007 First Light, from developer IO Interactive A/S, has been released amid much hype and has seen massive sales of over 1.5 million copies in a few days. Described as “Earn the number. 007 First Light is a thrilling espionage action-adventure game. Follow James Bond as a young, resourceful and sometimes reckless recruit in the MI6 training programme”. Let’s jump onto the Xbox and see if IO Interactive can pay homage to this cult brand while keeping fans and the player base happy.

Loading in you have two EULA’s to agree to which i found a bit weird, then you select your difficulty; Novice, enemies are slower and weaker and you have constant access to your abilities, Intended; the recommended experience, enemies will give you a balanced challenge and final Purist; you will need to be more strategic and resourceful with you health and technology which depletes quicker and your enemies attacks will be harder to counter. To try and get through the game for the review, I chose novice, but rest assured, I will be coming back for another playthrough on a harder level.

You can then adjust the usual game settings, screen darkness, movement, camera, etc. 007 First Light is essentially a movie with gameplay elements interspersed. It is absolutely stunning, the storytelling and how the missions are intertwined into the story. In all, there are around 17 missions to complete, which send you to some of the most picturesque locations I have seen in a video game. Norway, Malta, Slovakia, London, Vietnam, Mauritania, no detail has been spared in these locations.

Interestingly, your introduction to the game takes place on a helicopter departing the Norwegian coastline, with a young James Bond on board, part of the UK Army Aviation group. After a series of events, you wake up on the beach, surrounded by enemies, and you make your way through a series of challenges to escape the enemies’ view. Finally, after making radio contact with your base, you speak with an MI6 agent as she guides you through a series of challenges.

At the end of the mission, you sustain substantial injuries, and the story skips forward 6 months, where you are invited to MI6 headquarters and asked whether you wish to complete the training program and, hopefully, pass and become an MI6 agent. This differs from the lore of James Bond, depending on which lore you follow: he is either an ex-SAS operator or gains the title from his father’s friend as a Royal Navy volunteer. So, not 100% accurate, but there are some similarities within the story for you purists out there.

Your training begins as you fly to a secret training ground on the island of Malta with the British SAS. Being a late inclusion into the MI6 program, six of your colleagues have already started training. It isn’t a warm welcome at first, but as you progress, you slowly earn the team’s respect, and everyone comes together. While this experience is invaluable to teaching you the commands of them from vaulting, fighting, driving, and various other mechanics of the game you will need, I do feel it dragged on a bit too long, but the story needed to keep evolving before your first mission. Maybe I was just too eager to get into the action.

Before each mission, you will visit Q and pick your gadgets, like any true spy. Q’s technology lab is actually quite comical; you can always see some interesting things going on in the background when you visit. You will have a limit on what you can take per mission. Also, as you progress, you will have access to different technologies to assist you with missions. Make no mistake, 007 First Light is a classic IO Interactive A/S title, where going in guns blazing isn’t going to get you very far.

The developer has honed their skills through their most famous series, Hitman. It is all about stealth, eavesdropping, distractions, and overcoming challenges while attracting as little attention as possible. The game will actively prevent you from certain actions like shooting, unless your life is in danger, forcing you into stealth mode like any good 007 agent, and moving you more towards hand-to-hand combat. There are a few different engagement modes you will see at the top of your screen as you progress, which indicate where you are: Restricted Area, Trespassing, Reinforcements Coming, License to Kill, or Situation Contained.

The real skill comes from patience and from using your technology to sneak through most levels. You even get to drive in some epic chases with the typical 007 sports cars. The game is very multidimensional, and it does it all so well. You also have the ability to build a collection of rare items from around the map in the form of collectibles such as postcards, Intel, souvenirs, playing cards and the old James Bond 007 lore items. It’s a nice little easter egg.

After completing the first mission, you unlock TACSIM. TACSIM enables players to revisit the mission they just completed with extra challenges, new objectives and more gameplay restrictions to improve their skills and potentially enhance them for the next mission. It also gives you the chance to take different gadgets on these levels that you didn’t try out the first time. TACSIM is essentially Purist mode and is a challenge; don’t expect a quick walk-through. This mode has its own leaderboard, and scores are based on the player’s time, flair and accuracy. If you complete these, you can be rewarded with a mix of cosmetic upgrades and skins.

The graphics are the best of any title I have played recently. The amount of work that has gone into these locations is second to none; they are breathtaking. As I mentioned, it is essentially watching a movie with a game embedded in it, and it works extremely well. Interestingly, there are a few brand placements as well from real watches and car manufacturers, which give you a peek into the future of free advertising in gaming.

All the main characters and civilians in the area are rendered with great detail; you can see that experience from previous titles has paid off for the developers. These visuals can be detrimental sometimes; if you die or fail a mission, it can take a little while to load back to your last save on the Xbox.

The sounds replicate the visuals, tying the whole package together. Various actors have been brought in for each character; there are too many names to list. Even the background conversations as you walk past people in the maps can start talking about you; it really feels like a fully alive environment in play. The weapons, spy gadgets, car sounds, nature when you are outside, it’s all there and all top quality.​

I must have been hiding under a rock, as I didn’t see 007 First Light coming; it wasn’t a game I was tracking. But I am very glad I was sent it to review. If this is the future of gaming, we are in for a bright future. The ability to tell a story through a movie and to intertwine relevant gameplay into it was masterful craftsmanship by IO Interactive A/S. The developers have spent years honing their craft on similar titles, and they have done the 007 name proud with this title.

Were a lot of those purchases made by cult fans of the 007 series? Perhaps, but were they treated to a master craft of a title? 100%. Stealth, ingenuity, and the ability to use your surroundings to your own benefit are the backbone of this title. We will all get the same result in the end, but how you get there can differ in so many ways, which gives the title its longevity. To quote from the Goldfinger movie, this title is “Shocking, Positively Shocking”, in a good way!

Written by: Mike Bridge