Overall 7.9 Graphics 7 Sound 6 Addictive 5 Story 6 Depth 6 Difficulty 7
5
Not a good choice for a port. NovemberJoy
Splinter Cell is a pretty well-liked series of stealth games. Personally, I like them for their depth and realism. Where Metal Gear Solid relies more on just watching enemy patterns and using distractions, Splinter Cell relies more on staying silent and in the shadows, and it's a welcome deviation from the norm; but there are three things that don't translate well onto a system like the GBA: Stealth, shooting, and 3D graphics. Since this game has all of those things, it would be a terrible idea to port it onto the system. For reasons that still remain unknown to me, they did it anyway. Now, the GBA has a lack of stealth games. Honestly, I like a good stealth game once in a while, so this might be a welcome addition to the tiny pile.
To start with, I really dislike the graphic style that is used in this game. It's the exact same style that was used in Max Payne's GBA port where it seems like they just took the 3D models from the console versions and turned them into 2D sprites. They look very grainy and it just looks off from the well-designed backgrounds which were created specifically for this version of the game. They are animated very fluidly, but it would've looked at least a hundred times better if some original graphics were created. With the way that they're been turned into sprites, most of the detail is gone to the point that nobody has a face anymore. It's unfortunate that this seems to be a very common trend in GBA ports from console versions of games.
The music really didn't hold my interest. It fits the situation well enough, but it was just generic background music that was composed in a rush to get this version out on store shelves. I completely forgot about most of the music that was there. What I did remember only stuck in my head because I had to hear it so often. The sound effects are very similar to the music. They're just as tinny, generic, and forgettable as the music tracks. You have your gun sounds and grunts when people die and get knocked out, it's all very forgettable. There are only two or three different noises for the enemy detecting you, so every enemy has a similar voice regardless of appearance.
The gameplay really starts to show why this type of game doesn't work very well on portable systems. Since a 3D third-person stealth game would've been literally impossible on the GBA, it's been reduced to a 2D sidescroller with elements of stealth. Most of the actions that were possible in the console versions are possible here; although they're cut down to fit on a 2D plane. Unfortunately, the weapons and items aren't so lucky, and there are very few of either in this version. To put things into perspective, the only two weapons you have are a tranquilizer gun and gas grenades. The gadgets that aren't automatically used are thermal goggles, which let you see lasers, and night-vision goggles that aren't useful because you can see just fine without them. Things are already looking pretty shallow compared to other versions of the game, even if you take into account the limitations of the hardware, but it gets better.
For a game like this, you'd think you could knock on walls, right? Well, you can't. Neither can you whistle or do anything else to attract attention without alerting the enemy. The stealth elements feel very bare-boned, like they were just slapped together at the last minute. The only remotely stealthy move Sam can still perform is hiding in the shadows. There's also something new for this version, at least to my knowledge: a danger meter, that fills up depending on how close you are to an enemy. I suppose they had to add this feature, since the screen size is small enough that enemies can see you from across the screen. Aside from that, there's also the sticky camera, which acts totally different than it did in any other game. Instead of sticking to walls or doing any of the other cool stuff that it did before, now it just lets you move the camera around independently of Sam. They really forgot what game they were working with, didn't they? Last time I checked, using a variety of gadgets was a major selling point of Splinter Cell games.
This game's difficulty has...issues. Let's just put it that way. It's some of the most inconsistent difficulty I've ever seen in a game. Most of the game isn't too difficult, but then the game will throw an obscenely difficult part at you completely out of the blue before going back to being easy again. This happens throughout the entire game. Even the tutorial has a moment like this, where you have to land a perfect grenade toss to hit a target that you have to use the Sticky Camera to see in the first place.
Later in the game, you'll have to chase after a guy who's always at maximum running speed, and you have to somehow shoot him three times before he escapes. This doesn't sound so hard by itself, except you have to stop to be able to draw your gun, and you can't run with it drawn, AND can't hit anything that's off-screen. Let's not forget that the guy runs so fast that he can outrun the bullets! So the only way to shoot him is to wait for the time when he's climbing on pipes and can't outrun the bullets; however, the controls will still screw you up, because you have to stay perfectly still to draw your gun and fire while climbing. I lost count of how many tries it took me before I was able to beat this part. Ten? Twenty? Thirty? Who knows, I wasn't keeping count. The previous part of the same level was an incredibly easy adventure through an oil plant where there's no alarm to raise and all the enemies have pathetically ineffective grenades for weapons.
This game also doesn't have especially great replay value. There isn't too much about this package that'll leave you coming back aside from the total lack of alternatives if you want stealth on your GBA. Once you defeat the missions the game gives you, there isn't any extra objective or optional missions or anything of the sort. Considering the very limited options you have to get through the game in the first place, it probably won't be any more fun the second time through.
In conclusion, this is a good example of why certain games just don't work on portable systems without a lot of work. Max Payne managed to change its mechanics and make third-person shooting work on the GBA, but Splinter Cell just doesn't put in the required effort to make a good stealth game on the GBA. It just ends up being a third-rate copy of its console counterpart. It seems like they just wanted to squeeze a little bit of money out of the portable market, so they just made this as a rush job on a low budget to get something out on the GBA for people to buy. If you're looking for stealth on the GBA, you might want to keep looking before you take a look at this one.
Final Rating - 5 obscenely hard chase sequences out of 10
Graphics 6 Sound 6 Addictive 4 Story 7 Depth 6 Difficulty 8
Review Rating: 5/5
Submitted: 01-27-16
Updated: 01-27-16
Review Replies: 7
6.2
My introduction to Splinter Cell Eirinn
So many times game developers have taken a perfectly good console title and ported it to a handheld, and it ended up being a complete bust. So much so, that it's made hardcore gamers with actual game quality standards want to personally fire everyone at their favorite game development studio and
replace them with chimpanzees. We've fussed about it, written online articles about it, even had printed articles about it published, and yet they just don't seem to catch on. It makes one wonder what exactly their Research and Development teams are doing with all of that monetary backing they get. Some possible answers to that question might be:
-Making paper airplanes out of it
-Using it to wallpaper their offices
-Making bonfires with it to roast marshmallows over
Whatever the answer may be, it certainly isn't that they're using it to find out what the consumers actually want, else they would cease the senseless porting of console titles to handheld systems.
Which brings us to Splinter Cell for the GBA. Yes, not only have they once again ported a console title to a handheld, but it's quite probably the worst possible genre for porting to a handheld: a stealth shooter. So can it break the long streak of games that have suffered from BadPortitis?
Graphics: 8/10
Exceptional.
These graphics won't wow you in the least, but they're solid. They don't look bland or pixelated in the least, and they manage to successfully communicate the spy mission atmosphere in a modern way, which is very nice indeed. In fact, the way that the environments are designed to give that feel of a modern spy theme is what bumped my graphics rating up from a seven to an eight. They really did impressive job on creating the right atmosphere here.
The sprites all look very realistic for a handheld system, and coupled with the environments, level, and equipment designs, they communicate the intended theme well. It's nice to see that this game's developers didn't go overboard with gadgets and futuristic designs, or retro spy designs, or even worse, futuristic gadgets mixed with stomach-turningly seventies/eighties retro levels and character designs like some game's developers do all the time *cough*James Bond games*cough*. Excuse my nasty cold, those coughs are dreadful.
Though I've already touched on the backgrounds and level designs a bit, it's worth noting some of the specifics here as well. The lighting here is low in most places, and at times, almost non-existent. This definitely adds to the feel of the game, as it makes the experience offered by the title feel all the more realistic. We can't have rainbows and sunshine, or fluffy bunnies and pretty birds everywhere in a stelthy spy themed game (no matter how cute the bunnies are). We're infiltrating buildings and stopping criminal masterminds, not holding hands with unicorns while skipping through meadows and farting rainbows. And while all of this was kept in mind by the developers, they did take care to balance the realistic atmosphere with good taste, and not make the levels drab or depressing. Well done, Ubisoft.
The levels are designed well for looks, if not always for the actual gameplay, but then this isn't about me and my mindless rants about ridiculous objectives that tear at the very gamer soul inside of me, while making me traverse tedious obstacle course-like levels at high speeds, or having shootouts while sitting still out in the open, unable to move like...oh, I don't know...anyone with a brain would. No, that part is for the Addictiveness section. For now, I'm all smiles, as the developers successfully made good level designs in almost every situation. Again, Kudos Ubisoft.
Highlights:
-The game shows no "Bonds" with worn out spy shows from thirty years ago
-No more lame puns from me
-Nice overall approach to graphics
Sound: 6/10
Good.
The music here is fitting, changes with the intended mood as you progress through various points in the game, and is decently composed, but it's far from being a masterpiece of GBA audio. Sadly though, either the music didn't change from one level to the next, or each track was just so similar to the next that I never really even noticed a difference. But I suppose if redundancy is a game's only issue in the audio section, then it must not be all that bad. In fact, I actually started to play this game with my own music playing at one point, and found myself stopping the song so I could hear the game's background music. That's a pretty good sign if you ask me. One downside of the music is that after you put this one down, you won't be left with much memory about the audio at all.
The sound effects are decent enough, if not always accurate. They get the job done, and they'll never get on your nerves. Good enough for detail? I hope so, because there isn't much else to say about them. They're more or less just there to keep the game from feeling incomplete, but they never really do much for gameplay. They're like the hundred and fifty FPS titles we'll see released over the course of the twelve months: most of us really wouldn't care if ninety-five percent of them never saw the light of day, but the developers feel like life without them would be incomplete, so we just play along with it.
Highlights:
-Nice enough music to play along to
-Not an FPS
Story: 5/10
Average.
Meh.
Oh yeah, one word isn't enough for the entire category...right. Okay, how about "Meh. Same old same"?
Okay, so it's a plain and simple spy game story: Bad dude wants to do bad things. Stop him like everyone is expecting you to do, but manage to surprise them while doing it". So many times I've wondered why they always expect one man/woman to handle an entire terrorist organization, army, or whatever else they face. Well this game doesn't do that! Or at least that's what I'd like to say, but that would be a lie. So yeah, that's what we get here once again, but like I always say, a story is no worse the fifth time you hear it than it was the first time, so I won't hold it against the game that it's entirely and completely predictable from the moment that you see the game's box art until the time that the credits roll. Kind of like CoD fans don't hold it's redundant gameplay against it, and cherish whatever it is that they find enjoyable about it. Probably the fact that Multiplayer lets you shoot people that you don't like right between the eyes, and not get in trouble for it. Huh. Maybe I should give the game a try after all, and invite some...uh..."friends" to play with me.
Highlights:
-I finally understand CoD fans
Depth: 6/10
Good.
So there isn't that much to do here, but that doesn't mean that what you're offered isn't any good; it actually is. In fact it's a nice title as far as handheld shooters go, and it does offer at least as much as you would expect from a GBA shooter title.
There are a decent number of levels to play through, and the stealth themed gameplay and controls offer a nice addition to the game. You are indeed given a gun, but it doesn't always come with ammunition, and even when it does, your overall rating in each level is affected by how many shots you fired from it (hint: less is more). So basically you're placed in a building filled with armed enemies that want nothing more than to put a few bullets in you, and then you're asked to refrain from shooting anyone if at all possible. Sounds fair enough, right? While we're at it, why not just make Sam talk the bad guys down instead? In all seriousness though, I think it's a nice touch that you're not supposed to fire.
Now for the downsides.
Weapon
selection is almost non-existant. You have two weapons, one lethal (a Handgun) and one non-lethal (Smoke Grenades). The gameplay manages to make this extremely limited arsenal more than sufficient though, and it actually makes sense. I mean, what spy is going to pack an AK-47 into an office while trying to avoid being detected? So while it takes away from the depth, it does keep the game on the realistic (and fun) side.
Next up on the negative list: redundancy. The game is fun enough, but after the fourth or fifth level, it all starts to feel the same, look the same, and even sound the same. Too much of a good thing, maybe? At the very least it's too much of a decent thing.
Highlights:
-Extremely limited ammunition forces you to use strategy and stealth
Addictiveness: 6/10
Good.
This is a good game with a nice approach to side scrolling handheld shooter gameplay, and it was able to hold my attention for a few levels. However, as I stated in the depth category, the repetition got the best of me after a while, and I became bored with it.
The next real problem for the addictiveness factor is the fact that the game has a habit of dropping you right in the middle of a situation where beating it requires knowledge of the the level's layout and goal at least in part, and sometimes in it's entirety.
See the problem? How can I possibly know what the objective of a level is if you don't tell me? Or how do I know where every pitfall that will send me plummeting to my doom is, if I've never played the level before?
And my personal favorites: the sniper scenes. In these scenes, you switch to a first person view (so much for that "not an FPS" highlight) and must snipe out several enemies before they can shoot you three times. The problem? Well there are a few of them actually. First off is the fact that you're lying out in the open, and cannot move. If you get shot once, the enemy doesn't have to adjust their aim, as you don't even flinch, and so you will be hit a second time very quickly if you don't take them out immediately. The second problem is that the gun's sights are painfully slow, and you must move from the far left to the far right with no stopping at any point, as enemies issue from both sides of the screen. Finally, the last level requires you holding the A button to speed up the sights movement, but the tutorial never bothers to tell you that you can even do that. I wasted so much time on that one before I discovered that the A button could do that.
Really, Splinter Cell on the GBA is a good game with some almost innovative gameplay, but with no depth by way of options or modes, the addictiveness here is only a fraction of what it could have been. Sadly, Ubisoft made the same mistake we've seen so many times before, and assumed that good gameplay with no depth was good enough. Add to that the unfair level designs (I left a few examples of this out), and you have a recipe for Video Game disaster.
Difficulty: 6/10
Challenging.
First things first: I'm rating a little higher on this category than I normally would. In fact, the game itself only gets a five in difficulty from me, but the fact that it sometimes drops you directly into situations that intentionally leave you in the dark as to what you're supposed to do, along with the other cheapshots I mentioned in the last category, bumps the rating up by one. It would be higher, but those cheapshot scenes aren't so hard once you get past the cheat factor that they sneak in on a new player.
Simply put, once you know how the game works, you won't have any trouble beating it, but it will definitely take your full attention and some strategic planning.
Overall: 6.2/10
Good.
Though not without it's fair share of faults, Splinter Cell is a decent game that offers some pretty good stealth/shooter action for a handheld system. So while it may not be the best game on Vizzed (far from it. Like as far as I am from being uncool. Yeah, that far), it's worth checking out if you're just wanting to play through all of the good GBA games on the site.
In the end, I didn't regret playing this one, but I wasn't really glad that I did so either. I probably won't touch it again in the near future, but if I decide that I want to play a short stealth/shooter blend, this will probably be what I go for. Based on fun alone, this one could be worth your time, depending on your game preferences, but as for my personal recomendation, I neither encourage nor discourage playing this one. It's a good game, but nothing about it is that special, save a few aspects such as lock picking and sneaking up on unsuspecting guards, or tossing a smoke grenade in the midst of a crowd of enemies. Splinter Cell is not without it's charm or fun moments, in fact it has plenty of both, it just falls short of greatness because of it's lack of depth and change of pace in the game. In short, Ubisoft actually did manage to make a good port from a Console to a Handheld. The impossible has been done. What's next? A good Justin Beiber song? Yeah....let's not get carried away...
Graphics 8 Sound 6 Addictive 6 Story 5 Depth 6 Difficulty 6
Review Rating: 4.2/5
Submitted: 03-17-14
Review Replies: 8
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