For the PS2 version of Quantum of Solace, Eurocom return to the Bond franchise. This one is entirely a third person shooter, but is not an extension on Everything or Nothing, with no lock-on at all. While the ability to shoot anywhere is nice, aiming feels extremely inaccurate in this game. The game, apart from a few areas, has different level design than the “next gen” versions.

Starting in the same garden as the HD game, this mission has bene transformed from instant action into a long, drawn out tutorial. It goes through the basic movement, the hacking minigame (which is the same as the main version, but a lot more difficult), stealth and shooting. The game doesn’t feature anything that needs such a long tutorial, and even here you can feel how wonky and broken the cover mechanics are – the game boasts that shots are more accurate form cover, but it’s much better to walk away from cover to shoot.

The Mitchell chase is very much a chase – spend more than 5 seconds to figure out the way to go (due to the blurry dark textures) and you’ll fail the mission. It is a bit obvious when you take your time in the main game, but this is far too much in the other directions and makes this level feel like a trial and error game. You do get a boss fight at the end, which is nice, but you still have the quick time event after – and this is one of the worst examples of QTEs – a random button will pop up and you have to press it almost instantly or else you’ll fail.

After this, we do get a new level as Bond investigates a general. This is the first section where stealth is required, but the stealth mechanics are awful, so it’s a case of keep trying until you get lucky. It would have been nice to have this level in the main game, as it’s the start of Camille’s journey, which was missing form the game.

The opera house has more forced stealth, somehow even worse than the previous level as here you fail the instant someone sees you (in the previous level you had a chance before they set of an alarm). The atmosphere is completely gone, and the level itself feels tiny and static.

The sinkhole level is actually ok – probably better than the main version. This also touches on the whole water plotline that was missing from the main game. It’s still not a good level, this version is just passable.

With that, it’s time to jump back to Casino Royale again.

The bomb chase sequence is less riveting, and I found that it was better to just ignore enemies and run past in order to not fail the mission. The chasing really doesn’t come across as well without the “spectacle” the other systems were capable of.

Miami science centre skips the sniping section (which is good, the aiming is extremely stiff in this version), with Bond trying the front entrance before moving around the side. The final fight requires you to shoot the boss a lot and then complete a QTE, fail and he recovers his health. It’s a very frustrating end.

There’s no Miami airport or train missions in this version, so it’s straight on to Casino Royale, trying to save Le Chiffre.

This level is surprisingly similar to the main version, with a similar layout (but with the end cut off). It makes it more obvious how toned down the graphics are, even compared to the Wii version of the game – it shows how impressive the Wii port really is. When the level layout is so similar, it just highlights how this is lacking in the fun.

Skipping straight to the barge, this level is a slog. You have to shoot through some corridors, then take a detour to turn some pipes. Then you have to solve a puzzle involving dials before shooing your way through more rooms. The level has a boss that is invincible, not matter how much you shoot him in the head. You have to shoot random pipes instead.

Now onto the final mission. What about the Venice, the level that contains the main pivotal moment in these two films? Replaced with a line of dialogue “so that’s where the girl died”. We’re off to the eco hotel instead. Lots of shooting combined with the hardest part with the game: a hacking sequence. It took me a few dozen attempts to finally get past it. After that is a boss where you have to shoot Greene’s goons and them him – with his main henchmen, I wasn’t sure if you had to shoot him a lot or if he was invincible except for environmental stuff – turns out you just shoot him a lot.

We haven’t dealt with the general yet. Instead of escaping like last time, we have to race to the roof to stop the General. Once you reach him (going slowly, because you’ll die from random explosions if you try going fast), you have a slow motion scene where you have to shoot him, except the animation on the general is so bad that he looks like a stop motion puppet – you can see each frame of his animation as his feet glide across the floor.

Other than containing one important mission (and then skipping even more important ones), this a much worse version of Quantum of Solace, not nice to play and nowhere near as good as the other Bond games from this generation – even Rogue Agent is more fun to play.

The superior adaptation of Quantum of Solace.

If you’re familiar with the main version of Quantum of Solace which came out on the 7th generation platforms (PS3, 360, PC), you’ll know the title as a poor man’s Call of Duty made in the very engine that powered the aforementioned popular first-person shooter series.

Well, that is not the case with the PlayStation 2 version. Developed by Eurocom rather than Treyarch who worked on the main version, the PS2 title is a third-person stealth action game which, in my opinion, fits the James Bond series better. The game features a good mix of stealth, shooting and set-piece segments.

Stealth gameplay, while nothing outstanding, is competent enough with decent level design backing it up. The levels themselves are rather linear but it never feels like a detriment. Aside from some mandatory stealth-only sections, the game actually allows you to choose your own approach. That said, while you can certainly simply shoot your way through the stages, it is clear that the game was primarily designed with stealth in mind due to how stingy the game can get with ammo (more on this later).

This is not your standard third-person shooter. Gunplay and aiming mechanics are a bit untraditional and feel somewhat reminiscent of classic Splinter Cell titles, though not nearly as punishing or polished. You have two shooting modes: free aim and "precise mode". The free aim is for the more hectic and faster-paced moments, while the precision mode allows you to take more precise and deliberate shots with the aiming reticle slowly narrowing down while you’re not moving it. It may feel clunky at first, but once you get used to it, it becomes a rather enjoyable aspect of the game.

Featuring only 11 levels rather than 15 compared to its next-gen counterpart, the PS2 version is rather short, clocking in at around 4 hours. The game cuts out some of the levels featured in the PS3 version while adding a couple new stages of its own. You can probably finish this in around 3 hours if you avoid unnecessary deaths or it might take you five due to some sections being quite challenging. The levels themselves are also fairly short clocking in on average between 15-30 minutes. That said, it’s not a bad thing as it doesn’t overstay its welcome and the game has good pacing on top of that.

Unfortunately, this game came out during the dreaded quick-time event (QTE) era and some of the game’s frustrating moments stem from just that. Thankfully, they are used sparingly but one of the boss fights can only be completed by passing a rather strict set of QTEs, failing which you must re-do a part of the boss fight, which would be annoying enough in any game and is only made worse by the limited ammo.

The ammo system is clearly very deliberately designed - not quite topping the player off like normal TPS games do, but rather drip-feeding ammo in a way that ensures that you can always make progress while simultaneously making it clear that every shot - every bullet counts. This goes back to my original point about the PS2 version being more of a stealth-action game rather than your typical third-person shooter that many wiki articles seem to insinuate. It makes the game more tense and thoughtful than your average tie-in game. While the first half of the game is more stealth based, by the time you reach the end you’ll be expected to have gotten used to the game’s shooting mechanics and your reflexes and skills will be put to a test during the game's climax.

For the most part the ammo system works really well - enemies will always drop bullets ensuring you get rewarded for kills enabling you to progress further. Some sections will also feature renewable weapon pick-ups to ensure that you can progress past some of the set-pieces and boss fights will feature infinitely respawning ads that serve as cannon fodder ammo drops. The last boss is actually somewhat problematic in that regard with the infinite ads simultaneously being both a blessing and a curse given how much they spam grenades. On the bright side, boss fights are actually far more interesting than in the PS3 version and I’d have to say that is the case with all levels in general.

Luckily, the game features a rather generous checkpoint system and you can save your progress at every checkpoint making it the perfect game to play if you're limited on your gaming time due to work or other obligations.

Overall, I had fun with both incarnations of Quantum of Solace tie-in but the PS2 version is definitely the more interesting game to play, having more substantial thought put behind its game design.

If you’re interested in my thoughts on Treyarch’s version, you can find my Backlogged review here: https://www.backloggd.com/u/DarkDante14/review/582868/