process…the number of online tips proves that the system is not intuitive…bad, in other words. Some verbal tips in the training video on what buttons to press would have helped…there were a lot of visual clues which weren't obvious…to much information to process. Useless.

General observations:

The best game of the trilogy. You can see the seeds of some of the features I hate in Ubisoft's Assassin's Creed series here. Would have liked to have known why missions didn't get 100% even when I thought I did everything required. 10-20 hours worth of play over 10 missions…10 for replays once you know the drill.

Plain and simple its a really good game. its got an awesome plot and the graphics have improved from the old splinter cell games. when i got this game and played it i was addicted i just couldn't get enough of the game. I wouldn't recommend playing co-op with someone who's never played the game before. I've tried. Usually they will just run around shooting anything and end up getting killed within the first minute or so. but the single player is terrific. If you don't have any patience i wouldn't recommend playing the game. In this game you are the shadows. YOU choose how, when, and where they die. YOU are your enemy's greatest fear. they cant stop you. at the flicker of a light your enemies will fall. how do you kill something that can't be seen? you don't.

It's the summer of 2007, and tensions are running high between China, North Korea, and Japan, following Japan's formation of an Information Self Defense Force (I-SDF). Considering this to be a violation of the Post-World War Two Constitution, Chinese and North Korean forces establish a blockade in the Yellow Sea against Japanese shipping.

Sam Fisher is on yet another mission to solve this issue on the Eastern Asian Countries. And prevent a WW3 between North Korea, China, and the USA.

Throughout the game you'll experience newer stealth and attack techniques that weren't included in the first 2 installments. Including improved Thermal, Night, and a new EMP Vision. There's also new combats including both lethal and non-lethal attack on an enemy. You're able to use a Combat Knife to negotiate with an enemy instead of your trademark 5.72mm pistol. You're pistol in fact is upgraded with an Optically Channeled Potentiator which disables anything that's electronic for a short time.

The graphic again, are excellent and improved, Strong and great voice overs, the storyline is longer, you're able to save your progress and not start all over at the checkpoint, and it's probably the best Splinter Cell game yet. Highly recommended to the fans of the previous games.