Hitman 3 Legacy Escalations Thread

Hitman: World of Assassination
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That is very debatable. Have a look at them, and you’ll notice a running pattern in their creation; A lot of these “substantial” missions were basically officially added contracts-mode puzzles, with a small modifier attached (kill with explosions, and then later, kill with explosions without pacifying someone else). Some do have unique gimmicks, such as the one with lasers in Villa Caruso, but again, that was, far as I can tell, not liked by anyone who tried it, as it was a painful gameplay experience. Quelle surprise 47 being a minesweeper didn’t test well.

This is why the escalation format gained the ire of players, because…well…that’s what many of them played like. Officially added contracts mode contracts.

What matters is the mechanics and how they’ve aged, and I’d argue IO should always put their best foot forward. Embrace of the Serpent is not a particularly good mission, but neither is it hair-pullingly maddening like The Lupei Sensitivity was. It’s just a fairly average ET Mission-turned-special assignment that was put on a pedastal because of its surrounding context. Nothing really wrong with it, other than being Paid DLC and being a bit underwhelming to play. It has unique trespassing zones, new character model, and new voice lines.

a challenge isn’t a tangible piece of content it’s just a checklist.

I think for preserving Hitman as this wholistical multi-year project we need to include and credit all the substantial work that went into it

…You do realise some of the challenges have work put into them, right? Heck, depending on what you have to do, it’s a lot of work. I don’t like many of the old challenges, but implying that it’s not worth saving them seems antithetical to that idea?

I do not agree that everything in WOA should be preserved; at least not on the surface level. If you really wanna play the older contracts, then mod them back in. But the best thing about a medium designed to provide entertainment via gameplay is that if something is not entertaining to anyone, then it probably shouldn’t be in the game by default.

Hardcore mode has balance issues, it’s not inherently a bad idea to have a harder-than-hard mode for a roguelike game (in fact. it’s a fairly common difficulty!).

So I think a couple free, medicore escalations is fine

Six is a couple, Thirty-six is a deliberate understatement.

I also think new escalations and a rework of the challenges systems in Featured Contracts and Escalations to be global rather than game-specific would be a better solution

Completely agree. I’ve never really been fond of this system as it feels so arbitrary and artificial.

1 Like
42

I feel all the cut legacy content has some sort of merit to it and is worth bringing back. Encouraging players to explore maps more, use certain disguises more, change up typical playstyles, figure out puzzles, learn certain NPC routes, and plan out the best loadout for the mission. Yes this can be done with player contracts, but the escalations have a much more deliberate design to them, and there are many complications not possible to have in contracts (map changes, extra enforcers, finding certain items, elimination streak, etc.)

Each challenge and escalation does represent some developer’s work, developers who are unlikely to be still working on Hitman or even still working at IO. And the work of all of IO should be better preserved, especially as we head to the trilogy turning 10.

And there’s plenty of potential for other improvements to them. New unlocks for completing the challenges and escalations (easy). Reducing escalations to three levels (pretty easy). Reworking the more infamous content to be better (more work). But they shouldn’t remain totally cut.

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43

Given how barebones the roadmaps are now, slowly bringing back some of the old escalations would be good filler content to pad them out a bit. And given the various new items we have in inventories that we didn’t have in H1, they automatically get a new coat of paint without IO having to do anything to them beyond activating them because of the new options that are available while playing (unless loadouts are restricted of course).

5 Likes
44

Which I’m all for (Even with its strict timers, TLS would probably not be so annoying if it were three levels, so it feels more doable). Heck, I think I’ve already given this stance on this thread.

For escalations? Yeah, I can understand that. Those can be modified and made better. For challenges? Not so much as those are usually more specific and/ or one-note. I don’t think you want to play Seven Minutes in Heaven, or the “Slam Dunk” challenge from Patient Zero. There are several challenges like this that you can reasonably infer that they were cut for being too annoying. As I have said before, which will be continually ignored I’m sure, that content that doesn’t respond well with players probably shouldn’t be re-added to the game, at least not without a rework.

Those two challenges I mentioned are not worth bringing back because they were unnecessarily tricky (The former required Blake to be dragged through several crowded rooms to reach the raider room to stuff him into a wardrobe – the latter required launching Sister Yulduz onto the canopy at the cult meetup which relied on the physics engine and positioning) Same with “Making Waves”, which was just outright broken due to Sgails’ level design. There’s no merit in bringing back the broken, other than to say “it’s playable again!”.

2 Likes
45

The only H1 escalation that can be left in the past imo is the one in Paris that has mines, but the disarm device has different locations it can randomly spawn.

That one can fuck right off.

1 Like
46

That’s the one with the lasers and the minesweeper gimmick I was talking about.

47

Hmm… I recall hating the one in Marrakech with mines. But I think the disarm device was held by that gal on the rooftop instead of being in a random location. :thinking:

I think by the time I realized that I was already done with it without finding the disarm (thingy) and didn’t even care to go through that torture again.

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I don’t think I ever bothered to find the disarm device in any of them. I just learned a safe path, since was always one - usually just a slightly less efficient path to where I wanted to go.

4 Likes
49

Did…did you forget the part where I said they should rework the more infamous content to be better instead of totally cutting it? Even though you literally quoted that part? I’m not ignoring you.

My point is that the vast majority of the cut content is not broken or terrible. Most of it is perfectly fine or even dare I say fun to do.

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50

Malory Misfortune is a cakewalk when you hop the fence.

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The emetic tools added in H2/H3 make that one a breeze tbh. They take away the stalker’s enforcer status so he’s not a pain in the ass to just spot you and void SA.

If you’re close enough, stalking you takes priority over his desire to vomit. So you can keep him from becoming an enforcer again for as long as you like with a single Sieker dart.

4 Likes
52

Okay, I probably should’ve explained what I meant there. This was not pointed as you specifically. it was more a general comment on this forums’ need to prioritize returning content over how it actually plays (See: the elusive target poll from a few months back). I didn’t really add that context in when I should’ve done, so sorry for the confusion.

That is something I kind of agree with, very few of the escalations are outright terrible, the great majority just suffer from being quite mediocre, which I still think is a valid reason to not bring them back unless they get altered to play better. I don’t think the challenges have the same reputation; several of the cut challenges range from “boring “Find X item quests”” to “outright infuriating attempts at grappling with the physics engine”. Those are more a mixed bag.

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That’s pretty much what happens with The Mercenary in TS6 too, though his entourage is the issue there.