I only replay the Dartmoor Garden Show with a custom contract I made where 5 targets are on. Blending the three stages into one. It makes it much more interesting for inventory management. Especially if I try to recreate the “all targets with poison”, and “all targets electrocuted” challenges. It forces to use the frogs and the battery.
It was the largest issue of DGS, since you restarted at each stage you could just bring three time poisons and three time electrocution devices. It made the whole escalation too easy, and more importantly too boringly repetitive on setups (running for 2 minutes to go from start to the event, knock the same server, poison/sabotage, repeat three times)
(and apparently people agree, because this is by far my most played contract)
Lust is also good to replay. Because it’s a one stage escalation, and more of an alternative game mode than anything.
I also find it cozy.
You know what, I think you accidently talked me into replaying it again tonight
Freelancer disappointed me on the safes. The Merces are not that useful.
I will maintain that it would have been good design if we could find meeting phones, or ways to reduce the number of suspects inside safes to edge the bet, and prepare before the showdowns. More involved.
The rage could be interesting to replay if we could unlock a damned loadout.
In general this is the main issue of Hitman 3 escalations. Because they had to be designed around 4-6 years of items unlocks that could make anything a breeze (sieker, kalmer, emetic briefcase, all the poisons…) they chose to restrict the player loadout 90 percent of the time. Which is boring to replay, and the opposite of what I like with the gameplay.
It’s a shame IO always used restricted loadout to mean “no loadout”. They could’ve used it to give you certain items that at face value wouldn’t be too helpful until you figured out the puzzle that you’re facing.
Also, its interesting to go back and play 7DS now since you can see how the DLC funded creating stuff that ended up becoming baked into the centre of Freelancer. ie Lust is now really just a reversed Showdown - using looks and traits to single out the non-target rather than the target.
The fact that they’re continuing with this smaller content makes me think that it’s biding time for some kind of big send-off, even if that’s just one more level.
It occurs to me that with as much as they use Elusive Targets as part of the live content delivery, the day they finally make them all available to just play as much as you want is probably also the day that the live service delivery is over too.
Yeah I had always suspected that to be the case, I just hadn’t touched any of the 7DS content for so long and having now experienced Freelancer - drawing the links between the two now after recently replaying it is extremely obvious.
Makes me wonder, does Envy suggest they had a different concept in mind for the Freelancer assassins? Guess I’ll never know for sure. But I can let my mind ponder on what might have been…
Frankly, I was looking forward to the idea of rival assassins, rather than glorified bodyguards. Ones that you have to beat to the target, but get a bonus for taking out as well, since they’re the competition. Some are after the target, some are after you, and then there’s those guarding the target. Hectic, I know, but imagine the fun!
Same, Envy’s okay as a one-off thing but I’d hate it if every Leader in Freelancer had a strict time limit to find and take them out before a rival. I’m happy with how it is now with Assassins just being souped up bodyguards
Like others have pointed out, they’ll definitely be more roadmaps because I would think IOI would do quite a build up towards the last roadmap to mark it as the final one for the game. I posted this the other day, but I’m hoping we get some sort of Anniversary pack for Freelancer in January before we close off
In regards to a new map, others have mentioned this over the last year or so and it is possible I guess, but we did get Ambrose Island and the Safehouse area not that long ago, so it may not happen, especially as IOI appear to be slowing down with content.
January 2021 to Ambrose Island’s release was 18 months of development time. 18 months after that brings us to January 2024, just in time for the Year 4 roadmap and the new map announcement…but not really.
It’s nice we’re even still getting any new content after three years. If you want new Hitman maps, you’ll just have to wait until either Project 007 or Hitman 9. Ugh.
Just to note, Ambrose Island was finished well before it’s release, I have it that is was completed as early as March of the same year (but likely was finished earlier).
Part of me believes you based on what I know/understand about game development. I know that the vast majority of entire video games are “done” before they release. The reason they take so long to release after being “done” is QA, bug fixing, and play testing. Nevermind a single map, which I imagine would follow a similar timeline, just on a lesser scale. I could be wrong, because I am not a game designer, but it’s my understanding of how it works.
While I would like to see evidence in regards to the timeline of map development (as I am not on PC and don’t have access to the files), part of me just wants to believe you because my most wanted piece of content is a snow map that isn’t mostly indoors (as in, not like Hokkaido, despite me liking the map).
Perhaps I’m coping, and I accept that’s probably what it is though.
That is even ignoring the policy on leaks or any unreleased info.
To get back on topic to the Winter Roadmap…
YES!!! The Public Enemy suit was my number 1 most wanted unlockable suit ever since I found out about the suit in Hitman Absolution (I never knew about the DLC weapons and Suits when I played thr original release).
