This review contains spoilers
A first person shooter with an all-new storyline. This one doesn’t license the likeness of Pierce Bronson, so at least we don’t have the issue of someone else’s voice coming from his face. The default controls are dreadful, but the options provide a modern style shooter setup. I played using the “Reloaded” mod, which adds widescreen, some nicer textures and removes the screen turning white every time you get shot.
The game starts off in a really nifty offshore biodome facility, straight away you have the option of hacking the front door or using a grappling hook to sneak in through the roof. When you perform “Bond moves” you get a flashing golden 007 and a Bond jingle. This level serves as a good introduction to the mechanics. You’re trying to locate a box containing a virus and rescue a CIA spy, Zoe Nightshade. You find her strapped to a submarine, with sharks circling in the water.
After escaping the facility, you get a vehicle section…but unfortunately it’s an on rails turret mission. There are some cool set pieces (and probably hundreds of civilian casualties), such as blowing up a petrol station to take out multiple cars and a helicopter. After recovering the case of viruses for the second time, R pops up to advertise Bond’s new car. Considering they have a new Bond, I have no idea why the went with “R”, especially as that name for John Cleese was a joke from Bond, not his official title. A few earlier games had John Cleese as “R”, but in this, he’s an old man and the voice actor chose a voice much more like Desmond Llewelyn.
After Nightshade gets a rocket to the face from the villain’s super assassin, we get to control the car this time. The driving feels great, and the level has lots of branching paths. Like 007 Racing, the power ups are dotted across the paths, but you can overlook it more as this is very enjoyable to play. You need to get a pulse and knock out an armoured van.
Time for a stealth mission as you infiltrate a British embassy, you have a dart gun with limited ammo, but you can also knock out enemies via punching. There are a few alternate routes through the level using gadgets, which is common across the game. Bond nearly breaks his cover by spending too long ogling a woman. Bond comes across a bit like a clumsy oaf in this game, getting distracted by women instead of seducing them. After discovering the use of clones, it’s time to pose as a journalist and speak to the CEO behind them.
As Bond is told to wait in the CEO’s office, he realises that his cover has been blown immediately – the CEO is the woman he got caught perving on in the previous mission. This mission offers a bit of optional stealth as you go through grates and take photos of evidence, before hacking the computers and escaping through an underground lair.
This level is actually a lot of fun, although I don’t think it needs a timer (apparently it’s a timer until you get sealed in the base, but that happens later on anyway). There’s some hidden routes and a fancy weapon through a secret door – or you can smash through a window and set an alarm off to get it.
You found out that the super assassin from earlier is attacking a different British embassy to find someone who has stolen information from their group. I found this part confusing as you get told to go to “R’s” safehouse on the other side of the embassy, but its down a few other streets. You rescue hostages as you go though, get given a puzzle to find a hidden door (I worked it out and opened the door before M finished the clue, it’s very obvious) and fight the super assassin, who takes a lot of damage. You then have to take our a helicopter, which is easier to deal with.
Time for another driving section in a classic Aston Martin. You have to locate a few objects in the city, and I enjoyed this mission a lot – it shows that something like 007 Racing could be a really good game. If you perform well enough, you can even unlock a Lotus Esprit. Having to jump over a river, Bond ends up crashing his car into a warehouse. Luckily for Bond, there just happens to be a fully armed tank right where he crashed.
Sadly, this tank part is very disappointing, as it’s another turret section and you spend almost all of it using a minigun (you have very limited tank shells). It goes on for far too long. The final part is also very confusing, two tanks turn up near a bridge and if you start shooting them, you’ll fail the mission. You have to carefully aim for fuel tanks on a train passing on top of a bridge.
If the game was good with checkpoints, this would be a mild annoyance, but you go back to the very start of a tank section. Mess up two or three times (depending on difficulty), and you’ll end up at the start of the car mission. The lives system is just annoying, especially as the only checkpoints are when a new section of the level is loaded.
Now we have to investigate an oil rig using a jetpack, which sounds a lot cooler than it is. When fully fuelled up, you get a single burst upwards. The level itself is enjoyable, with some fun hidden routes and a few ways to climb up the tower at the end. Bond gets distracted by a woman and the main henchman pushed him off the tower.
Luckily for Bond, diving off the tower into a pool is actually the entrance to the villain’s secret base. Unfortunately for Bond, this is another tedious and overly long turret section. The henchman climbs into a large machine at the end for a boss fight. If you don’t figure out what to do quick enough it’s back to the last checkpoint…which is the start of the level.
Now it’s time to take care of the cloning lab. While in the previous mission, M said that this facility was too shielded to talk to Bond, she tells Bond that he’ll have to figure out how to take out the place without explosive, then straight away tells him how to do it.
This mission introduces the elite guards, which take more damage and are more aggressive. There are also two possible endings to this, depending on if you find a hidden keycard, which alters the start of the next mission. As Bond tries to escape in a submarine, he meets the CIA agent he saw get killed before, who is freely wondering around the submarine. She claims that the person that was killed was the clone, who was supposed to infiltrate the secret services before the super assassin accidentally killed her instead of Bond. Bond finds none of this suspicious.
Now on a aircraft carrier, either escaping from the ship’s brig or infiltrating from a boat (depending on the ending of the previous mission), M contacts Bond to tell him that he needs to get to the ship’s communications room so she can inform him about the current situation (couldn’t they have Bond do some of these briefings so they made sense?). You get to take out the clones of the world leaders and foil the plans of this group using them to replace the real ones from taking over the world (it probably would have been cheaper to bribe them).
With the clones taken care of, it’s time to rescue the real world leader in the final mission…which is probably the most boring mission of the game. While the outside view is nice, the base is really boring internally, as you go between missile silos killing enemies that are holding the world leaders hostage.
The CEO sets off a self destruct timer and the main henchman returns (you killed his clone earlier) and you shoot him a lot before he flees into the CEO’s office. Your first instinct is to strafe to dodge rockets, however if you do, you’ll die due to the rest of the floor blowing up (and having to do the whole fight again). If you manage to resist this urge you’ll shoot him a bit more then escape on a jet piloted by Nightshade. The game then fades to black.
And…that’s it. There’s no actual ending cutscene. We have no idea if the main villain or world leaders escaped, or if they all blew up. If you complete the game on the highest difficulty you do unlock a bonus video…which is just a clip show of the Bond moves in the game.
Agent Under Fire has really fun gameplay. The main missions are enjoyable and the car missions are great. The turret missions are tedious and something about the game makes it feel like a parody of James Bond instead of an actual Bond game. It feels like a decent starting point to expand on.
The game starts off in a really nifty offshore biodome facility, straight away you have the option of hacking the front door or using a grappling hook to sneak in through the roof. When you perform “Bond moves” you get a flashing golden 007 and a Bond jingle. This level serves as a good introduction to the mechanics. You’re trying to locate a box containing a virus and rescue a CIA spy, Zoe Nightshade. You find her strapped to a submarine, with sharks circling in the water.
After escaping the facility, you get a vehicle section…but unfortunately it’s an on rails turret mission. There are some cool set pieces (and probably hundreds of civilian casualties), such as blowing up a petrol station to take out multiple cars and a helicopter. After recovering the case of viruses for the second time, R pops up to advertise Bond’s new car. Considering they have a new Bond, I have no idea why the went with “R”, especially as that name for John Cleese was a joke from Bond, not his official title. A few earlier games had John Cleese as “R”, but in this, he’s an old man and the voice actor chose a voice much more like Desmond Llewelyn.
After Nightshade gets a rocket to the face from the villain’s super assassin, we get to control the car this time. The driving feels great, and the level has lots of branching paths. Like 007 Racing, the power ups are dotted across the paths, but you can overlook it more as this is very enjoyable to play. You need to get a pulse and knock out an armoured van.
Time for a stealth mission as you infiltrate a British embassy, you have a dart gun with limited ammo, but you can also knock out enemies via punching. There are a few alternate routes through the level using gadgets, which is common across the game. Bond nearly breaks his cover by spending too long ogling a woman. Bond comes across a bit like a clumsy oaf in this game, getting distracted by women instead of seducing them. After discovering the use of clones, it’s time to pose as a journalist and speak to the CEO behind them.
As Bond is told to wait in the CEO’s office, he realises that his cover has been blown immediately – the CEO is the woman he got caught perving on in the previous mission. This mission offers a bit of optional stealth as you go through grates and take photos of evidence, before hacking the computers and escaping through an underground lair.
This level is actually a lot of fun, although I don’t think it needs a timer (apparently it’s a timer until you get sealed in the base, but that happens later on anyway). There’s some hidden routes and a fancy weapon through a secret door – or you can smash through a window and set an alarm off to get it.
You found out that the super assassin from earlier is attacking a different British embassy to find someone who has stolen information from their group. I found this part confusing as you get told to go to “R’s” safehouse on the other side of the embassy, but its down a few other streets. You rescue hostages as you go though, get given a puzzle to find a hidden door (I worked it out and opened the door before M finished the clue, it’s very obvious) and fight the super assassin, who takes a lot of damage. You then have to take our a helicopter, which is easier to deal with.
Time for another driving section in a classic Aston Martin. You have to locate a few objects in the city, and I enjoyed this mission a lot – it shows that something like 007 Racing could be a really good game. If you perform well enough, you can even unlock a Lotus Esprit. Having to jump over a river, Bond ends up crashing his car into a warehouse. Luckily for Bond, there just happens to be a fully armed tank right where he crashed.
Sadly, this tank part is very disappointing, as it’s another turret section and you spend almost all of it using a minigun (you have very limited tank shells). It goes on for far too long. The final part is also very confusing, two tanks turn up near a bridge and if you start shooting them, you’ll fail the mission. You have to carefully aim for fuel tanks on a train passing on top of a bridge.
If the game was good with checkpoints, this would be a mild annoyance, but you go back to the very start of a tank section. Mess up two or three times (depending on difficulty), and you’ll end up at the start of the car mission. The lives system is just annoying, especially as the only checkpoints are when a new section of the level is loaded.
Now we have to investigate an oil rig using a jetpack, which sounds a lot cooler than it is. When fully fuelled up, you get a single burst upwards. The level itself is enjoyable, with some fun hidden routes and a few ways to climb up the tower at the end. Bond gets distracted by a woman and the main henchman pushed him off the tower.
Luckily for Bond, diving off the tower into a pool is actually the entrance to the villain’s secret base. Unfortunately for Bond, this is another tedious and overly long turret section. The henchman climbs into a large machine at the end for a boss fight. If you don’t figure out what to do quick enough it’s back to the last checkpoint…which is the start of the level.
Now it’s time to take care of the cloning lab. While in the previous mission, M said that this facility was too shielded to talk to Bond, she tells Bond that he’ll have to figure out how to take out the place without explosive, then straight away tells him how to do it.
This mission introduces the elite guards, which take more damage and are more aggressive. There are also two possible endings to this, depending on if you find a hidden keycard, which alters the start of the next mission. As Bond tries to escape in a submarine, he meets the CIA agent he saw get killed before, who is freely wondering around the submarine. She claims that the person that was killed was the clone, who was supposed to infiltrate the secret services before the super assassin accidentally killed her instead of Bond. Bond finds none of this suspicious.
Now on a aircraft carrier, either escaping from the ship’s brig or infiltrating from a boat (depending on the ending of the previous mission), M contacts Bond to tell him that he needs to get to the ship’s communications room so she can inform him about the current situation (couldn’t they have Bond do some of these briefings so they made sense?). You get to take out the clones of the world leaders and foil the plans of this group using them to replace the real ones from taking over the world (it probably would have been cheaper to bribe them).
With the clones taken care of, it’s time to rescue the real world leader in the final mission…which is probably the most boring mission of the game. While the outside view is nice, the base is really boring internally, as you go between missile silos killing enemies that are holding the world leaders hostage.
The CEO sets off a self destruct timer and the main henchman returns (you killed his clone earlier) and you shoot him a lot before he flees into the CEO’s office. Your first instinct is to strafe to dodge rockets, however if you do, you’ll die due to the rest of the floor blowing up (and having to do the whole fight again). If you manage to resist this urge you’ll shoot him a bit more then escape on a jet piloted by Nightshade. The game then fades to black.
And…that’s it. There’s no actual ending cutscene. We have no idea if the main villain or world leaders escaped, or if they all blew up. If you complete the game on the highest difficulty you do unlock a bonus video…which is just a clip show of the Bond moves in the game.
Agent Under Fire has really fun gameplay. The main missions are enjoyable and the car missions are great. The turret missions are tedious and something about the game makes it feel like a parody of James Bond instead of an actual Bond game. It feels like a decent starting point to expand on.