Tom Clancy's Splinter Cell Chaos Theory

"Splinter Cell 3 is definitely to be."

Once, again, Sam Fisher, the 'Splinter Cell' is sent into action to fight Computer Terrorism in Korea (North and South) and help maintain foreign relations with Japan. But a special computer algorithm, known only by two men, Bruce Morgenholt and ??? is needed to counter increasing threats.

When I first saw this game in video form back in E3 2004, I thought this was an Xbox 2 launch title, or a PC running on a Radeon X850 XT PE, overclocked.

This game blew me away with incredible graphics, physics, and most importantly, Realism. It was just like an actual Tom Clancy Novel.
Fast, fluid, and full of action. But the game isnt all about that stuff. But first lets talk about all the main subjects.

Story: 9/10 As I said before, just like an actual Tom Clancy Novel, the story really captures you and brings you closer into the world of Tom Clancy, and makes you appreciate what an actual person may be doing right now. The cutscenes really do tell all, however, the only real bit of story you will receive ingame is from Lambert informing you what is happening on the outside, such as, "Sam, North Korean troops just spilled over the DMZ. We are at War!" But still, from the little story you actually hear about ingame, its usually interesting stuff.

Graphics:10/10 In one word. Incredible.
The graphics this game offers are the best on Xbox, bar none. The attention to detail is astounding, every Newspaper you see, you can actually read from, (headlines anyway) Sam's suit will actually shift models ingame when water or bright lights hit it, with no slowdown in frames. The enemies look better than ever, especially when combined with those physics, and the guns look like guns, pistols like pistols, modular assault weapons like modular assault weapons, AK's like, etc. The only downfall to the graphics are the T.V. screens or Monitors, they only show stop motion video, so you wont be seeing an actual streaming video on a computer screen or T.V. for instance, but this is of little consequence.

Sound: 9/10 Sam Fisher has never sounded this good from Michael Ironside, he is great at this, the voice is just as dark and manly and gruff as usual, but Ironside puts a bit more 'energy' into SC3's Sam Fisher, especially in the way of Dark Humor. Possibly one of his best lines is, "Like my new Knife?","I've been using it alot lately. Is it still sharp"? The way he portrays Sam is astounding, when you see Ironside on T.V. you immediatley think, "Thats him!", "Thats the guy! From my videogame!", Ubisoft chose a great actor for this job, and I see no reason why they would 'Cut-him-loose'.

The guard chatter is also amazingly hilarious, accents match their nationalities, and the occasional remark from Grim or the random Korean guy makes for some laughs, sometimes.

Guns also make for some good noise, especially since you can actually match the noise to the caliber of the bullet and tell what gun they are using, be it an AK, .44, or some Black Market gun, you can always tell what they are firing at you.

Gameplay/Replay Value: 8/10 Not exactly a step-up from previous Splinter Cell endeavors, but good nonetheless. It's the same grab a guard, ask him a question, knock him out, hide the body, sort of stuff, but Ubisoft was lenient on letting you kill whoever you damn well please in this game, and for good reason. People want to kill other people! At least thats what I wanted to do in the previous games, even though I knew it would ruin plot lines and such. Splinter Cell 3 is also, in my opinion, the easiest of the three, but also the most fun.

Replay Value is high because you receive a ranking everytime you complete a mission, and you must strive to not kill anyone, not get spotted by anyone, not activate any alarms, and complete, EVERY SINGLE OBJECTIVE, which can be a major pain in the ass in later missions.

Multiplayer: 8/10 This is probably where the game suffers, first of all, Co-op, why, oh why does it frame lag?

And in Versus, you guys still couldnt put in those good graphics from SP?

Well, at least it still has good game mechanics.

Overall, this is a BUY game.

Reviewer's Score: 9/10, Originally Posted: 04/06/05, Updated 04/10/05