With two dozen films released over several decades, James Bond isn’t exactly a secret agent these days. Everyone knows who MI6’s most lethal operative is, a spanner on two legs who is ready to be thrown into the machinery of a supervillain plot to take over the world, cause a few explosions, and ride off into the sunset after delivering a well-timed quip.
Everyone also has an opinion on which incarnation of Bond is the best. If you’ve got class, you’d probably say Pierce Brosnan. If you had your head kicked in by an angry donkey, you’d probably say Daniel Craig while you attempted to fit a square peg into a round hole. Or if you wanted to be undisputedly correct, you’d say James Bond Jr.
Anyway, Hitman developer IO Interactive announced that it would be shaking up a new Martini for Bond now that it’s done working on Agent 47’s world of assassination trilogy. Previous James Bond games have had two defining factors in the past: They’ve usually all been based on a particular Bond at the time, and aside from Everything or Nothing, they’ve all been regularly crap as well.
Speaking to the Danish Broadcasting Corporation (Cheers The Gamer), studio head Hakan Abrak explained that IO’s approach was to focus on an entirely new version of 007, creating an origin story that the studio can build on with not just one but multiple games. IO is pretty much going all in on its next game, as it plans to lay the groundwork for a 007 trilogy and double its workforce from 200 employees to over 400.
Is it risky business to put all its Walther PPKs in one digital basket? Absolutely, but the independent studio has proven with Hitman 3 that it knows how to create a globe-trotting adventure with cinematic story beats, tight gameplay, and a dry one-liner just before someone meets an untimely demise.
Last Updated: January 27, 2021
