PS2 Review: Tom Clancy's Splinter Cell (2003)

I remember being quite excited back when I learned that Splinter Cell was going to be made available for PS2 users. Being dazzled by the graphics, I eagerly rented it as soon as I was able. I'm not sure whether it was culture shock or shell shock, but the learning curve for me was quite a long one. I started playing it at about nine in the morning and didn't stop until seven in the evening; it is certainly a strange feeling to have spent all day with a game, especially one you are just getting to know. It was like I had never played a stealth game before and this was my extra long first date. Sure, they gave you a silencer in some missions in GoldenEye and the Hitman franchise can certainly be billed as a stealth series, but you know if you get exposed you can shoot your way out of problems in both. Not so in Splinter Cell; Sam Fisher put me through a boot camp where I was broken down and reprogrammed. I had to unlearn to shoot first. (This took me a long time. It is quite strange to play it today and think there was a time when I struggled with not having enough ammunition.) And when you spend this amount of time with a game, with all of the frustration and growing pains that go with it, you can only come out with a deep sense of connection to it. Sticking with it through the hard times is proof of one's love. In so doing, Splinter Cell came to define the stealth genre for me. And it became more than just a game, just like for many Star Wars is more than just a movie. People will dress up like Storm Troopers; I will climb pipes and do shoulder rolls. It was a world I wanted to play in. As well, Sam Fisher became iconic. He is brilliantly brought to life by Michael Ironside, which is made cooler by his nearly always playing the "bad guy" role (indeed, my first exposure to him during my more impressionable years of youth was his playing the villain in Free Willy). I loved the idea of a seasoned veteran, knowing that he could only have survived this long if he knew what he was doing. You can read more about my admiration for Sam here, when I talk about the upcoming Splinter Cell: Blacklist. Splinter Cell also undeniably bears the signature of Tom Clancy and his fascination with modern military technology, especially of the near future. This, in fact, is one of the many charming things of the series as a whole: the setting is always a few years after the actual release date. The story also behaves like one of Clancy's crafted novels of geopolitical chess games, and, as enjoyable as reading them can be, I had far more fun playing them. All in all, Tom Clancy's Splinter Cell is a joy and the birth of a wonderful series (albeit one that needs to find its roots), and is a must buy at the prices for which it can be had today, particularly if one has not previously tried it.