I've been on a DC Animated Universe kick and wanted to revisit these. It's a really good game, but it does have a weaker back third. It's a good thing it's a joy to fight and explore because I really dislike this game's take on the series. It's ugly and mean and cynical without coming close to the best ugly, mean, and cynical Batman stories. It just sort of presents one note to you at all times: that every member of the rogue's gallery is the most sick and twisted monster you could possibly imagine.

I think this one's in the conversation for greatest games of all time. Certainly one of the best of its generation. It's remarkable what a leap there is between the first game and this one over so little time, especially considering the original already felt like it was from the future in 2002.
The first two games are essentially obstacle courses. I feel like this often gets leveled at them as a criticism, but I don't think that's a bad thing by any means--that's more or less what all stealth games are when you get down to it. What sets Chaos Theory apart is how it takes that trial and error obstacle course design and applies it to maps that are far more complicated and intertwined than anything in the first two games. There are multi-tiered buildings full of vents, pipes, and security doors providing many different paths to your goals. The game also has sub-objectives (a bit like Goldeneye's) that reward you for exploring every inch of the map. Guards are predictable and easy to manipulate--a positive. They'll also provide information about the map to you if you grab them. Nearly everything you can do winds back around into your main or bonus objectives. It's immensely rewarding.
This is also one of the Coolest games ever made. It looked unbelievable in 2005 and thanks to its meticulous lighting direction it still impresses. Only the character models remind you that this is an Unreal 2.5 game from 20 years ago. The locations you visit are hugely varied (cargo ship! Bank heist!) and I can't applaud Amon Tobin's score enough. You should get spotted in every level just to hear how the music evolves.
Some stray notes:

-There's like maybe one bad level out of the lot (Seoul 2), plus a "boss" encounter at the end of one otherwise good level that kind of blows.

-The plot is nonsense but it's better nonsense than Pandora Tomorrow. It at least feels like a proper Clancy spy thriller again, not an extended joke about airport security. They finally settle on the best version of Sam here, too--I love his cranky middle aged American banter.

-Speaking of, in general this game is really funny, minus some tiresome accent humor in some levels. Grabbing a guard nets you an instant manzai routine between Sam and his foe. He's funny without being irritating, and his politics make sense again. Remember how in Pandora Tomorrow he kept making surprisingly lefty asides? I sort of doubt Sam Fisher is anything left of Reaganite.

-Again, the score is amazing. It's one of my favorite game soundtracks of all time. If you've never heard it before, listen to it. It's one of Amon Tobin's best albums, in my opinion. I'm so sad that the bank heist music never made it onto the official album release, though...

-This game feels like an immersive sim just for different kinds of stealth builds.

GOATed game, I need stealth to make a comeback.

This is one of those game's that is so universally beloved it's hard to believe it's that good, but it really is that good. This is one of the best video games ever made. It is so good that it has spawned imitators that I would also call iconic experiences that do not even come close to it. Like, Dead Space 2 is one of my favorite action horror games of all time, but there just is no comparison. Sometimes there are five star games that feel a whole extra star away from other superlative five star games.
I replayed this on the GameCube this time (I didn't have my own copy until the Wii version came out) to get ready for the remake. Considering that Resident Evil 4 is available on practically every 3D platform that has existed since 2005, it's striking just how For The GameCube it feels. When people complain about this game's controls feeling "dated" I wonder if they've tried the original version, because it makes perfect sense on Nintendo's weird little gamepad. The precise, grippy left stick is a joy to aim with, and makes some sort of logistical sense too with Leon always being on the left side of your screen. The big A button controls all important actions. Even the quick-time events essentially boil down to asking you to clench one or both of your hands onto the controller. If you're emulating this or playing the PC version, I do wonder if getting one of those refurb USB GC pads might help for people who struggle with the non-standard controls.
I don't have too much to say about the game itself that you haven't heard a million times before. The action is fantastic. The tension is so expertly wound and unwound through encounter design and ammo scarcity. The variety is unbelievable--there are more gimmick sequences and setpieces in one chapter of this game than most games have in their entire runtime. Every now and then I'll see people say that disc 2 drags, but I could not disagree more. In the back third of the game you are whisked through several massive shootouts, a classic horror sequence, multiple boss battles with unique mechanics, and a bulldozer ride. There's a laser hallway. Stuff is never not happening in this game.
It also still looks stunning. I played on a CRT and was blown away by the impeccable art direction. The nighttime rain sequences in particular look shocking. The grimy photo-sourced texture work is a technique that I think subsequent HD ports hasn't been kind to, but on a tube TV that stuff looks like magic.
This is also one of the funniest games ever made. A key ingredient in any Resident Evil game is that all the characters should react about ten degrees lower to everything compared to even a typical B-movie protagonist. Ethan Winters behaving like he just dropped a potted planet when he gets fingers cut off, for example. Leon is the apex of this ethos already, but RE4 gives him uniquely hilarious stuff to under-react to. The villain having the same motivations as every ooh-rah American action movie from the 2000s makes for some incredible scenes where he pivots from complaining about American interventionism to explaining why he is unleashing The Thing monster in rural Spain. There's a bit where a villain randomly explains to Leon that while he may look old, he is actually only 20 years old, as if this invalidates Leon's comment that he looks old. Ashley knows how to drive the world's biggest bulldozer and nobody says anything. This game is looney tunes. I hope even half of this camp masterpiece's humor made it into the remake.

This is a stunning launch title that still holds up visually. I was surprised and a little disappointed revisiting this overall, however. The game looks stunning but actually playing it is frustrating more than anything else. The controls are very squirrely, and the ships themselves feel more like floating cameras than vehicles. The real killer though is the mission design, which outside of a handful of classics everyone remembers (the trench run and the first Battle of Endor level) ranges from forgettable to outright malevolent.

Prisoners of the Maw asks you to ignore everything exciting happening to do drivebys in the Y-wing. The Battle of Hoth really wants to show off its Snowspeeder cable tech, and makes you reenact tripping the AT-ATs a mind-numbing amount of times. There's an Ace Combat-esque canyon stealth run to hijack a shuttle that feels like the beginning of a wild escape mission that never builds to an exciting twist. And then there's Strike at the Core, which clearly wants to feel like a sadomasochistic gauntlet for players to overcome with all the skills they've learned, but it's so full of seemingly random lasers and enemy behavior it feels more like a miracle than a challenge to finish.

I have fond memories of playing this thing over and over, but revisiting it without that launch title sheen reveals a lot of flawed design. I hate to do the direct comparison thing, but Ace Combat 04 came out at nearly the same time and is easily the better arcade flight game. This is still absolutely worth playing just to experience the attention to detail and enthusiasm for the source material, though!

This game has some of the most inspired level ideas in the entire series--the train, Jerusalem, LAX--but the whole thing is riddled with little issues that bring the whole experience down. Granted, some of that is on the PC port (I was playing with the shadows fix, don't worry) but some of it isn't. Hair-trigger guard AI, occasionally illogical level design, and a half-baked story make the whole thing feel significantly less polished than the original. The story is truly bizarre and the game just kind of ends all of a sudden. I still don't know why it opened with a close-up shot of someone in handcuffs, and the ending made me laugh out loud.

Still! It's very much worth it if you really like Splinter Cell. When it hits, it really hits. And you get to play Chaos Theory afterward!

It's unbelievable that this came out in 2002 (unless you look too closely at the character models). This game has better use of light and shadow than many games with full ray tracing; watching Sam and whoever he's dragging into a corner fade completely into the shadows never gets old. Compared to Pandora Tomorrow and especially Chaos Theory your toolbox is a bit limited, but it's still an exciting campaign. It only has one, maybe two bad levels (Abattoir and Embassy 2), the rest are all fantastic. I played through the first half or so on an original Xbox, and the game looks stunning still on a CRT, but I would recommend playing on PC purely for the quicksave function--those aforementioned levels might do your head in otherwise.

Found this in my garage while scrounging for old games; I'd completely forgotten I had it! I was earnestly delighted by this replay of it nearly ooh uh god oh no 20 years later. If you can get over the barrier of the wildly unconventional controls (L1 to shoot!) there's a really solid action game in here.

My only gripes are with the sparse environments variety and small number of levels. The entire game takes place in warehouses and industrial hallways, and there's not much here that makes use of the honestly really great movement and hacking abilities. According to my save file I finished the game in under 3 hours. Still, It feels lovingly dedicated to the SAC property. The full dub cast is here, the story is structured like a standard episode of the show, and the music rocks. Kicking guys in slow motion never gets old, either.

I highly recommend this if you're on the lookout for cool PS2 stuff outside the typical top ten best ever lists, especially if you have a passion (or at least tolerance) for Cavia stuff.