Tom Clancy's Splinter Cell: Chaos Theory

I'd have liked to give this game a score of 9, but there are things that I dislike in it.

The enemies using a flare to search in the dark was a really nice addition. Now shooting at lights isn't always going to guarantee that enemies won't see you in the dark. The addition of a noise meter was also welcomed. It adds to realism. The knife for close encounters was also extremely positive. I was left wondering why there wasn't any close combat move in the previous games. The fact that you can now choose a loadout before beginning a mission adds to the replay value. The addition of jokes was another much needed change. I loved all of them.

The level design is more or less on par with the previous game. However, sometimes the path to follow is an air duct hidden in the dark. I wasted a lot of time looking for it. The map doesn't show your current location, which would have helped a lot. In fact, the map does show in which area the player is, but it doesn't show the exact location.

In Pandora Tomorrow I was amazed by Jerusalem. In Chaos Theory I was amazed by Seoul. Comparing the two I can't help it but feel that the atmosphere in Jerusalem was superior. In Seoul we have a mission to avoid a drone with a search light. That was one of the best moments for me. The environment art of Seoul was really good.

Now for the negative parts. I didn't like how the weapon's spread was ridiculous. Totally unfair when compared to how enemies would easily hit you. In the bath house mission I almost went nuts with how ridiculous the weapon's spread was in the last part of the mission. To my shock (pun), the shocker had zero spread to hit the enemies.

I couldn't believe that I was a few feet away from an enemy and he couldn't notice me there in the dark. The following seems to be a design mistake. If you are spotted by a security camera and the alarm goes off and this happens after taking down all the enemies, no enemies come. The game doesn't spawn more enemies than the already placed ones in each mission.

There is one thing that I strongly disliked and that is how this game went for an excessively slow paced gameplay. The combined noise and visibility meters created more immersion and added to realism. However, I was feeling impatient having to wait for NPCs to walk away or having to wait for a long conversation to end before being able to progress.

I criticized the same thing in Pandora Tomorrow, the game doesn't explain things or those were left to paper manuals. I killed off most enemies because I didn't notice that there were two options: render them unconscious or strangle them to death.

I don't know why they removed the level selection from the game.