A Blink Return of Splinter Cell

First look at Splinter Cell animated series. Taken from Twitter.

Splinter Cell is one of those franchises I loved since I was a kid. Before falling into a rabbit hole with World of Warcraft, I remember playing the Game Boy Advance version of the original game on my Game Boy Advance SP. And I was very excited to watch my dad play through Tom Clancy's Splinter Cell: Double Agent on his Xbox 360... which is kind of funny since nowadays I don't want to touch both versions of that game. As well as two mainline titles that followed before the series stepped into shadows.

And it is great at staying hidden. So much so Ubisoft can't spot it for long enough to make a new proper game. Instead, we get various Sam Fisher cameos in different games, VR title and animated series. Of course, not having Splinter Cell being twisted over by their current formula is a gift to be cherished, and you can even say it already endured that with the likes of Conviction, but it doesn't change the fact that many players around the world are hungry for some proper stealth action with Third Echelon, Lambert and famous night-vision goggles.

Wrong & Disgraceful Development.

I'm not going to focus on Sam Fisher's appearances directly. Those are pretty self-explanatory, I think. Instead, I'll focus on another topic I've seen floating around fairly recently. Some people noticed a certain development that's been made for the character of Sarah Fisher: the one that's highly questionable at best. Both Ghost Recon: Breakpoint and Elite Squad "allude" to her being an operative of Forth Echelon as a sniper of sorts. And if the first game just hints at it via description for Paladin 9 SNR, latter title features her as a playable character.

That mobile game even includes a biography for her and that adds in even more problems than clarity. She was basically trained behind her dad's back because he (rightfully) wouldn't want her to follow in his footsteps and Sarah somehow keeps all of that secret from him... even though Sam is, like, at command there. How does that make any sense?

Why there's this need in having a friend that stabs Fisher in the back? Alright, Sheltand... But Lambert? Grimsdottr? This time it's not only Victor Coste, but also Sarah. His own daughter! I don't know what is up with Ubisoft here, really. To me, there's no real problem with her becoming a Splinter Cell. In fact, I think it could be very interesting. The problem comes from execution and point in timeline. What I mean by second point is that after the events of Double Agent & Conviction, seeing her suddenly become a field agent is rather far fetched.

To me, it seems that it's just a setup for the protagonist of upcoming virtual reality title. One thing Ubisoft have to realize is that making Sam Fisher a playing character there would cause only more outrage. But if they go for Sarah, it will fit in better for this game and even call back to Half-Life: Alyx, which is most likely affected its development.

Animated Series.

This Netflix project was a longtime coming... Not as long as the movie that was some have waited since the release of Tom Clancy's Splinter Cell: Chaos Theory, but you know what I'm saying. Even though it's not a new game, I still have certain expectations for this animated series as I believe it actually has a lot of potential. Not only it can be successful on itself, but the positive outcome may result in franchise's resurgence.

It depends on if it's going to be done right, which is something I have concerns about for one simple reason: writer. We know that Derek Kolstad is working on this series and while personally I'm not really familiar with his work, he's widely known as a writer of John Wick. I've seen the movie, it's great... but it's not real Splinter Cell. That's something closer to Conviction and Blacklist, which is far from the classic trilogy that defines this ironic franchise. And I have concerns that we couldn't get proper representation of Splinter Cell in animated form.

In an interview with Collider, Derek shared some details about this project. First season will have 8 episodes, which lines up with Variety's report that revealed this series to the public and mentioned an order for two seasons with 16 episodes in total. He also talked about self-contained story within seasons, two different timelines in episodes that introduce people to Sam Fisher in his "current" and "past" forms and their 20-30 minute duration. From this interview, it sounds like Derek "gets" Splinter Cell right. Although it's very likely that they would attempt to somehow tie it series' classic attributes with its modern problematic experimentations in order to satisfy all camps and introduce the franchise to new audience in its full form, I'm remaining slightly more optimistic in this animated series and hope that a full teaser trailer is not only going to be shown soon, but also wouldn't disappoint.

Stealth Way to Success.

In the right hands, there's a perfect opportunity for triumphant return of Splinter Cell. Even though it's hard to believe that Ubisoft would be able to use this momentum right, I would still throw a few obvious ideas of how and what they should actually do on top of animated series and VR game, if we assume that just one of them is going to be a success.

Apparent way would be making remaster of the three classic titles and that's important: remasters, not remakes! Not whatever they're trying to do with the Prince of Persia: Sands of Time. Just a simple and faithful update that keeps these classic stealth action titles pure and full in favor of reinventing the wheel and parasitism on old games via remakes. You can even throw in some raytracing! They can release it as so-called "Third Echelon Archives" that would bring in three games in one packages, similarly to Crash Bandicoot N. Sane Trilogy.

I'll follow on with Crash Bandicoot analogy and say that getting proper "Splinter Cell 4" would be the best outcome. Just ignore Double Agent and everything that came after and make the true continuation of Chaos Theory. No experimentations, no clique plot twists for the sake of it and all other nonsense. Just good old Splinter Cell with classic gameplay modes and character cast that would serve as a farewell for Sam Fisher. Combine the best elements of all three titles, center the plot around yet another digital internation thread and tease a potential soft reboot starting Sarah that, in this scenario, would make much more sense...

You know, I'll probably go back to Chaos Theory for a bit. Yeah.