Hitman 2 Silent Assassin is an interesting experience to say the least as some one who came directly from the reboot trilogy. There is very little about this game that feels particularly polished yet you can't really blame the devs too much as this was back when they were trying to find that Hitman formula we have all come to love. The first game, Hitman Codename 47 started development as a standard FPS game but was later transformed into a pseudo-stealth game by release, however it didn't really accomplish that goal too well. With this entry IO got a chance to start over again while continuing 47's story. This game introduces mechanics such as corner leaning, and crouching which help you maneuver through the maps in a somewhat of a stealthy manner. This game unfortunately does fall flat in this regard though thanks to the incredibly slow pace of the stealth movement and the super jank of the enemy AI. You can be following any enemy's particular movement path while crouching and doing everything right but for no discernible reason the enemy will just turn around and ruin your run. There is also the problem where some of the maps are just too big for their own good. Stuff like St. Petersburg, and the mountains of Japan are just colossal (for a Hitman game) for no real reason outside of padding the play time, which speaking of padding there is a lot of it in this game with it's stuffy 21 locations you visit, some of which are pretty fun to play around in. My favorites include the Yakuza Stronghold mission, and the Indian Cult Island as they provided a real template of what future Hitman games would build their level design around. As for the story, it is nothing too crazy which is inline with the other Hitman games, however unlike the other Hitman games i've played the story does have a vary particular level of funk, and cheese in it's tone that I really don't hate. Following the end of Codename 47, Agent 47 has decided to find a new lease on life by trying to live peacefully at a catholic monastery before being thrust back into the life of murderer for hire when his priest buddy gets kidnapped. Speaking of B-Movie cheese this only compounded by the wonderful score fro Jesper Kyd. The Euro-pop/Movie score soundtrack really fits this world that IO had developed and it makes me kinda wish we got to see what he would've composed if he stuck with the reboot trilogy, my favorite song being the Main Menu theme. Despite it's jank, and despite my lukewarm feeling on it I recognize this game as a very important piece of the Hitman pie, as it is the first true stealth game in the series, even if it doesn't pass with flying colors and you can play much worse for 13-14 hours.