Splinter Cell: Blacklist Aims For More Realism Over Metal Gear Solid: Ground Zeroes

In the past generation of gaming the only comparisons you could draw between Metal Gear and Splinter Cell is that both games were stealth games. Comparisons stopped there. However, with Splinter Cell taking on a more action-oriented guise, gamers and gaming media have been making closer comparisons between Ubisoft's action-stealth title and Kojima's sci-fi stealth series. One of the directors for Splinter Cell: Blacklist says that the differences between both series is still spaced apart, mostly because Blacklist is rooted in more realism than Ground Zeroes.

In a brief interview with NowGamer, cinematic director David Footman for Ubisoft's upcoming Splinter Cell: Blacklist stated that...

"I think the tones of the games are really different," ..."We both have really core audiences, but I just feel like the tone and the voice of the game, and the type of hero Sam Fisher is, is so different,"

One of the main reasons why both games have been compared so much as of late is because of the tone both have taken on. While Metal Gear has usually been rooted in stealth with an arc of science fiction and futurism, the gameplay tech demo for Ground Zeroes however talked about technology and gameplay that was a lot closer to what you would expect from the sequel to Splinter Cell: Chaos Theory: directional lighting, shadow casting, realistic stealth movements and new stealth mechanics.

What's more is that the Ground Zeroes demo was a proper stealth setup: it was at night, it was dark, Big Boss was in serious stealth gear and moved around quietly and covertly. It was about using darkness to an advantage and avoiding light at all costs. It was the complete opposite of the Splinter Cell: Blacklist walkthrough from E3.

Footman goes on to say...

"I see it as [for] a much different audience. With our realism pillar, all of the story elements we have in Splinter Cell are much more ‘current events’, stuff you’d see in the news."It really needs to have all those elements of realism in it, and that really drives the story. Which is also what I think makes it mature, and maybe disturbing to some people."

The “realism pillar” is entirely debatable. The older games had scenarios that seemed realistic and plausible given that they were espionage missions...things you would never hear about on the news. If Blacklist is anything like Conviction then that “realism pillar” is about as accurate as the fair and balanced journalism on Fox News.