poroshin on 14/10/2005 at 19:14

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In my opinion, the Splinter Cell series, while vastly different and inferior to the Thief series, is probably the best of the "stealth" genre, other than Thief itself. At least I haven't played another game that for the most part focused so much on stealth, while other games simply had stealth elements.

Anyway, the reason I'm posting this (and I've run a search and didn't come up with anything) is to offer up a challenge to the people here. I'm sure many are Splinter Cell fans here, so there should be some interest. Granted, Splinter Cell (I'm talking only the original game here for now) isn't 100% ghostable - there are still several places where you must kill or knock someone out. But for the majority of the game it's possible to fully ghost it. I think veteran Thief players won't have a horribly hard time with this, but I think it's still fun and offers its own unique experience.

I'm already into it, and have reached the Police Station without alerting anyone. However, it appears that you must knock out the cop in the top floor room of the Police Station with the computer from which you must retrieve the information. I'll try and see if it's possible to spook him into leaving the room and sneaking past him... I've then moved onto the Defence Ministry and here it's also fully ghostable, except where you must grab the colonel (or whatever he is) to use the retinal scanner. This is obviously an unavoidable knockout. It was tough getting into Nikoladze's office and staying undetected through the whole ordeal, but I did it, and now I'm onto the Oil Rig.

Hopefully others will want to try this, as I'm having a great time with this. Perhaps everyone who played Splinter Cell, played it ghost-style right away, but when I initially played through it, I did use my weapons on enemies, etc.

I'll post more as I advance through the game, should there be any interest.

poroshin on 15/10/2005 at 20:12

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I just finished the Oil Rig level. This was fun. Not very stealthy, due to the chaotic situation, but I did go through almost everyone undetected. There was the one soldier whom I had no idea how to sneak past, the last one guarding the door, running back and forth. I tried different things, but he'd always see me. And of course you knock out the technician to retrieve the briefcase. But overall this was great fun, if too quick.

Now I'm onto the CIA Headquarters. This should be awesome.

poroshin on 16/10/2005 at 17:58

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Very cool, Malleus. I too have found out that some KOs are unavoidable, unfortunately. However, in the Defence Ministry (other than the driver that you must KO), it is totally possible to KO only the retinal scanner colonel and no one else.

On the Oil Rig, which soldier are you talking about at the beginning? At the beginning it was easy. I did not sneak past the soldier running back and forth the door at the end (I had to put him to sleep with a headshot from the top of the stairs, so he didn't get alerted - I figured this would be okay given the choas on the Rig), and the technician doesn't really count, since you must KO him to end the level.

I've just gone through most of the CIA level, and now I'm bringing Dougherty to extraction. You must KO the guy to get the keycode (unless it's on one of the computers?), and both technicians in the server room. It's just impossible to do this stealthily. I spooked the first guy into entering the adjacent dark room where I jumped him and then ran up to the other guy and knocked him out before he even turned around. And then Dougherty. I haven't gone down the stairs with Dougherty yet though, so maybe that's where the "last CIA guy" is that you knocked out.

I'll be going onto Pandora Tomorrow after I'm done with this one.

EDIT: Oh I think I know which soldier you mean. Is it the one after you drop down from the beam and go up the stairs, you see the technician and the soldiers with him going down, then there's an explosion, and one guy stays behind? Yeah this was a tough spot, but actually ghostable. He runs inside and outside, with pauses, so I timed it so that when he ran inside, I'd run and hide in the little space just near him, and when he'd run out, I'd run (but not too fast) right past him and cling right away to the left wall where there's dark. He'd run back inside again, and then out, and I'd continue.

SithLord2001 on 17/10/2005 at 00:15

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Yes but then that's not technically "ghosting" in the true sense of the word. (although I have done that in certain parts, mostly the original SC.) I Love Choas Theory though because it makes "ghosting" much more possible because you don't have to grab anyone to get by scanners or anything and just makes it that much better imo.

poroshin on 17/10/2005 at 15:47

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Malleus, yeah I guess I fudged the server room. It's probably possible to ghost it 100%, if I try hard enough. It was excruciatingly hard to pass the little machinery room with one technician and a soldier before you reach the final outside area with Dougherty on your shoulders. It took me about half an hour of reloading to just sneak past this one room and then, of course, the guard beneath the stairs. The lights in this area are non-breakable, so it was incredibly tough, because it wasn't so much the patroling soldier inside the room (he's easy to avoid), it's the guard outside downstairs that would always spot me and open fire.

Now I'm onto Kalinatek, and surprisingly it's easy so far, at least up to the point where you drop into the elevator shaft. There was a bit of a trouble with the thugs guarding the window in the garage that you must jump out of to get to the Kalinatek building, but I managed. Going past the well-lit area with the wallmines was somewhat tough, but I shot most of the lights, spooking the thugs, so it was easy to go past this point. And the ones guarding the elevator shaft got spooked as well, so up to this point I'm a 100% ghost.