Tom Clancy's Splinter Cell

"Once agian Ubisoft have excelled themselves, nicely done!"

INTRODUCTION
Like every other Gamecube owner, my interest was piqued when I heard about this great game on Xbox called Splinter Cell. Of course, like any good publisher, Ubisoft took the liberty of porting this baby to Gamecube. After deliberating for months, I decided to pick this game up and it must be said that this game revived my love of video games. It was the first game, in quite a while, that I actually played right through and completed. At all times it was a challenging yet fun experience.

GRAPHICS
Splinter Cell on Gamecube looks much like its Xbox brother. I haven't seen the Xbox version but apparently, some lighting effects were dumbed down in the GCN version. Nevertheless, the Gamecube version looks exceptionally good with a very smooth and consistent frame rate. The only point where the frame rate took a dive was in the first level when you come across a water fountain. The fountain was nothing special so I was left wondering how that area could be more taxing on my Gamecube's hardware.
As far as heroes go, Sam Fisher, the main character, looks pretty good and he is quite detailed. As for the enemies, well, they look pretty good too. Both Sam and his enemies have a visibly high polygon count and it must be noted that Sam animates very realistically and smoothly from one position to another.
The game takes place all around the world and the levels look nice and have a certain gritty realism about them. The textures are all pretty good and some of the lighting might make your jaw hit the floor. All the environments are very nicely put together and overall they have that something that draws you in.

GAME-PLAY
Splinter Cell is all about stealth and only stealth, there is no blazing away characterised by games like Quake. You have to stay in the shadows, move silently and above all, you have to consider the best tactical option for making your next move. The main feature that helps you stay stealthy is the light meter. This meter is the same concept as the meter in Thief and allows you to gauge how visible you are. Sam can do a whole host of things like; climb ladders, rappel of a wall, lean up against a wall just to name a few. Aside from doing the aforementioned things, most of the time you will be sneaking past guards or creeping up behind them, knocking them out and hiding the body. It may sound samey, but combining this with intelligent level design, it all comes together into a challenging and entertaining package.
As a side note, I was a bit disappointed that the levels were not more open-ended because they just seemed a bit too linear for me. However, that said, you still have to think about how you are going to approach any level. How are you going to deal with that patrolling guard? Will you stick to the shadows and wait or will you dash to that next room? Sometimes it wasn't immediately obvious how to get to the next area, but if you persevere, you'll eventually work it out.
When you start a level, you have an alarm limit of maybe 2, 3 or even zero. What this means is that every time the enemy gets alerted to you, either by seeing you or finding a body, an alarm goes off and if this happens more than the allowed times, you fail the mission. It's a simple concept that lets the developers factor some forgiveness into the game. You don't have to be perfect, but being stealthy and thoroughly hiding bodies does help.
The enemy AI is pretty realistic. They'll hear you if you are moving too quickly and they will see you, when they get too close, even if you are in the darkest shadow you can find. Once an enemy spots you, you had better take them out quickly because if you take just a few bullets, its goodnight Mr Fisher.
Even though this game is based around stealth, in some missions, fatalities are allowed and you can start to be a bit liberal with how you use your silenced rifle/pistol. However, you can't be too gun ho as running out of ammunition happens quite easily.
The cut scenes all look very realistic and they serve to drive the story forward. In addition, the cut scenes help the player because they serve as being a quasi briefing for the up coming level. The briefings, aside from the cut scenes, are merely text that appears as the next level is loading up. However, Ubisoft don't hang you out to dry because Sam's superior is constantly in radio contact, during a mission, filling the player in on the current situation. Unfortunately, there are no statistics compiled after a mission is completed. Although being relatively superfluous it would have been a nice touch.
As for the camera, if you like total control then this game is for you. What I mean is, the camera is in no way automatic, period. If you want to take a certain view then you have to move the camera yourself. It takes a bit of getting used to, but after a while, moving the camera around Sam will become second nature.
In terms of saving opportunities, most of the time you get a chance to save halfway through a level and then another chance at the end of the level. You can't save this game anywhere you want. This may annoy some players but I feel it is a necessary evil that makes the game more balanced.

SOUND
This game is acoustically very good. Sam makes the occasional wise crack in response to his superior who quite regularly speaks over Sam's personal inter comm. Both Sam and his Superior sound like a genuine operative and commander respectively.
While playing you will occasionally stumble near to guards, who are having a conversation or doing something that wets anybodies aural appetite. The sound you hear while playing also adds to the game-play element because hearing nearby occurrences can help Sam avoid confrontation. Suffice to say the game sounds good and all the sound effects help generate a sense of heightened realism.

OVERALL
The presentation of Splinter Cell is quite effective; however, the menus and options that appear once the game is loaded up are a bit on the minimalist side. To counter this, the story of this game is quite intriguing and the plot takes many twists, but you sometimes have to be on the ball to be able to follow what is going on. Unlike the more recent Rainbow Six 3 port, Ubisoft did a great job when they ported this game to gamecube. The load times are quite exceptional and the graphical quality didn't take too much of a hit either.
If you want an intriguing, intelligent and very much adult game to play on your Gamecube then look no further than Splinter Cell. Ubisoft have delivered another A grade title to everyone's favourite cube.

Reviewer's Score: 9/10, Originally Posted: 07/06/04