Confidential Mission

"Why did we have to wait so long for thiss great game?"

When playing this game you will find yourself wondering why this game couldn’t have been released earlier. After all, the graphics are mediocre and could have been from a launch title. In Confidential Mission you play a secret agent on a mission to stop a devastating weapon … a satellite. Lots of the ideas in the storyline and characters have obviously been borrowed from James Bond and even some of the bosses look similar to villains in the James Bond films. Other gameplay elements such as the circles around enemies as they prepare to open fire are rather like the virtua cop games. But at least this informs you which enemies you should be popping first.

Gameplay: 9/10
There is nothing wrong with the gameplay; it is your average light gun game with the normal formula: shoot the bad guys before they shoot you. You lose lives if you shoot civilians and you have a number of credits. On the plus side, developer Hitmaker has added a new twist in the form of small mini games that affect the next piece of action. For example, in the first section you find yourself locked in a gas-filled room, you have to shoot adhesive bullets to stop the gas. Complete the challenge and everything is fine, fail it though and you find yourself dizzy and impaired, which makes the next section more difficult as the screen sways and smudges.

Playing through the all too short game, you are sometimes overwhelmed by the sheer number of enemies on screen. Add to this the fact that the official light gun is not the most suitable weapon due to a stiff trigger. You feel more useless, as if you were really in the game fighting tons of terrorists but holding a plastic gun and shouting, “pop”. But once you get a feel for the game, i.e. shooting the enemies in the right order and reloading, the gameplay become more enjoyable. The difficulty level is not too high and completing the game is easy as long as you have the time. As I said before, there are lots of enemies but the levels are nothing special in size; this way the amount of troops you have to kill pushes up the completion time and makes the shooting a bit monotonous.

The developers have added a new section that wasn’t in the arcade version, a training mode called “agent academy”. The same thing was done in HOTD2, to add more replay value. It doesn’t accomplish this because of the horrid difficulty level and boring challenges. That is the problem with the main game, the lack of “just one more go” has probably been shot by one of the terrorists in the game. After completing the main game a couple of times there is not much incentive to come back and have another play.

Sound: 8/10
Not one of the strongest points in the game. There are a few tracks that are played throughout the game but they don’t have a lasting impact because you are trying to concentrate on actually hitting the soldiers on screen. The main theme tune is the typical action/secret agent theme which can become tiresome after a while but is none the less well composed and suits the action and cut scenes well. Gun and other sound effects are realistic like many other fps or light gun games. The quality overall is above average, with every gunshot and scream being recreated in crisp digital sound waves. Confidential Mission has good sound quality but it could do with more fast-paced exciting tunes like Sonic Adventure 2 has. The music tracks it does have are quite good but become boring rather quickly.

Graphics: 7/10
The visuals here are poor, they look like something the N64 could produce, not the high-quality graphics that we have come to expect from the later releases on DC when the developers were really getting into their stride. Admittedly, the models are of a nice quality but the textures are mucky and look smudged. This is highlighted when an enemy pops out close up, showing the low res textures that make up his character model. Luckily, most of the soldiers you have to fight are a reasonable distance away so the action looks good. But has the smooth gameplay with no slowdown come at a price? It’s hard to say; with more detailed textures throughout the game it would run slower, so probably yes. The large areas in the game would also add up the polygons reducing the number available to be used on character models. But do the graphics really matter that much? Well in my opinion, no. It is the gameplay primarily. And that is the high point of the game.

Overall: 8/10
Basically Confidential Mission is a mixed quality game. Good gameplay, bad graphics, medium sound. It has more strong points than weak so it is a worthy title to add to your library of games. When comparing this game to HOTD2 in terms of sheer fun to play, this game comes out slightly better. But if you like to demonstrate the power of the DC then play HOTD2 more. Either way this game will provide concentrated fun. It is amazing at the start when you are completing it for the first few times. Then your excitement dies down and you are left with a good light gun game that has lost its “wow” factor. Confidential Mission adds a few new ideas into the light gun mix and does well. With a small amount of graphical tweaking, it could be up there with the heavy weights, but it slips down slightly, though still a great title.

Rent or Buy?
Buy it, after all what other games will you use that expensive light gun for? And if you are going to buy this game make sure you already own HOTD2 (which is reviewed in issue 1). Fortunately, I found this game pretty cheap: 7.99 pounds brand new. It is not worth the 29.99 price tag that was stuck to it on release day. The gameplay is great but there is not enough of it here to provide serious entertainment.

Reviewer's Score: 8/10, Originally Posted: 12/03/02, Updated 12/03/02