 This Article was written on 28th of February 2014.It’s also part of the GruntWatcher Archives
With the release of the Thief reboot I’ve decided to do an article sharing my history of stealth games. So it back grab a cup of tea and enjoy my exploits of hiding in the shadows.
It’s the mid 2000’s I’m in my shed playing Burnout 3 on my PS2 when all of a sudden my uncle comes to visit and along with him some games to lend, one of them being Hitman 2. As soon as he left I saved my progress in Burnout 3 to play my new found discovery into the stealth genre. When I started the first mission little did I know that I wasn’t supposed to get caught or I fail the mission. See I was used to WW2 shooters like Medal of Honor or 3D platformers like Rachet and Clank so I had to think a strategy rather than rush in all guns blazing. Unfortunately though I was a little too young for Hitman, oh not because of its content but because I found it hard to play. 
It took a couple of years for me to fully experience a proper stealth game fully, that’s where Splinter Cell comes in. I was roughly 12 when Double Agent came out so i was just about the proper age to play it. The graphics were a little dated for the time (considering the Xbox 360 came out two years ago so i was stuck with my PS2) but hey was grand enough in terms of gameplay. I heard of the game first on an issue of PSW showing an article on the games production. It reminded me of those films you would see on a Wednesday broadcast on RTE before the days of Sky TV.
When I did get my Xbox 360 I got a lend of Assassin’s Creed, and it was terrible. The game had a four year development cycle and yet it still had major problems.For starters the NPCs are dumb as hell always getting in the way of your targets or enemy’s. Also the story felt uninteresting while Altair felt like a whiny Anakin Skywalker wannabe. Finally the graphics were dull and grey not offering alot in the visual medium. My 14 self thought game sucked and five years later I still think it does. I got this game recently on a steam sale for 2.50 so I’ll have to play the game all the way through(yeah back then I stopped playing after the beginning) but until then it will have to wait.
Most recently I completed Mark of the Ninja which I found to be an interesting little indie game that has unique stealth mechanics for a 2D Platformer, I felt the story was lacking in development and the ending is unsatisfactory but its like Mass Effect 3 good game, bad ending. The graphics were impressive for an indie game, the animation on the cutscenes are stylized and the control is spot on(for the Xbox 360 controller) so overall the game is good, but not great.
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