Splinter Cell Double Cross

User Rating: 4.8 | Tom Clancy's Splinter Cell: Double Agent PC
An unfortunate entry into one of the most successful franchises in gaming. Greatly disappointing. Where much is promised, very little is delivered. New gadgets either don't work or can't be upgraded. Installation is beyond finicky. After updating all my drivers, turning off the virus scanner, I began the plodding installation process. After installing the box version I then installed the patch.

Initial play was mired in crashes during level loading and game play. The save menu requires the player to compare time and dates which are not displayed in any particular order. There is no user options to how save menu information is displayed, so if you made a mistake early in the game you have to hunt for the correct time stamp to replay. After much frustration, I uninstalled and did a selective start-up then reinstalled. Game play was better, but load times are still excessive.

On a top-shelf homebuilt (AMD 64FX, 4GB Ram, dual BFG 7900GTX SLI, etc...) I toyed with customized graphic settings. Even with the most benign changes, the game crashed on startup. The only saving grace of SCDA is the storyline. It is by far Ubisoft's most inventive and engaging in the series, but in a game so bug infested, it doesn't provide the necessary salve to heal its bleeding wounds. It is a sorry addition to an otherwise brilliant series.

SCDA is nothing more than a pay-to-test beta version of what could have been an absolutely stellar game.