Hitman’s protagonist, Agent 47, has seen the world. He has parachuted into the tallest tower in Dubai. It has infiltrated manor houses in the British countryside and on the Amalfi Coast. He’s even been to New Jersey. But apparently everyone’s favorite secret agent still needs one more stamp in his passport: a dimly lit island that looks a lot like an Uncharted set piece.
Yes, developer IO Interactive has added a new level to Hitman 3. Called Ambrose Island, it’s available for free to anyone who owns the game as part of developer IO Interactive’s “second year” plan. Hitman 3 came out last January with five incredible stealth sandboxes and one divisive non-stealth sandbox. IO has slowly introduced a wave of new content, including a series of downloadable content (note: not free) based on the Seven Deadly Sins. It also has a roguelike mode, although it has been delayed until later this year.
But Ambrose Island is the first real new stage for Hitman 3. It’s set in the Andaman Sea in western Thailand (the location of one of the best levels in the series). Chronologically, as you know if you’re one of the 17 people who were able to unravel Hitman’s hilariously convoluted narrative, it’s set before the events of Hitman 3. One of the early cutscenes, seen above, indicates that it takes place before Isle of Sgail. stage at the end of Hitman 2.
The mission summary comes courtesy of Hitman characters Lucas Gray and Diana Burnwood. Grey’s former ally, a generic brownshirt named Noel Crest, has attempted to team up with a modern pirate queen named Sinhi “Akka” Venthan. Your mission, if you choose to accept this heavy and irrelevant part, is to kill them both by clandestine means. (Look, I just devoured the entire Mission: Impossible series back-to-back, you gotta cut me some slack.)
I did some digging last night, and yes, Ambrose Island is definitely more Hitman. Although it looks like a third-person action game, it’s actually a tricky puzzle. There are containers to hide and deadly objects to find, people to observe and track. Because it is a densely packed area, the environment looks so sumptuous, so real, that you feel like you are on vacation. I haven’t completed the mission yet, so I don’t know exactly how it compares to the rest of the series, but yes, yes: More Hitman. Of course.
I know there’s been a lot of talk lately about the 2022 release list and how it’s been relatively thin compared to years past. But between this new Hitman level, the Into the Breach update that’s basically a new sequel, and the compulsively playable Hot Wheels expansion for Forza Horizon 5, I realize I don’t need new games Right Now. The backlog is doing its job.