Splinter Cell Conviction's Cancelled DS Version Review

 Hello everyone. A while back, I learned that there was a cancelled Nintendo DS version of Splinter Cell Conviction and I was curious to check it out. This version was based on the original scrapped version of Conviction that was originally supposed to release back in 2008. While OG Main Console Conviction was rebooted into the 2010 version we ended up getting, the DS version was just flat out cancelled in 2008. However, a ROM of the prototype development version recently resurfaced and I just had to check it out as a window into an alternate timeline where we got OG Conviction and as a fan of DS Splinter Cell Chaos Theory, I just had to see how they adapted OG Conviction for the DS.

 

When I booted up the game and played the first mission, my first thought was "OMG, this feels like a hybrid between Assassin's Creed Chronicles on the DS and Metal Gear Solid 1 PS1. I love those games. This is going to be sweet" .  The game showed its cool sorta overhead camera angle and PS1-inspired models and graphics. It was also made by Gameloft, the people behind Altair's Chronicles DS with menus, graphics and a feel reminiscent of that game. The game ended up being more of a roller-coaster of emotions afterwards.

 

Conviction DS' gameplay is divided up into 2 "phases". The first is "Stealth phase" where the mission plays mostly like a Metal Gear Solid 1 clone. And the second phase is "Action phase" where it tries to play like a 3rd person cover shooter. Lets talk about "Stealth Phase". The controls are decent. You move/run with the Dpad. Y is used for punching. B is used to crouch and take cover. A is used to interact with objects (such as picking up throwables, opening doors and climbing on pipes). X is reserved for special occasions. L turns on the DS Microphone and Holding R lets you walk. The touch screen shows a Soliton Radar with vision cones for guards, cameras, civilians and your objectives. The bulk of Stealth Phase missions had me running between enemy vision cones, sometimes holding R or crouching to sneak behind enemies to bonk them into unconsciousness.

 

You have a meter on the top right of the screen that indicates how alert enemies are. If it's green and says "SAFE", it means guards aren't alerted at all.  If you enter an enemy guard's vision cone, the green meter will quickly fill up and become Yellow and change to the words "WARNING". The guard will now become suspicious and come investigate you. If you stay in their Yellow vision cone, the Yellow Meter will fill up, become a "RED ALERT" and will start shooting at you.

 

Guards have pretty poor vision range, although their peripheral vision is pretty good. Good luck sneaking up on them from the sides. They will also stay in the yellow phase for quite a while and will travel pretty far from their original posts to investigate you. However their overall detection AI isn't very advanced. For example, if you alert 1 guard, nearby guards won't turn red until you walk into their vision cones while another guard is shooting at you. So if you get spotted,you only have to deal with 1 active guard as long as you play smart. You can push yourself against walls and this will shrink their vision cones. Guards in later levels will also get better hearing so you actually have to walk or crouch when approaching guards so they won't hear you.

 

I was looking forward to see how Conviction DS adapts the gameplay and mechanics of OG Cancelled Conviction. I remember being rather excited for the more "social stealth" focus of OG Conviction. The DS version tries with mixed results. You can quickly and seamlessly hide under tables like in the OG Conviction trailer to lose guards that don't see you. You can pick up and throw objects like books, cups and bricks to distract and pull guards away from their posts.  This even draws snipers' attention. Melee combat is rough. In the OG Conviction Trailer, Sam had a pretty robust hand-to-hand melee combat system that let him punch and throw enemies around. While Conviction DS doesn't replicate that. Combat works by pressing Y to punch. If you time your Y presses, Sam will do a 4 hit combo that can  stun and tear huge chunks of an enemy's health bar. I managed to do a perfect 4 hit combo the first time I tried it....... and never again. At most I sometimes managed to get 2 hits. I have no idea why that is. You can also whistle to attract guards by Holding L and blowing in the microphone which works well but I would rather it be an icon on the touch screen to free up L for additional commands. 

I was surprised that DS Conviction actually tries to adapt the social stealth mechanics of OG Conviction. Not even the DS Assassin's Creed games tried that hard with Social Stealth. If you hold R near a group of 2 or more civilians, Sam will do an "Assassin's Creed 2 Style blend" that works nearly flawlessly. The "Green Safe Meter" on the top right of the screen becomes a "Blue Blending" meter that lets you know how much time you have left if you move too far from a crowd. Some civilians, indicated by a blue icon on the minimap, can be pickpocketed so Sam steals their phones. Sam can then place their phone on the ground and call them to act as a portable distraction. 

 

While I rarely used this mechanic (it was usually easier to just throw an object or whistle to lure/distract guards), I really love the idea of it. The story of OG Conviction is that Sam is supposed to be a rogue agent trying to lay low and using whatever improvised tools he can get his hands on since he no longer has access to any 3rd Echelon gear. In the current 2010 version of Conviction we got, Sam has to break a car mirror to use in place of the Optic Cable. And that's the only improvised gadget Sam uses (and replaces with a proper version later). So Conviction DS using pickpocketed phones as a remote distraction tool is a cool and creative idea at least. One that the main console version of OG Conviction probably used more.

 

While Conviction DS does try with crowds and social stealth, it is rather basic. Civilians will cry out if you bonk a guard in front of them but they won't run and alert guards like in Hitman (unless the guard is literally right beside them). Nor will they flee or scatter when you blow your cover. There's no alarm system where areas become less populated the more you get spotted. Conviction DS does have a disguise system where Sam disguises himself depending on his objective. Disguises let you run around an area without needing to worry about the guards. However, other Civilians with same outfit as you will see through you Hitman Absolution style (despite coming out nearly 4 years later).

 

I know all this probably sounds pretty lacklustre. But there is a mission in Conviction DS, Mission 6, Hospital, where it all just clicks and game becomes genuinely a blast. Its level design and mechanics just work. This mission takes place in a large multi-story hospital building. It's linear and the game marks where your objective is. But the hospital is this rather interesting large complex of multiple routes, hallways, side rooms and paths that all look pretty distinct and recognizable (a feat Splinter Cell Chaos Theory DS had a hard time with). I lost myself in this mission as I dashed around guard vision cones on what felt like instinct. Narrowly avoiding detection. There were times when I'd stop next to a hallway with a guard patrolling it, look at my minimap and make a split second decision to follow what looked like a side path around some doors to bypass it. Another one had me stopped next to a guarded hallway looking for a way through when some civilians were walking past. On instinct, I ran next to them and held R and entered a blending state just in the nick of time to walk past the guard vision cones. Another time, I got spotted and ran past crowds as I entered into a bathroom, enemies in hot pursuit. I saw the bathroom had a vent that led to the opposite bathroom next door. I used it to give the pursuing guards the slip. You know this level is onto something when it's fun to get spotted because the following chase and losing the guards is this dynamic and fast paced affair. If there was a mission I'd try ghosting in Conviction DS, it's this one. It's that good.

 

Unfortunately, none of DS Conviction's other Stealth missions come close to the Hospital mission in terms of that large, complex but still readable and fun level design. Civilians, especially those moving you can use to time a blend, are rare in other levels. Other levels tend to have more basic layouts with side rooms to hide in to lose pursuing guards but lack the means to make it as fun and dynamic as the Hospital Mission. As a result, they peak at more of a "OK" rating than a "Certified Banger" rating. Sometimes relying a lot more on trial and error with inconsistent checkpoints. Part of the issue is that Conviction DS doesn't have a lot of tools or mechanics to build a lot of interesting levels around. Like, in terms of controls, Conviction DS and Metal Gear Solid 1 are about par in what you can do. But Snake has moves like crawling, as well as gadgets like Goggles and Boxes which can lead to some nice puzzle solving in areas. Prior Splinter Cell Games let Sam manually jump and climb, letting you build verticality and more paths through levels. As well as do things like turn off or shoot out lights to create more darkness to exploit.

 

My point is that in an ideal world, the Hospital Level would be just one banger level that focuses on navigating this massive but accessible maze-like level with creative use of the regular stealth gameplay but with blending being more viable and feasible here. But you'd also have another level that swaps blending for some kind of parkour/climbing to maintain that fun but with a change of pace. And then you'd have another banger level with a different flavour/gimmick that mixes up the stealth experience. Unfortunately, Conviction DS is unfinished so the Hospital Level remains the only standout. Giving the game the benefit of the doubt, I can imagine a finished version of this game might have been able to add more climbing and gadgets to make other levels stand out more.

 

Action Phase:

The other main gameplay phase is "Action Phase". During some missions, the game displays "Action Phase" on the screen. Most of the controls are the same except now Sam takes out a pistol. Pressing Y when far from enemies has Sam shoot enemies MGS1 style. While being up close lets Sam do punches. Enemies no longer have vision cones on the minimap but have greater vision ranges and will instantly go into an ALERT state when they see you. The game intends for you to play through this phase as a cover based shooter. However, while you can crouch behind any piece of cover for some inconsistent protection, you can only properly take cover on select pieces of cover that have a large green circle behind them. Pressing B in these circles will make Sam properly take cover and have the camera move from its MGS1-style overhead view to a more typical "3rd person shooter" camera view. You also get crosshairs you control with the Dpad. The crosshair will also sway on their own kinda like those old Rail Shooters. If there are other pieces of green cover in close proximity to you, you can press L or R and Sam will roll in between them to get a better view on the enemy.

 

The actual gunplay is really dull and tedious. You just move the cursor over enemies and press Y and Sam will automatically pop and fire and return to cover when you stop firing. You can only hit enemy guards that are out of cover shooting at you so you can't target enemies' limbs that are poking out from behind cover. There also isn't any locational damage so doing headshots doesn't take enemies down faster. Some shootouts do have explosive barrels you can exploit. But that's it. Every shootout from the start of the game to the end plays the same. Get behind the prescribed cover, shoot the guards and repeat until they are dead. No variety or options. Not even different weapons or grenades.

 

Enemy AI is also not very engaging. There aren't any interesting tactics or strats. They just run to their spots, take cover, pop out and shoot (sometimes through your cover) and repeat. Their hearing isn't great so you can be engaging one guard in a firefight while his friend just wanders around unaware of the gunfight literally happening in front of him. I exploited this as much as I could to get through demanding fights.

 

Mission 2 in particular was absolutely dreadful. It's this long 20 minute mission that drags because it is entirely Action Phase and shootout after shootout. Health packs are rare and you don't even get a health refill on  death or when reloading a checkpoint. I had to restart the entire mission because I simply did not have the health to get past some shootouts. I kept looking at the time going "I get that this is a tutorial for Action Phase and the gunplay but why is this so long? Surely it's almost over now so I can go back to Stealth phase right?" But no. It kept going. I'm someone that wrote a 100,000 word essay praising the DS version of Chaos Theory but even I was fed up here and nearly quit the game. That's how bad this mission is.

 

Part of my complaints could just be that the game is unfinished. I imagine the release version probably would have patched this with more health pickups or slowly regenerating health or restoring health in between submissions/checkpoints. Maybe even have MGS style rations or armour. But I feel the limitations of the DS mean gunplay never could have been better than "something you tolerate". The DS versions of the Call of Duty games, despite being arguably the most impressive 3D games on the DS, had limited movement, animations and responses from enemy guards because the DS simply doesn't have the raw horsepower to do a lot with them.  The game is also limited by the camera and perspective. You can't have the enemies flank the player because the player literally can't turn around and aim at them when in cover since the camera view is locked facing certain directions when in green cover. You can't have the enemies chuck grenades at the player to flush them out of cover because the player can only take cover at prescribed points. You can't have stuff like shooting the enemies' legs to incapacitate them or shooting their arms to make them drop their guns because the DS likely doesn't have the memory to spare tracking multiple hitboxes and responses like that.

 

It goes without saying but the appeal of 3rd person cover based shooters is the flexibility and freedom you have to dynamically move across the arena, taking cover on whatever you can, fighting the enemies and choosing how to engage with them, and moving between cover organically.  Even Rail Shooters where you are locked behind a piece of cover and can only move a cursor at least give you different enemy types, weapons, tools and responses as well as rewarding precision and streaks. While Conviction DS' "Stealth Phase" does a good job in replicating the appeal of a stealth game despite its limited mechanics, "Action Phase" is far too rigid and limited to be fun even the first time you get into a firefight. The game's difficulty and limited health, which is fine for "Stealth Phase" is dreadful for "Action Phase".

 

Moreover, it doesn't even make sense narraitively. In the early missions, Sam switches between Stealth and Action phase with the justification that he uses Stealth Phase when there are civilians around since getting into a firefight risks collateral damage. And switches to Action Phase mid-mission in areas without civilians. But there are missions later without civilians Sam plays in Action Phase. Sam can also get dedicated in crowded Stealth Phase missions and have multiple guards shooting at him. The second Oil Refinery mission has a situation where Sam is playing in Action Phase while you can switch to Anna in Stealth Phase. Moreover, the point of OG Main Console Conviction was that Sam could choose to stealth or shoot in crowded areas and the game would react accordingly. He wasn't forced to stealth or shoot.

 

The funny thing is, there is actually a stealth game with a gunplay system like DS Conviction that actually works. 2012's CounterSpy. In that game, you typically play from a 2D Side scrolling perspective. Whenever you take cover, the camera zooms in to  fixed "3rd person behind the shoulder perspective". You aim by moving a cursor from behind cover. Some enemies are farther in the background that you cannot reach due to the 2D gameplay so you have to use the cover system if you want to take them out. But Counterspy makes it fun. For one, there isn't a dedicated "Action phase". You can enter cover and shoot even in stealth and there are silenced weapons. In fact, you can use this to kill guards in a room by stealth headshotting them and the game rewards you with bonus points for getting multiple stealth kills in a row.

 

Enemy AI, although simple, has more going on. They will notice bodies, hear loud gunshots, and radio in to alert others, creating pressure on you to eliminate them as a high alert means mission failure. In a gunfight, they can throw grenades to flush you out. But the game never forces you to fight or stick to your spot. You can run through an area and eat the alert, or back away and reposition. The simple gunplay being something you dynamically enter as you stealth through levels just works.

 

If I could wave a magic wand to magically fix DS Conviction's Action Phase, I'd remove it entirely from the game. Have it that you can take cover on any piece of cover and the game automatically brings the camera in. You can then pull out a variety of guns and grenades. Gunplay is something you can engage in but is treated as more of a punishment or last resort (justifying why it's so shallow) but you're better off hiding from enemies or running away (which is far more fun).  But that's likely infeasible given the DS' limitations. Ideally I would still have Action Phase Removed entirely but if we must keep it in, I'd opt for the following changes to help bring it to the standard of being "tolerable" while still being feasible given the DS' limitations.

 

Firstly, have ways of letting the player bypass shootouts. Maybe you can climb a pipe to get around most of the enemies and/or get the drop on them so you can eliminate them using a stealth takedown so there are fewer you need to engage in for the actual gunfight. But more importantly, at least have Headshots do increased damage or even instakill the enemy. That alone would at least make it fun to be precise. The second would be more green cover and from different angles. Right now, you can only switch between ground level cover if it's right next to you. But maybe when you take cover on walls, some walls have pipes or railings you can climb to get the high ground on enemies. You can balance this by giving Sam limited Stamina so you can't hang on them forever but can use this to pick off multiple enemies in that short time. This would be interesting with the headshot idea. The third would be more environmental interactions. Maybe the player can move a crane before starting a firefight so they can then drop the cargo on enemies during the firefight. The fourth would be more gadgets and weapons. Maybe frag grenades to take out multiple enemies, or smoke/flashbangs to stun enemies so you can go in and do melee takedowns. Maybe even a human shield mechanic so you don't need to be so reliant on green cover.

 

Rather funnily, I would kill to have Current 2010 Conviction's Mark and Execute System in this game as even that would elevate Action Phase so much. You can build levels around the puzzle aspect of finding a way to bonk 2-3 guards to fill up Marks, then actually Mark more problematic guards, then find a way to position yourself to have Sam auto-execute the rest. Though, I have a suspicion Mark and Execute was only created for 2010 Conviction since Social Stealth wasn't the core gameplay there.

 

The game does have 1 additional weapon you can only use in some Action phase Missions. The Sniper Rifle. Very rarely (like 2-3 in the entire game), there are sequences where Sam gets a Sniper Rifle and can use special sniper green cover to enter a first person sniper view to snipe targets. Enemy guards will attempt to rush Sam's position and move between cover sorta well. I found these sections rather hard to do on the DS Dpad since there isn't a lot of aim assist or bullet magnetism or large aiming hitbox like the pistol. So stuff like the Sniper Boss Fight in Malta 2 was rough to play for me. I'm not apologizing for using Save States there as it would have taken me forever.

I noticed the game had a ranking system after every mission. You'd be rated on your performance in every mission and its corresponding Stealth and Action Phases. Stealth Phase ranks you on a Bronze, Silver and Gold scale for minimizing alerts and knocking out guards. So the DS version of Conviction encourages stealth more than the main version we ended up getting lol. While Action Phase rewards you on kills and time taken. Not ideal for a stealth game but oh well. I would rather there only be a ranking for Stealth Phase since the stealth systems are more developed anyway.

 

Minigames:

 

Conviction DS features 4 minigames all controlled by the DS Touchscreen for activties like lockpicking or hacking similar to other Splinter Cell games. Time doesn't freeze when you are doing them so you can be spotted by guards while doing them. These minigames are also located in the main menu as extras but are inaccessible in this prototype version. These include:

 

--Lockpicking.

I remember reading the tutorial for this and being confused. I just decided to wing it and found while it was kinda confusing at first, it ended up being my favourite minigame and arguably my favourite version of lockpicking in any Splinter Cell game. It works by having a bunch of Plus shaped gears with a different colour on each of the ends. You have to rotate each Plus Shaped Gear so the colours all line up. So if Gear 1 has a blue end, green end, red end and yellow end, and is next to Gear 2 which has 2 green ends and 2 blue ends, you have to make sure the ends making contact between Gear 1 and 2 are both Green or both Blue. The minigame usually throws around 4-5 gears at you that you have to align properly. While a pretty easy minigame overall, I found it a nice change of pace. It was brief enough to not get annoying and required enough thinking to be engaging. I approve. There are automatic lockpick gadgets you can find that can instantly bypass the minigame but I never found the urge to.

 

--Dusting for Prints.

 

Since Sam doesn't have his goggles in this game, he can't use Thermal Vision to see fingerprints on keypad locks. Instead, he has to powder them then the player has to blow on the DS microphone to reveal which 4 numbers were pressed then figure out the correct sequence for the keypad. The game at least remembers if you input a number in the correct place. So if the numbers revealed are "1234" and you input 1234 but the actual code is "2314" then the game will let you know that 4 is the last number. There are no penalties for incorrect guesses.

These were an ok novelty at best but became tedious afterwards. For some reason, this is the most common minigame. There are more keypad locks than regular lockpick locks in this game. At least lockpick doors can be zoomed through once you get good at the puzzle. For keypad locks, you have to rub powder on all 10 number keys, blow in the microphone (which is unreliable for this minigame), get the 4 numbers and trial and error until you get it. There is no challenge or variety. It's the same thing repeated so many times. I started rolling my eyes when some missions had multiple of these in a row. Why game? Why? I would 100% use my Automatic Lockpicks to bypass keypad locks if the game let me. It feels like these are there more to show off the DS and slow down the game rather than because it's an interesting puzzle.

There is actually a way for Conviction DS to salvage this mechanic. Let the player find keypad codes by exploring the map or being able to interrogate some guards or overhearing conversations. The game has a cutscene in the first Hospital Level where the guards forget the password and go ask the Secretary for a reminder and you can overhear this. Why not incorporate this into the game have the dull keypad minigame be a last resort if you didn't find the code some other way. It would incentive exploring a level to grab all codes.

 

--Recording Conversations.

 

In previous Splinter Cell games (and also current Conviction), one of Sam's gadgets is the Laser Mic which lets him listen in and record conversations happening far away as long as he has line of sight. Previous SC games required you to keep the Laser Mic pointed at the people talking. Conviction DS adapts this mechanic by giving you a sound wave and requiring you to place and hold a square on the touch screen so it follows the sound wave. You start with a score of 100 that drops the more of the sound wave you miss. Early versions of this are pretty easy but later ones go on for a long time with complex sound waves so I often ended with a score of 34/100.

 

This minigame is kinda fun and used infrequently enough that it doesn't feel like a drag (unlike some minigames 🙄). I do feel it loses some of its appeal because the game isn't voice acted. In prior SC games, if you lose line of sight with the Laser Mic, you couldn't hear the conversation anymore. The DS version can't replicate that sense of listening to the conversation while matching the shape and panicking as the sound cuts out or glitches as you miss or aren't 100% accurate.

 

 

--Hacking

 

This one is the hardest to explain but kinda fun. It's also the rarest minigame appearing only 5-ish times in the game. The way it works is that there are these nodes/chips on a circuit board. Each node can have big squares on them or little squares. The objective is to draw lines connecting the big square of one node to the little square of another node. The catch is that all nodes also have to be "powered". Squares that aren't connected and have no power are black. Squares with power are green. Squares that are connected to another Square but lack power are yellow. You have to make sure all squares are green. Connection lines can't cross and only one set of squares can be connected together in a 1:1 connection.

 

It was fun puzzling through these and figuring out which combination of connections would ensure all squares on a node would be green without blocking other nodes. Even though I feel one of these Hacking Puzzles took longer than all the Keypad Minigames combined, I would 100% choose to replace every Keypad Minigame with a hacking one. At least the hacking ones are actual brain teasers that are fun to work through.

 

Collectibles:

 

Each of the 14 missions have collectibles in form of floating USB sticks. Collecting the 4 USB Flash Drives in a mission unlocks a brief file giving you some more lore details. These are kinda cool but I don't feel are really interesting rewards. Maybe place some cheats or alternate costumes or door codes behind them to really sweeten the deal here.

 

The Story and Missions:

 

Normally in my reviews, I tend to gloss over the story. It's not my forte. But I feel it might be worthwhile to document this game's missions and story in detail, both as a lens to what the original 2008 main console version of Conviction would have been like, and also because there is barely any info or YouTube videos on this game. Even its Wiki entry is sparse and contains typos. So lets start.

 

Mission 1: Valletta.

One of the things that makes my life easier is that each mission and sub-mission has a brief description before it starts so I can copy paste that here. Here's the first:

"For the past few years, Sam Fisher has been in retirement from Third Echelon, a division of the NSA. They have an agreement with each other, both will try to stay out of each other's way. Up until now. Sam has been moving around Europe. However, when he arrives in Malta, a group of military mercenaries begins to hunt him down".

 

Adding on to the story, the mission begins with Sam being contacted by a mysterious individual who tasks him to call him from an isolated phone booth and to avoid the mercenaries hunting him. After doing so, this man directs Sam to meet him in a safehouse. This man reveals himself to be Tom Reed, a field operative for 3rd Echelon who tells Sam the mercs work for Evangeline de Lozada, head of a defense contracting firm called Contrar that's been recently linked to terrorist activities. Reed believes that Contrar has been tasked to launch attacks against the US. Anna Grimmsdottir was previously investigating Contrat, but was compromised. However, she continued to work on her investigation despite the NSA trying to pull her out (which Sam notes is unlike Anna). Anna has been captured by Contrar who also know about Sam and are hunting him down since Anna would be likely to try to contacting him. Reed wants to bring Sam out of retirement for one more mission to help out here. Sam reluctantly agrees. Reed hatches a plan to have Sam cross the city for a safe extraction. The rest of the mission is Sam trying to evade the guards to escape by stealing their jeep.

 

Alright, from a gameplay perspective, if I was a kid and was given a Demo of Splinter Cell Conviction DS and that demo was just this level, I'd be salivating to buy the full game. It hooked me (I had a similar experience with the demo of iOS Assassin's Creed Altair's Chronicles). The game looks surprisingly charming with its blocky MGS1-style look. It also acts as the stealth tutorial for the game and introduces the basic concepts of sneaking, vision cones, whistling, lock picking etc. All in all, pretty solid.

 

I will note one oddity. The first thing you have to do is sneak past guards and find a phone booth and manually punch in Reed's entire phone number.  The game doesn't record it for you in the phone booth so you have to exit it and look at the objective on the touch screen if you forgot it like me. This is the only time this concept comes up in the game. There are other phone booths in this mission but those only function as hiding spots. I was expecting the game to do more with this concept. Maybe let you phone from booths to distract guards, or order supplies at booths or even hide bodies in booths. Even the DS version of Chaos Theory lets you hide bodies whereas they just disappear in Conviction DS.

On the story side, I like that DS Conviction retains the thriller focus of SC games on the DS. Even having rather elaborate cutscenes with 3D Models and textboxes. The only other proper stealth game on the DS was Chaos Theory DS so Conviction DS would have stood out among the DS lineup. You get glimpses of antagonists like Evangeline and Dragun for their later confrontation.

 I noted that Reed looks entirely different from his 2010 iteration. Looking more like he's portrayed by Batman Begins Christian Bale. The order of events is also interesting. Like the 2010 version, Conviction DS starts in Valletta, Malta, has Sam being pursued by mercenaries, being roped in with the NSA/3rd Echelon. Leading me to suspect this was also the way the intro went in OG Cancelled 2008 Conviction. I do find it interesting this version starts with Reed contacting Sam and coaxing him out of retirement as a sort of unofficial agent and Grim is missing (the opposite of the release version). I imagine this version of the mission in OG 2008 Conviction would have been the game's stealth tutorial as Sam uses social stealth and climbing to move through Valletta while dealing with mercenaries after him.

 

Mission 2: Valletta 2:

 

Mission Briefing: "Evangeline de Lazada has sent her mercenaries to kill Sam. He must find a way to get out of Malta alive. An attempt to steal a mercenary's vehicle and drive out has failed, leaving Sam on foot now. Tom Reed, a special field operative working at Third Echelon has advised Sam that he can arrange for extraction. But first, Sam will need to fight his way to the designated extraction point".

 

 I already talked earlier about how dreadful this mission was to play with how many forced combat encounters with limited health and shallow mechanics were. Made worse by how this mission has 3 sub-missions while mission 1 only had 2. This mission didn't need to be this long. The shooting gets old quickly. As I was playing it, I was like "damn, I get this is the tutorial for Action Phase but this is overboard. You can stop now and let the player play the rest of the mission how they like, and preferably in Stealth Phase". But no. This is entirely Action Phase.

 

My conspiracy theory is that this is not an accident. Maybe in OG 2008 Conviction, there was meant to be a section where the game forced an alert on you so the latter half of the Valletta mission was more action focused with enemies pursuing Sam and the player having to engage in open combat for an extended duration. Acting as the game's combat tutorial before Sam is whisked away to the US and the game takes off the training wheels now that the player has a taste of how the game plays with social stealth and with combat.

Mission 3: Tranchion Corporation. 

 

Mission Briefing: "The Third Echelon has discovered that the CEO of an American Oil company named Tranchion Corporation has set up a phone meeting with Evangeline de Lozada. The Third Echelon plans to send Sam in for reconnaissance. The plan is to have Same get close to the CEO and record the conversation".

Adding onto this, after the last mission, Sam gets extracted by helicopter. This mission starts with Sam outside the Tranchion Corporation where he gets invited to sit with Reed in a "Cafe" (really just some chairs. Nice try game. Even the dialogue where Reed tells Sam to order a cappuccino isn't fooling me). Reed lays out the mission for Sam and tells him he needs a disguise to be able to get in. He tells Sam to pursue a window cleaner through a side building into an actual cafe and take his clothes. Sam does so and is instructed to take the elevator up the 17th floor and use the window cleaner carts to spy on the meeting from the outside and see what CEO Anderson says to Evangeline. He learns they intend to assassinate Senator Davis at an upcoming meeting.

 

This mission acts as the tutorial for blending and environmental interaction. Teaching you how to use 2 or more civilians to hide, throw objects and trigger car alarms to lure guards. I also really like the sneaking music in this level. It's so tense and foreboding. And Like I said before, disguises work similar to Hitman Absolution where you're fine as long as you don't do anything suspicious or walk in front of other people with same outfit. Overall, a pretty fun mission even with the annoying keypad minigame.

 

I have my suspicions if this is entirely accurate to the OG 2008 Main Console version of Conviction. Just a gut feeling (I could be wrong here). I do think the plot of Tranchion being up to something with Contrar and assassinating Davis was likely present in OG 2008 Conviction. Would be odd to have such an elaborate and specific plot detail made up for just the DS version. Especially since the DS version doesn't have voice acting or elaborate and expensive cutscenes, Gameloft wouldn't have had to radically alter the story to fit the carefully constructed continuity of a different vision of the game. Like, they can replace the Tranchion Company with any other company and  the assets and level still would have played out the same. Since it doesn't matter if they change those aspects, Gameloft likely took the easier route and adpated the written story of OG 2008 Conviction.

My suspicions stem more towards the way the mission plays out. Seems weird for Sam to be flown via helicopter, dropped off in front of the Tranchion Corporation building, then has to meet Reed in front of it, where he is given his next objective as opposed to on the helicopter beforehand. The concept of the mission kinda makes sense for OG Conviction. It's a large office building complex with areas like parking garages, cafes etc so you have a mix of civilians, office staff and guards patrolling the area. But I don't know. Maybe it's the disguise aspect. I can't imagine scruffy hobo Sam changing clothes Agent 47 style or walking around office buildings and it being as believable. Especially as DS Mission 3-Part 2 has Sam's disguise compromised so he has to sneak around the office building in a more typical stealth way. I suppose a more traditional stealth section wouldn't be out of place in between in OG Conviction.

 

My outlandish conspiracy theory is that in OG 2008 Main Console Conviction, this version of the mission was set in more of a commercial plaza area rather than the office building of the DS version. That way, Sam's gameplay has him interacting with civilians out in public where his scruffy appearance doesn't feel out of place. He would still have to sneak through restricted areas to record the meeting. Of course, this is all assuming DS Conviction follows the story of OG Conviction the way DS Chaos Theory did for Main Console Chaos Theory. It could also be this is an entirely original level because DS Conviction couldn't replicate what OG Conviction was doing (even though DS Chaos Theory didn't do that).

 

 

Mission 4: Government House.

Mission Briefing: "Armed with the knowledge that Evangeline de Lozada intends to eliminate Senator Davis, the Third Echelon has a chance to prove that Contrar is a terrorist organization. The attack against Senator Davis will take place at the upcoming oil talks, hosted by the President at the Government House. The Third Echelon sends Sam undercover to catch the assassin red-handed" 

I also want to add that when Sam enters the Government House, Reed contacts him and tells him the Oil Talks will be conducted in "The Round Office". Sam is also tasked with finding a Senator to knock out so he can disguise himself as him to prevent Senator Davis' assassination. Sam doe so and enters "The Round Office" to see Anna Grimsdottir poorly disgusing herself as Junior Senator of Virginia, Samantha Moss (not "Moose". Get it right or pay the price), which actually fooled me 😢, talking with Senator Davis. Davis expresses in a rather sinister way that he intends to get the President to "see his way". Before Davis can elaborate, he is killed by sniper fire. Sam saves Grim by entering Action Phase  to shoot iron bars on the room's curtains to trigger shutters to seal the room.

 

Afterwards, Sam and Anna talk. Sam gives his side of the story while Anna explains he suspected something was wrong with her missions and actually left the NSA. She describes her missions as being seen as "dangerous to national security" and that Senator Davis had oddly been communicating with 3rd Echelon. Anna came to the "Round Office" to learn what was going on. The 2 decide they have to leave before they can talk more. Anna hands Sam some kind of device that disables all nearby cameras. She also tells Sam not to use his gun to take out marines (which you still have to since the game is in Action Phase. You kill a lot of people in the latter half of the mission. Conviction DS is so committed to its Action Phase that it's willing to let you kill US Marines despite saying the opposite in the cutscene previously lol). As Anna and Sam escape, Reed calls Sam and warns him that if he continues, he will be in prison for life. Sam chooses to back Anna on this. Sam shoots his way out.

 

Now that I am done with the mission summary, time to review it, Firstly, I fully admit that I am not familiar with US Government buildings. But I am 80% sure this mission takes place in the White House and is just called "Government House". The "Round Office" is meant to be the Oval Office. Granted, my only knowledge of the White House is from the 2010 version of Conviction, Call of Duty Modern Warfare 2009, and Hitman Blood Money. My evidence is the following:

 

-DS Conviction Mission 4 takes place in the same kind of hallway that was the start of the White House Level in Hitman Blood Money. The building's general architecture and gardens also kinda look like the White House in the game.

-The guards all wear the same outfits that the White House Guards wear in Hitman Blood Money.

-There is a section where Sam runs across a balcony outside the building and the building is vaguely rectangular shaped and is white.

-The Round Office kinda looks like the Oval Office. There is a texture on the floor with a seal that says "Seal of the President of the United States".

 

I suppose I could actually Google it to confirm it instead of relying on Hitman Blood Money of all games to be the measuring stick but I feel it's funnier this way. Assuming this is true, I imagine this was a writing slip up. Gameloft and Ubisoft are French Companies and the game has a few grammar oddities here and there. Wouldn't be surprised if something got lost in translation and wasn't corrected by the time the game was cancalled.

 

 In any case, the mission is kinda fun..... if you can play it. My Desume Emulator kept crashing during this mission. I hear MelonDS works better but I couldn't test it out. Had to watch Gekon 009's Playthrough on YouTube of this level. Interestingly, the wiki for Conviction DS includes cheat codes you can enter by tapping corners of the DS touch screen in specific orders. There are ones for invincibility and noclipping but also one for instantly completing a mission and moving on. I was forced to use that here since later missions are far more stable than this one.

 As for the story here and how accurate it is to OG Conviction, I am pretty skeptical. I strongly believe this level is either 80% original and/or a remix of ideas from OG Conviction because DS Conviction couldn't 100% replicate them. My evidence for this is that DS Conviction's second half reuses the exact same levels. Including the Government House Level (albeit at night). Splinter Cell games aren't known for reusing levels like this. It's not like in Chaos Theory, you have a second mission set on the Maria Narcissa  Cargo Ship again later on because Sam needs to retrieve some new documents he didn't get on his first trip lol. The closest Splinter Cell did to reusing levels was the JBA HQ in between main missions in Double Agent. But in Double Agent, you'd expect from the premise that Sam would be spending time in the villains' HQ.

 My conspiracy theory is that either this Mission or the second Mission to the Government House was not present in OG 2008 Conviction. You only had 1 White House Mission.. Unfortunately, I can't decide if DS Mission 4 is accurate or not. It could go either way. Here are my points for and against it:

For (That this mission is somewhat accurate and had an analogue in OG Main Console Conviction):

-The plot point regarding Davis and Anna seems way too fleshed out and it would be really dramatic if the trajectory of the plot changed due to an assassination in the White House. We do know there was a White House Mission in OG Conviction somewhere. And the assets from that served as the final level for 2010 Conviction.

-The later White House Mission in DS Conviction lacks the same narrative impact that Mission 4 does. It doesn't have to be the White House that Sam sneaks in again for the story to work there. So Mission 4 makes sense for the White House one.

-If this isn't the White House Mission, then where else in the story would it make sense for it?

Points Against (That this mission isn't accurate. Even if the overall plot beats are, the actual White House Mission was used in a different place in OG Conviction with a different context):

-The White House is a heavily fortified area with minimal civilian access. Scruffy Hobo Sam sticks out like a sore thumb. I can't imagine social stealth working as cleanly as it would in a place like Valletta. In Hitman Blood Money, Agent 47 is a sharply dressed guy in a suit and is using proper disguises to be able to move around undetected.  Moreover, Splinter Cell games are rather pro-America. Wouldn't really fit the vibe if the player got detected at the White House and started firing at American guards. I doubt Ubisoft even back in 2008 would have been cool with the potential controversy. That's why 2010 current Conviction was set up where the White House mission was the final mission of the game and taken over by Mercenaries so the player was the good guy when they were shooting at them. Even Hitman Blood Money made its White House Mission one of the final missions and had the setup that the VP was attempting a coup 47 was trying to prevent to minimize any controversies.

- It just seems weird for OG 2008 Main Console Conviction to throw such an early mission at you where neither Social Stealth nor switching to open gunplay would really make sense.

In closing, I don't know for Mission 4 DS. Could be either or. My wild prediction with no basis in reality is that the White House Mission was actually the final mission of OG Conviction (similar to 2010 Conviction). Sam would collect some of his old 3rd Echelon Gear and it would play like a throwback level (plus some of OG Conviction's additions). I'm Picturing a "God of War 2018 Kratos gets the Blades of Chaos" moment.

 

-Mission 5 Subway Central Station:

Mission Briefing: "With the surprise appearance of Anna Grimsdottir at the oil talks, the NSA has no other suspect for the assassination of Senator Davis. Furthermore, Sam's failure to prevent the assassination and his attempt to assist Anna escape renders him an accomplice. NSA agents have chased Sam into a Washington subway station."

 

Don't have much more to add for the story. Sam is separated from Anna and has to navigate the subway tunnels while being pursued by NSA agents. Eventually activating a train so he can escape. This mission is a mixed bag. It has 2 Action Phases which mean more boring gunfights that are a slog to get through. Justified in the story with Sam claiming "there aren't civilians here". The Stealth Phase introduces a new mechanic, being able to pickpocket cell phones and call them to act as distractions. I already discussed this mechanic earlier in my gameplay review. The Stealth phase here is alright but is easily one of the weaker Stealth Phases in the game given its short length and being sandwiched between tedious Action Phases. The Stealth and Action Music in this level absolutely slaps.

 

Sam does have something of a mini boss fight against Dragan, of the Lieutenants pursuing him since Valletta. Conviction DS has something akin to reoccurring antagonists that pursue Sam but not very fleshed out aside from info hidden in collectibles. I doubt OG Main Console Conviction had characters like this. They feel a bit out of place given SC's tone and how the player would be solo sneaking and shooting through areas.  But given the more cinematic approach OG Conviction was going for, it's not unreasonable they could have had named characters as key figures leading the pursuit for Sam to add more to the narrative.

 

While the level itself is mostly filler in DS Conviction, I have a feeling OG Main Console Conviction might have been able to do more with the concept. A Subway system where Sam has to deal with guards actively looking for him while trying to blend in and find a way on a train sounds like a cool level to play. I can imagine a setup where if the player keeps enough of a low profile for the entire level, they can blend their way onto the train and give the guards the slip. While a player that blew their cover might have to find a workaround to get a train going or fight their way onto the train before it leaves.

 Mission 6: Saint Micheal's Hospital

 

Mission Briefing: "During her attempted escape from the Government House, Anna Grimsdottir was severly injured. The NSA sent her to a Washington hospital in order to recover from her wounds. Despite being under tight surveillance from NSA, Anna was able to send a text message to Sam informing him of her current situation. Sam heads to the hospital in an attempt to extract Anna".

Adding to the game's description:, Anna was hospitalized for "Severe contusion, bullet wound right thigh". Sam arrives at the hospital, asks for Anna from the secretary and is told she doesn't know but Anna was with Doctor Green that the secretary describes as a "bald African American Man" (what kind of hospital is this lmao where the secretary has no idea where a patient is and tells a visitor to go flag down a busy doctor that's rarely in his office lmao?). Sam has to use the cameras to find Dr. Green but also notes there are mercenaries here looking for Green and Anna. Sam tails the mercenaries and Dr. Green, pounces when the Mercenaries are about to kill Green. Green informs Sam that Anna is on the 3rd floor. Sam goes there, notices the place is heavily guarded and knocks out a doctor to disguise himself. Sam finds Anna and informs her of the situation as the 2 escape after doing the Hacking Minigame.

As for my review of the mission, this level easily has the best music in the game. It's quite catchy. I also already reviewed the gameplay of this mission in my earlier section on Stealth Gameplay since this is the high point of Conviction. This mission is genuinely fun and where all the mechanics just click. Made better by the fact it's entirely Stealth Phase so you just the decent stealth gameplay elevated by the great level design. Even graphically, all the areas from the operating and patient rooms, to the lounges and gift shop, all look well done and charming in the MGS1 artsyle.

 

Storywise, this mission feels a bit off. Reed implied back in mission 1, that Anna was in some way captured or compromised by Contrar. Yet in Mission 4, she shows up like she's still an active agent. She tells Sam she left the NSA but Mission 5's Briefing Implies she and Sam are implicated in Davis' assassination. Anna disappears in between cutscenes between Mission 4 and 5 but there's no mention of that. I imagine the text boxes would have gotten another pass later on and the story tweaked a bit more to make sense. I'm choosing to believe what the game was trying to say that Anna was doing her own independent investigation rather than "leaving the NSA" like she claimed. So she's still an NSA operative which is why she's under NSA care. However, this still conflicts with Mission 4's massive shootout and escape sequence (as well as Mission 7's Briefing). Leading credence to my speculation from earlier that Mission 4 might not have been 100% accurate in OG Main Console Conviction.

Conceptually, I imagine this mission would have been so cool in OG 2008 Main Console Conviction. A hospital where Sam has to find Anna while being pursued by mercenaries after both of them sounds like a blast between the more claustrophobic hallways, bevy of siderooms, occasional courtyards and gardens, and lots of interactive items. You wouldn't even need a disguise system like in the DS version as there would be plenty of tight civilians to blend with without being so wide and open. While there wasn't any evidence in any concept art, promotional material or interviews that there would be a Hospital level in OG Main Console Conviction, it's a concept that seems like a good fit so I imagine it was planned.

 

-Mission 7: Subway Central Station.

 

Mission Briefing: "Anna is now able to provide data support for Sam. She advises him to meet with Maria Donohue, a journalist for the Washington Today. Anna suspects that Third Echelon is trying to prevent the press from publishing an article about the President's defense policies. Anna had been asked to spy on Maria when she was still with Third Echelon. Sam has set up a meeting with Maria at a Washington Subway" .

 I also want to add this mission starts with Maria getting escorted by some of Evangeline's guards into a room in the Subway Station with a lot of bodies on the floor (the game kinda does "show don't tell" in here) and Sam opts to go rescue her. After doing so, Maria tells Sam that she is writing a piece about Federal Defense Programs. Quote:

Sam: "Alright, I think it's time to hear about your feature"

Maria: "Well, the Washington Today is running a story about Federal Defense Programs. It's well known that President Caldell is shifting government away from the military. But, I've been speaking to some of her friends. I can't reveal names but they tell me that the NSA is headed for a shakedown. More specifically, your former employer: Third Echelon."

 Sam: "Why would the President want to do that?" 

Maria: "I think she's concerned about the agents working there. There are other guys there like you, who go rogue".

 Sam: "I didn't go rogue. I just quit".

Maria: "Well, I heard a different story. It doesn't matter, really. What's important is that Third Echelon is in the red now".

Now to review the mission: In terms of gameplay and setup, it reuses part of the map from the last Subway Mission but stitches on a lot of new hallways and corridors for new areas. My brief time with this mission, it felt kinda labyrintine and unfun to play. Granted, my emulator glitched out so I had to use the "Skip Level Cheat" to by pass it entirely. Looking through this level on YouTube, this doesn't feel like it would have been a standout mission. NPC crowds are sparse. There are a few fun stealth rooms interspersed between more barren hallways and even some "Action Phase" gameplay.

Storywise, I like what's going on. We have a bit of connection to Splinter Cell Essentials with how Sam's record has been altered to say he's gone rogue. Plus, I feel OG Conviction/Conviction DS seems to have this one interesting thread going on regarding the morality of 3rd Echelon. Sam has no obligation or loyalty to the NSA/3rd Echelon now. Especially since Essentials and Double Agent show they aren't on the best of terms. Moreover, President Caldwell doesn't seem entirely wrong here. Legally speaking, the Splinter Cell Program is a huge red flag. You have an entire US Agency that can capture and assassinate both US and international citizens without due process and very little accountability. The whole reason why Splinter Cells are a secret is because both the US public and international communities would be appalled at their existence. Moreover, the plots of Pandora Tomorrow, Double Agent and Blacklist are instigated by US Military and Espionage operations. DS Conviction has people targeting a journalist for wanting to write about this.

It could have been interesting to see the story explore this angle more. Maybe discuss how even if the gameplay fantasy of being a superspy is cool, the IRL ramifications of it are anything but. Similar to how the Metal Gear Solid games weren't subtle about how the Military Industrial Complex and Intelligence Operations left their stain on the world. But knowing Tom Clancy games and their themes, they would have brushed it under the rug.

 

Onto another topic, the Mission Briefing mentions Anna providing data support to Sam. And she seems to act as the voice in his ear now. Assuming OG 2008 Main Console Conviction followed a similar structure to 2008 DS  Conviction, I imagine this would have been a cooler moment in that version. You've been playing as Hobo Sam needing to use Social Stealth and improvising your way through levels using whatever you could scrounge. But now, you start having access to some of the resources from prior games.

I remember watching Chris Davis' YouTube review on OG 2008 Main Console Conviction and he brought up that he suspected that starting out, Sam would have been forced to improvise his equipment as a rogue 3rd Echelon agent. Maybe even needing to purchase lethal equipment from Black Market dealers (kinda like Blacklist's system). But as you would have progressed through the game, Sam would slowly have re-acquired some of his old Splinter Cell gear.

I wonder if this also could have been tied into the narrative. In prior SC games, Sam was encouraged not to kill people (despite Sam claiming it would "make his job easier") by his bosses more due to pragmatism than morality. Splinter Cells avoid killing people and use stealth because people and other countries finding out the US is conducting illegal espionage actions is a big deal. OG Conviction had an interesting opportunity to let players show what Sam could really be like. To quote Chris Davis:

"Mathieu Ferland, a Senior Producer, described the Fisher of the first four games as being a basic "soldier obey order" type and the team wanted to move away from that. What better time than when Fisher has no boss except himself? What is Fisher like when he doesn't have to follow orders? We've had few chances to experiment with that so far, outside of optional moments in missions like the potential execution of Dhalia Tal or rescuing the pilots against Lambert's orders. To a certain extent, the player would be able to decide what Fisher is really like when he's let off the leash. Does he become more violent when he's not watched by his employer, or does he stick to a non-violent approach when possible, not because that's what he's told to do, but because that's what he wants to do?"

 

Assuming this is what OG 2008 Main Console Conviction was going for, I wonder if a modified version Blacklist's currency system would have actually fit better here. If the player does opt for more lethal strats, they earn money which they can spend on Black Market weapons. And they'll be more reliant on Black Market weapons since Sam might now have an easier time convincing what few NSA contacts he has left to slip him some Splinter Cell gear. Kinda like what happens in the PS2 version of Double Agent where if you make NSA approved choices, Lambert is able to convince higher ups to slip Sam more non-lethal equipment. Whereas if you make more JBA approved choices, Lambert has a harder time convincing NSA Higher ups to further support Sam and Sam has to make do with the Lethal Equipment JBA give him because the JBA trust him more now.

 

Hear me out. Lets say in a hypothetical version of OG 2008 Main Console Conviction, if the player opts for lethal plays, they earn money and money is used to purchase Black Market weapons. But if the player opts for stealth, they earn less money but get "tokens" or something which can be redeemed for Stealth Equipment slowly throughout the game. I'm just saying, I'd be down for that since your playstyle is further encouraged by the game.

 

Mission 8: Government House 2

 

Mission Briefing: "With the motive behind the assassination of  Senator Davis still unclear, Sam returns to the Government House to extract files from Senator David' Computer. The hope is that information revealing the senator's relationship with the Tranchion Corporation will be discovered."

Not much for me to add here for the story. This mission is pretty filler in terms of story. You have a second visit to the White/Government House because Sam and Anna need Senator' Davis files. This is what I was talking about earlier when I said this game reuses levels in its latter half. You travel through a lot of the same rooms as Mission 4 albeit at night. It plays about the same since it's more typical MGS1 style stealth with no civilians.

The gameplay is solid. No "Action Phase" and all stealth. Whistling helps you get past a lot of the enemies here.. The snipers in the court in the first part of the mission were kinda annoying to deal with but an ok mission overall. 

Mission 9: Valletta (again)

 

Mission Briefing: "The Information extracted from the senator's computer shows that a deal was brokered between Tranchion and Contratar to ship a package from Malta to the United States. Sam returns to Malta in order to learn more about this potential threat". 

Not much to add for the story here. This mission has 3 parts. Part 1 is a "Stealth Phase" section where you play a good chunk of Mission 2 backwards but in "Stealth Phase" this time. Some of the enemy placements and locations are different. You can now use civilians to blend or steal their phones and use as distractions but by in large, it plays the same as Mission 1. This game being unfinished is pretty evident here as there are places you can walk off the map and into the void. During my playtime, I was able to use this to skip a huge chunk of the map (I did reload my save and play normally as well to see how it would be different). I also had to use the Cheat Code to skip this level because the trigger to complete it and move to part 2 didn't work.

 

I feel this mission highlights DS Conviction's biggest issue (aside from being unfinished). The Hospital Level was the best level in the game because of how its level design really brought together all the mechanics of the game in interesting ways. Accommodating blending, running past enemies and thrill of being chased and hiding as well as being fun to plan out an approach or relying on improv gameplay. It was large, deep and had a lot of pathways and rooms and civilians to exploit. Unfortunately, DS Conviction doesn't have any more mechanics to really build interesting levels out of. Mission 9 Part 1 tries to feel different by letting you use blending and phones that you couldn't do in Mission 1 but it's not much of an upgrade or changes the experience.

 

I'm not saying it's impossible for DS Conviction to make this work. But it would need to add in more mechanics for Sam and add in more stuff to levels to reward players for thinking outside the box. For example, why not give Sam more parkour/platforming moves. Maybe even able to manually jump and climb. Now you can do what Assassin's Creed Altair's Chronicles DS (or Splinter Cell Pandora Tomorrow GBA) did and have alternate paths in levels based on your jumping and climbing skills. Maybe for this Valletta mission, the streets are way more guarded than they were in Mission 1, but Sam now has more jumping/platforming related moves and gadgets so the player could now navigate rooftops more comprehensively. In Mission 1, perhaps the player could only access some rooftops if they had pipes or ledges providing a direct route to them. But in this new version of DS Conviction's mission 9, the player can now cross most of the level using only rooftops. I don't think it's impossible given the DS hardware (it would depend on how much time and resources Gameloft were given. If they are resorting to reusing levels so much, I imagine they probably didn't have as many resources as they would have liked).

Mission 9 Part 2 is entirely "Action Phase" but this mission is even more broken and unfinished. After an initial shootout, a lot of guards have their AI just break entirely and don't move or respond to you so you can easily Stealth KO them. But this also means you can't complete the Part and have to use the Cheat Code to skip it.

 

Mission 9 Part 3 is interesting. It's a full on sniper boss fight between Sam and Evangeline. Evangeline is also the only character in the game with actual voice acting as she taunts Sam (not even Sam has proper voice acting so clearly Evangeline has to be a big deal). The way this fight works is that it takes place on a section of map from Mission 2 but Evangeline is perched on various sniper points. You have to make your way to her without getting shot too much and do a brief melee section with her. She then flashbangs you and disappears and you have her Sniper Rifle. You then have to look down the perch she was on and snipe her as she makes her way down to you. Once she reaches you, she flashbangs you, takes her Sniper Rifle back and moves further up the level. You repeat this until she dies.

 

Conceptually, this is a really creative move by Conviction DS by twisting its limited mechanics and repeated level. You're rewarded with your familiarity with the level by finding more convenient routes to get to Evangeline, more cover spots and health pickups. The game's cover system operates like a precursor to something like CounterSpy and you use that to snipe at Evangeline as the roles reverse with her trying to cross the same path you did to get to her.

 

The biggest issue here is that, I found it really hard to use the DS Dpad to line up my shots. I'm terrible at Sniping even with a controller and Mouse and Keyboard. So this was rough. And the game tries to help you out by having Evangeline run out in the open and I still missed most of my shots. And you have to take her out early since she can glitch and get stuck in the walls if the fight goes on for too long. I had to resort to using Save States and even then, this fight took me forever 😢.

 

Moving on from that to the story, yeah, It's kinda filler in the overall plot. It also doesn't make sense. How did wanted fugitive Sam, that needed a 3rd Echelon helicopter thanks to Reed's explicit help to even get from Valletta to DC in the first place, go there and back to DC in a single mission? I'm pretty confident in saying this probably wasn't in OG 2008 Main Console Conviction and was something DS Conviction had to do to get more levels into the game without creating too many new environments.

 

I do wonder if the broad stokes of this mission were still in OG Main Console Conviction. I'm leaning on "No". From what we know of OG 2008 Main Console Conviction, the focus was on keeping Sam close to the action and surrounded by potential threats. Sniping sections and Sniping Boss Fights tend to have a vibe of "being slow, detached and methodical". Whereas even OG Conviction was aiming to be somewhat faster paced. Prior SCs didn't exactly have a lot of sniping gameplay.

I can imagine maybe a section where Sam needs to sneak through an area while there are multiple snipers, perhaps with silenced weapons, scanning for him. Sam might have to use cover or crowds to hide as he moves between Snipers. But an MGS style Sniper Bossfight feels rather too unrealistic for Splinter Cell. Even 2010 Conviction didn't have a ton of sniping.

Mission 10: Tranchion Corporation 2

Mission Briefing: "Evangeline de Lozada has been eliminated but the uranium shipped into the United States is still at large. Sam's only clue to locate the shipment is the Tranchion Corporation, the company that paid Evangeline to acquire it. Sam returns to Tranchion Corporation in an attempt to hack into the CEO's computer and find out where the uranium has been sent."

 Adding to this, here is some dialogue from the start of the mission:

Anna: "I'm checking the Tranchion blueprints to locate Anderson's office"

Sam: "Don't bother, I've seen it already "

Anna: "You were asked to spy on Anderson?"

Sam: "Well, how do you think I ended up at the oil talks?"

Anna: "Really? That's odd. Sam, before I left Third Echelon, I requested the NSA to monitor Anderson. I had come across emails between Tranchion and Contratar. But my request was denied, and I was informed that Tranchion was clean. I don't see why the Third Echelon would have you spy on him, though".

Sam: "Hmm, maybe they learned the truth about Anderson." 

Anna: "Or maybe they wanted you to be there when Davis was killed."

Sam: "In any case, they won't be happy to see me here again".

Skipping ahead a bit but Sam has to sneak into a different wing of the building. Then here's some dialogue I found humerous as a callback to Mission 3.

Anna: "There's an elevator just past the office to your right that can take you to the eighth floor of the building. Then head to the security elevator that leads to Anderson".

Sam: "Sounds better than using a window-cleaning cart."

Anna: "Excuse me?"

 Sam: "Don't ask".

 

This mission is ok. It takes place on the same map as Mission 3 but in a different wing of the building. However, the aesthetics and graphics of the mission feel similar to Mission 3. The smaller cramped hallways, limited civilians and sparse doors mean that the stealth is a lot more basic now. A lot more "throwing objects" or whistling to distract guards. The lack of checkpoints was also annoying. A lot more hacking minigames as well.

The one interesting set piece is in Anderson's office. There is a security camera that goes back and forth. If the camera sees you, mission over. If Anderson sees you in his office, he will run and and lockdown his computer, resulting in a mission fail. So you have to time when you KO him.

Not much more to add here. I do find it funny that Sam and Anna are just now talking about the events of Mission 3. How did Anna think Sam ended up in Mission 4 lol?

Mission 11: Stratton Petroleum Refinery

Mission Briefing: "Data from a computer belonging to Anderson, the CEO of Tranchion, shows that the uranium was sent to Stratton Petroleum, a refinery located in Houston Texas. Sam heads there in order to collect an oil sample to ensure that the data is accurate."

 Finally, a new area!. After like 4 repeat maps, nice to have a new level. On top of that, the music rather catchy for both Stealth and Alert. I like how it seems to include the lockpicking sound as part of the beat.

Mission 11 has 3 parts. Part 1 has you move from the outside of the Refinery to find an entrance. There are no civilians to blend in with. The gimmick is that even though the level is linear, there are gaps in your path. One path will usually have guards, the other will have steam vents you have to move past when the steam isn't active. It's a fine level. The different sections are oddly memorable and distinct.

I did note the minimap was a lot less detailed. Usually, the game's minimap is fully coloured in but here, it's just boxes back and dark green rectangles. I guess this mission wasn't finished. Especially as the final keypad lock contains a 6 digit code and the microphone doesn't work so this requires another Level Skip Cheat Code.

 

Mission 11 Part 2 takes place inside the refinery next to this massive silo with a lot of rooms encircling it. I found the environment cool with how it had stuff like break rooms where employees would chill but the level less fun to play as there were fewer alternate routes or ways to bypass enemies. Definitely not a mission I would recommend ghosting. It also has  the longest laser mic minigame for recording the convo of an NSA agent mysteriously investigating the refinery. You have to do one that's 100 seconds and one after that which is 30. These were really tense.

Mission 11 Part 3 is literally part 1 but backwards. Damn, this game is now reusing the same level twice lol. Except there are snipers now which can be annoying to deal with. Mission 11 has a whole definitely needs another pass of its layout. Which is probably why the minimap is so unfinished. This is likely an earlier version of the mission.

Storywise, my gut says something like this was in OG 2008 Main Console Conviction in some form. The fact that the DS version gives a rough location and city of the refinery corroborates that. Meaning that Sam would have had to find a way to get from Washington DC to Houston subtly but still quickly enough before the situation changes. I'm curious how Sam did this. He probably couldn't take a flight. The 2 cities are about 2300 km apart.

More importantly, I wonder how this mission would have played in OG 2008 Main Console Conviction? A private refinery doesn't exactly have the kind of social stealth that OG Conviction was going for. My unsubstantiated conspiracy theory is perhaps this mission was a throwback to older  Splinter Cells. A traditional mission requiring you to use a basic version of the "in the shadows" stealth of prior SCs, maybe with some of your gadgets? But I am not sure.

 

 

Mission 12: Saint Micheal's Hospital 2.

Mission Briefing: "Having determined that Stratton Petroleum is where the  terrorist attack will originate. Sam must now figure out who is orchestrating it. After overhearing the phone conversation of Third Echelon Sergeant Lawrence Spradin at the refinery, it's a safe bet that the NSA is involved. Sam heads to the Washington Hospital to question the oil worker who is suffering from radiation poisoning."

 

Adding onto this, Sam has to find this oil worker while also watching out for assassins sent in to assassinate said worker (wow. This really is a copy and paste of Mission 6 lol). Sam navigates the hospital, finds the assassin, does a 80 second Laser Mic minigame. Sam takes out the Assassin and finds the oil worker, named Billy Bob (bit of an odd name). Same explains that he "took a tour of Stratton Ridge" and heard all about Billy. Billy is confused at this and how Sam even knows his name.

Billy confesses that he doesn't how how the uranium got there or where it's going. All he knows is that he was supposed to contact about the shipment but got irradiated before he could. This contact will arrive soon at the Refinery. Before Billy can say more, Spradin walks in. Sam hides as Spardin injects Billy with a syringe which kills him. Sam defeats Sparadin in a melee bossfight (which can glitch with Spiradin leaving the room. If you kill him outside, the next cutscene has Sam phasing through walls to get back over to Billy's body. But the mission then just ends).

 

Not much to add about this mission. It takes place in the best level in the game that still holds up on a second playthrough despite there being zero new areas (that's how good the level design is). Billy is even in the same room Anna was back in Mission 6. In fact, this mission covers less mandatory ground than Hospital 1. I went out of my way to revisit Dr. Green's Office on this trip and there was nothing there. Not even a collectible.

Storywise, it feels like this mission is missing some content. Maybe a part where Sam escapes in Action Phase since Mission 6 didn't have one (I'm not complaining lol). We don't get closure over Sam returning to Billy's body. The level just ends.

It's also odd that a Houston Oil worker would be sent  for treatment in a DC hospital (I'd hate to see his hospital bills). And that the consequence of this is that Sam would have to return to same Refinery from Mission 11 for Missions 13 and 14. Sam's travelling between Houston and DC like 2-3 times lol. As a result, I don't think OG 2008 Main Console Conviction was structured like this. It's more likely that either the Refinery was larger and/or there were other locations that the DS version could not adapt and instead reused the hospital map. In fact, the DS version is missing levels like the Washington Monument, Washington Streets, Police Station etc from the trailers.

 

Mission 13:  Stratton Petroleum Refinery 2.

Mission Briefing: "Sam has learned that a government official will arrive at Stratton Petroleum to oversee the shipping of irradiated oil in a matter of days. He heads there with Anna immediately in an attempt to shut down the refinery's systems so that the dirty oil cannot be pumped out".

Part 1 is literally the same as Mission 11 Part 1. Same route, same enemies, even the same bug that the door is glitched and you need to use the cheat code to skip Phase 1.

Part 2 is interesting because it technically requires you to play it twice in one mission. You need to make 1 full lap around the level as Sam. Then, Anna shows up, gives Sam a Sniper Rifle and has Sam climb the top of the tower. Then the game introduces a new mechanic. You can press X to switch between Anna and Sam (the only time the X button gets a use and unique icon in the game). The game actually found a way to combine Stealth and Action phases instead of treating them as separate gameplay styles entirely.

Anna plays mostly the same as Sam (even using the same grunts as him when she takes damage) except she can't melee or KO enemies (despite having the prompt). If you switch to Sam and Anna gets detected, the game forcibly switches you back to Anna to help her. Sam's sniping isn't too useful. This Silo has 2 areas. An "outer" area Sam can see and can snipe. And an "inner area" that Sam can't see. Anna needs to criss cross between these 2 sections to do another full lap of the area. So yeah, you would have played this level 3 times in 1 playthrough. There's also no checkpoints.

 

The idea is cool and a creative take on Conviction DS' mechanics. I don't even thing is something OG 2008 Main Console Conviction would have done (although 2010 Conviction has a section where you play as Coste with a limited moveset. And Blacklist has a mission where you briefly play as Briggs from a 1st person shooter POV). However, I will note the executation is lacking. Even ignoring the story ramifications of Anna being a field agent and why Sam couldn't just do it or have them swap roles, there isn't much back and forth or cool use of the mechanic. Imagine if there were windows and Anna could throw something to lure a guard and the player would have to swap to Sam to take the shot that was now possible. As it stands, it's mostly a section that plays like normal except you can't melee people anymore.

 After you complete this section, Sam climbs down from the silo and finds Anna has been captured by Tom Reed. There's the following exchange:

 

Anna: "I'm sorry Sam"

 Tom: "Oh, how touching. She might actually mean it. When we asked her to track you down, she refused. She wanted to leave you alone."

Sam: "That's the problem with Third Echelon, right now the people calling the shots rarely consider what others want".

Tom: "If you accept everything that others want, you compromise too much".

Sam: "So, you'd threaten the lives of the people you're sworn to protect?"

Tom: "What I've done is not nearly as dangerous for our society as the President's effort to marginalize Third Echelon. Third Echelon has been the backbone of our defense policy for decades. If the government breaks this institution the safety of the entire nation will be in jeopardy."

Sam: "Third Echelon is a division of the NSA. It exists to serve the government, whether or not you agree with the decisions that are made."

Tom: "Spoken like a true coward. I'm not going to be lectured by an agent who lacks conviction". {Tom begins walking away with Anna as a hostage}

 Sam: "I can't let you go, Tom." 

Tom: "Right, now you're the government hero. You're going to do the 'right' thing. Make sure you know what the right thing really is. Your dear friend has a bomb around her neck. If you follow me, she blows up. See you in hell, Sam!"

Anna: "Forget about me, Sam. The bomb on me is proximity controlled. It will blow if I leave this refinery. He's planted other bombs around the refinery. You've got to stop him."

 Sam: "Right"

 

So yeah, the story actually tries to throw an interesting plot twist. You have Sam, the guy at the start of the game that was reluctant to work for 3rd Echelon, having to stop the guy trying to "save" 3rd Echelon and being called a "Government hero". Tom's dialogue implies that Anna really was on Sam's side. This reminds me a bit of 2010 Conviction where the game has Anna shoot Sam and deliver him as a present to Reed, the game framed it as Anna betraying Sam before turning around and revealing that actually, this was a setup by Anna and Sam to trick Reed and take him down.

I think some of the messy DS version's story inconsistencies were meant to be intentional to get Sam/the Player to wonder who was really on their side. Anna's story doesn't line up with Reed's so who is telling the truth? But the story's presentation lacks the means to make it appear more provoking. Rather, it feels more like "huh? I guess the DS text is a little weird" rather than something that tips off the player. Though the game does give away the twist when Anna says earlier that "maybe someone wanted you nearby when Senator Davis was shot".

I think it would have been interesting if there was some actual friction between Sam and Anna so the player might have reason to suspect that maybe Tom was in the right. Maybe have it that Anna really was spying on Sam and this is what led to him getting spotted.

 

2010 Conviction's way of accomplishing this was to reveal that Lambert faked Sam's daughter's death in order to keep her safe. A plot beat that makes little sense despite being presented in a really engrossing and emotional way. But DS Conviction seems like it had the means to do more with less. 

I also noted that DS Reed has the same general motivations as his 2010 counterpart. He wanted to frame Sam for the assassination of a political figure (The President in 2010's case) in order to justify 3rd Echelon's existence. The 2010 version had Reed orchestrate a coup with the VP, use EMPs to shut down DC, and have the Black Arrow PMC invade the White House. Reed had no way of knowing Sam would be at the White House however. While the DS version has it be more of a framed nuclear terrorist at a refinery in Houston.

 

I do wonder how both version of Reed's plans would have feasibly worked. In the 2010 version, if Caldwell is assassinated and the VP succeeds her, then Reed has someone in power that is supportive of 3rd Echelon. He doesn't need to frame Sam specifically. 3rd Echelon also doesn't formally exist. It's a subdivision of the NSA so it's not like he needs to convince the general public to increase NSA funding. Kinda overkill my man. Maybe 2010's story would have worked better if the more drastic actions were also used in a kinda "Call of Duty Modern Warfare 2" way to make sure people would always be support for the NSA?

 

The 2008 DS version kinda gets closer to this idea.  You have the angle that Journalists are looking into the NSA and 3rd Echelon and might blow the lid with all their illegal activities. Reed's actions here are less "drastic" (at least compared to his 2010 counterpart) as they have to convince President Caldwell not to dissolve 3rd Echelon. But seeing as Reed intends to blame it on Sam, would it be a smart idea to get support for 3rd Echelon by drumming support for the expensive organization that produces Rogue Agents that assassinate Senators?

I don't know. I guess the 2010 version feels more over the top but would actually work. While the 2008 version feels more plausible but has more holes to poke through.

I will complain the DS version's stealth music doesn't fit the vibe of the cutscene. Or the fact that Reed is wrong about 3rd Echelon being an important institution for decades. 3rd Echelon was set up in 2003. The first Splinter Cell was about Sam getting pulled up as part of this new secretive organization. So at this point, 3rd Echelon would have been active for 5-8 years (depending on when Conviction DS actually takes place).

 

Mission 14: Stratton Petroleum Refinery

 

Mission Briefing: "Third Echelon agent Tom Reed is the man behind the operation to attack the United States. Since Sam and Anna have made it impossible for him to use pipelines to pump  out the irradiated oil, Tom will try another way to release the radiation into the United States. Blowing up Straffton Petroleum is his current mission, and if Sam and Anna are brought down with it, even better".

 

This mission has 4 parts. Sam must climb the tower floor by floor disabling 10 bombs. Each floor is copy pasted with the same general layout (but with a detailed map). You must use a Sniper Rifle shoot a precise section of the bombs to disable them while guards patrol the area. The game actually manages to combine Stealth and Action phases as you can use weapons like in Action Phase, and enemies have their vision cones and behaviour of Stealth Phase. So I guess it was possible this whole time!

 

This mission is pretty repetitive. I can see OG 2008 Main Console Conviction maybe doing a better take on this with the bombs in a public space where the player might have to make some hard choices, maybe like a better version of MW3 2023 where you can shoot civilians accidentally blocking your way to get closer to disarming the bomb, so you, on some scale, get to experience what Tom is doing, killing a few innocent people in order to potentially save more lives. Maybe if you don't kill civilians or take too long, the bomb blows up and you get a bad ending. Showing that you "didn't have the Conviction to do what's right" (according to Tom).

 

Mission 0: Tom

 

 Mission Briefing: "Third Echelon agent Tom Reed is the man behind the operation to attack the United States. Since Sam and Anna have made it impossible for him to use pipelines to pump  out the irradiated oil, Tom will try another way to release the radiation into the United States. Blowing up Straffton Petroleum is his current mission, and if Sam and Anna are brought down with it, even better".

 

That's not a typo. The final mission is called  "Mission 0: Tom" and reuses the same description. I have a feeling that maybe these were used as a placeholder. You travel this balcony disabling bombs while Reed shoots at you. Unfortunately, this mission is glitched and can't be completed. If you use the skip mission cheat code, that works, but there is no ending cutscene. The game just strats from Mission 1 again like it's Dark Souls 1 doing a new run (although on YouTube, some people were able to get the end credits instead).

 

So yeah, hard to say what actually happens next. 2010 Conviction ended with  Reed's death and Caldwell dissolving 3rd Echelon. She and Anna presumably clear Sam's name after the fact so Sam can finally stop being on the run. Although the setup here also makes more of a "return to status quo" for Blacklist where Sam and Anna are now a part of 4th Echelon and conduct more typical missions. Even Sarah comes back from the dead.

I imagine something similar might have happened in DS Conviction/2008 Main Console Conviction as with 3rd Echelon formally dissolved, Sam is finally free to no longer be on the run as much. Though it would probably be harder to convince Caldwell to greenlight 4th Echelon given Sam doesn't personally save her life here and the plot involves journalists investigating t.

 

I wonder if Ubisoft ever intended to make follow ups to OG 2008 Main Console Conviction? Blacklist was the way it was in part due to fan backlash to Conviction. Ubi was trying to make a game to cater to both classic SC fans with how Blacklist supports stealth, and 2010 Conviction fans with how Blacklist supports Panther and Assault playstyles. Somehow, I doubt Blacklist would be the way it was if OG 2008 Main Console Conviction was the game before. Maybe Ubi would have tried to marry OG Conviction's social stealth with CT's Classic Steallth? Or they would have gone back to a more typical Splinter Cell? I guess we will never know.

 

Conclusion:

 

If Conviction DS was finished and released in 2008, regardless of what happened to main console Conviction,  I think it would have been treated as a "6/10 ok Stealth game" on places like Metacritic. While Conviction DS has some strong points, it's too limited in terms of mechanics and scope to be a compelling stealth game through and through. Part of that isn't Conviction DS' fault. I've been comparing it to Metal Gear Solid 1 a lot here. But MGS1 had the advantage of being a big budget AAA game with years of development. Even though Conviction DS does stuff MGS1 never did like social stealth or actually good minigames, Conviction DS likely would never have gotten even a fraction of the budget and development time of MGS1. So the fact it has such positives even in an unfinished state is impressive.

Moreover, had it released, it would unironically be the best stealth game on DS by a country mile. There are no Metal Gear, Hitman or Tenchu games on DS. The Assassin's Creed games on DS are either 2.5D (Altair's Chronicles) or 2D (Discovery) aren't really typical stealth games. The other stealth game on DS is Chaos Theory DS which....... doesn't have the best reputation. So even a functional Conviction DS would be the best stealth game by default.  Even then, DS Conviction, by opting for an MGS1 style, is playing to more of its strengths. Chaos Theory DS had a rough time being a more faithful adaptation of Splinter Cell 1-3 on DS. To the point its controls, performance and graphics were severely compromised. But Conviction DS didn't have those worries.

But for many people, I imagine the most interesting thing about DS Conviction isn't the game itself, but the game it wasn't. It was meant to be a tie in to 2008 Main Console Conviction. The game that never came out and as a result, took DS Conviction down with it and time made it obsolete. Had DS Conviction come out in 2008, I can imagine the people that played it might have had some positive memories and an experience they might not have been able to have (especially if they only had a DS). But now, in 2025, small stealth games are far more accessible. Between CounterSpy, Stealth Inc, MGS1-3, Mark of the Ninja, Intravenous 2 etc Nintendo users and players in general have plenty of options.

 

Still, DS Conviction provides a view to what 2008 Conviction would have been like. And despite everything, I now wish we got that game. I remember feeling like 2008 Conviction was a huge departure from classic Splinter Cell. Why was this what Conviction was going for? But the DS version of Conviction, despite everything, fulfilled its purpose and did the impossible. It sold me on Conviction.

 

 

I platinummed Prince of Persia The Forgotten Sands on PS3

 Hello everyone. I recently platinummed the PS3 version of Prince of Persia The Forgotten Sands (my third PS3 platinum) and I wanted to talk about it. I found my old PS3 and my 2015 save file and saw I already had most of the trophies and decided to go for the platinum.

Overall, this was a very straightforward and easy platinum. To the point I feel the main guide on PSNprofiles is exaggerating a bit. This game is a not a 4/10 difficulty. I’d say closer to a 2.5. It's possible and not too challenging to get all the trophies in a single playthrough. There are a few missable trophies that have some good spots to farm them in the story mode but also have ok replacements in challenge mode. 

I missed the following trophies on my first casual run back in 2015: "Acrobat - Jump on enemies 30 times in a row without falling or using the Power of Time." because there wasn't a need to ever jump on enemies. And "Sand Nemesis - Kill 50 enemies in a row without being hit and without using upgrade powers or the Power of Time." I missed this one because I'd catch a stray hit and was never concerned about this. Both of these trophies can be farmed in the challenge mode quite easily but there are easier places to obtain them in the story mode such as when these summoner enemies keep summoning weak skeletons you can easily kill.

 

I also missed "Stay Dry - Move on solidified water for 1 minute without using the Power of Time."  because I found description confusing. Wasn't the act of solidifying water itself using a Power of Time?What it actually means is that you just have to walking/standing/climbing on water structures for a minute straight while holding the L2 button to solidify said water. You're allowed to jump between water structures to release L2 to recharge the water solidifying power to continue the process. I missed this one because the game encourages you to be platforming quickly through these sections. You aren't exactly encouraged to chill on a couple water columns for a while as they could stop working. But this was easy enough to get as I found the first 3 water columns and just chilled on them to get the trophy.

 

"Our Little Secret - Don't worry. We won't tell if you don't" was one 2015 me never figured out. It turns out that all you have to do to get this trophy is start a playthrough on the normal difficulty and change the difficulty to easy mode at any point. I suppose that explains why every loading screen tip kept hinting to turn down the difficulty.  It's not one I ever would have even accidentally got. POPFS isn't a very difficult game. Its combat, especially towards the end when you get the upgraded sword, lets you tear through groups of enemies. So.... points for being the most well hidden trophy?

 

"Got Walkthrough? - Find and break every sarcophagus." is the trophy for finding the only collectibles in the game. There's around 20 sarcophagi in the game that you can break for health, magic/sand and XP.  The game does try to clue you that a sarcophagus may be nearby with these blue dust particles that get more dense as you get closer to them but despite often being right on the main path, these collectibles are hidden just out of sight in some clever places. Levels with a blue colour palette also camouflage these dust particles. I followed the Achievement Hunters' guide for them. It was a trip hearing the guy apologize for a 10 minute video being long in 2011. Ah the memories.

 

"Untouchable - Defeat Ratash in the Throne Room without taking any damage" is the first actually sorta rough trophy (and the one with a typo). This requires you to defeat the main boss of the game in your first fight with him without taking any damage i.e your health bar depleting. Everything else is fair game. The trick is the Stone Armour power you unlock. This prevents your health from being drained by enemy attacks even if the Prince grunts in pain or gets sent flying by a massive attack. The key is to activate this power and keep it on for the whole fight, including the brief platforming section since Ratash is throwing fireballs at you.

 

The main issue here is the way POPFS does checkpoints/autosaves. The game does not allow you to make manual saves or level select in any way. So if you take actual damage and the fight progresses to the next checkpoint, you gotta replay the entire game to get back to this point and try again. Supposedly, you can still reload a checkpoint in a latter stage if you get hit and it should still count but fortunately, I didn't have to test this. The boss fight itself also isn't very challenging or long so even being a bit wasteful with stone armours should still mean you can complete this easily.

 

The final trophy I earned was "Invincible - Finish the final battle against Ratash without taking any damage". This one has the advantage that even if you mess up and complete the game without getting the trophy, this is saved as your last checkpoint so you can literally continue your last save and keep retrying this. You can use the same Stone Armour strat as the previous one except the fight goes on so long that you won't have enough magic to stone armour for the entire fight and mooks almost never drop refills. So there is a bit of trying to dodge his easier attacks and timing when to activate stone armour to get the most out of it. I also advice making sure you reach this point with max magic. The fight itself isn't hard but it can be annoying to get hit by a stray attack that does like 4% of your max health and needing to retry.

 

And that's it for the most notable trophies. Everything else was simple enough that 2015 me got without even trying. I do wish the game had a few more cool challenge ones (in addition to a manual save/level select to help with that). For example, how about a speedrun one like God of War 1 or Prince of Persia '08 to beat the game in under 7 hours or something?  In 2007, Ubisoft released a licensed game based on the TMNT movie that basically played like a Prince of Persia game. One of my favourite things about that game was that it came with a series of bonus platforming levels that were genuinely tough. I would have liked to see something like that in this game. POPFS does have a bonus time trial challenge I couldn't even attempt because it was locked behind Uplay (and I am pretty sure POPFS PS3 doesn't even support the new Ubisoft Connect client so I might not even be able to redeem it anymore). Regardless, POPFS was a fun game to play and platinum.

 

As for the game itself, I really like POPFS. I might even say this is my favourite Prince of Persia game to play. I love the Sands of Time Trilogy but whenever I replay them, the platforming feels rather .... basic. With the exception of the odd challenge room or the final gauntlet in the Two Thrones, I tend to go on autopilot whenever I play them. The traps and timing often doesn't challenge me and I feel like I am going through the motions. POPFS has some wild sections such in the Djnn city where you need to combine and alternate between the Water Solidify Power and the Recall power at such speeds that I have to get engaged. I love that stuff. The sequence near the end where you have to wall jump between multiple waterfalls in quick succession is just so fun to play. POPFS has arguably the best platforming in the series (tied with POP '08. And for saying that, I might have lost all my credibility lol).

 

POPFS' controls are pretty good and about what I expect from a modern Prince of Persia game. There are a few changes that did sometimes conflict with my muscle memory from the Sands of Time games. You now have a manual jump by moving and pressing X and rolling is bound to O. I did have a few oopsie moments of jumping into a gap instead of rolling but managed to adjust pretty quickly. Something that took me longer was vaulting/climbing. In the SoT games, when you're climbing or clinging onto something, pressing X makes you climb up it and pressing back + X makes you back eject off it. POPFS changes it to holding up to climb and just X to back eject which did mess me up a few times. Rewinding Time is now bound to R1 instead of L1 and wallrunning/Interact is bound to R2 instead of R1. I had a few embarrassing movements of rewinding time instead of wallrunning or pulling a lever.

 

What makes platforming more interesting in POPFS is that you have more places to wallrun which is incorporated into platforming. For example, you can now wallrun horizontally or vertically while climbing and there are platforming sections that task you to time a vertical wallrun while shimmying to dodge blade traps and then fall back and resume shimmying. Or shimmy into a horizontal wallrun and jump into a pole swing. Manually jumping into a wall also lets you follow up with a vertical wallrun by holding R2 so you do miss out on extended wall jump sequences since you can wallrun up them to skip needing to do as many wall jumps.

 

The game also improves the Prince's animations and better accommodates flow. For example, lets say you cling to a column. In past POP games, you'd have position the Prince so his back faces where you want to go and then press X to back eject to where you want to go. But in POPFS, you can just press Direction + X and the game will buffer your inputs and make the Prince automatically jump in that direction when the animation allows. This led to a lot of cool sequences where I was in the zone moving from wall to pole to column all without breaking my stride or pausing. It was fun.

 

The final piece that adds to platforming is the Prince's powers. The Prince gets 3 main platforming powers: the ability to solidify water and the ability to recall parts of the environment and a Sonic Homing Attack. Solidifying Water lets the Prince freeze all water in the environment. Letting him wallrun on waterfalls and swing/move on columns. Some puzzles also use this such as freezing a water stream to block certain objects. You have a gauge that determines how long you can freeze water for. The game throws timing challenges at you where it asks you to freeze and unfreeze water such as mid jump. So you jump and hold L2 to freeze a stream of water you can swing off, press X to jump off and then release L2 to unfreeze all water so the next stream or column can move into place, then hold L2 to freeze that. All this at a rapid pace. Later levels go wild and ask you to freeze and unfreeze and plan out your path when wall jumping at a rapid pace. It's great.

 

The second ability is "Recall" not to be confused with the Prince's ability to rewind time. This lets load in a destroyed piece of the environment be it a floor, wall, pole, column etc by pressing L1. The catch is that the Prince can only load one item at a time. This leads to platforming challenges where you load in a platform, jump and then press L1 to unload the platform you were just standing on and load in the next platform to land on mid jump.

 

There's a wild section in the Djinn city that combines these abilities. You're sliding down a crumbling staircase. The game throws challenges at you where you use different combinations of tapping L1 while holding and releasing L2 and pressing X. You're jumping, freezing/unfreezing water and recalling the environment at once. It's great.

 

The 3rd ability is a Sonic The Hedgehog-like air homing attack that lets you cross long distances to fly into an enemy across a gap. The game throws platforming challenges at you to homing attack into birds and jump off them and combines this with the other powers.

 

So yeah, hopefully y'all can see why I like POPFS' platforming so much. However, I do have some complaints. The first is regarding Recall. The game shows you the next section/platform you can recall with a yellow silhouette of it but doesn't highlight the current platform you recalled. In 90% of cases, I found it was intuitive to know that if I recalled the next platform, which previous platform would disappear and if I would have to jump off my current one first. But in a handful of times, I was caught off guard and fell to my death (of course, I could rewind to undo it). Still, maybe some blue or green outline on recalled platforms to make it obvious they are the current recalled one would have helped here.

 

I do feel it's a missed opportunity the game doesn't go further with the environmental powers. After the Djinn City  Section, you never need to use the Recall powers. The game justifies this that since you aren't in the Ruined Djinn City anymore, there are no more ruins to recall. But I don't know, the current palace is still crumbling and falling apart. Why leave behind such a fun mechanic?

 

Another complaint I have is odd. Remember earlier when I praised POPFS' animations and flow? It's hard to explain but around 80% of the time, POPFS' animations and sense of flow is on point. But 20% of the time, it kinda isn't which stands out and takes me out of the experience. To use an analogy, imagine you are playing Tony Hawk Pro Skater. You do a combo of 5 cool fast tricks in a row. For your 6th trick, you decide to do a basic kickflip. For some reason, your skater takes a second longer, braces himself and then jumps and does a kickflip. Even if it doesn't break your combo, it can throw off your rhythm which can mess you up later.

 

POPFS normally does a pretty good job in maintaining the flow state but there are times when I am sliding or running or climbing and I try to do a Wallrun and the Prince lags for sec before doing it. It throws me off that I sometimes mess up the following sequence. Some of the Prince's animations also don't seem to match his momentum. His horizontal wallrun feels really slow which definitely messes with me.

I think this throws me off because of how much I played the SoT trilogy. In those games, while the Prince's animations were more scripted and less flexible they were more consistent and better showed a sense of momentum. Like in SoT, if I run and then do a Wallrun, the Prince always starts the wallrun the same way and he moves quickly enough with distinct phases to his animation that I can always tell what he's doing, how far he's got left and when I should jump.

 

I can't be sure but I have my suspicions that  POPFS nudges your animations and inputs to help you. I first noticed this when I clearly jumped perpendicular from a beam and would have missed a column. So I should have fallen to my death. But the Prince made a slightly more diagonal jump and reached the column.

 

My second piece of evidence is the way rewinds work. In the SoT games, you can rewind to the past 10 seconds by holding L1. Releasing L1 stops the rewind exactly where you released it. Lets you have a sequence where you are standing on a safe platform, then do a horizontal wallrun then jump. Lets say you jump too early. In SoT, you can rewind to either before you began the wallrun or mid wallrun and correct your jump right there. But POPFS works differently. It doesn't stop rewinding when you release R1, it continues rewinding you until it puts you in a "safe spot". So in this example, even if you release R1 mid wallrun, it would rewind you back before the wallrun.This often threw me off, especially during wall jump sequences as rather than rewinding me mid jump, it would rewind me a bit earlier to a wall cling state and I'd fail that. 

 

All this makes me suspect that all the occasional weird "delays" and "hitches" I sometimes feel are the result of the game's invisible assists kicking in. I imagine with time, I probably could have gotten a better feel of how they worked. If I could get good at Classic Assassin's Creed Parkour, this is in my wheelhouse. But I will complain at the way rewinds work now. In SoT, choosing when to end a rewind was part of learning the game. It was cool that even when you made a mistake, a more experienced player could rewind just before it and keep going while a less experienced player could rewind further back to give themselves more of a buffer. The animations and controls were intuitive enough that it was feasible to see where you messed up and how to correct it. Still, overall, the platforming is still arguably the best in the series. I imagine a hypothetical sequel would have ironed these out. 

-Combat:

 

POPFS holds the honour of having arguably the best combat in the series while feeling just as unengaging as its predecessors. Let start with the controls. You have a basic 5 hit combo with Square. Holding Square charges up a power attack. You can combine regular and power attacks for those 5 hits. Triangle does a kick which can push enemies back and drop enemy shields. You can jump on enemies with X and hop on top off enemies or press square to do an aerial attack. You can also do cool cinematic takedown animations if you knock an enemy into a wall or railing and then press Square. You can roll with O and that is your only defensive option. No Block or counterattack or parrying here.

 

You also have 4 Sand powers activated by pressing one of the D-Pad buttons. Up activates the Stone Armour which temporarily prevents you from taking Damage. Down Activates a wind storm that sucks up nearby enemies and damages them. Right activates a fire trail that follows the Prince and damages enemies that step into it. And Left adds Ice attacks and projectiles to the Prince's basic attacks. The game also adds quite a few enemy types like summoners, giant charging minotaurs and minibosses that are cool to fight. Defeating enemies also awards XP you can use to purchase upgrades such as increasing your health and magic reserves, improving your Sand powers etc.

 

Ultimately, the combat was something I tolerated in this game. And in my most recent playthrough, ran past almost every combat encounter and had a much better time. Prince of Persia games don't have the most engaging combat. The different enemy types don't require different strats or learning how they operate so every fight feels the same. The Sand Powers didn't change much about how I played and were just there. I think its telling that one of Two Thrones biggest innovations was adding stealth kills so you could skip fighting enemies and in POP '08, your punishment for being slow in a platforming section was a combat encounter. POPFS doesn't do much to address this. Every combat encounter starts to blend together. Especially towards the end of the game where you get the improved water sword that 1 shots most enemies and tears through most larger enemies.

 

I always wondered if a Prince of Persia game would be better served if combat was reworked into being an extension of platforming where enemies were platforming obstacles rather than enemies in a fight. Even something like The Two Thrones where you could use stealth to quietly take out enemies has its merits as it requires you to climb to certain vantage points or position yourself to get the drop on enemies. The Two Thrones even has a stealth takedown you do when wallrunning letting you transition from a platforming wallrun into a stealth kill. POPFS never incorporates that or even the Djinn powers to deal with enemies.

 

I'm just saying, in a Mario game, Mario doesn't need to start throwing hands with multiple Goombas in extended combat encounters for the game to be fun. It's enough to Goombas be obstacles Mario jumps on to defeat and move on.

 

Graphics and Artstyle:

Graphically, the game also looks impressive. The sandy kingdoms, effects, palace rooms and blue mythical areas are beautiful. I will complain the game lacks visual variety compared to something like Sands of Time which explored more novel areas like the zoo, construction areas, different kinds of baths etc. Sands of Time felt like I explored more and different places. To the point the game's save points named every location and the final vision showed you a lot off the areas you visited along the way that I remembered. Show me a screenshot of a location from Sands of Time or The Two Thrones and I am pretty confident I can tell you where in the game that is. Show me a screenshot of a location in POPFS and I'd have a harder time. It's harder to describe but POPFS feels more like individual areas are all connected by "biomes" that share the same general architecture and visual themes. I experienced a similar feeling in Warriour Within (granted, it was worse there as WW was a lot less varied in its visuals).

 

Performance and Stability:

The game did hard freeze on me around 3-4 times on this playthrough in such a way where I couldn't even exit the game and had to manually get up and turn my PS3 off. I did also notice a few slowdowns in areas with a ton of enemies and effects. Not sure if it's because the game has some issues, or my PS3 and/or Disc is getting older. My poor PS3 was chugging every now and again. So be careful should you choose the play the game. Aside from that, the game seemed to run flawlessly.

 

 

The Story:

POPFS' story was ...... ok. It's not something that will stick me nor was it something that upset me. I felt mostly neutral playing it.

 

Part of that, I feel, is the nature of the game. POPFS is an interquel, set some time after the events of Sands of Time but before the Dhaka came and started hunting the Prince for 7 years leading to Warriour Within. The game can't really challenge the Prince or give him a major arc since he has to be relatively static for Warriour Within to happen. The game is also quite self referential and often feels like a callback to its predecessors, especially Sands of Time. During the opening sequence, there are set pieces where the Prince shimmys along buildings and the camera zooms out and the scene feels like a HD remake of the same section from Sands of Time. The final climb is in a treasure room. The Prince even references Azad and Farah several times. The game also uses a similar blue aesthetic for the more dreamlike areas of the Djinn. The climax of the game has the Prince taking a few cues from Warriour Within by obtaining the water sword. The main villain, Ratash, even resembles the Dhaka visually. The Two Thrones shows its influence with Razia becoming a disembodied voice that comments on the Prince's combat performance.

 

So not only is POPFS limited by its place in the timeline, its going to be harder for it to stand out given its references to past games. To the point I wonder if this game wouldn't have been better served actually being a 7th gen HD Remake of Sands of Time. But even ignoring that, I feel POPFS doesn't do its story many favours. The first issue is the tone. The Prince is quite chipper and lighthearted to the point of cracking MCU style quips at the situation. The entire palace is turned to sand and there are sand monsters everywhere plus a giant demon rampaging around. In terms of danger, this is worse than in Sands of Time since there isn't even a way to rewind time to fix everything. Yet it feels less dire. At least in Warriour Within, the Prince was straight up terrified of the Dhahka whenever he showed up but the Prince never shows that kind of fear here which undermines the tension.

 

Sands of Time was by no means a dark game, (especially next to Warriour Within) but the game still highlighted how severe the situation was. The Prince would lament at how tragic the devastation was. He rarely made light of the situation and most of his humour/jokes was directed at Farah to bring some levity. Playing Sands of Time, you get a sense of how occasionally lonely, atmospheric and haunting some locations could be. The story being framed as a story a future Prince is telling also helped it out by contrasting the wiser and more cautious future Prince with the more brash and arrogant current Prince as well as expositing how the Prince is feeling. POPFS starts with the Prince explaining to Razia how he got there for first part of the story before dropping the narrator framework entirely.

 

The Prince's conflict and arcs are underbaked. There is the idea that the Prince looks up to his brother Malik and feels conflicted when Malik calls him a traitor. Prince is also unwilling to go ahead with killing Malik to stop the main villain Ratesh as Ratesh slowly takes over Malik. But the game touches these beats before moving on. One weird element is how Razia, Djinn the Prince meets on his journey, is handled. Unlike the PSP or DS version of Forgotten Sands, the Djinn here doesn't accompany the Prince by becoming his sword until the end of the game. So instead, the story has it that the Prince occasionally finds an entrance to her domain as he explores, stops in for a quick break and fill Razia in on her progress. This limits the story since it isolates the Prince's characterization to brief cutscenes in between long stretches of gameplay.

 

In contrast, The Two Thrones was setup that the Prince was stuck with the Dark Prince as a comforting voice in his head and devil on his shoulder from quite early on allowing for conversations and plot progression through the dialogue that occured as the player played. Even Khaleena as the narrator helped out here by expositing information. I feel POPFS would have had more to work with if Razia joined the Prince sooner. Their dialogue when they join near the end is quite entertaining.

 

If I could wave a magic wand and tweak the story to make it more entertaining, I'd do the following:

 

Firstly, I'd have the Prince show more anxiety and worry at the situation while trying to hide it from Razia. Like, this is the second time a Sands of Time-like event happened and there is no hourglass for him to undo it like nothing ever happened. There will be lasting consequences this time. If the game is going to have so many callbacks from Sands of Time rather than being a more novel story, I think it would be interesting for a follow up to Sands of Time to explore how that's affected the Prince. Go all in on the concept. The closest the current version of POPFS does is having the Prince be distrustful of magic because of his past experience. But I'm imagining a moment where the Prince has flashbacks to Sands of Time and is caught off guard and stressed by it. Because while the Prince managed to successfully reverse the situation in Azad, it was still an extremely stressful and "trial by fire" sequence for the Prince that changed his personality and outlook. Especially since there isn't even anybody the Prince can talk to about it (yet). This is a secret only he knows.

 

I also feel it would be interesting if this anxiety affected his decision making process. In the current version of POPFS, the set up is that both Malik and the Prince have a piece of the medallion that gives them powers. Both of them are levelling up as they defeat enemies but Malik is slowly getting corrupted by his where he becomes more distrustful and paranoid of the Prince. What if the Prince's anxiety and experience facilitates this. Like, lets say there is a plot beat where the Prince uses his past experience to solve a puzzle or deal with a section that someone without the experience couldn't have. Malik sees this and becomes curious that the Prince is hiding something from him. The Prince tries to explain how to fix the situation without explaining how he knows it which makes Malik suspect the Prince is the one being corrupted or being driven to madness by the Medallion. This weighs on the Prince that despite having past experience, he messed up and maybe even begins to feel that Malik is right.

 

Maybe this could also apply with the Prince's relationship with Razia. What if the Prince was initially hesitant to trust Razia and hesitates on fully going after Malik rationalizing it will be fine. After all, the Prince reversed the events of Sands of Time so surely Malik can do the same. This creates the conflict between the 2 where Razia suspects the Prince is hiding something and not taking the situation seriously and the Prince suspects Razia has ulterior motives. Finally culminating in a sequence where the Princes messes up just like how he did in Sands of Time and gets temporarily trapped with Razia somewhere. The situation looks hopeless and Razia chews out the Prince for this. The Prince finally drops his guard and confesses his worries to Razia and tells her an abridged version of Sands of Time. That he has seen something like this before and he doesn't want to believe he'd have to kill Malik and why this made him distrustful of Razia. You could have Razia not believe the Prince at first but give him the benefit of the doubt and this becomes the moment that fully unites the two as a proper team.

 

I also feel the final boss fight against Ratesh, who has taken over Malik's body and grown into a kaiju sized threat, was rather underwhelming (even ignoring the fact that the Prince beat him twice already). The preceding platforming section across floating broken scenery in a sandstorm was arguably a lot more interesting and fulfilling gameplay wise. The actual fight consists of a platform where you avoid Ratesh' telegraphed attacks and attack his chest when he gets close. Even when I first played the game over a decade ago, I always wondered why this fight felt so underwhelming despite the cool spectacle of fighting a skyscraper sized monster. I think I now know why. Lets compare 2 bosses from The Two Thrones: The Final Boss Fight versus the Vizir and the first boss fight against the Giant.

 

For the boss fight against the Vizir, yeah you have all the hype and build up from the story but even on a mechanical level, this fight works. Vizir's first phase as this biblically accurate angel is a back and forth where he attacks and moves quickly and you have to move fast and strike fast well. It feels like a back and forth so even though The Two Thrones' combat isn't amazing, it works with the fight and elevates it. The second phase has the Vizir go to the edge of the arena and summon floating rocks as mines for the player to avoid. You have to dodge the rocks, get under him and do a vertical wallrun into a QTE sequence to cut off his wings quickly before he moves. Here, the fight uses both the movement one of the new core additions to The Two Thrones, the QTE Speed Kill system in a memorable way. The final phase has him fly high his telekinesis creates one final platforming gauntlet out of random debris for you to climb and stab him. It's cool and memorable to have the final phase of the fight use the platforming the Prince is known for. The one shot only adds to this.  For the Giant Boss in Two Thrones, you can't attack him directly. Instead you must go to edge of the arena, climb up to get to the Boss' head level and do a QTE to stab out his eyes. Once he's blind, you attack his legs taking care to avoid his attacks before finishing him off. 

In both cases, even though the actual boss might not be the most complex, the way it plays feels unique to The Two Thrones. It highlights the mechanics and platforming of the game so it feels memorable. If you took the Vizir and ported him as is into something like God of War 3 or Dark Souls 1, the fight wouldn't play out the same as it does in POP The Two Thrones. But in the case of Ratesh, you can paste him as is and he'd work the same because nothing about his mechanics of avoiding telegraphed attacks and attacking the glowing spot on his chest is unique to POPFS. Even POP '08 did a better job with its final boss Ahriman. In POPFS's case, I feel a better boss fight would have been a quick platforming gauntlet similar to the one preceding it. Have the Prince moving in a Sandstorm, using the Recall Power to trap or damage Ratesh. The final strike could have been one where the Prince uses the Freeze Water power to freeze rain in such a way where he can use it to platform to Ratesh/Malik and deliver one final tearful strike to end the game. The final conversation between the Prince and Malik could also add a line where Malik notes that he suspects the Prince lived through all this before but is unsure of the details as Malik dies. Adding the twist of the knife that the Prince truly doesn't have anybody now that knows what he went through or believes him. I feel even if this sequence was short scripted set piece, it would feel cooler and be more memorable than the current version. But maybe this would have been infeasible to implement.

 

I do suspect the game might have been rushed as the ending is extremely brief. With stuff like the aftermath of the game and Razia's fate relegated to a quick voiceover after the main ending. If that's true, then it further dilutes an already underwhelming ending. I imagine in an alternate timeline, if the game had more resources, there could have been a sequence where we see Razia sacrificing herself and the Prince having 1 final sombre and quiet platforming section where he returns Razia's sword (kinda like the vibe POP '08 was going for).

 

 In closing, despite my complaints, I really do like POPFS. Its biggest flaw is that its story is ok and that its mechanics have a few nitpicks and missed opportunities. But despite that, I 100% recommend this game. The raw platforming is some of the best in this series. The game more than justifies its existence and forgives every flaw from that. It was a truly enjoyable game to Platinum. Of the 3 versions of Forgotten Sands I played (The PS3 version, DS version and PSP version), this is by far not only the best version of FS but also arguably the best playing game in the series (besides maybe POP '08). If this truly is the last the big budget AAA Prince of Persia game we ever get, then I am ultimately satisfied the series still ended on a high note.