The second last levels of C47 and Hitman SA is almost same. The ICA client who used 47 to kill their enemies, now, wants to kill 47 and so sets him up.
But the role of Diana and ICA is never mentioned in this. Did the ICA know it is a setup? If nobody knew, why is 47’s rifle filled with blanks?
47 always contacts Diana immediately when there is a problem in the mission, but here, he doesn’t tell her that something is wrong. It feels really strange. He just figures out things by himself, and Diana doesn’t even ask him for a status update for the mission.
Especially, in St Petersburg Revisited, I find it weird how neither of them report to one another that it is a setup.
I don’t know if at the time the game was written ICA was supposed to be in on it or not.
Now though I’d like to believe 47 didn’t contact her b/c he was unsure if ICA was in on it or not. He just took things into his own hands. It’s possible Sergei knew where the rifle would be and had his men alter it after it was staged for 47 to collect. It’s also possible ICA was in on it and back then Diana and 47 were not so close. Maybe it was just business? Third option is maybe ICA knew and so did Diana. ICA thought it’s just business and Diana already knew she didn’t need to warn him b/c his skill set was high enough he would be fine.
The ending level of contracts is similar too. I don’t below we know if Paris was a full blown setup or if the Paris cop just got lucky… BM uses the setup storyline too. This time though it’s Diana who uses 47 to setup the bad guys (which we see again in WoA).
A hitman who is double crossed is about the only way to make an interesting story about a hitman. Otherwise the story is just a person who kills people and gets away with it or a person who has a job go bad and has to go loud to get away in one piece (which can be fun, but is short. Usually that part is in the double cross story).