You have probably heard this before. A hectic game hits the market. It requires some degree of connection to the Internet. Everyone flocks to play the first day, only to find a series of frustrating road blocks. Online connectivity is unstable, if it works. There are problems with saving data and character progression. Some players opt for sophisticated versions – say, an “Ultimate” edition – and have trouble accessing what they have paid for. The developer fires a series of apologetic tweets, says he recognizes the situation and is “investigating” and publishes a FAQ addressing the most common problems with a series of responses that are fine, at best, and vague, at worst.
The game’s release, in other words, is a mess.
The disaster of the day is not a Destiny or one Diablo or one Division. it is Hitman 3, the latest in IO Interactive’s recent series of interactive Instagram posts, launched this week for a lot of platforms.
Oh boy. What happened this time?
Hitman 3The company’s problems started, supposedly, before the launch. IO’s Hitman games have always had an online element, which depends on a persistent internet connection to keep track of their progress. KotakuRiley MacLeod’s told me that when he was reviewing the game, connectivity would increase and disappear. As far as he knew, he had no major influence on how he played. (When reviewing the game for PC Mag, Mike Williams had similarly unstable connectivity.) You can technically play Hitman 3 offline, but you will lose some unlocks.
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It doesn’t look so bad.
In the vacuum, no, that wouldn’t be a problem. It is common for online games to have server problems before launch. Hitman 3The servers were running (on paper) during the review period, but still faced some problems. And keep in mind that such problems existed despite the fact that only a small crop of reviewers – and not the broadest audience of players – had access to the game.
Server problems persisted when the game was officially released on January 20. Bonus points if you saw this coming.
This is not everything. Hitman 3 technically allows players to continue their progress – both in terms of character progress and unlocked levels – from previous games in the “World Murder trilogy”, Hitman and Hitman 2. This process was also not carried out with the announced smoothness.
Hitman games are defined both by their locations and by anything else. Previous games have sent Agent 47 to chic destinations like Marrakesh, Morocco; Hokkaido, Japan; Miami, Florida; and Sapienza, Italy, which is not a real place, but, come on, it may well be a carbon copy of Positano, Sorrento, Praiano or any other vacation spot on the idyllic Amalfi Coast. If you had Hitman 2, you can import any unlocked level to Hitman 3 downloading expansion passes called Access Packs at no extra cost. (Those who owned Hitman or Hitman 2 on the disc I had to go through even more complicated download process. It’s a whole thing.)
Attempting to find these access packages in the proprietary window of each console, however, can show them listed by price. Instead, players had to navigate to Hitman 3Store tab through the game’s main menu. But even that did not guarantee success. Some Xbox players were totally unable to access the Access Pack for the first game, even if they follow the guidelines for a tee. IO says a “resolution” is in progress.
PC players, however, faced some mixed message about whether PC players would have to repurchase or not Hitman 2 at the Epic Games Store, where Hitman 3 is a timed exclusive. Currently, Hitman 2 is not available on the Epic Games Store, but you can purchase the Hitman 2 Gold Edition Access Pack—Which includes the basic game and its add-ons – with an 80 percent reduction by February 3. In other words, if you have Hitman 2 on Steam and I want to play the levels of that game on Hitman 3, you will have to pay again. IO says a correction is in the works. It is not clear why the Hitman 2 The Gold Edition Access Pack is not completely unchecked. (Kotaku contacted IO representatives for comment.)
And then there is the actual data transfer. If you played Hitman 2, you can transfer your gamer profile – your XP rating, your DM levels, your unlocked outfits, things like that – to Hitman 3. IO Interactive even created a dedicated website, allowing players to solve the process smoothly. The site almost immediately gave in to the tension, with some players receiving error messages. At 2:57 pm Eastern Time, IO Interactive acknowledged the problem by writing, in a tweet, that anyone seeing a failure notification has been “queued at [their] final and processed. You cannot do more. “
“We have taken steps to stabilize the transition progress,” wrote IO in a Common questions Thursday morning. “We are cautiously optimistic that we will avoid further problems and are ready to maintain the situation[s] smoothly as we reach peak hours. “
And there is the problem with cross-generation enhancements. It’s no secret that upgrading a game from your version of PlayStation 4 to PlayStation 5 is already a confusing process. Hitman 3 throw an extra key at him. In some cases, PlayStation players have reported problems using a PS4 game disc to upgrade to the PS5 version, despite IO pre-release promises stating that next generation updates would be free. Today’s FAQ directs players to first download the PS4 version to their PS5 and then go to the PlayStation Store (console only) and download the Hitman 3 Disc update edition.
In addition to all this, some small pieces of downloadable content are apparently not even transported. By IO, the Requiem Package—Which, curiously, had a white rubber duck – it is currently “AWOL”.
Wow, ok, I withdraw. This is too much. Why does this always happen?
this ever happens, doesn’t it?
Speaking for Kotaku in 2019, developers frayed a list of common problems that can potentially harm an online game, including crashes, system failure, a code problem, an unexpected influx of players, or even bugs on an individual player’s machine. Vlambeer developer Rami Ismail compared these releases to Mini Metro, the fantastic minimalist management simulator on building accessible traffic in major metropolitan areas.
It is also important to remember that issues like this are not universal. (See: All people who respond to articles about Cyberpunk 2077 with some diatribe about how the game works perfectly on its zillion dollar equipment, and which is the game of the year, and why it’s getting so bad word of mouth, what’s the problem? Hitman 3 players, everything is peaches and sauce. For others, the whole ordeal was an exercise in frustration.
And this is a story as old as time. Mass Effect: Andromeda released like a mess full of bugs, before BioWare turned the ship around and transformed the game, if not the best Mass effect, a solid series input. Similar things can be said about Halo: The Master Chief Collection–which is a crazy explosion today-or Diablo III. And everybody knows The Nobody’s heaven ark of redemption for a while. IT’S Hitman 3 the next chapter in a long saga of now excellent games that burst at launch? Only time will tell if IO can do this job.