You’ve probably heard it before. A lively game hits the market. A certain degree of internet connection is required. Everyone rushes to play on the first day, only to hit a series of frustrating obstacles. Online connectivity is insecure, even if it is functional. There are problems with saving data and character progression. Some players receive deluxe versions – say, an “Ultimate” edition – and have trouble accessing the things they paid for. The developer launches a series of apologetic tweets, says he acknowledges the situation and “analyzes” and publishes a FAQ that addresses the most common problems with a series of answers that are thin, at best and vague, at worst .
Launching the game, in other words, is a mess.
The du jour disaster is not a Destiny or a Diablo or a divided. It is Hitman 3, the latest in the recent series of interactive posts from IO Interactive, released this week for a bunch of platforms.
Oh boy. What happened this time?
Hitman 3The problems are supposed to have started before the launch. IO’s Hitman games have always had an online element that relies on a persistent internet connection to track your progress. KotakuRiley MacLeod told me that when he was reviewing the game, connectivity would fade and fade. As far as he knew, he had no major influence on the way he played. (In reviewing the game for PC Mag, Mike Williams faced similar connectivity.) You can play technically Hitman 3 offline, but you will lose some unlocks.
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It doesn’t sound so bad.
In a vacuum, no, it wouldn’t be a problem. It is common for online games to have server issues before launch. Hitman 3The servers were up and running (on paper) during the review period, but they still had some issues. And keep in mind that such problems existed despite the fact that only a small crop of reviewers – rather than the wider gaming audience – had access to the game.
Server problems persisted when the game officially launched on January 20th. Bonus points if you see him coming.
That’s not all. Hitman 3 technically, allows players to continue their progress – both in terms of character progress and unlocked levels – from previous World of Assassination trilogy games, Hitman and Hitman 2. Also, this process did not go as well as announced.
Hitman games are defined as much by their locations as by anything else. Previous games have sent Agent 47 to lightning destinations such as Marrakesh, Morocco; Hokkaido, Japan; Miami, Florida; and Sapienza, Italy, which is not a real place, but, come on, it could just as well be a copy of Positano, Sorrento, Praiano or any other holiday spot on the idyllic Amalfi Coast. If you owned Hitman 2, you can import any unlocked level into Hitman 3 by downloading expansion permits called access packages at no extra cost. (Those who owned Hitman or Hitman 2 on the disk had to go through even more complicated download process. It’s a whole thing.)
Trying to find these access packages in the proprietary showcase of each console, however, could display them at a price. Instead, the players had to navigate to Hitman 3Store tab in the main menu of the game. But even that did not guarantee success. Some Xbox players have not been able to fully access the first game access package, even if they follow the instructions up to a tee. IO say a “resolution” is underway.
Meanwhile, PC gamers have clashed some mixed messages about whether or not PC gamers should redeem Hitman 2 on the Epic Games store, where Hitman 3 it is a timed exclusivity. At the moment, Hitman 2 is not available in the Epic Games store, but you can buy it Hitman 2 Gold Edition access package– which includes the basic game and its supplements – with an 80% discount until February 3. In other words, if you own Hitman 2 on Steam and you want to play the levels of that game in Hitman 3, you will have to pay again. IO say a solution is in the works. It is not clear why Hitman 2 The Gold Edition access package is not fully marked. (Kotaku contacted IO representatives for comments.)
And then there is the actual data transfer. If you played Hitman 2, you can wear your player profile – your XP rank, your Master levels, your unlocked suits, things like that Hitman 3. IO Interactive even created a dedicated site, allowing players to solve the process perfectly. The site crashed almost immediately, with some players encountering error messages. At 14:57 ET, IO Interactive acknowledged the problem, writing in a tweet, that anyone who sees a failure notification has been “placed in a queue on [their] finished and processed. There’s nothing you can do. ”
“We have taken steps to stabilize the progress carried forward,” IO wrote in a statement FAQ Thursday morning. “We are cautiously optimistic that we will avoid other problems and we are on deck to keep things going[s] smooth as we reach peak hours. ”
And then there’s the problem with cross-genre improvements. It’s no secret that upgrading a game from PlayStation 4 to PlayStation 5 is already a confusing process. Hitman 3 throw an extra key in it. In some cases, PlayStation players have reported problems with using a PS4 game disc to upgrade to the PS5 version, despite promises of pre-release from IO stating that next-generation updates would be free. Today’s frequently asked questions lead gamers to first download the PS4 version to the PS5, then head to the PlayStation Store (console only) and download Hitman 3 Disc update edition.
In addition to all this, some small pieces of seemingly downloadable content are not even taken at all. On IO, Requiem package– which, funny, featured a white rubber duck – is now “AWOL”.
Wow, okay, I’ll take her back. That’s a lot. Why does this always happen?
This one always It happens, doesn’t it?
Talking to Kotaku in 2019, developers noisy a list of common problems that could potentially disrupt an online game, including crashes, system failures, a code issue, an unexpected influx of players, or even errors on a single player’s device. Developer Rami Ismail of Vlambeer compared such releases Mini Metro, the terrible sense of minimalist management about building an accessible transport in large metropolitan areas.
It is also important to remember that such issues are not universal. (See: All people who respond to articles about 2077. Cyberpunk with a certain diatribe about how the game is played swimming on their billion dollar platform and that it is the game of the year and why, anyway it gets so bad in the mouth, what is the problem?) For some Hitman 3 players, everything is peaches and sauce. For others, the whole ordeal was an exercise in frustration.
And it’s a story as old as time anyway. Mass Effect: Andromeda released like a buggy mess, before BioWare returned vessel and turned the game into, if not the best Mass effect, a solid serial input. Similar things could be said Halo: Master Chief Collection–which is a strange explosion these days-or Diablo III. And everyone knows No Man’s Sky redemption ark so far. It is Hitman 3 the next chapter in a long saga of now great games that erupted at launch? Only time will tell if IO can finish this job.