Pandora Tomorrow...honestly, what a nothing game. Even after finishing it, the events of the plot and the levels themselves escape me. It's like it all went in one ear and out the other, except this isn't some lecture from my high school algebra class.

Lambert has had a change in voice actor for this game, alongside a change of character. He and Sam are no longer cracking jokes at each other all buddy-buddy. In fact, Lambert's serious tone feels downright abrasive against Sam in many cases. There's a new guy on your team whom I cannot begin to remember the name of, he feels like such an afterthought (looked it up, his name's "Brunton"). Sam still keeps his mostly serious, occasionally sarcastic quips. Story is something something Indonesia, something something Smallpox, something something viruses. For some reason I really couldn't give less of a crap.

The game doesn't have any huge setpieces or interesting bits that come to mind. There were like, some frozen brains, a brief infiltration inside a submarine, and a section where you had to stay under a spotlight to prevent a guard with night-vision goggles from seeing you. I mostly remember how when the game asks you to do something highly context-sensitive, you know that section is going to be a real stinker. The alarm limits placed on you are extremely game-y in design, and not in a fun way. Far too much of this game is like playing Metal Gear Solid 2/3 on "European Extreme" difficulty; aka, being spotted is an instant game over. One of the ways the game raises the alert counter feels like it's downright cheating. If you don't bother to hide bodies in darkness, the game performs a rudimentary check as you pass certain points in the level, and raises security by one level. The problem becomes clear if you keep advancing after that happens: it'll keep happening at each subsequent point until your alert count fails the mission. On that note, a ton of the levels in this game take place in broad daylight, which feels weirdly unfitting for a sneaking game. In simpler terms, there are a lot less light sources you can shoot out to negate (unless you could shoot out the sun like a lightbulb this whole time, and I just didn't try to).

This game was made by Ubisoft Shanghai, Splinter Cell's "B-team". In the shadows behind Pandora Tomorrow, Ubisoft Montreal was working hard on Chaos Theory, giving it some extra time in the oven. I feel as though I enjoyed the first Splinter Cell more than this, so the A-team must have an understanding of Splinter Cell that the B-team clearly just couldn't grasp.

Reviewed on Jan 18, 2023


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