Hitman 2 offers few surprises – it just does what Hitman games do best, in a typically polished and unforgiving manner

By Steve Boxer

Hitman 2

Developer: Io Interactive

Publisher: Warner Bros Interactive Entertainment

Platform: PlayStation 4, Xbox One, PC

HITMAN 2 developer IO Interactive would undoubtedly characterise 2017 as the year in which it took back control of its destiny. During the course of the year, publisher Square Enix, which had owned the company since 2004, announced that it was selling it. But Io Interactive instantly bounced back by pulling off a management buyout and retaining the rights to the Hitman IP. Pretty soon, it found a new publisher in the form of Warner Bros Interactive Entertainment, and all the while, it continued to beaver away on making Hitman 2.

Not that you would detect any signs of turmoil in the latest instalment of the revered stealth-em-up starring the taciturn Agent 47. There is, admittedly, one radical difference between Hitman 2 and its predecessor, 2016’s rebooted Hitman. Whereas the latter was delivered in episodic form, Hitman 2 comes with all its six missions included from the outset. Clearly the episodic format was one to which Square Enix, rather than IO Interactive, was wedded.