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Splinter Cell: Conviction Co-op Hands-on (Xbox 360) Splinter Cell: Conviction Co-op Hands-on (Xbox 360)
The latest iteration of Ubisoft’s stealthy shooter has been through a lot on its way to a 2010 release. Delays, complete redesigns (no one liked that haircut) and start-overs have almost taken the game off of everyone’s radar. So, it was nice to finally get to play the game ourselves, even though it was “only” cooperative play. Then again, co-op has been one of the best features in Splinter Cell games of yore.
The cooperative missions in Splinter Cell: Conviction are set apart as their own little mini-campaign. The developers are calling it a “prologue,” because the events that play out within it take place before the events that Sam Fisher experiences in the main game. You don’t have to play the prologue before jumping into the main game, and can in fact play it no matter where you are in the main story.
In the co-op prologue, you play as one of two special operatives—Archer, an agent from Third Echelon or his Russian counterpart, Kestrel, from the Voron group—and your mission is to retrieve four stolen EMP devices before they are sold on the Russian black market. Your quest will take you across four maps set in the Moscow underworld, and you and your counterpart must work together to save the weapons from falling into the wrong hands. Possibly a tall order for two soldiers more accustomed to being adversaries.
The cooperative play contains some of the same new elements of the game that you will discover in single player. The “last known position” and “mark and execute” functions are still there, but take on new angles when playing with another person. Both players can see an enemy that’s been marked by one of them, making it easier to share the executing duties. And sometimes knowing your teammate’s last position—or at least where the guards think it was—can give you the opportunity to drop in behind them. While the cooperative gameplay doesn’t rely on you and your buddy doing too much simultaneous actions (such as forcing a door open together), it does depend a lot on creating situations where a second gun is very useful. Creating crossfires and distracting guards for your buddy are good things. Having the ability to duck out of the way while being held hostage, so your partner can terminate your captor, is a good thing, too.
There is another game mode that can be played cooperatively called Deniable Ops, which consists of four different game modes that can also be played by your lonesome (except for one):
Hunter—Eliminate all the enemies in a progressive sweep of the map.
Last Stand—Defend the EMP against waves of enemies.
Face-Off—Adversarial mode of spy versus spy, with hostile AI thrown into the mix (for two players only).
Infiltration—Eliminate all hostiles in the mission area without being detected.
These four game types are available on four different unique maps in the Deniable Ops mode.
The last thing the developers from Ubisoft showed us from Splinter Cell: Conviction relates to the cooperative mode, but also extends to the single-player game as well. The Persistent Elite Creation System (PECS) is similar to an experience points system not unlike the Barracks Challenges from Call of Duty. Completing various in-game challenges will earn you points that you can spend on upgrades to your spy equipment and weapons, as well as to visual customization. Earning points with PECS should extend the player’s connection to the game greatly.
Splinter Cell: Conviction still feels like it has a way to go development-wise before the February 2010 release date, but we’re fairly confident in Ubisoft’s ability to deliver a solid game that lives up to the high expectations created by earlier incarnations of the series. That’s good, because the world has waited long enough for the return of Sam Fisher.
Splinter Cell: Conviction Co-op Hands-on (Xbox 360)
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