Splinter Cell: Conviction – A welcome addition to the Splinter Cell legacy.

Ubisoft’s newest installation to the Splinter Cell series was released this month after a long period of hype.  And it’s an absolute blast.

The gameplay is totally different than the rest of the series.  If you played the first few, you remember sneaking around rooms, pulling bodies into dark corners, and frantically picking locks as the guards patrolled closer.  But Conviction has Sam as a determined killer; out to get the guys who took away his daughter.  The game hasn’t turned into a run and gun shooter yet, and stealth is still important, but it doesn’t have the same tricks of the trade that old Sam Fisher used to have up his sleeve.

One of the new features of the game are the interrogations that Sam will sometimes put his foes through.  Overall, the interrogations seem to both hit and miss.  The first few may be kind of exciting, but overall, they’re few and far between, and don’t get any more exciting or feel as fresh and interesting as the first.

But, that shouldn’t draw away too much from the game.  The sound track is pretty amazing.  It weaves you in and out of the story by adding to it, rather than becoming part of the game itself.  It builds suspense when you need it, and is fairly unnoticeable otherwise; the way a good soundtrack should be.

The length of the game was a little too short for my taste as well.  Since most companies are focusing on building the replay value, they often neglect making the first play through exciting enough to want to play it again.  Gamespot has the correct idea when it said that the first play storyline isn’t challenging enough, but the co-op is what really brings the game to life.