This is a very good start to the Hitman trilogy with the massive Paris map and a few tight tutorial missions as well as introducing contracts.

I'm going to focus on the game itself, and ignore the controversy surrounding the episodic release of this game. I'm reviewing "Hitman: Season 1" here since I can't seem to find a metacritic page for the Steelbook edition of season 1 that I bought. I should clarify that I'm a huge fan of the previous games. So, I "gave this game a chance" more than I would most games. Hitman: Season 1 advertises itself as more of a return-to-form than "Hitman: Absolution", the previous title in the series. While it IS true that this game is a more traditional Hitman game that the previous title, it's not as fun as before. If anything it will make you appreciate the gameplay changes that were made to Hitman: Absolution. (I'm going to be comparing this game to Absolution a lot, since it's the most logical game to compare it to) First of all the levels....they're huge and teeming with activity. This sounds like a positive aspect of the game, and in most games it would be, but somehow this works against the fun of this game. Mostly because more than any other Hitman game, you're surrounded by witnesses. In Absolution, most levels were sparsely populated. That is how it should be imho. In Hitman: Season 1, the levels are absolutely congested with people. It just makes the game that much harder (and dips the framerate too, if we're honest) Second of all, the combat. In previous incarnations of the Hitman series, if you found yourself in a tight jam or you got too frustrated with tailing a target you could use blunt force to beat the mission. You'd lose points for doing so, but the option was there. However, in Hitman: Season 1, Agent 47's health bar is tiny. I don't even think there IS a health bar. I'm guessing that they wanted to make the game as realistic as possible, but that was one of the ways they went too far with the realism. Another way was making the levels so densely populated that Agent 47 couldn't even sneeze without 18 people noticing. Another thing I should mention is the AI, which is again, way too realistic. In previous Hitman games the NPCs had varying levels of predictability and followed these scripted "paths", so the player would usually have a good idea of where certain guards/targets/civilians would be at what time. Knowing roughly where the enemies would be at what time did make the games a bit easier, but there was still some challenge there. In Hitman: Season 1, the non-target NPCs are far less predictable than any other Hitman game. Your target will have a somewhat predictable scripted path he'll take, but the other NPCs move at complete random. It just makes the game that much harder. Also making the game harder is the fact that you need certain tools to perform certain actions to kill your target. EXAMPLE: You see something that can drop on your target, you go to drop it (because it says DROP ITEM ON TARGET, etc) and it turns out you need a crowbar to do so. EXAMPLE 2: You walk over to poison your targets drink (because it says POISON DRINK) but you can't because you need poison to do it. This game really seems to love to tell you about the kills you could be making if you had the missing items. I'm kind of in a rush, so I'll try to sum up my feelings on this game in a paragraph. This game takes what made Hitman good, and **** it all up. The levels are too big, the AI too unpredictable and too eagle-eyed, the levels too crowded, there's no plot to speak of, and the frantic combat that ensued after a noisy or botched assassination attempt (which was so fun in the previous games) is just gone. This game is like a turd wrapped in gold--you think it's going to be a great Hitman game but then you realize it's just kind of **** And boring. This game is boring if you play it they way they want you to. EDIT: 6-4-2018 I should note that this is the game that made me finally decide to tell my PS4. Not that it would have been any better on xbone.

Although the tutorial missions are dull but you still have to complete them for the good cutscenes, Paris is a really good place to start. It is good that the game rewards creativity, although being creative takes you time and you have to be patient. "The Showstopper" is a good mission. The map has a 3 floor + basement museum, with almost every corner unique. It also has an outside area, equal in length with combining 2 floors at least. A lots of disquises and opportunities, an average variety of weapons (due melee weapons having the same animations), all the silenced pistols sound the same. 2 targets to take down. Can get you a few times to actually complete it without anybody spotting you. (Game purchased pre February 2016, played at launch)