great co-op
Gameplay:
Gameplay stays extremely close to what you would expect from a Splinter Cell. While for a small period of time, you're a bald convict with nothing but a shiv, you'll quickly go back to familiar territory. There are the same thermal and night vision goggles to use, the same gadgets, and the same strategies to use against AI. Surprisingly, the game manages to be fun and exciting, though nothing will ever surprise you. Some missions require you to interrogate guards to find out information, and then others will require you to use a bunch of different computers across the level to get intelligence on what to do next. You generally just try to stay in the dark and make no noise. Occasionally you'll run into one of the mandatory "alert" sequences, when something is about to go off, or you'll need to immediately kill some one. (If you've ever seen an episode on Alias or 24 when a mission is going perfectly and then someone screws up and the whole plan goes to crap, then you'll know what I mean.) As dull as this sounds, the gameplay is stable and does have its moments. There's also an online multiplayer, which is radically different from the single player but sometimes much more fun, as well. In it, you play as spies working for either Echelon or Upsilon, with fun gadgets like smoke bombs or electrocuting darts to frag each other with. The controls and style are different, but once you get used to them, they're addictive. The spies are much faster and more flexible, which makes the rounds more adrenaline-filled and suspenseful than most other games. There are lots of fun game modes, from hacking the enemy's computer while your fellow spies guard you, or trying to kill Sam Fisher while he runs around and breaks into your base. However, you need to remember that this is a Playstation 2 game, not something for the Xbox 360. There's usually few people on, so chances are anyone you find will be playing deathmatch on a favorite map. Nonetheless, online play is one of the highlights to Double Agent.