But if you didn’t, they’ll serve as a constant reminder that Hitman 2 is the sequel to something that you don’t own, and probably should, but also really reinforce the overarching feeling that Hitman 2 is like an expansion pack to those episodes rather than a complete sequel. If you bought the last Hitman, you’ll have access to them all here. Then, when you’ve downloaded the game’s various sections and booted it up, you’ll actually have to navigate past the story of 2016’s Hitman before you can get to the new stuff.
That might sound fantastic for anyone wanting to just download the first level and get playing, but actually is just a sneak preview at how fragmented the game can feel. For instance, you have to download each of the six levels separately (which means each one has their own set of trophies on PS4, if that bothers you), along with another chunk that counts as the ‘main game’.
But, unfortunately, you can tell from the second you try to install Hitman 2 that it was designed as an episodic release originally, and the machinery of that delivery system is evident everywhere.
Hitman 2, though, has ditched the episodic release schedule and you’re getting all six locations in one full-priced package, complete with an overarching story and several chunky extras, including Sniper Assassin and Ghost game modes - although more on both of those later. (Something that will sound very familiar to anyone who remembers Hitman: Blood Money's Murder of Crows level.) While the very second level, in Miami, can have you literally strutting your stuff in a giant, and very, very pink, flamingo outfit, complete with oversized eyelashes.
The recipient of your botched tattoo will question your cheekbones, for example, but will still let you starting inking him nonetheless. Thankfully, Hitman 2 - the direct sequel to the 2016 Hitman reboot - retains all of that, and regularly plays on those ideas. Throughout the entire history of the Hitman series, the games have embraced this silliness, the slightly surreal, the tongue-in-cheek humour that means no-one really questions the validity of Agent 47’s disguises.
Or that time you gave a tattoo directly to a man’s eardrum after walking boldly into his drug-funded mansion pretending to be a famous, reality TV star, artist who’s mysteriously lost all his own ink and comes sporting an entirely different face. There aren’t many games that let you recall the time you knocked an old woman unconscious with a freshly baked blueberry muffin while she was distracted by a Big Mouth Billy Bass in an upstairs corridor of a suburban house.