FAQ

No, this is a completely different game. It is not directly based on the previous game, but actually a very extensive "remake" of GoldenEye (1995), the original movie that the N64 Goldeneye was based on as well.

What has basically remained the same is the following:

• Overall plot (Bond facing a crime syndicate lead by a former ally who has gone rogue).

• Many of the same locations are used (Arkhangelsk/Severnaya/ St. Petersburg), many of the action sequences return, and lines of dialogue directly refer to the original movie.

• Most of the original characters are featured (M is even played by the same actress, Judi Dench).

• Same song playing over the opening credits (this time, performed by Nicole Scherzinger).

Among the many differences:

• James Bond is played by Daniel Craig this time; just as with Casino Royale (2006), this means the overall tone of the game is much darker, the action more physical, and the Bond character much tougher than in the original movie.

• Miss Moneypenny, Q, Boris Grishenko and CIA agent Jack Wade are missing from the game, although an American character called Skye Briggs features briefly, who may have been intended as a nod to Wade.

• Characters that were carried over from the movie are portrayed by different actors (except for M) and sometimes have a different part in the story; e.g. Valentin Zukovsky is much younger, has a scar instead of a limp, is a club owner in Barcelona instead of a ex-KGB crime boss, and is killed by Xenia Onatopp (he survived in the movie) posing as a waitress in Zukovsky's club.

• The game is set between the events of Quantum of Solace (2008) and Skyfall (2012), whereas the movie took place in the nineties. The time frame of the game is considerably compressed compared to the movie, where nine years passed between the opening scene and the remainder of the movie. In the game, all events seem to happen within several days, and a few weeks at most.

• Differences in plot: Bond visits Zukovsky for information about the helicopter in his night club in Barcelona. Zukovsky lives in St. Petersburg in the movie, their meeting occurs after the Severnaya attack, and he helps Bond to make contact with Janus; the night club escape is exclusively in the game. Xenia and Ourumov steal an EMP resistant helicopter at an arms fair in Dubai (Monte Carlo in the movie), where they create a hostage situation which is not in the movie (although they do steal the helicopter). Bond is present at Severnaya when they stage their attack (where he also meets Natalya for the first time). Ourumov is killed by Xenia, not Bond. The part where Bond goes to meet the head of the Janus group, who turns out to be Alec Trevelyan, and ends up in the helicopter set to self-destruct, occurs after his prison escape and tank chase in the game (reverse order compared to the movie). And the game's climax takes place in a solar energy station in Nigeria, whereas it was a hidden base in Cuba in the movie.