Video Game / Hitman (2016)

Oh... he's heading there.

"You were always the best. Nobody ever came close. You define the art and it defines you. Your actions have changed the world. Powerful men have fallen by your hand. But by the same token, others have risen. Do you realize what kind of world you've been shaping?"

Hitman (stylized as HITMAN) is the sixth game of the Hitman series by IO Interactive, and is the first entry into the World of Assassination Trilogy. It was released in 2016, and is often called Hitman (2016) as a result by pretty much everyone (Including this very wiki for page disambiguation purposes) to differentiate it from the first game.

The plot takes place after the events of Absolution and returns to the formula of the titular Agent 47 going around the world performing hits on high-profile targets.

The game took an episodic approach, with the episodes releasing roughly monthly, each one containing a new map, with a story mission and set of "Escalation" missions to go with it. The episodes released included two prequel tutorial missions set during 47's induction to the agency and six proper missions set at a fashion show in Paris, France; a private villa in the fictional town of Sapienza, Italy; a busy market in Marrakesh, Morocco; a hotel outside of Bangkok, Thailand; a remote farm in Colorado, USA; and a luxury private hospital in Hokkaido, Japan. The game also comes with bonus missions for Sapienza, Marrakesh and Paris.^note Landslide and The Icon for Sapienza, A House Built on Sand for Marrakesh, and Holiday Hoarders, a free Christmas Special, for Paris.

The complete game was launched on physical disks on January 31st, 2017 for PS4 and PC. The game saw a digital release for Linux on February 16th, 2017,^note the 47th day of 2017, no less (get it?) with a macOS port releasing later in the year, June 20th, 2017, both of which are published by Feral Interactive. The game was also ported (very briefly) to DRM-free game service GOG.com (despite the game not being DRM-free) on the September 22nd, 2021, but was removed on October 8th, 2021 after overwhelming backlash.

This is where things get a little bit complicated. Publisher Square Enix declared that the game wasn't making them enough money, and cut its ties with IO Interactive on May 2017. Despite this, IO interactive managed to turn into an independent studio, and surprisingly, kept the rights to the franchise, something which is legitimately quite unheard of when dealing with bigger publishers like Square Enix.^note Usually, it's the publisher, not the developers, that tends to retain the IP. The first release from the now-independent IO Interactive was on October 24th, 2017, when they announced the Game Of The Year edition, which includes all the existing content and some new treats: a new "Patient Zero" campaign, where 47 races against time to prevent a weaponized virus from spreading in modified versions of some of the existing levels,^*Bangkok, Hokkaido, Colorado, and once again, Sapienza 3 new outfits (including the Clown outfit from Blood Money!), three new weapons to go with the outfits, and new escalations designed for said outfits and weapons. It costs $60 to new players, while those who already own the base game can upgrade to the GOTY edition for $20. Alongside the GOTY edition's release, the game received a free update that improved things such as menus and skyboxes, and "Elusive Targets" made a return and were rerun for those who missed them the first time around. While those who've already beaten or failed them cannot replay them, those who did so received a unique coin variant for participating in the original run.

After IO Interactive became independent, they released a comic series on November 4th, 2017, titled Agent 47: Birth of the Hitman, a prequel comic series to the entire franchise which had Diana struggling to cope with the loss of her parents, and 47 finding out about himself and the world while doing odd jobs for clients and taking down "The Institute". The comic ran for six issues and ended in July 2018, a few months before Hitman 2 came out.

On April 4th, 2018, IO Interactive revealed the "Definitive Edition" of Hitman, which bundles the aforementioned GOTY edition with the Blood Money Requiem DLC and adds 3 new suits based off of IO Interactive Franchises; the Freedom Phantom suit, the Lynch suit, and the Futo suit. The suits are console-exclusive in this game, but IOI added them in games' sequel on July 30th, 2019, so long as you're willing to sign up for an IOI account.

New features and improvements in Hitman:

• In previous iterations, when you pick up the same gun, the ammo stacks. In this game, pistol ammo is capped at 80 and assault rifles at 120.
• There is now damage falloff with pistols and rifles. Even at a medium distance, it takes quite a few shots to kill someone.
• When you press the aim button, it automatically goes from a wide third-person view to an over-the-shoulder view.
• A smaller inventory. For instance, you have to choose between the fiber wire, bombs, syringe, and poison vial; they're handheld weapons.
• "Escalations": Similar to the now-defunct Contracts Mode in Hitman: Absolution, except the player is tasked to do something (kill an NPC with a specific weapon and/or disguise) and escape. Completing it unlocks the next level where the action needs to be repeated, with a new objective as well (steal the contents of a safe) or a limitation (more cameras, don't pacify anyone etc.)
• "Elusive Targets": For a limited amount of real-world time, the player is tasked with killing a person and escaping the map. However, saving is not possible, the contract cannot be replayed after the target has been killed, and dying permanently ends the ability to replay the contract.

The sequel, simply titled; Hitman 2, was released on November 13th, 2018,^note 48 days from the end of 2018... with IO Interactive now having Warner Bros. as their publisher. On a related note, this entire game is available in Hitman 2 as DLC, named the "Hitman 2 Legacy Pack", available since launch day. Season 1/ GOTY edition owners get the DLC for free, which incorporates Hitman 2's new features into the first games' levels. A second sequel, Hitman 3, was released on January 20th, 2021, with the same deal as before —previous games available with the third game.

This game, alongside Hitman 2, has been de-listed on storefronts as of January 26th, 2023, as Hitman 3 was rebranded as Hitman - World of Assassination, which imports these levels for free regardless of game ownership. The move was done to avoid customer confusion that had plagued the latter two games' life on getting these levels' DLC packs. No word on the servers being shut down, however.

As mentioned at the start, if you're looking for the very first game in the Hitman franchise, click here instead.

Spoilers for this game are mostly unmarked, so be warned! Spoilers for Agent 47: Birth of the Hitman, Hitman 2 and Hitman 3 are marked as such.

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Hitman provides examples of the following tropes:

0 - K

• 20 Minutes into the Future: The game takes place roughly around 2019-2020.
• Acceptable Breaks from Reality:
  • While the AI has smartened up, they're still manipulable and sometimes blind to certain things. For example, guards don't get suspicious if they escort you out for trespassing repeatedly, so as long as you're willing to go back to the start, you can try as many times as you need to sneak through a trespassing zone. Likewise, while dumping a vial of poison into a drink will make NPCs suspicious, they will quite quickly forget if you simply leave the area for a minute, and if you're wearing an appropriate uniform, such as a waiter, a bartender, or a chef, you can do it in full view of the public and they'll be none the wiser.
  • Blunt objects only knock people unconscious. In real life, blunt objects with enough force applied to them can kill.
  • Closets and bins are never checked for bodies, so you always have the opportunity to take care of at least a few pesky NPC's, or make a clean getaway if you're not spotted while going in. Similarly, fountains, pools, and other bodies of water are always opaque enough to hide corpses, and all bodies dumped into them will sink to the bottom and never float back up.
  • Nobody makes a note of any disguises lying on the ground, so you can change into them as needed.
  • Dropped weapons will attract attention, but only to the extent that a guard will come pick them up and take them to a secure location. No other guards will be alerted, nor will the targets be evacuated.
  • When 47 talks to someone disguised as a specific person of interest, his targets never notice that that person's voice (and possibly language) has changed, even if they know them personally. Occasionally he will Hand Wave such changes by mentioning illness or saying he's a replacement for the person they expected, but more often that not it isn't mentioned at all.
    • This is averted in at least one instance. In the Patient Zero mission "The Author", should 47 choose to impersonate Brother Akram and attend the meeting with Craig Black, Black will eventually see through his disguise. Oddly, the reverse is not true; 47 can impersonate Black and Akram won't suspect a thing, despite Black being a world famous author (at his own book signing too, no less)!
  • All corpses are quickly removed from a scene and foot traffic through it resumes as normal.
  • No matter how many suspicious accidents happen, no one actually looks into them. It's especially noticeable with targets. While it's perfectly plausible for one target to suddenly suffer an accident and die without arousing much suspicion from the second one, certain missions feature 3 or more targets. Freedom Fighters in particular has 4 high-profile militia leaders that fight against a clandestine and dangerous organization, yet when 3 out of 4 suffer sudden accidents in a matter of hours, no one puts the last target on security lockdown and the compound on high alert.
  • Diana is immediately able to tell when a target dies, no matter how impossible (For example, poisoning someone's food and walking to the nearest exit to wait for the target to eat or drink the tainted food or drink).
• Adam Westing: Gary Busey and Gary Cole appear as themselves in the "The Wild Card" Elusive Target mission, with the former playing an even more insane version of himself. The two were part of a contest in which people voted for which one to kill, with Busey becoming the dubious winner.
• Adaptation Distillation: The developers at IO Interactive have stated this is something they wanted to do for the game. They've downplayed the gonzo sci-fi elements of the previous games, gotten rid of all of the grindhouse elements of Hitman: Absolution, and generally made the games's story more serious than previous installments. They have however, played into the absurdness of the Hitman world in-game, and several mechanics were altered or backported from Absolution to make the game easier.
• A.K.A.-47: Played Straight. No weapon shares its name with its real world counterpart, either to avoid copyright issues or to aim the budget to other parts of the game. Even the signature WA2000 is renamed. The Silverballer avoids this problem, as it's better known by its nickname by this point.
• Alone with the Psycho: The psycho being you, of course. The game adds the ability to have extended conversations with certain NPCs, so now 47 can disguise himself as someone else (such as the target's accomplice, a blackmailing private detective, or a psychologist) and lure the unsuspecting target into an isolated room for a little chat before killing them.
  • Also counts as Dead Person Impersonation if 47 killed someone for their disguise.
• And Your Reward Is Clothes: The new inventory system includes the ability to change 47's starting outfit. While some costumes are exclusive to their level, completing an Elusive Target in a level for the first time unlocks a variation^note usually just consisting of the addition of gloves of that level's unique suit to your starting inventory to use in any level. Most suits are tied to the Elusive Target system, as listed below.
  • Completing 5 Elusive Targets unlocks the suit 47 wore in Hitman: Absolution.
  • Completing 10 Elusive Targets unlocks the suit 47 wore in Hitman: Blood Money.
  • Completing 13 Elusive Targets unlocks a gloved variation of the default suit.
  • Completing 1 Elusive Target with a silent assassin rating unlocks "Terminus", the damaged suit from Absolution. It also has a bandaid covering 47's barcode.
  • Completing 5 Elusive Targets with a Silent Assassin rating unlocks the "Winter Suit", a trenchcoat over 47's default suit.
  • The Requiem DLC includes 47's "funeral" suit from Blood Money.
  • Completing every challenge in the free "Holiday Hoarders" mission unlocks a Santa Claus outfit.
  • The GOTY edition includes Blood Money's Corky the Clown outfit, a "Raven Outfit",^note some sort of jacket and a "Cowboy Suit", a stereotypical southern suit with snake-skin boots, a belt buckle the size of a fist, cowboy hat and sunglasses.
• Anti-Frustration Features:
  • Each level on professional difficulty gives you 20 challenges, each worth 5000 mastery points. There are 10 mastery levels, so you only need to complete 18 challenges to get the final reward. So if there's a challenge you just can't complete, you can still get all rewards.
  • Autosaving basically only exists because of this. Probably why it's disabled on Professional difficulty.
  • Completing a challenge doesn't require actually completing the level. For example, in "World Of Tomorrow", you can disguise yourself as a therapist, save your game after your target lies on his couch, smother him with a pillow, reload your game, then plug him with a pistol, and you'll obtain the experience points for completing two separate assassination challenges as well as completing the opportunity. Even if you die in the process of completing a challenge, it still counts towards your mastery level. Note that this is disabled on Professional difficulty.
  • Upon death, NPCs drop their items, while in Blood Money they remained on the body, making them unretrievable in some cases. This way, if you, say, push someone out of bounds, their items can still be picked up.
  • Normally, once you begin completing objectives during Elusive Target contracts, you can't restart or quit anymore. However, if you're disconnected from the internet, you can restart from the beginning without penalty.
  • Unlike in previous games in the series, running isn't suspicious and barely makes any additional noise, sparing the player from the need to go through large parts of the game at a glacial pace.
  • In most story missions and challenges that require a specific NPC to go to a specific place, the NPC will begin heading there when 47 is ready for them, or constantly revisit the spot as part of their cycle. This means that very few events in the game require 47 to make it there at a specific time to kill someone. Specific opportunities may be time-sensitive, however, particularly those involving a one-time meeting between the target and another NPC. One notable example of this occurs in the Paris level; should the player wish to use the Sheikh disguise for their infiltration, they must hurry—the Sheikh will pass through security within a couple minutes of the mission start.
• Armor Is Useless: Enemies wearing body armour (i.e. General Zaydan's elite soldiers in Marrakesh and the Militia Elites and Militia Spec Ops in Colorado) are no tougher than regular unarmored Mooks, and putting on their uniforms makes you no more durable either. The only armor in the game that actually stop bullets are Dino Bosco's metal superhero costume in "The Icon", and Ezra Berg's mask, which protects him from headshots.
• The Artifact: The game features YouTube buffering dots when an NPC is whacked unconscious. Since 2016, Youtube has moved away from using circling dots for buffering videos and into clean design, so this reference will be totally lost on anyone playing the game now.
• Artificial Brilliance: IO is really trying to improve the notoriously bad AI that plagues the previous games.
  • If 47 is found trespassing, he will be escorted out, except in certain situations.^note He is visibly armed with a disguise that does not allow visible guns, is wearing a forbidden disguise, or the area is labeled "hostile" on the minimap.
  • If the detection bar rises to about halfway, and the NPC loses their sight of 47, they will check the area as they are certain they saw something.
  • If an alarm is triggered, the target(s) will be escorted to safety. If their intended safe point is compromised, they will be escorted elsewhere.
  • Guards will flank 47 if given the opportunity. Any firefight can end in quick death if there's even one way a guard can get behind 47, as they'll make their move while others keep 47 occupied.
  • If 47 is taking cover in a different room, the guards might not enter and instead take cover, and refuse to leave unless 47 escapes through another route. If 47 pokes his head out of the room, they will open fire.
  • Guards will pick up any firearms they find, and civilians will tell the nearest guard if they find one. They'll also disarm explosives, unless they look harmless.
  • Guards can tell from which direction a silenced sniper shot was fired if they see someone get shot. They will then investigate the origin of the shot. That said, the AI is far from perfect there.
• Ascended Meme: The game references the various Memetic Mutations throughout the series, starting from Allan failing to add details and 47 saying "I need to use the bathroom" to a Japanese toilet.
  • The puddle-killing mentioned below is a same-game example.
• Badass in a Nice Suit: The Suit Only challenge involves completing an entire mission in your default suit. There are three variations; Regular,^note where the game doesn't care about specifics as long as you get the job done Silent,^note where you still can only kill the targets and cannot be seen, but you have to be a true ninja with disguises off the menu and Sniper.^note Exactly What It Says on the Tin.
• Bathhouse Blitz: One campaign features Agent 47 infiltrate a sauna to reach Yakuza lawyer Yuki Yamazaki. A successful infiltration leads to 47 trapping Yamazaki in the sauna and cranking the temperature dials as high as they will go, causing Yamazaki to succumb to the heat.
• Bavarian Fire Drill: Opportunities on a number of levels rely on this:
  • 47 can convince Jasper Knight to strap himself into a live ejection seat and pull the handle simply by approaching him dressed as a mechanic (and wielding a Clipboard of Authority).
  • One of the simplest methods to get Jordan Cross to leave his recording studio/suite is to dress as an exterminator and tell the hotel manager the room needs to be fumigated.
  • Penelope Graves can be convinced to follow you to a secluded area by flashing an Interpol badge at her.
• Black-and-Gray Morality: You're an assassin paid by people with personal interests (be it money, a cover-up or plain revenge) to take out people who range from dangerous assholes to bloodthirsty warlords. The overall plot, however (a "Shadow Client" who starts a war with Providence, the organization behind a lot of the nefarious schemes you encounter) is more Gray-and-Gray Morality.
• Boom, Headshot!: Killing a target via headshot is one of the standard challenges for every mission.
• Boring, but Practical:
  • Of all the weapons in your arsenal, the most versatile is probably the screwdriver: it can be used as a distraction tool, a melee or thrown weapon, or a means to set up environmental traps, and it can be carried openly with any disguise.^note Except on Professional Mode, where only certain disguises allow you to carry it openly.
  • The wrench, much like the screwdriver, allows for quicker silent knock-outs than a choke-out, and can be thrown as a non-lethal weapon or as a distraction. Several story-related kills also require a wrench to perform (usually through some act of sabotage, such as dropping the light fixtures in "The Showstopper" or stopping the cool water in the spa in "Situs Inversus"). It's a great idea to pick up the first wrench you see, because you may not know when you might have to hunt through the level for one later.
  • The coin. Like in Blood Money, you can simply throw it to create a distraction. Unlike most other objects, you start with three of them (which can be chained to lead enemies astray), and it's available from the start. You can also simply place one somewhere, and any NPC who notices it will go pick it up, whether it'll be on the floor, a table, a puddle, on the edge of a cliff...
    • Certain levels also have coin-operated machines that can be activated as a distraction, such as the diorama in "The Showstopper".
  • The ICA19 continues the series tradition of a silenced pistol being the game's most useful firearm. Available from the very beginning, it's quiet, but has enough stopping power to get the job done. It's also a stark contrast in appearance from 47's usual Silverballer.
  • 47's trademark Fiber Wire is undetectable by frisks, won't be noticed even if equipped, and is lethal to anyone you can approach from behind. In instances where a mere second may count in concealing a body, using the Fiber Wire will automatically leave the player dragging their target's corpse at the end of the action.
  • Some of the easier killing methods are this: For example, in "The Showstopper", one of the simplest ways to kill Dalia Margolis is to spike her drink with the lethal poison that she gives you. Not exactly flashy, but it gets the job done quietly without calling any attention to you.
• Bragging Rights Reward: Getting to mastery level 5 in an episode unlocks Professional Mode for that episode. Once a player gets to level 20 mastery for Professional Mode, they unlock a unique item for that episode. These tend to be Joke Items, which still have uses in-game but are hardly useful to anyone skilled enough to unlock them.
• Breaking the Fourth Wall: If Agent 47 takes too long to choke someone out, some will say he seemed a lot stronger in Blood Money.
• Breather Episode: The developers have described the Summer Bonus Episodes as this, being a more lighthearted set of missions disconnected from the main story arc.
• The Can Kicked Him: It's possible to kill your targets by drowning them in a toilet, typically after they vomit into it after drinking something you spiked with emetic poison beforehand.
  • You can also kill Reza Zaydan by kicking a toilet onto his head from the room above, counting both as an inversion and as a straight play.
• Capcom Sequel Stagnation: This game has been re-released multiple times as both DLC and full games. It was initially released episodically throughout 2016, then was released as a Game of The Year Edition in late 2017, a Definitive Edition in early 2018 (for consoles only), and DLC for Hitman 2 in 2018 and Hitman 3 in 2021 respectively. This also means the game has been ported to every modern platform (Windows, Mac OS X, Linux, Xbox One, PS4, Switch (via cloud gaming), Xbox Series S and X, and PS5) as either a full game or DLC pack.
• Casting Gag:
  • The voice actor of Dino Bosco, William Mapother, was planned to replace David Bateson as 47's voice in Absolution, but the fanbase protested, and Bateson was brought back at the last minute. His level has a few gags and Self-Deprecation about this.
  • Someone at IOI or Square Enix must've been a big Torchwood fan, as Naoko Mori voices the KAI AI; Naoko Mori plays Toshiko Sato, the resident Asian and Nerdy tech expert in that show.
• Cold Sniper: 47 is often distanced from human emotions. He's also very skilled with a sniper rifle.
• Complexity Addiction: It's possible to invoke this. Some player-made contracts rely on them.
• Conspiracy Thriller: The plot of the game reveals that 47 and the ICA are in the middle of a war between two nebulous organizations: Lucas Grey and his allies, and Providence.
• Continuity Nod: Plenty. One of the intro cutscenes shows several of the previous assassinations rendered in CGI, and there are a lot of references to previous games in the levels, such as:
  • The Delgado family is mentioned often, possibly most notably during the briefing for "The Showstopper".
  • Whenever 47 needs to provide a name (Paris, Bangkok, Hokkaido), he introduces himself as "Tobias Rieper".
  • In Sapienza, two guards can be heard discussing movies, and mention a horror film called "The Haunting of the Beldingford Manor."
  • The ICA facility is surrounded by snowy mountains, which can also be seen through the window in the Hitman: Contracts tutorial area.
  • While not named, Ort-Meyer and his experiment are brought up in the last episode.
  • The bat that goes with the GOTY edition clown outfit is called "A New Bat". The clown outfit comes from the Blood Money mission "A New Life".
  • One of the String Theory boards 47 investigates at the end of the Colorado mission has a list compiled by the Shadow Client of 47's previous targets, some of which are said to go back "decades". Naturally, the targets named are from previous games.
• Continuity Snarl: In the Colorado mission, there's a game console that, when played, shows footage of what is clearly Kane and Lynch 2, despite Absolution having established that Kane and Lynch are real people in the Hitman universe.
• Conspicuously Selective Perception: The Hitman 2 Legacy Pack added a guard placed at Paris's outside cafe patio, specifically to encourage blending into the crowd, it seems. What makes it this trope is that he'll be suspicious of you, even in your suit.
• Cosmetic Award: ICA Performance Coins were given to players who attempted at least one Elusive Target before the GOTY Edition was released. There were three levels of coins, and which one you acquired depended on whether the target was eliminated and if you managed to get a Silent Assassin rating. They're functionally identical to regular coins.
• Covers Always Lie: The cover art shows 47 carrying a briefcase. The briefcase was present as an equippable item in the closed alpha and allowed you to discreetly carry a weapon similar to older games. However, it was scrapped before release.
• Crazy-Prepared: It seems that 47 takes every possible scenario into account, and thus shows off unexpected, but rather impressive, knowledge and skills that many wouldn't expect a bald assassin to know. For a few examples, he knows enough about yoga to teach Yuki Yamazaki, can pull off a drum solo good enough to impress well-known indie musician Jordan Cross, and can call out Craig Black, a writer of a popular series of teen romance books, on some bad writing he noticed. While some of these moments are obviously made to maintain the Rule of Funny, the intel ICA digs up for 47 is also pretty detailed, justifying many of these moments.
• Cruel and Unusual Death: Opportunities not only provide scripted ways to approach the targets, but occasions to kill them in particularly flashy (and of course, cruel) ways.
  • In Paris, you can drop the lighting rig above the catwalk onto Viktor Novikov.
  • In Sapienza, you can throw Silvio Caruso into a woodchipper and grind him to shreds.
    • Similarly, the Colorado mission has a hay baler that you can shove bodies into. There's even a challenge where you have to do it a certain number of times.
  • In Marrakesh, you can push General Zaydan into a printing press.
  • Colorado also has a slurry pit, which you can knock Penelope Graves into.
  • Hokkaido takes the cake with the automated operating table, which can alternatively drain Soders of his blood, stab him, or kill him with tainted stem cells.
• Cutting Off the Branches: Judging by the opening "Legacy" cinematic, 47 canonically killed Hayamoto Jr. by poisoning his sushi with fugu, garroted Don Delgado while he was playing his cello, and shot Dom Osmond in the forehead through a one-way mirror with an unsuppressed silverballer. Oddly, he is shown drowning Fritz Fuchs, which is very difficult to pull off in the original game, as the player had to wait for civilians to leave the area. Drowning him was a more viable option in Hitman: Contracts, which was in a dream.
  • A news ticker later in the game confirms Sebastian Sato canonically survives "The Showstopper".
  Scandalous deaths make Sanguine more popular than ever. Sebastian Sato quits.
  • Padre Francesco can be killed by the player or Abiatti in "Landslide", but can be seen alive and well in "World of Tomorrow", showing he canonically survived.
• Dead Man's Chest: The levels are full of empty cabinets, trunks, and trash bins in which 47 can store up to two bodies so that nobody can notice them. The victims don't have to be dead, merely unconscious. There's a bonus associated with hiding bodies this way.
• Decapitation Strike: This is the story behind the majority of the missions.
  • In "The Showstopper", 47 must take out Dalia Margolis and Viktor Novikov, the leaders of an international spy ring. Since they are the sole masterminds of the ring, it ceases to exist after their deaths.
  • In "World of Tomorrow", you are tasked with killing bioengineer Silvio Caruso, who’s developing a new super-virus, and his assistant Francesca de Santis, who might be the only person capable of completing the virus without Caruso, and destroying the virus itself. With no means of recreating the virus, the project is cancelled afterwards.
  • In "A Gilded Cage", 47 must kill corrupt banker Claus Hugo Strandberg, who scammed Moroccans out of billions of dollars to provoke riots, and his partner General Reza Zaydan, who wants to use the riots to establish a military dictatorship. With the people having no one to riot against anymore and the military without a figurehead capable of becoming dictator, the plans are terminated.
  • In "Freedom Fighters", 47 is tasked with killing the leaders of a paramilitary terrorist group. With all of them dead, the group is apparently disbanded.
• Destruction Equals Off-Switch: Shooting the security tapes with a (preferably silenced) pistol (or another gun) will kill the cameras in the level, letting you not worry about them spotting you as you sneak around. In Professional Mode, it's wise to do this before making any meaningful progress within the level.
• Desecrating the Dead: It’s possible to steal dead or unconscious NPCs' clothes (in "The Author", you can even steal the two targets' clothes!), leaving them only in their underwear. Female targets and NPC's cannot have their clothes stolen, however.
• Developer's Foresight:
  • A neat detail about accidents; if the target was conscious upon, say, falling off a balcony, their death seems to get no investigation. However, if they already were unconscious or dead before being thrown off the ledge, there will be a brief investigation, since the victim would likely show some signs of foul play.
  • If you incapacitate/kill a target without their bodyguard(s) noticing the act, the bodyguard(s) will say some rather hilarious lines as they wander around the map.
  Bodyguard: Oh... Did I lose the package? Where's the goddamn V.I.P!? Hello?! You can come out now!
  • NPCs actually have lines that are almost never heard in normal gameplay. For example, the guards in the Colorado mission have unique reactions to 47 dressed as a scarecrow, despite the fact that the scarecrow costume normally makes everyone shoot at 47 on sight.
  Guard: Hey! That thing belongs in the orchard.
  • Shooting Maya Parvati's prosthetic arm won't do any damage to her.
  • The Bag of Gunpowder can be detonated by Silvio Caruso's cigarette.
  • Shooting someone with glasses in the eye adds a crack to the lense(s) (although the head won't have a bullethole in it). Likewise, shooting through several glass surfaces adds a bullet hole to each one.
  • Just like in "Situs Inversus", there is a heart for a heart transplant near the mortuary in subsequent Hokkaido missions. You're able to destroy it just like you destroyed Soders's, but if you do so, you get a "Non-Target Killed" penalty. Obviously, the heart is for a non-target.
  • In Bangkok, you can find a soundproof recording booth used by Jordan Cross for when he sings during the band sessions, and if you enter it and shut the door, it will cut out all outside sounds and dialogue. The reverse (silencing the inside of the recording booth) isn't true, however.
  • Most targets who have phones that can be used to draw them out (such as the golf coach and Francesca De Santis) have a voicemail message, just in case the player decides to ring them when they're dead or pacified.
  • Sparks from generators can cause broken fire extinguishers or propane flasks to explode.
  • If 47 is wearing a security disguise, NPCs will sometimes report crimes to him if he's the only "guard" around. They'll then note that he isn't co-operating, and seek out other guards (but fortunately don't mention 47).
• Disney Villain Death: Most areas have a few convenient places for pushing targets off high places to their deaths.
• Dirty Coward: Most of the targets are revealed to be this when cornered at gunpoint, but especially so with Francesca De Santis and Claus Strandberg, who desperately blame their accomplices (Silvio Caruso and General Zaydan respectively).
• Early-Installment Weirdness: Compared to the rest of the trilogy, this game has a lot of this, making going back to this game a case of Damn You, Muscle Memory! with all the later changes, and any location-specific changes mentioned below do not apply to their reappearances in Hitman 2 or 3:
  • All but four escalations^*The Kotti Paradigm, The Dexter Discordance, The Corky Commotion, and The Cheveyo Calibration have 5 stages instead of the 3 stages of the sequels.
  • There are no briefcases, and sniper rifles are treated like any other firearm in most disguises (the sole exception being high-tier guard disguises). The sequels made sniper rifles illegal with all disguises, so the briefcase served the purpose of carrying such guns around.
  • Fire extinguishers are lethal here, on top of counting as an accident. This made them so overpowered that they were made non-lethal in the sequels.
  • Sedative poison voids Silent Assassin if sedated bodies are found, making it less useful than emetic or lethal poison. The sequels made sedative poisoning count as an accident alongside adding poisonable ventilation systems, making it far more useful.
  • Tall grass and hiding in crowds are not part of this game, but do reappear in all of the legacy locations in the sequels (Bangkok being the exception).
  • The in-game inventory covers the entire screen and the items are displayed with large icons, similar to in the earlier games. The sequels use a menu where all items are displayed on the bottom of the screen with small icons, and with detailed Flavor Text weapon information relegated to the Intel menu, leaving most of the screen unobstructed. In the case of 3, this was actually a holdover from Ghost Mode in 2, as it was a necessary change for the sakes of seeing what the other player was doing.
  • Before the GOTY update, the main menu background was red. After this update, it was changed to grey and white. Hitman 2 would later use a red layout, and 3 would have a darker user interface.
  • Difficulty levels worked very differently:
    • Casual difficulty doesn't exist here. The hard difficulty was added in months after release, and is called "Professional Mode". In the sequels, "Professional Mode" is the name of the normal difficulty, and hard is "Master Mode".
    • Security cameras don't alert guards on normal difficulty. They still need to be destroyed to retain Silent Assassin, but being recorded more or less just adds an extra objective instead of triggering any kind of response from guards.
    • The difficulty spike between Normal and Professional in 2016 is very pronounced. Running causes noise (which heavily affects certain strategies), guard disguises don't allow "unusual" items or firearms (which is to say, just about anything the other guards aren't carrying), guard placements have been altered, and there is the occasional Obvious Rule Patch to routes that were much simpler on normal. In the sequels, Master doesn't differ that much from Professional and relies more on saving and disguise limitations than level overhauls.^note This is likely because in this game, hard mode was patched in months after players created their optimal paths, which the devs could then address; in the sequels, all difficulty levels are available from day one, making it harder for the devs to anticipate and address common player-created routes and tactics.
  • Civilians and guards speak only in American and British accents regardless of the location, with proper accents primarily saved for the targets themselves. The second game changed this so that civilians have suitable accents for their location.
    • The civilian voice cast is also fairly different, with most of them returning from Absolution. Only six of the voices^*Elsie Bennett, Oliver Cotton, Ben Crowe, Matthew Gravelle, Derek Hagen, and Royce Pierreson returned in later games.
    • The Elusive Target cast (and all but Bradley Paine of the male "Patient Zero" cast, who is otherwise The Voiceless) have completely unique voices not used by any other target or civilian. Later games' Elusive Targets (bar Sean Bean as Mark Faba in 2, who actually did record a lot of the weirder "Stop Poking Me!" dialogue) almost always share their voices with targets or civilians.
  • Guards only carry unsilenced weapons in this game. Silenced weapons are only used by 47 and can only be brought into levels. Starting in 2, bodyguards now use silenced weapons, and weaponry found in levels can come with a silencer.
  • There are no car batteries anywhere to orchestrate electrocution accidents, while the sequels usually have multiple in almost every level. Notably, none were added to the legacy versions either (possibly for balancing reasons), although some unlockable tools from the sequels allow you to essentially bring one at the cost of other gear.
• Elite Mooks: Elite troops, such as CICADA mercenaries, General Zaydan's Elite Soldiers, and the Militia's Elite units and Militia Spec Ops, are no tougher than regular Mooks, but tend to carry heavier assault weaponry instead of the simple pistols carried by regular security guards. They also tend to have access to higher security areas compared to the regular grunts.
• Evil, Inc.: The Ether Biotech Corporation is involved in two separate contracts. In the first, they're trying to develop a lethal virus that remains dormant until activated, acting as a kill switch for anyone on the planet. In the second, they're trying to replicate a massively contagious bioweapon created by a doomsday cult. They're also one of Providence's major assets.
• Evil Versus Evil: The Shadow Client and his associates are certainly no saints, but their adversary, Providence, isn't winning any prizes either.
• Exact Eavesdropping: The game notifies you when a conversation you're overhearing could lead you to an assassination opportunity.
• Felony Misdemeanor: Some actions are noted as crimes, and if an NPC observes the player committing them, they will berate the player and summon guards, potentially leading to a sticky situation unless the player thinks quickly. While some of these actions can seem serious (like planting an explosive, sabotaging a vehicle, or breaking and entering), others can be something as simple as turning off a fan or turning on a radio. They'll get the exact same reaction, regardless.
• Flavor Text: All the weapons, poisons, and suits have one to describe their effects (if any) on the player/ target.
  Coconut: A Coconut
• Foreshadowing:
  • Jordan Cross, one of the targets in the Bangkok mission, is mentioned in Paris and Sapienza (by Tren Po and Dr. Lafayette, among others).
  • The Kronstadt Industries name can be heard in Hokkaido (as the makers of the KAI AI), with the logo being found on lots of equipment there.
  • At one point, a glitch caused Agent 47 to make noise while running, something that doesn't happen normally. It being a mere glitch sounds somewhat unlikely, since somebody would have had to program it in. The then-unreleased "Professional" difficulty later made it a feature, so it was likely accidentally added to lower difficulties.
• Gosh Dang It to Heck!: Guards will occasionally say "What in the fargly H-E-double-hockey-sticks is that doing there?" when they encounter a suspicious object.
• Greater-Scope Villain: Though the Shadow Client initially seems to be the Big Bad, the ending of Episode 2 reveals that he's a lone wolf operative acting against a powerful and ruthless global organization/conspiracy known as "Providence".
• Guns Akimbo: For the first time in the franchise, this trope is averted. 47's signature Silverballers have even been replaced by a single silenced .45, though a single Silverballer is available as an unlockable weapon.
• Hand Cannon:
  • The GOTY edition adds the Striker, an M1911 variant chambered in .357 magnum. It kills in one shot, can pierce multiple bodies with one bullet, and is so powerful it will cause enemies to fly through the air and flip end-over-end, likely a reference to the broken physics of the Silverballers in the earlier games. To unlock it, you need to complete the "The Dexter Discordance" escalation mission.
  • Even 47's default .45 Silverballers would count, though to a lesser degree. They do twice as much damage as the standard 9mm pistols used by most security guards in the game, and can kill anyone (other than Dino Bosco) with 2 torso shots.
• Hide Your Children: There are no kids in the streets of Sapienza, Marrakesh, wandering the halls of the Palais De Wawlesca in Paris or the Himmapan Hotel in Bangkok, or checked in with parents at the GAMA facility (to be fair, the latter two are meant to be rather exclusive places). Lampshaded by a guard if you wear the Santa 47 costume, who notes that it's a little weird that they haven't seen any kids:
  Guard: Forget about it, St Nick, there are no kids here. Like, no... kids. Anywhere. At all. It's like children do not exist... Capiche?
• Hidden in Plain Sight: The "Blend In" mechanic allows 47 to conceal himself by performing a mundane action within an environment as long as he's wearing an appropriate disguise. For example, cleaning a bar up while disguised as a bartender, mopping the floor while disguised as a janitor, chopping vegetables while disguised as a cook, etc. While this might seem at first redundant, this allows 47 to be overlooked by people who would otherwise see through his disguise, allowing him to safely eavesdrop or wait to make his move.
• Hidden Weapons: You can hide small items in your suit (coins, pistols, a screwdriver, etc.), though some of the later unlockable weapons (such as the 5mm pistol, the folding knife, and the collapsible baton) are deliberately designed to be concealed from guards during a frisk search.
• High-Voltage Death: One of several ways to kill targets. Electrical equipment can often be found next to a water source, and NPCs can be made to walk into an electrified puddle and die without arousing suspicion.
• Hostility on the Set: An in-universe example; during Elusive Target #7, Gary Busey and Gary Cole had a tense relationship while both starred in a film project. This was mainly caused by Busey's antics, so the film's producer hired 47 to kill him.
• The Illuminati: There's an Omniscient Council of Vagueness called Providence which secretly governs the world. The Shadow Client is trying to challenge that.
• Janitor Impersonation Infiltration: 47's modus operandi and his penchant for disguises. Invoked in "A Gilded Cage" to a literal degree, as the janitor is pretty much given free rein of the consulate.
• Joke Item: Sedative poison. In this game, there is no situation where sedative poison is a better option than the various available emetic or lethal poisons. The only thing that it does differently to either of these is to put the victim to sleep on the spot, which isn't very useful for anything more than a small-scale distraction, and more crucially, it immediately makes the "Body Found" prompt come up, voiding a Silent Assassin run. Fits Crippling Overspecialisation to a tee. If you have access to your victim's drink, you may as well simply lethally poison them, or alternatively, make them throw up with emetic poison. The former is a quick way to kill a target silently (which, unlike the Sedative poison, doesn't count towards if a body is found or not, and therefore doesn't ruin a Silent Assassin run), and the latter leads to the opportunity of isolating the victim to be knocked out and hidden away in a closet. Probably the reason why the sequel gave sedative poison a buff so it doesn't give you a body found penalty.
• Karmic Death: All of the targets have at least one.
  • Tossing Viktor Novikov into the Seine after he's managed to bribe the FSB to cover up his crimes, and poisoning Dalia Margolis with the same poison she gives you when you meet her as Helmut Kruger.
  • Smothering Silvio Caruso with a pillow (the same way he killed his mother), and killing Francesca De Santis with the experimental virus she's working on.
  • Snapping Claus Strandberg's neck during a massage as he's talking about how the lure of easy money makes people stupid, and killing General Reza Zaydan as the prisoner he is planning to execute.
  • Getting Ken Morgan murdered by Jordan Cross, the man Morgan got cleared of murder charges despite being clearly guilty, and shoving Cross out of a window (or off the hotel roof), the same way he murdered his girlfriend and potentially Morgan too.
  • Blowing Sean Rose up with his own explosives, either by using his watch or overpowering his safecracking bomb, killing Penelope Graves during a test to see whether she's loyal to the militia, killing Ezra Berg by making him blow himself up in one of his experiments, and killing Maya Pravati in the grueling tests she makes her men go through.
  • Destroying Erich Soders's replacement heart or convincing the chief surgeon to murder him by showing him evidence Soders had murdered his father, and exploiting Yuki Yamazaki's utter disregard for the rules and people in the hospital she's staying at: she can be brought down by her smoking addiction (which causes her to shoo her guards away, after which 47 can either push her off the balcony or watch her blow herself up with a nearby gas lamp), her hogging of an entire day's worth of yoga lessons (47 can impersonate the instructor then kick her off a cliff), or her insistence on eating the potentially poisonous fugu sushi despite its obvious health risks (guess).
  • Shoving Marco Abiatti onto a fountain pen stand or spire while disguised as either a lawyer he intends on blackmailing or the priest he bullied in his youth.
  • Tampering with movie props so that they incinerate or gravely wound Dino Bosco after he berates the movie crew.
  • Using flammable vodka to ignite Oybek Nabazov during a ritual to a cult he intends on leading into suicide, and killing Sister Yulduz when she attempts to abandon the cult for her own gain.
  • Poisoning Craig Black or crushing him under a chandelier in front of his fans, who he intended to use Nabazov's virus on.
  • Elusive Target #21 has an optional objective to eliminate the targets, two transplant surgeons, by specifically injecting them with a hemorrhagic virus. The client wants them eliminated in this manner because they worked on the client's son, who died of a hemorrhagic fever due to an illicitly sourced organ.

L - Z

• Leave No Survivors: Still possible, but takes a lot longer, as there are around 300 NPCs in each level. Many consider it a Self-Imposed Challenge.
• Lethal Joke Item: The remote-explosive ducks, phone, and Napoleon Blownaparte. They will not be disarmed when found, and the latter two can be used to draw guards to secluded locations.
  • To a lesser extent, the "A New Bat" unlocked in the "The Corky Commotion" escalation mission, which looks goofy and plays voice clips when hitting someone. It's also the only bat in the game that allows you to wear it with a suit, even on Professional Mode (specifically the clown suit, that is.)
• Lighter and Softer: So far, the game appears to be a return to the cleaner, more colorful "International Man of Mystery" vibe of the first two Hitman games, Codename 47 and Silent Assassin, pulling back from the darker, more lurid and obscene atmosphere of the more recent Contracts, Blood Money, and especially the grindhouse-inspired Absolution.
• Limited Loadout: When selecting a loadout for each mission, 47 can start out with one pistol and two supplementary weapons/gadgets on his person, and one additional weapon (of any variety) or gadget stashed in an Agency pickup somewhere in the level. In terms of what can be picked up in-game, 47 can carry as many small weapons and items as he can find, but only a single rifle-type gun or large melee weapon slung across his back or in hand.
• Mad Lib Thriller Title: Most of the escalation contracts are named in this particular fashion, such as "The Dexter Discordance", "The Aelwin Augment" and "The Delgado Larceny". "The Kotti Paradigm" and "The Bigmooney Flamboyancy" are notable in that they are named after usernames (the former is a speedrunner, the latter a Youtube personality).
• Make It Look Like an Accident: Just like in Blood Money, this is a viable way of eliminating the target(s). A patch also changed it so that even if found, bodies from accident or poison kills no longer count against the "Bodies Found" score.
• Master of Disguise: Agent 47, natch.
• Mooks, but no Bosses: Unlike previous games in the series, the game avoids Authority Equals Asskicking to any noticeable degree, though this might be because unlike in previous games, you never actually confront the Big Bad. The only exception is the ersatz Iron Man from one of the bonus missions, whose Hollywood prop superhero suit turns out to be genuinely bulletproof.
• Mugged for Disguise: Once again, a staple mechanic of the game, though averted in the case of the "Suit Only" challenges for each level. Notably, 47 seems to be unique among ICA assassins in obtaining disguises this way, as Diana reacts to him doing so for the first time in the tutorial:
  Diana: You took his clothes... that's a first.
• Mundane Utility: Screwdrivers, wrenches, crowbars, and even coins can be used for their intended purposes, albeit often with deadly intent. Special mention goes to the wrench in Bangkok, which 47 can use to repair a broken rickshaw. The rickshaw can then be used to set up an "accident" kill... or 47 can hop in and exit the level.
  • Using gunfire to distract guards harmlessly (such as shooting walls or lamps nearby a stationary guard) won't void Silent Assassin.
• Murder, Inc.: The ICA (International Contract Agency), an organisation that accepts contracts to kill people, regardless of who they are (former clients notwithstanding) and whoever ordered their death.
• Mythology Gag:
  • The Winter Suit seems to be based on the Badass Longcoat 47 wore in some scenes of the (non-canon) 2007 Hitman film.
  • The "Legacy" cinematic makes reference to the famous Casino Sniper poster used in Blood Money's advertising.
• Needle in a Stack of Needles: Downplayed, as 47 himself knows what the normal and Elusive Targets look like, it's up to the player to find them among the NPC's within the level, some of which look similar to each other. The only exception is the 25th Elusive Target—not even 47 and the ICA (at first) know who they're looking for, and are completely clueless. They only know that the target is in the GAMA facility for either face, eye, or ear surgery, and that's pretty much the only information 47 has to work with.
• Negative Continuity: Can come off this way if you decide to complete Elusive Targets or certain bonus missions after completing the main storyline, where targets from the main storyline are shown to still be alive. Granted, the chronological order of these missions is up to debate.
• Nice Job Breaking It, Hero: The Shadow Client criticizes 47 and the ICA for blindly killing powerful people, enabling the rise of worse ones while thinking the death of their predecessors simply made the world better. Downplayed somewhat, since 47 doesn't really care about politics and the ICA doesn't exactly claim to make the world a better place.
• Nice to the Waiter: Averted. Bumping into NPCs and targets dressed in a service uniform can often prompt them to insult or even threaten you.
  • And with the exceptions of Ezra Berg, Penelope Graves, and Kong Tuo-Kwang, all of the targets are rude and dismissive to workers and their employees.
  • Played straight after Target Lockdowns. After being saved, the targets will often thank, praise, and offer to reward their guards.
  • A subtle example: When getting his makeup done as Helmut Kruger, 47 compliments the stylist for his work, unlike the real Helmut. Judging by the stylist's reaction, 47 made his day.
• Nintendo Hard: Professional Mode is very tough and will likely require players to retry several times to get the hang of the new rules. Cameras can now actively spot you instead of just lowering points, and bloody kills and most accidents ruin an NPC's disguise. In short, IOI was looking at the tactics most players used for each level, since most of them have at least one new obstacle specifically to make it more impractical.
  • One of the Escalations, "The Mallory Misfortune" on the Colorado map, is regarded as one of the most difficult and frustrating missions in the game. While it's beatable, the fact that one escalation has one of the NPCs literally stalking you as you try to kill your targets (and in the last two escalation levels, killing or knocking out the stalker will fail the mission) makes the task of completing the mission nerve-wracking.
• No-Sell: So-called "Enforcers", NPCs with white dots over their heads, will get suspicious of you if you enter their line of sight, as they know everyone in the level with that particular outfit.
• Not Even Bothering with the Accent: No matter where 47 goes, nearly everyone around him speaks with American or British accents, some exceptions being Claus Strandberg and (for some reason) the AI in the GAMA facility in Hokkaido.
• Our Lawyers Advised This Trope: The game opens with a disclaimer similar to the ones from the Assassin's Creed series, indicating that the game was made by a multicultural team of various nationalities, religions, and ethnic backgrounds.
• Player Nudge: Many of the easier challenges imply or point out resources available in the level and often hint at their location so the player isn't completely blind going in. More overtly, Opportunities point out possible methods of dispatch.
• Police Are Useless: Downplayed. A group of guards is perfectly capable of taking out 47, but they never call for reinforcements from outside the level. Some maniac is going around a Thai hotel and systematically killing random people with an assault rifle? No need to send in special forces or anti-terrorist specialists, surely the hotel's regular guards and a rockstar's bodyguards can take him down with their basic pistols no problem!
• Pragmatic Villainy: Since the ICA is supposed to be a neutral organization, its agents generally don't take a stance in the morality of their missions or their targets. In the end, the ICA is only concerned with completing its contracts, and the fact that most of their targets happen to be very unsavory characters anyways is just a small bonus.
• Punny Name: The poison vials have labels on them named after their effects they have someone; VomiTOROL (emetic), resTYNZINE (sedative), and FataLIDOMIDE (lethal/fatal).
• The Reveal: The game ends with Providence claiming Ort-Meyer was only the tip of the iceberg, and that there's more to 47 than meets the eye.
• Rank Scales with Asskicking: Averted hard, in sharp contrast to previous games in the series. Every single one of your targets is unarmed and has absolutely no way of fighting back if attacked directly. At best, they can only flee as their bodyguards escort them to a safe zone. If cornered, the bravest of them will insult 47, while the rest can only cower and plead for mercy.
• Revisiting the Roots: In contrast to the divisive Actionized Sequel that is Absolution, the game plays more like Blood Money, though features like Instinct Mode still remain (though it isn't necessary anymore and can be turned off entirely).
• Real-Place Background: As per tradition with the series, the levels are designed to represent the culture and architecture their real-life counterparts would have, with the exception of not having regional accents. For example, Sapienza is largely a pastiche of various Italian coastal towns, most notably having arches similar to that found in Finalborgo, Sivorna.
• Running Gag:
  • The Kane & Lynch video games appear in Colorado, as well as in the "The Bad Boy" Elusive Target. Both the hackers in the "The Bookkeeper" Elusive Target, as well as Bartholomew Argus in "The Bad Boy", give glowing praise for the games despite them being loathed in reality.
  • For reasons unknown, IOI really has something against pink. No, not the band, the color. Both Sapienza and Marrakesh feature odd jabs at the color. A lady in the gelato store mutters to herself about the color while taking forever to order ice cream, and a consulate member in Marrakesh questions the amount of pink the person on the other end of their phone call wears.
• Skeleton Key: Disguises that allow entry to most of the level serve as this, as they either have very few Enforcers or none at all, while still giving you the run of the place. Usually, these are hard to obtain as they are specific people in high fame or power status, but there are exceptions; see each level folder for examples.
• Scenery Porn: All of the levels look amazing, even on the lower graphical settings. There are a lot of details in the distance, such as a lighthouse island in Sapienza, or Hokkaido and its gorgeous mountain view.
• Schmuck Bait: Almost everyone will check out any noises they hear, and pick up any placed coins or weapons 47 has interacted with. You can place a coin on a ledge, throw something to get someone to investigate, and push them off once they notice and try to pick up the coin, for example. They're not complete idiots, though—trying this while they are watching won't work.
• Secret War: The Shadow Client and his associates against Providence, with 47 acting as an Unwitting Pawn to the Client, although he soon catches on to that. Not that 47 cares about it, but Diana wants to guarantee that their work for the ICA stays neutral.
• Series Continuity Error: As revealed in the "Legacy" cinematic, 47 killed Dom Osmond by shooting him through a one-way mirror, but with an unsilenced Silverballer, which is a little odd, as 47 doesn't have it for that mission (Birdie had taken them in exchange for information on Victoria prior to that point, and a mission later on at the shooting range is all about getting them back).
• Signing-Off Catchphrase: Diana concludes almost every mission briefing with "I will leave you to prepare."
• Spanner in the Works: Seemingly the case, but averted. As far as Providence knows, Agent 47 is just eliminating targets related to their operations through bad luck. He's hired by the British government, a corporate shareholder with an attack of conscience, a development firm, and a grieving family for the first few episodes—all of which are implied to have been manipulated by the Shadow Client.
• Stopped Numbering Sequels: The game is simply titled Hitman.
• Sunglasses at Night: Playing "The Author", "Freedom Fighters", or "A House Built On Sand" while wearing the Sapienza-exclusive Elusive Target suit (the Summer Shirt with Gloves) or the Cowboy Suit can lead to this.
• Stop Poking Me!: Bumping into non-Enforcer civilians or guards too many times will eventually result in them becoming suspicious of 47.
• Stuff Blowing Up: Aside from the obvious explosives, shooting a fire extinguisher causes it to explode, killing anybody nearby. Open gunpowder bags also explode. Propane tanks start leaking when shot, and any spark afterwards will blow it up. The Colorado mission even features jars of nitroglycerin, which detonate on impact, basically acting like grenades.
• Super Drowning Skills: If 47 throws a distraction into even the tiniest puddle of water, when npcs lean down to grab it they instantly die, even if it's puddles they can otherwise walk across.
• Suspect Is Hatless: Every now and then.
  Witness: He looked really evil and was wearing some outfit!
• Tag Line: "Enter A World of Assassination".
• Take Your Time: Zigzagged. None of the story mission targets will leave their respective maps under normal circumstances, and most will only evacuate to an on-map, player-accessible location when spooked^*(those who do have a means of leaving the map entirely will resort to it only if their primary safe area is also compromised)... all of this meaning the player is rarely, if ever, under any time pressure to assassinate a particular target. Where this trope may be subverted, however, is with specific opportunities; a unique NPC that offers a prime method of infiltration may only meet with the target once. That said, the player may rush to subdue said NPC only to find them procrastinating, shirking their duties, or otherwise attempting to avoid the meeting, meaning the player can once again take their time!
• Temporary Online Content: Elusive Targets. Each one is only available for a limited amount of time, and once that period passes, they're gone. Additionally, once you complete or fail the contract, that's it; you can't replay it at all.
  • Downplayed. The Elusive Target roster has been repeating regularly, allowing players who've never completed or failed them before to attempt them.
• Throwing Your Sword Always Works: The throwing mechanic is lifted from Absolution, and thus locks to NPC heads. Lethal items will always kill them and blunt weapons will always knock them out, walls be damned.^note If an NPC goes behind cover or a wall after 47 throws something at them, it will still hit them because of how the game engine works.
• Unlimited Wardrobe: Downplayed due to there only being a limited number of episodes, but still applies. Unlike previous games, 47 has a different default outfit for every location he visits. His classic suit is still available as a sartorially elegant option, but unless the player selects options otherwise he will generally arrive at a mission wearing whatever would let him most easily blend in, be that a tuxedo for a fashion show in Paris or a casual polo shirt for a small coastal town in Italy.
• Useless Useful Spell: As explained under Infinity -1 Sword, sedative poison is this, as it puts your victim to sleep and immediately voids Silent Assassin after that happens, which is not helped when all the other poisons and knockout options are much more flexible in their use (as opposed to a poisoning a specific cup).
• Variable Mix: The background music gets more intense in certain situations, like when you're being hunted or you're close to exiting the map.
• Video Game Cruelty Potential: Since this is an wide-open sandbox that encourages you to kill multiple people in the most creative ways possible, there's a great opportunity to experiment with particularly gruesome, creative, and cruel assassination methods (or all three), such as throwing a person into a woodchipper, off the balcony of a hotel, going on mass killing sprees, or even turning mundane items into death traps à la some twisted combination of Home Alone and Saw. You can also just terrorize innocent people by assassinating your targets as egregiously as possible (such as by blowing up Claus Strandberg on the walkway above the Swedish consulate's reception desk, frightening everyone in the already-besieged building).
• Virtual Paper Doll: 47 has a starting outfit that can be changed to your liking. For example, the Italian Suit can be swapped out for the Santa 47 suit if that's more your thing.
  • On a related note, the game encourages the use of disguises to get to otherwise-inaccessible areas.
• Villains Want Mercy: If you hold your targets at gunpoint in private, they will cower in fear and beg for mercy or try to bribe you. Subverted with Penelope Graves and Maya Parvati, who curse and taunt you if you threaten them.

Tutorial:

In General

A flashback to "better days", we see how 47 trains to become the best assassin in the world under ICA watch.

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• All Part of the Show: In the training missions, the targets, guards and civilians are played by ICA employees. 47 can throw them off buildings, drown them in toilets, or throw knives at them which remain stuck in their heads. Good thing Diana told him beforehand that all weapons are just "simulated".
• Cryptically Unhelpful Answer: The Title In text for this tutorial in Hitman 3 is "ICA Facility — Classified", which isn't all that helpful to know where the training facility is located. For what it's worth, storyboards for the game and Word of God reveals it takes place somewhere in Greenland, although the in-game files inconsistently refer to it as Siberia.
• Distant Prologue: The tutorial missions take place 20 years before the rest of the game, and detail 47's induction into the Agency in 1999.
• Easier Than Easy: Despite being based on real events In-Universe, these two tutorials are among the easiest levels in the game by quite a wide margin. To some degree, this is because you're expected to complete this mission using disguises; doing it in your suit (or in this case, the Tactical Turtleneck) is a bit trickier.
• Gameplay and Story Segregation: No matter what you do in-game, 47 passes these tests. You can go on a murder spree and Soders will allow 47 to be recruited into the ICA.
• Justified Tutorial: The training missions are framed as previous real-life events that happened In-Universe. Diana teaches 47 about the ICA's code of conduct, as well as helping him in certain moments so that he passes, so it makes sense for Diana to guide him through the level in this case.
• Kayfabe: The actors playing the varying civilians, guards and work crew all act like they've never seen 47, and attempt not to break from the illusion the training map is meant to give off. In Yacht Training, there's a pair of builders who do discuss 47 in whispers, but get told to shut up afterward. This is broken fully if 47 does the Ejector Seat opportunity, which has everyone nearby break character and call 47 out for his actions.
• Where the Hell Is Springfield?: The tutorials are set in a top secret location, somewhere in the middle of some snowy mountains. Other than that, we're not really given a clue. The Title In text for the levels in Hitman 3 just gives a Cryptically Unhelpful Answer of "ICA Facility — Classified".

"Guided Training"/"Freeform Training"

As part of his first assignment, 47 re-enacts the ICA's assassination of infamous thief Kalvin "The Sparrow" Ritter on a set designed after the yacht party Ritter was killed on. Diana guides 47 through his first attempt before allowing him to attempt it without any assistance.

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• Anachronism Stew: The mobile phones some civilians are holding are smartphones, which hadn't been invented in 1999. A car clearly based on the Citroën C4 (first produced in 2004) can also be found in the makeshift auto shop.
• Ascended Meme: The chef in the yacht kitchen from Hitman 2 onward has his head and ear bandaged. This is because the player is expected to knock him out with a wrench and take his disguise, as per the tutorial, but IOI didn't expect players to do this all the time outside of scripted events.
• Developer's Foresight:
  • Ritter has unique dialogue if you kill his guards before him.
  • Ritter's guest Terry Norfolk has dialogue for if you stay in cover after killing Ritter, which you're not likely to do as Diana tells you to exit the yacht.
• Foreshadowing: Some of the party guests are aliased as future characters you either hear about, or encounter, later in the game and series, and talk about future events that will come to pass:
  • A man aliased as Thomas Cross is talking about his fledgling newspaper business and wanting to expand into a global media empire. His friend Terrance tells him that he has "connections" who can help make it happen. Thomas Cross is the father of Jordan Cross, the primary target of "Club 27", while Terrance is likely associated with Providence, given his language about looking for "Men of Ambition".
  • A woman aliased as Isabella Caruso is talking about her three kids and her particular disdain for Silvio, claiming his genius makes her skin crawl. Silvio would later be the primary target in "World of Tomorrow". It also alludes to his older brothers Renzo and Orlando Caruso, who would later flee Italy because of her controlling nature.
  • A group of guests state that Ritter previously stole art belonging to the Stuyvesant family. Marcus Stuyvesant, a member of that family, is revealed to be one of the Providence Partners in the following game.
• Identical Stranger: A minor, if slightly odd, example. In the Hitman 2 Legacy Pack version of the Freeform Training Yacht mission, an NPC named Olivia D. Trent is using the old in-game model for Andrea Martinez that was showcased in this game's version of Paris. Andrea's new model for the Legacy Pack version of Paris now uses her new face from the Santa Fortuna mission in Hitman 2, but retains the old clothing.
• I Know You're Watching Me: In the cutscene that plays before the second go-around on Freeform Training, Diana and Soders are talking behind a (presumably) two-way mirror as 47 paces around a room. By the end of their conversation, 47 is standing in the middle of the room, staring directly at them.
• It Will Never Catch On:
  • A group of corporate executives celebrate the merging of a video rental retailer with a record retailer, with a woman stating "Movies on the Internet? Please!" in response to other companies' idea of the future. Nobody tell them about Netflix or iTunes...
  • Another guest is talking about the new hot craze of texting, and how it's extremely addictive. Note that half of the crowd on the yacht are texting.
• Karmic Death: A challenge; "Ironic", is named after this trope, and asks you to drown Ritter in a toilet after poisoning him. Of course, the real irony in it is drowning while on a boat.
• Retirony: Played with. One of Kalvin Ritter's associates confronts him about apparently lying that his next job would be his last since he is planning something else for afterward. Ritter replies that he didn't lie: he’s simply going to become a "manager" and recruit other thieves to carry on the legacy of "The Sparrow". Naturally, he dies very shortly afterward.
• Leaning on the Fourth Wall: One of the guard conversations talks about how "nobody notices bodyguards", so anything he says will be ignored by the party patrons.
• Shout-Out: Soders' talk of "pressure points" for keeping agents in check is in reference to the first Mission Impossible film, where Eugene Kittridge said much the same thing about Ethan Hunt.
• Surrounded by Idiots: If the fire alarm goes off or 47 is spotted killing NPCs, Kalvin Ritter will run to the top of his yacht protected by police officers. Ritter will also talk about how the safe zone is terrible if Agent 47 kills the guards at the helipad.

"The Final Test"

47's final test is to re-enact the 1979 assassination of Jasper Knight, a famous chess player turned Soviet spy, who was killed by now-board member Erich Soders at an airstrip in Cuba while he was an active assassin. Soders, believing 47 is a threat to the organization, has rigged the test by throwing additional guards into the mix.

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• All Part of the Show: The Forced Tutorial version of the Jasper Knight training mission gives the player the option to trick "Knight" into activating a fighter jet ejector seat that blasts him through a hangar roof and off into the sky. The actors even break character for a minute and call 47 a "crazy bastard". 47 and Diana just straight up killed an ICA employee for real and the ICA hires them anyway. Tellingly, in the Hitman 2 version of this mission, Diana claims that not only is she glad the chair has a parachute, but that she had no idea the jet was fully functional.
• Chekhov's Gun: Jasper's escape is being plotted by KGB spymaster Janus, who later becomes a target in Hitman 2. A few of the soldiers wonder if the escape is a sign of Janus' true allegiance, referencing that Janus would later defect from the USSR.
• Clipboard of Authority: Even a chess grandmaster knows to shut up when a safety inspector is holding forth. Just read aloud the "instructions" from the clipboard in the hanger ("Pull ejection handle") to send Jasper flying.
• Deadly Escape Mechanism: The canon method of assassinating Jasper Knight involves sabotaging the ejection seat of the jet he plans to leave Cuba in. In a twist, said sabotage involves arming the seat, so that when he's called down for a walkthrough of emergency procedures, he ejects himself for real... without a parachute.
• Dirty Communists: Jasper Knight was a chess player-turned-double agent who worked for the Soviets.
• Gratuitous Russian: "Nash Z'darove!" The name of this challenge can be vaguely translated as "Our Health"; in actuality proper toasts vould be either "Za zdorovie!"—"For health (of drinkers)!", or "Vashe zdorovie!"—"(For) your health!". Also, the brutal-sounding Soviet "GLASЛOST" vodka.
• Irony: The second easiest level in the game is one of the hardest pulled off In-Universe, and was the highest achievement of Soders' career, a feat he pulled off "against all odds" according to Diana. Soders even added more guards than he encountered to try and make you fail, but it doesn't do much to make it difficult for 47 to pass.
• Moving the Goalposts: Erich Soders, the ICA training director, is a legendary assassin who is considered to be the best of his generation. Killing Knight was his most challenging assignment, but he decides to up the ante for you and turn the difficulty up to eleven for your entry test, no less.
• Not Even Bothering with the Accent: Most of the ICA actors are presumably re-enacting what was said, but none of them put on any accents; everyone (excepting one Soviet soldier who puts on a very hammy fake Russian accent when greeting 47) would've had a Cuban or Russian accent during the actual mission, but they stick to American.
• Smart People Play Chess: Jasper Knight is a chessmaster, and spends a good portion of his mission pondering a chess conundrum given to him by an ambassador he killed (with ricin-coated chess pieces, no less). 47 may also alter the chessboard, and there is a challenge to solve the problem.
• Unwinnable Training Simulation: Training Director Soders believes 47 to be too much of a threat, so he bases the latter's final exam scenario on Soders' own assassination of Jasper Knight. Not only is the scenario on its own supposedly far more difficult than the usual ICA exam (the Knight hit is described as the pinnacle of Soders' distinguished career), but Soders even added more guards than he actually encountered just to be sure. 47 only succeeds via Diana breaking the rules herself and helping him directly.

Campaign:

Paris: "The Showstopper"

47 heads to the Sanguine fashion show held at the Palais de Walewska in Paris in order to assassinate Dalia Margolis, former Israeli spy turned model, and her lover Viktor Novikov, former Russian oligarch turned designer. While the two are posing as big names in the fashion world, they are in reality the heads of IAGO, one of the world's largest spy rings, and must be eliminated following their leak of a list of several MI6 agents undercover in the Middle East.

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• 419 Scam: Linger around the news cameraman outside the Palais de Walewska for long enough, and you'll see him get a text from someone claiming to be a relative and a former Nigerian president, asking for help transferring $80 million out of the country.
  Cameraman: Yeah, yeah, of course I'm gonna help out! Family, bro!
• Auction of Evil: On the second floor. The items for sale are actually made up of randomised voice clips.
• Black-Tie Infiltration: How you initially enter the level. Diana points out that 47's "classic look" will fit right in. The Auction starting location allows for you to start in a bowtie and suit.
• Badass Israeli: Dalia may "just" be a superstar fashion model and information broker, but she controls a vast network of spies feared the world over. Which makes sense, as one conversation mentions that her father is a Four-Star Badass who looked down on her modeling work.
• Bullying a Dragon: Viktor Novikov is a former oligarch turned international information broker, who just had the head of the FSB murdered and destroyed all evidence against him. Valerie St. Clair knows all of this; she keeps a file on him and Margolis' exploits in a safe. Her plan? To blackmail him into funding her failing magazine.
• Celebrity Resemblance: The star of the Paris Sanguine fashion show is Helmut Kruger, a bald fashion model whose face looks almost identical to 47's, which a fan even lampshades. Helmut is scheduled to meet with Dalia Margolis. You know where this is going.
• Chekhov's Gun:
  • Dalia plans to send Helmut to seduce Jessica Highmoore in order to gather information on her father's company, Highmoore Consulting. Jessica's sister Hannah was killed (in a deniable way) by her boyfriend, Jordan Cross. The Highmoore family would later employ ICA to kill Cross in order to avenge Hannah.
  • If 47 introduces himself as Tobias Rieper to Dalia, she will head into her quarters and call an old colleague and later target, Ezra Berg, for a background check on him.
• Chekhov's Gunman: Attending the IAGO auction is Andrea Martinez, one of the targets in Hitman 2's Colombia level.
• Church of Happyology: Dalia intends on sending one of her honey traps to infiltrate the Church of Ascendants, a crypto-spiritual cult with a popular actor in their ranks. To further the reference, dialogue in "Club 27" suggests that they have an army of lawyers.
• Continuity Nod: Looking closely at the auction tablets shows pictures of Sheikh Mohammed Bin Faisal Al-Khalifa and Vinnie Sinistra.
• Convenient Escape Boat: The back of the palace has one. It does need a key, however.
• Dead Artists Are Better: In-universe, the deaths of Novikov and Margolis cause Sanguine's popularity to skyrocket.
• Easy Level Trick:
  • Snagging the IAGO invitation (which can be easily found in a ground-floor bathroom on any difficult besides Master, where it has to be snagged from an invitee) gives you easy access to the top floor without ever needing to find a disguise (so long as you're not bringing any lethal weapons). Even if you don't use the invitation and find some other way to the top floor, your starting suit still gives you free rein of the top floor's public areas.
  • The fireworks remote. Triggering the fireworks display immediately draws both targets to exact locations, making them easy pickings for either sniping or the Grievous Harm with a Body example below.
• Executive Meddling: In-universe. Sebastian Sato hates the designs he has to make for Sanguine and the fashion show, and Novikov has to intimidate him into going onto the catwalk with him. His speech on the catwalk is rather obviously about him being forced to create work he doesn't enjoy.
• Falling Chandelier of Doom: The level has a lot of these, with an attendant Feat for offing each target in this manner. All of the winches are conspicuously placed, to boot.
• Foreshadowing: One of the auction guests will receive a call about Crystal Dawn, the terrorist group they represent, having their posters put up in Morocco despite having no active cell there. This turns out to be part of General Reza Zaydan's plan in the following mission. In addition, he mentions Richard Ekwensi, who would later become an Elusive Target soon after.
• Freudian Excuse: Dalia's father refused to support her career in modeling, instead believing she should use her vast intelligence for something more productive. As part of Dalia's revenge, she sells a terrorism-connected Sheikh a list of all British spies in the Middle East.
• Germanic Depressives: Helmut Kruger is dressed in black and navy with blue makeup, and is working with IAGO and Dalia Margolis, so you'd be forgiven for thinking he's an evil character. However, tailing him (typically as the Sheikh) seems to reveal that he's in way over his head, and he has his own personal Oh, Crap! moment after speaking to Dalia.
• Grand Staircase Entrance: Taking the straightforward path into the mansion, Viktor Novikov introduces himself by descending down the stairs to an adoring crowd. Since he's likely going to be the first target you'll get visual of in the game past the tutorial, this moment generally presents itself as an Establishing Series Moment for new Hitman players: your target is perfectly visible and right out in the open, but you can't assassinate him now because everyone is watching. Figure out a solution from there.
• Grievous Harm with a Body: One of the Feats in the Paris level is killing both Margolis and Novikov in one fell swoop by pushing the former off a balcony onto the latter.
• Have You Come to Gloat?: Sort of. Fashion magazine editor Valerie St. Clair, an Expy for Anna Wintour, meets Novikov after the fashion show, and gloats about her knowledge regarding the auction and how he's "finished"; Novikov is spooked regarding this, and wants to pay her off in order to keep her quiet. YMMV as to whether she knows that Novikov is going to die.
• Have You Told Anyone Else?: In the cinematic seen after the Paris mission, the Shadow Client asks Novikov something to this effect before asking his associate to leak the names, leading MI6 to hire 47 to kill Novikov.
• Hidden in Plain Sight: It's possible to sneak up into the auction, in your own suit, and roam around completely without suspicion. An achievement is triggered if you blend in during the auction; Dalia asks 47 for an introduction, and 47 replies with "Tobias Rieper", a pseudonym he's used a number of times in the past.
• Honey Trap: IAGO sends out fashion models to ingratiate themselves with the global elite and steal their secrets.
• Identical Stranger: Helmut Kruger is one of these for Agent 47, albeit Justified in that he's always covered in thick makeup as part of his style.
• Inconsistent Spelling: Originally, an undisguised 47 would introduce himself to Dalia Margolis as "Tobias Reaper" (spelled "Rieper" in previous games. An update has since corrected the spelling.
• Knowledge Broker: The targets of the Paris mission, Viktor Novikov and Dalia Margolis, are the ringleaders of IAGO, an organization that sells classified information for nefarious purposes. Their dealings have allowed terrorists to cause a nuclear plant meltdown and allowed drug lords to assassinate a president. During the mission, they are auctioning off a list containing the identities of British undercover agents to the highest bidder.
• Mad Libs Dialogue: The auctioneer on the top floor has a set of randomised voice clips for all the things IAGO is selling, meaning a specific item of interest ("A conflict in the middle eastern part of"...) is paired up with a totally random country (..."Mexico"), which can often be impossible to occur due to the conflicting details. It isn't obvious until the player listens to him several times over the course of many playthroughs, however.
• Meta Guy: Or Meta Guys to be more precise. NPCs will often speak to each other about particular annoyances that they (and by extension, the player as 47) will have to endure, such as frisking every time any of the non-guards go upstairs, or jealousy among NPCs for not being a suited bodyguard.
• Meaningful Name: Not only is "The Showstopper" referring to people standing and clapping at performances (as is happening during the fashion show), but it's also the name of an in-universe fashion magazine.
• No OSHA Compliance: 47 can overhear some workers complaining about how haphazardly the stage was constructed, and how easily the failure of a single component can send the entire lighting system crashing down onto the stage. This, of course, provides a perfect assassination opportunity.
• Paper-Thin Disguise:
  • In some cases. Most of the generic disguises make sense, but dressing up as Sheikh al-Ghazali leaves your face completely uncovered, making one wonder how many people are fooled by a man who is not only visibly Caucasian, but also biologically 20% Chinese and 20% Colombian, calling himself a Middle Eastern sheikh. It's Hand Waved by saying that few people have seen his face, but to believe that IAGO spymaster Dalia Margolis doesn't know his face either is a bit of a stretch.
  • Played with when Dalia meets with "Helmut Kruger", as she knows him personally but still thinks Agent 47 is him. Somewhat justified as he's under heavy makeup and looks strongly like 47 to begin with.
• Pop-Cultural Osmosis Failure: Viktor muses about where Valerie St. Clair parked her chicken hut. His guard has no idea what he's talking about.
• Punny Name: The honey trap who obtained the NOC list for Dalia is called Martha Herris.
• Screw This, I'm Outta Here: Dalia's secretary is actually a spy for Valerie St. Clair. After 47 sabotages the laptop she was meant to care for, she and her lover run away.
• Skeleton Key:
  • Helmut Kruger's disguise not only gives you easy access to Dalia, it effectively gives you free access to just about the entire level. The Sheikh also provides similar benefits, as he starts on the first floor, but makes his way up eventually.
• Stealth Insult: If Sebastian Sato heads on stage after the show, his entire speech is him mocking Viktor's control over his work by listing the latter's actions as "themes". It completely flies over Viktor's head.
• The Guards Must Be Crazy: A specific example — if you trigger the fireworks, the sole CICADA bodyguard on the central third-floor balcony is too busy filming the display on his phone to notice 47 shoving Dalia Margolis off the precipice onto her husband, killing both.
• White-Dwarf Starlet: Helmut Kruger's fading career is his motivation to join up with Dalia's schemes.
• You Do Not Want To Know: Novikov's answer to where his client could find a skillful assassin who would murder an FSB head without raising any eyebrow in a highly-secured environment, as they meet in a graveyard.
• You Have Outlived Your Usefulness:
  • The Shadow Client does this to Viktor and Dalia, turning their names over to MI6 after they provide him with their information reserves.
  • Overhearing certain moments of Enemy Chatter involving Dalia implies that she's also beginning to think that this applies to Viktor and is planning accordingly.

Sapienza: "World of Tomorrow"

The Ether Biotech Corporation is developing a weapon that could make all assassination irrelevant—a bioweapon that targets a person's genetic code, allowing it to be dispersed into a crowd relatively easily. They are developing it at the villa of genius scientist Silvio Caruso in Sapienza, Italy, and 47 has been contracted to kill him. He also has two more targets: Francesca De Santis, one of the head scientists on the project and the one who would likely be able to finish the job if Caruso was eliminated, and the virus itself.

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• Abusive Parents: Silvio's mother Isabella clung to her son after her husband's death and her twins running away, resulting in him becoming extremely neurotic and afraid of women. Silvio eventually snapped and smothered her in return.
• The Artifact: This level has a security footage box in the downstairs room of the church, which deletes all footage from Caruso Manor and the ETHER field lab, which makes very little sense as to why they'd be connected story-wise. This is a holdover from the game's alpha, where the security footage and cameras had specific zones, and players were required to delete the footage from cameras that covered that zone if they got spotted within it. This was removed to simplify things, and later levels in this game onward were not made with the feature in mind (and thus the developers put the security footage in more plausible places).
• Arson, Murder, and Jaywalking: The development of a specific DNA strand-targeting virus could change the global balance of power, kill innocents with no chance of discovering the perpetrator, and put the ICA out of a job.
• The Atoner: One of the scientists accidentally killed a lab technician and has developed a means to remotely destroy the bioweapon she blames for it.
• Bilingual Bonus: The love song that plays in Francesca's room is sung entirely in Italian. Translating it reveals that its about a man who lost his love (whom he refers to as "my Sun") and contemplates his feelings of loss.
• Biological Weapons Solve Everything: What Ether Industries is hoping.
• Black Site: Ether Corporation built a secret laboratory responsible for developing a virus able to target people via their DNA.
• Blatant Lies: Dr. Oscar Lafayette, Silvio's therapist, can be heard bragging on his phone about having cured Jordan Cross. When we meet Cross in Bangkok, we see that this is clearly not the case.
• Brick Joke:
  • When you first hear about Silvio's VHS tapes, one of the employees talking about them will mention that he knows a guy who can convert the video to digital for cheap. If you let Silvio watch the video long enough without killing him, he'll mention he should get it converted to digital.
  • Two servants in the cellar are looking for a vintage wine bottle that Silvio wants. Nearby, a scientist and a gardener are drinking the wine, as the former stole it to try and get fired.
• Bully Hunter: Deconstructed. Letting Francesca meet Sal Falcone without taking his disguise reveals that Silvio paid Falcone to get DNA samples of four children who bullied him in school, with the intention of killing them with his virus. However, all of them had since gone on to be better people, such as a schoolteacher, an environmental lawyer, a graphics designer, and a man who rescues turtles. Francesca will also find out he had another bully, a politician named Marco Abiatti, killed (which is explored in "Landslide").
• Captain Ersatz: The bioweapon is basically FOXDIE from Metal Gear Solid.
• Convenient Escape Boat: Speedboats can be found at the back of the villa or at the pier near the church. They also acts as starting locations.
• Cutting the Knot:
  • The virus can be destroyed by shooting a stalactite above the lab's roof or shooting at it from the window.
  • Its possible to use the lab's computer to destroy the virus by using an EMP charge.
  • Destroying the seaplane prevents Silvio from escaping during a target lockdown.
• Desecrating the Dead: Alongside the general example, a dead scientist lies in the open in the church's morgue. 47 can take his clothes.
• Developer's Foresight:
  • If Dr. Lafayette's coffee is poisoned but he isn't knocked out, he will eventually head to the villa for Silvio's therapy session.
  • Encountering Silvio as Dr. Lafayette without talking to the butler results in Silvio guiding you to his room instead.
  • If Francesca's wine is spiked with emetic poison and she finishes vomiting, she will have different dialogue for ending her date.
  • Waking up Sal Falcone after eliminating Francesca De Santis has him annoyed at being told to hurry up when Francesca doesn't answer her phone, feeling slightly miffed the latter didn't have the same courtesy.
• Delivery Guy Infiltration: Silvio's mansion can be infiltrated as a flower delivery guy.
• Disproportionate Retribution: Dialog between Francesca and a private investigator reveals that Silvio was planning to use the DNA-targeting virus on old bullies of his who have since gone into respectable careers, such as a schoolteacher and an environmental lawyer.
• Dragon Ascendant: Played with. The reason you have to assassinate Francesca when Silvio is more of a threat is that Francesca has intimate knowledge of the project and could potentially pick up where Silvio left off. In fact, Francesca is assigned to eliminate Silvio herself and finish his work.
• Easter Egg: Quite a few—a notable one is that on a wall near the entrance to the morgue, there are placards describing available coffins. They have rather surprising accessories, such as an optional TV stand and airbags.
• Empty Bedroom Grieving: Isabella Caruso's bedroom has been left the way it was before her death, as Silvio believes her ghost haunts the room. This can be used to make Silvio faint after activating her gramophone and stairlift.
• Freddie Mercopy: The bodyguard guarding the stairs leading to De Santis's office looks a lot like Freddie.
• Freudian Couch: Silvio lays down on one during his therapy session. 47 can make it his last.
• Hazmat Suit: One has to be worn to access the laboratory the virus is being held in due to it being perpetually doused in toxic chemicals.
• Interrupted Intimacy: Right as Francesca entices a disguised 47, she receives a phone call to investigate something.
• Joke Character: The hippie disguise found in the apartment above the lawyer's office, or the clown disguise worn by the street performer, since they share the same properties as 47's starting clothes.
• Labcoat of Science and Medicine: The lab underneath Villa Caruso has all the scientists wear goggles and white lab coats. Francesca de Santis, the secondary target, also wears one.
• Lethal Chef: 47 can make himself one of these as an Opportunity, either using poison or bad spaghetti sauce to cause Silvio to go to the edge of a cliff to throw up.
• Marijuana Is LSD: Inverted. Both targets can have blunts put into their cigarettes. Doing so will knock them out and make them sick.
• Meaningful Name: The Mission name derives itself from the popular speculative fiction phrase "enter the world of tomorrow", frequently used at conventions when showing off technology prototypes. It also refers to the ICA's reasoning for the contract existing; to avoid armchair assassins, and starting a new era of assassination.
• My Beloved Smother: Silvio had this sort of relationship with his mother, causing him to both love and hate her.
• New-Age Retro Hippie: The top apartment of the clock tower building is inhabited by one, distinguishable by its psychedelic paint. 47 can disguise as the hippie or steal a blunt that can be used to pacify the targets.
• Nobody Here but Us Statues: Inside the observatory is a Plague Doctor outfit on display that 47 can use to hide in plain sight by standing still on the pedestal.
• Noodle Incident: Diana mentions that Silvio is a former ICA client, but doesn't elaborate. This ends up falling under Foreshadowing, since we get to partake in said contract in "Landslide".
• No-Sell: Sal Falcone, the private detective in town to meet Francesca, is Properly Paranoid and will immediately aggro if he spots 47, regardless of disguise or even if he's in his starting suit.
• Old Money: The Caruso family has owned their villa for generations and own a famous district vineyard elsewhere in Italy.
• O.O.C. Is Serious Business: Both Francesa and her lover suffer from this, as she's a career-oriented woman and he's a notorious ladies' man, but both are serious about each other. Too bad one of the chief ways of killing Francesa is to do so disguised as the latter.
• Paper-Thin Disguise: Averted for once while disguised as Roberto. Silvio is an Enforcer, and when you meet with Francesca dressed as her lover, it's very dark, but she'll also recognize you if you get too close.
• Plague Doctor: A mannequin garbed like this is found in Silvio's office and 47 can hide himself by wearing it.
• Playing Possum: 47 can start the mission sitting in one of the morgue's coffins. There's an achievement for waking up when the priest comes in to check on the coffin, causing him to faint.
• Pragmatic Villainy: While Diana pays some lip service to the virus' catastrophic moral and geopolitical implications, it's clear she and the ICA are far more concerned about how it would put them out of business.
• Private Detective: Francesca is trying to meet with one called Sal Falcone in regards to a previous request from Silvio. 47 can disguise as him to privately meet Francesca. If the real Falcone meets with Francesca, he'll reveal that Silvio intended to use the virus to kill his school bullies, unaware that they had become better people.
• Psycho Psychologist: 47 can impersonate one in order to kill Silvio on his couch.
• Rule of Symbolism: Silvio can be killed by a Medieval Plague Doctor, who were historically associated with the Black Death and death in general, while watching videos of his birth. Also doubles as What Do You Mean, It's Not Symbolic?, since none of this particularly means anything other than that 47 has quite a flair for the dramatic.
• Scope Snipe: A variation. You get an achievement for sniping Silvio while he's looking through a telescope.
• Shout-Out: A housekeeper discussing Silvio's strained relationship with his mother states that if the Caruso's owned a motel, she wouldn't want to take a shower there.
• Skewed Priorities: It's clear the ICA and Diana are more concerned about the virus ruining their business than its catastrophic consequences.
• Secret Ingredient: Silvio has commissioned numerous world class cooks in an attempt to recreate his mother's signature spaghetti sauce, with all attempts so far being dismal failures. However, if 47 does a little snooping, he finds out that Silvio's mother just used ordinary, store-bought canned sauce.
• Self-Fulfilling Prophecy: Francesca has been sent to make sure Silvio doesn't crack, and kill him if he does. Silvio is cracking because he suspects Francesca is planning to kill him. Francesca may decide to kill him once she finds out he's planning to kill her because he suspects she's planning to kill him.
• Skeleton Key: Dr. Lafayette's disguise provides an easy kill opportunity for Silvio and allows him to roam around most of the villa without any enforcers, providing several opportunities to take out Francesca.
• Stuff Blowing Up: The ICA rather helpfully supplies an explosive golf ball at the safehouse that can be added to Silvio's bucket of golf balls for an explosive kill. You can also blow up his escape plane by firing a cannonball at it as he's leaving. Professional Mode didn't include the golfball in the level until the GOTY edition update added it back in.
• Truth in Television: A customized bioweapon that targets an individual's specific DNA is plausible enough that a U.S. Congressman (who notably comes from the political party not prone to jumping on internet conspiracy theories) has raised concern about DNA testing companies selling off customers' DNA sequences so they can be used for such nefarious purposes.
• Video Game Cruelty Potential: You can murder Silvio Caruso in front of his mother's grave before tossing him into a wood chipper, or murder him while he's watching a home video of happier days and on the verge of a mental breakdown. You can also murder Francesca De Santis while dressed as her lover, possibly poisoning her during a romantic dinner, and then stuff her corpse in the same closet you stashed her dead or unconscious lover in.^note (That last bit is actually a challenge you gain level mastery for completing.)
• Well-Intentioned Extremist: Silvio believes his weapon can help the powerless defend themselves, but it's much more likely to be used as a tool of control. Subverted by Francesca, who just wants a promotion for her part in developing it, and Ether, who are covertly doing it for Providence.
• Wood Chipper of Doom: There's a garden shredder near the grave of Isabella Caruso, and it can be used to kill Silvio. The "Weeding The Garden" challenge explicitly asks you to dispose of his body with it.

Marrakesh: "A Gilded Cage"

47 heads to Morocco to kill Claus Hugo Strandberg, a Swedish banker who stole millions of dollars from the Moroccan people and is now hiding in the Swedish consulate at Marrakesh, as well as General Reza Zaydan, who’s currently planning on staging a coup while assisting Strandberg's escape.

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• Abusive Parents: Strandberg is one of the financial variety: listening in on one of his phone calls reveals that not only is his own daughter in the rioting crowd, but Strandberg stole her sizable trust fund.
• Accidental Truth: While plotting out his trashy spy novel, the school headmaster manages to accurately guess both General Zaydan's plot to use Strandberg to provoke a riot and that there’s a malevolent conspiracy behind Strandberg and Zaydan.
• Artistic License – Biology: A food vendor around the market can be heard shouting "Snail meat! No bones!" Since snails are invertebrates, one can only wonder why she's using that as a selling point.
• Brick Joke: One of the servants in the upstairs rooms in Sapienza's Villa Caruso complained about the time he had to construct an IKEA chair to a colleague, and had a hard time putting it together. In this level, you can find someone trying to construct the exact same chair model and is having a hard time constructing it.
• Continuity Nod: The shopkeeper whose shop hosts the consulate's escape tunnel begs the soldiers to get out, saying his previous shops were caught in a fire and had a truck crash into them. In Hitman: Absolution, the mission "Operation: Sledgehammer" has a tanker crash into a shoe shop, causing a massive fire to engulf Hope.
• Dance Party Ending: The "Dance 'til You Drop" challenge could be seen as a deadly variation on this. Dismissing all of the troops inside the school while disguised as a lieutenant summons a radio near the school's intercom. Activating both causes everyone in the school's vicinity to dance.
• Deadline News: GNN are able to interview Claus Strandberg, which gives the opportunity to kill him by dropping a hanging moose decoration on him or a bomb concealed within a camera.
• Diplomatic Impunity: The entire point of Strandberg's plotline. The Swedish consulate's staff are horrified that this is being invoked and generally react with confusion as well as disgust to Strandberg's presence.
• Does This Remind You of Anything?: A light-haired man wanted for a serious crime hiding in an embassy? Definitely fits as a fictional Julian Assange. The only differences are that public opinion is united against Strandberg, and that the Swedish government is acting in favor of the aforementioned embassy-refuge-seeker.
• The Dog Bites Back: Symbolically done by 47, who can take the role of either an embittered intern, vengeful prisoner, or disaffected schoolmaster to take revenge on Strandberg and Zaydan.
• Dungeon Bypass: As long as you have lethal poison in your inventory, you don't even need to see Zaydan's hideout. There's a small shop/room on an alleyway between the school and the embassy, which has a plate on it. Poisoning this food and then waking up a sleeping waiter near the restaurant causes him to take the food to Zaydan, which will kill him eventually.
• Easy Level Trick:
  • As stated above, you can avoid infiltrating Zaydan's hideout by poisoning a plate of food near the embassy and waking up a waiter nearby by turning on the radio. Master adds a guard near the food, but he can be distracted.
  • Getting a sniper kill on both Zaydan and Strandberg is very easy as there are easy-to-reach sniper perches overlooking both parts of the map (the top floor of the school for Zaydan, and the top floor of the Swedish Consulate for Strandberg) that give clear shots to windows that both targets will not only walk past, but oftentimes will stand at.
• Even Evil Has Loved Ones: Averted by both Strandberg and Zaydan, the former betrayed his daughter for money, the latter about to execute his best friend for trying to thwart the coup.
• Even Evil Has Standards: Even though one of the soldiers betrayed Zaydan, some (but obviously not all) feel bad for him, as he did it because his brother was one of the cops killed in the incident to break out Strandberg. Agent 47 even hears a conversation about one soldier who's "glad [he] wasn't picked for the firing squad."
  • Even the propaganda poster makers think Zaydan is scum for what he's doing.
  • Providence, too, isn't happy with Strandberg's antics, which is why they've made arrangements for Zaydan to eliminate Strandberg the moment he leaves Morocco.
• Evil Plan: Strandberg steals billions of dollars from the people of Morocco, escapes thanks to mercenaries (actually Zaydan's soldiers), takes refuge in the Swedish embassy, then plans to escape to Argentina with Zaydan's help. Zaydan, having made the government look weak, will overthrow it and replace it with a military dictatorship. It's actually Providence's plan.
• False Flag Operation: General Zaydan is pulling one of these by bankrupting the Moroccan economy with his pawn Strandberg in order to trigger widespread rioting so he can, in turn, justify a military coup. They're actually both agents of Providence. More specifically, he's having fake propaganda printed to connect the riots to a wholly unrelated Pan-African liberation movement that isn't actually active in the area.
• Freeze-Frame Bonus: The news ticker briefly seen in the mission briefing features a couple of Call Backs to the previous missions: Novikov's death has caused Sanguine's popularity to skyrocket (which in turn caused Sebastian Sato to resign), and Ether Industries' stock prices have plunged, presumably because of the destruction of the virus and the deaths of two of its best scientists.
• Fortune Teller: 47 can disguise as one. While it’s no better than his starting suit, there's a series of challenges associated with it.
• Genre Blind: The Constant claims conspiracies are a stupid thing to look for. This from a man who’s part of a massive conspiracy to control the world. Of course, this could just be him appreciating the fact that the sheer absurdity of the concept of Providence has proven to be an effective cover... mostly.
• Gilded Cage: The mission is named as such because 47 must kill corrupt banker Claus Strandberg, who amassed billions of dollars on behalf of Providence to provoke riots in the streets, and his partner General Reza Zaydan, who wants to use said riots to establish a military coup and dictatorship. What wasn’t part of the plan was Strandberg stealing all the money for himself, hence the riot outside the consulate. Without a military figurehead capable of becoming a dictator, the plans are terminated.
• Good Cannot Comprehend Evil: Many of the Swedish consulate staff are confused at Strandberg's presence in the embassy. Generally, they're assuming the head of the embassy is doing it because Strandberg's innocent until proven guilty. The idea their diplomat has just been bribed by Strandberg or Providence never occurs to them.
• Guide Dang It!: While poisoning the food of most targets is fairly straightforward, General Zaydan's food is far away from him and requires 47 to wake up a sleeping waiter (who is nowhere near said food or Zaydan), with no hint that any of these things are connected together. This assassination method is also not an Opportunity, so it won't be marked for you by the game. On the other hand, knowing what to do and having the tools to do it makes this a Game-Breaking Dungeon Bypass.
• Hated by All: Nobody likes Strandberg... which is all part of the plan. Even the interview with him is meant to reinforce this. This also applies to Zaydan to a lesser extent, as none of the men under his command respect him and secretly insult him behind his back.
• Hidden in Plain Sight: If 47 can get inside the embassy undetected in his suit, he can walk among the workers, who are also wearing suits. However, every guard can see through the act, so moving around is still difficult, the lower floor is very difficult to navigate around, and every stairway is guarded, so getting to the upper floors requires you to find a route through the back offices.
• I Can't Hear You: Masseur Konny Engstrom is speaking with his contact through the phone. Turning on the TV nearby causes him to be unable to hear anything, promptly ending the call.
• Is This Thing Still On?: In Zaydan's hideout, two soldiers are shit-talking him while sitting in front of the school's PA microphone. It's off, but 47 can easily change that...
• Janitor Impersonation Infiltration: You can disguise yourself as the janitor by subduing them or taking the disguise in one of the back-rooms. One of the challenges for starting a mission as the janitor is called "You gotta start somewhere..."
• Meaningful Name: The mission name refers to the "Gilded Cage"; when someone is trapped in a place of luxury, but cannot leave either because they're forced to stay inside or, in the case of Strandberg, has a riot outside the front doors of the consulate he's taken refuge in.
• Military Coup: Zaydan plans to escalate the unrest in Morocco to justify taking over the country.
• Never My Fault: A lieutenant can be heard badmouthing Zaydan to his colleague in front of the school's PA system. Turn it on, and when Zaydan inevitably comes, the lieutenant rebuts his role by saying his friend "said all kinds of nasty shit" despite mostly agreeing with what he said.
• Newhart Phonecall: All the levels have these to some degree, but this level is quite unique in that the people on the phone are in the consulate, a fair few of them being just regular office staff, and they're extremely stressed out due to the riots outside and have to call to cancel arrangements or reassure people they're okay.
  • A woman on the bottom floor is being raked over the coals by a bride because she's going to missing a bride-to-be's wedding, and while it starts out as a minor argument, it turns ugly real fast, as the bride on the other end of the phone will not take no for an answer, leading to a strawman argument about being jealous of an ex-lover from high school, and finally, the hatred of the color pink.
  • The masseur keeps trying to contact "Donald" in an attempt to get out of the consulate, and gets nowhere fast.
  • A man upstairs is calling his son to check on him. The father attempts to explain to his son what's happening in simple kid-friendly terms, and tries to downplay the military presence as the soldiers keeping the protesters safe, well-fed, and hydrated, and assures his son to not be worried for his father. For a piece of incidental background dialogue, it's a surprisingly heartfelt moment between father and son.
  • There’s also a soldier in the school arguing with his ex-wife and trying to make amends, to no avail.
• No Honor Among Thieves: Providence and Zaydan fully intend to drop Claus from his plane for his crimes.
• No Kill like Overkill: One of the possible assassinations involves 47 hacking an APC and killing both targets with its autocannon, a weapon designed to take out armored vehicles. It also results in several non-target kills due to the amount of soldiers nearby.
• Not Even Bothering with the Accent: A lot of the Moroccan citizens have American accents, with the main protester sounding like he's from California. General Zaydan, despite the fact he's Moroccan and trained at West Point, sounds like he's British. None of the embassy staff sound Swedish either—averted with Claus and his masseur, though, who both sound Swedish.
• Not in This for Your Revolution:
  • 47 is tasked with preventing a military coup in Morocco by assassinating the General planning it and his banker associate who stole billions of the country's citizens' wealth. Another contract from MI6 or some peacekeeping entity? Nope! The client is a construction conglomerate who learned of the plot from an anonymous tip from the Shadow Client and is doing this solely so they won't lose their lucrative contracts with the current Moroccan government.
  • In fact, none of Zaydan's troops are particularly enthusiastic about his coup. He has little respect from his men and they're only doing it because he's their general.
  • Meta-subverted considering 47 is technically doing it for a revolution — the Shadow Client's revolution against Providence. Not that he knows or cares at this point, since the contract is legit.
• Oh, Crap!: The reaction of Director Fanin to the discovery that all of their files have been stolen.
• Powder Keg Crowd: The crowd outside the consulate are protesters demanding that Strandberg be arrested, instead of letting him hide in the Swedish consulate.
• Ripped from the Headlines: In-Universe example. You can hear the headmaster trying to shoehorn the embassy protests and a "Strandberg-like character" (recast as a Finn named Jaako Arola) into his spy novel.
• Shout-Out:
  • The achievement for dropping a moose on your target? A Room With A Moose.
  • When you're wearing the Handyman disguise, you can see that it belongs to A. Alhazred's Electronic Service.
  • One of the workers at the Swedish embassy is trying to assemble a chair and having difficulty understanding the instructions (a Brick Joke explained further up in this folder).
  • The entire level seems to be one for the Hitman: Agent 47 film, which contained an extended scene where 47 infiltrates a German embassy by allowing himself to get captured, and only escapes custody by pulling one hell of a Gambit Roulette, riling the security up, and disguising as two separate guards to escape. In this level, 47 has to infiltrate a Swedish embassy, which requires extensive use of disguising as well as sneaking past both guards and Zaydan's soldiers.
  • At one point, a guard at the Swedish consulate will thank a soldier by saying that they're not used to violent riots, stating "We're not Denmark, y'know?"; IO Interactive themselves are Danish.
  • A moroccan city, climbing across the roofs, the protagonist wearing a beige suit with a dark blue shirt beneath and a rogue general who's also a Smug Snake as one of the antagonists? Sounds exactly like one of James Bond movies, doesn't it? Even the two generals look alike!
• Soldiers at the Rear: Observing the tunnel entrance has two soldiers comment on getting to guard to tunnel itself; something that is a menial job, but otherwise favorable to both of them as it's nowhere near the riot, the coup, and it is really easy.
• Slogan-Yelling Megaphone Guy: He's there to rile up the people Waving Signs Around.
• Soundtrack Dissonance: Inside the embassy, soothing and relaxing muzak plays, while outside, a whole bunch of protesters shout out Strandberg's moral wrongdoings.
• Spanner in the Works:
  • It turns out Strandberg is actually acting as this to Providence. He stole the money without their permission and figured his connections would get him out safely. Providence is planning on having Zaydan kill him for the unnecessary complication.
  • Zaydan and Strandberg didn't take into account that a wealthy corporation would be upset by their actions, or that they'd employ an assassin to deal with them.
• Stylistic Suck: The headmaster's "airport thriller" reads like a parody of every Tom Clancy, Larry Bond, or Clive Cussler novel ever.
• Swiss-Cheese Security: Downplayed. If 47 manages to sneak his way into the consulate in his suit, he can wander around without suspicion from the other workers or Strandberg. The guards, on the other hand, will see through his disguise.
• Waving Signs Around: There's a large crowd of Moroccans protesting outside the Swedish embassy who are understandably angry that the embassy is sheltering a guy who stole 7 billion dollars from their economy.
• Xanatos Speed Chess: It's shown during the mission that Strandberg robbing the Moroccan people wasn't part of the plan. Zaydan breaking him out and planning his False Flag Operation was him trying to turn the unexpected complications to his advantage.
• You Have Outlived Your Usefulness: Providence has this planned for Strandberg. If the fact that his money has disappeared isn't enough of a clue, they're also having Zaydan throw him into the ocean as soon as his escape plane (presumably owned either by the military, Zaydan, his family or one of his associates, or another Providence affiliate; Strandberg's own jet is "mysteriously" gone) leaves Morocco.
• Zero-Approval Gambit: An unusual example, as the villain—Providence—is using another villain to achieve it.

Bangkok: "Club 27"

Jordan Cross is one of the most popular indie musicians in the world, in no part thanks to a recent scandal involving his "accidental" killing of his on-again-off-again girlfriend Hannah Highmoore, whose family has contracted the ICA to assassinate him, as well as Ken Morgan, the Cross family's crooked lawyer who has helped Jordan through the Highmoore scandal. The targets are currently staying at the opulent Himmapan Hotel in Bangkok, which is owned by Jordan's media mogul father Thomas.

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• Amoral Attorney: Ken Morgan, described by Diana as a corporate fixer, and one of the level's targets. An opportunity involves killing him while he waits to meet with a negotiation partner in a basement room.
• A Taste of Their Own Medicine: One method for killing Jordan is to throw him off the roof, much as he had done to Hannah Highmoore.
• Attack of the 50-Foot Whatever: Completing the easter egg challenge, "La Cucuracha", by playing the keyboard in the penthouse disguised as the Exterminator summons a Kaiju sized cockroach to lay waste to the city in the background.
• Badass Family: The Highmoore family, who's perfectly willing to hire the world's deadliest assassin to dole out some well-deserved extrajudicial justice.
• Batman Gambit: The Jordan Cross hit served no purpose other than drawing Cross' father away from his private island so that the Shadow Client could take him out. The ICA is not happy upon finding out about this. Ironically, the ICA used the exact same method to draw out Hayamoto in Hitman 2: Silent Assassin.
  • Diana lampshades this when talking to 47 in the airport after the mission, saying that all the contracts they did up to that point are from perfectly legitimate sources (MI6, an Ether shareholder, Hamilton-Lowe, and the Highmoore family) but seem to serve some overarching purpose to a fixer behind the scenes.
  • One of the methods to kill Ken Morgan is this. Just arrange for him and Jordan to meet. Jordan will realize that he's here at his father's behest, and well, Hannah Highmoore can attest to how lethal Jordan's temper gets when his dad comes up. Nature follows its course and Jordan pushes yet another person out of a window.
• Call-Back:
  • There are multiple conversations where 47 can overhear NPC characters with regards to previous game events:
    • Two bar patrons outside the hotel are talking about the recent deaths of Strandberg and Zaydan from the previous mission, and one of them (correctly) guesses they were both working together and were both killed to further or thwart some larger conspiracy (again, correctly).
    • Another NPC duo near the same place as above will talk about Eugene Cobb's plane going down over the Pacific Ocean despite it being a sunny day, with one commenting that his disappearance has "drawn all the conspiracy nuts out of the woodwork" after the black box wasn't found.
    • A pair of NPCs by the lounge area outside the hotel also talk about Cobb going missing (one of whom will contemplate writing a story on the missing banker, and wants to read up on it).
  • Indie drummer Abel de Silva mentions that The Class are the biggest band since The Franchise, the name of the antagonist group from Blood Money.
  • 47 can get access to a hotel room by a woman attracted to him, similar to a scenario that happens in "A House of Cards" in Blood Money.
• Caught on Tape: The audio found in the safe is of the argument that led to Jordan killing Hannah was recorded, which The Class's manager Dexy is using to blackmail Thomas (as the tape reveals Jordan sought her help in covering up the murder). The audio drive can be used to lure Jordan to his room for a confrontation.
• Chekhov's Gunman: The Highmoore family, the mission's clients, are the people that Helmut Kruger was assigned to spy on for IAGO in Paris. That cyanide pill suddenly makes a lot of sense.
• Coconut Meets Cranium: A challenge involves crushing both targets with coconuts. There's also a few coconuts around the hotel that can be used as a thrown weapon.
• Coincidental Disguise-Complementing Trait: 47 has the option of impersonating prospective drummer Abel de Silva in the hopes of getting close enough to assassinate Jordan Cross. However, once he's reached the recording studio in the Himmapan Hotel's penthouse suite, 47 will have to demonstrate his skills to lull Cross into a false sense of security... and by an unbelievable stroke of luck, 47 turns out to be an incredibly skilled drummer. Impressed by his skills, Cross takes him aside for a private chat - leaving the rockstar-turned-murderer in the perfect position to be flung to his death from the hotel rooftop.
• Continuity Nod: Activating the sound system in the Emperor Suite plays "Ave Maria".
• Convenient Escape Boat: The front of the hotel has one.
• Cutting Off the Branches: Strandberg's interview in "A Gilded Cage" does go through, as bystanders in the bar talk about it at length, specifically mentioning the Precision F-Strike he uses to rile the protesters up. This confirms that 47 disguises as a cameraman to get close to him.
• Died on Their Birthday: 47 is tasked with assassinating rockstar Jordan Cross on his 27th birthday. Diana even lampshades the fact that many music stars have died at age 27.
• Difficult, but Awesome: The kitchen staff disguise. It has a large number of enforcers inside the building, making traversing the map rather perilous, but with the disguise, Morgan can easily be disposed of by poisoning his food and Cross can be smothered with his cake, making the level extremely simple with cautious movement.
• Easy Level Trick:
  • The easiest way of eliminating Ken Morgan is by poisoning any plate of food on display at the restaurant, as Morgan will eat from every plate of food, regardless of which one you poison, so he will eventually be killed. No one else will usually notice the food being poisoned either, although Master adds an extra chef who can be distracted beforehand.
  • Disguising yourself as the exterminator already provides a convenient way to get Jordan out of his isolated suite, but if you then change into a staff disguise, talk to Morgan and lead him to Cross, not only will both targets head up alone to Morgan's own isolated suite with none of their bodyguards, but if you wait around long enough, Cross will end up doing half your work for you!
  • Like in Marrakesh, sniping Morgan and Cross is very easy. Morgan can be sniped from the balcony outside 47's suite (meaning he can be taken out less than one minute into the mission), and from there, the 3rd floor suite where Cross can be sniped is just a quick pipe shimmy away. And while the suite's main floor with the most convenient sniping spot is filled with hotel staff, the suite's upper floor is completely deserted save for one easily-incapacitated stalker, and provides an only slightly more awkward vantage point to snipe Cross.
• Empty Room Psych: Bangkok's many civilian hotel rooms are largely just set-dressing and really don't serve much purpose (the exception being Jackie Carringtons' room which contains a tech crew disguise). Even in Contracts mode, half of the rooms are empty and behind restricted areas, not to mention requiring a keycard to access to begin with, making them undesirable to lure targets or use the room for hiding bodies.
• Even Evil Has Standards: Dexy sums up her client's horrible personality by telling him that even by her standards, he's probably the most cruel person she's ever seen.
• External Combustion: The "Tik Tuk" Mission Story involves 47 using this to dispose of Ken Morgan. He's looking to purchase a souvenir tuk-tuk from one of the hotel staff, who can be found trying (unsuccessfully) to repair it. You can repair the engine with a wrench, then pierce the oil drum next to the vehicle to create a pool of flammable liquid which ignites when Morgan returns and starts the engine.
• Fake Band: "The Class", one of the biggest indie acts in the world. IOI even created an album for the band—"Providence" — featuring three songs, including the one you can hear if you attend one of their jam sessions in the game. One of the bellhops in the tunnels is singing to "Shine a Light", and all the tracks eventually make their way to be heard in-game in Hitman 3's Freelancer mode.
• Fake Difficulty: This level is somewhat infamous for its cruel security placement on both difficulty levels, to the point where it starts to feel contrived. On normal difficulty, the main issue is that the security footage is stored in a security-restricted room in the second floor of the band's side of the hotel (meaning that if you're caught on camera, you pretty much need to obtain a security disguise and a matching keycard, or outright restart if you're going for Suit Only). On Professional, the game also makes the boat exit a restricted area and adds multiple guards and a camera to the second-easiest exit, and rubs it in further in by adding yet another camera guarding the security tapes (forcing you to shoot it in a room full of guards). The security booth behind the hotel did originally have another recording storage (not that it was any easier to reach without a guard outfit), which was removed in an early patch for 2016.
• Happy Birthday to You!: The celebrants at Jordan's birthday party sing what sounds like a birthday version of "We Wish You A Merry Christmas" ("Happy Birthday" was still in copyright when the level was released, and wouldn't be public domain for another month in the US).
• Hidden Depths:
  • When 47 disguises himself as Abel de Silva, Jordan Cross asks him to demonstrate his skill at a drum set in the recording studio. Turns out 47 can bang out a good beat.
  • If disguised as one of the sound mixers, 47 will be asked to do some sound mixing before Jordan arrives. He's good enough to impress Wes Liston, the person in charge of recording.
  • If 47 inspects Jordan's suite while disguised as the Exterminator, he can "blend in" by playing a surprisingly funky rendition of "La Cucaracha" on a keyboard.
• History Repeats: You can get Jordan to more or less re-enact Hannah Highmoore's murder on Ken Morgan. Just get the two to meet in the lobby. Jordan will get mad and they'll go to Ken's suite to talk. Ken will reveal that Dexy was spying on him and, like Hannah, end up reminding Jordan that his dad's the real power in his life. Like before, Jordan will snap and push Ken out of a window, only to immediately realize how he fucked up and call someone for help (his dad in this case).
• Irony: Out of the missions, this is the first one in which neither of the two targets is plotting to kill the other, yet is the only one where you can make one of them do so.
• Joke Character: The stalker disguise turns the entire level into a hostile area. Outside of the "Smooth Operator" and "Chameleon" challenges that require it to be worn, wearing it is ill-advised, since the Queen Suite's exit is guarded and because stealthily exiting the hotel is tricky.
• Knockout Gas: 47 can poison the hotel's ventilation system with insecticide, thus knocking out everyone within the atrium.
• Loony Fan: Someone obsessed with guitarist Heidi Santoro can be found on the top floor of the Queen Suite spying on her. A phone call between his friend suggests that he was previously caught stalking a celebrity before. His disguise can be taken, but outside of two challenges ("Smooth Operator", which requires killing Morgan and Cross disguised as him, and the "Chameleon" challenge), the disguise is useless as it turns the map into a hostile area.
• MacGuffin: The audio tape of Jordan and Hannah's last argument that led to her murder, referred to as the Smoking Gun. Dexy confiscated it from Jordan after he became obsessed with listening to it, and is blackmailing both Morgan and Thomas Cross with it, as it reveals that Jordan called her to tamper with the crime scene.
• Meaningful Name: The mission name is in reference to the "27 Club", as the contract takes place on Jordan Cross's birthday — this is also mentioned in-game by the staff, and even Diana lampshades it in the briefing calling it "The age when rockstars die".
• Mood Whiplash: Jordan Cross is very happy when he discovers a birthday party held for him. The next part plays in two different ways, depending on whether 47 manages to poison the cake beforehand or not:
  • If the cake isn't poisoned, a celebrant points out the cake was ordered to be delivered by his father. As the other roadies tell the former he practically ruined the party, Dexy asks everyone to leave Jordan alone as the latter furiously rants about how it's another sign of his father asserting his authority.
  • If the cake is poisoned, Jordan is delighted with the "Algerian dates" incorporated into the cake. The same guy from before makes the same remark, but this time, Jordan is happy... until the poison kicks in. If lethal, a Pre-Mortem One-Liner shows how stunned he is to (wrongfully) learn his father actually killed him.
• Paper-Thin Disguise: 47 is tall and muscular, with pale skin, ice-blue eyes, and Northern European features. He's passable just about anywhere in the world as a bodyguard, but as a hotel bellhop in Thailand, not so much.
• Royal Brat: Jordan's father Thomas is a billionaire entrepreneur. Walking around the level sparks several NPC conversations about how wealthy he is and how his son was led into the attitude he's into now because of that wealth.
• Serious Business: The ICA's neutrality: once they realize the Shadow Client had been manipulating them to carry out his own agenda, they immediately mark him for elimination, despite there being no money involved (in fact, if anything he's been helping the ICA get more lucrative 47 contracts).
• Smoking Gun: The audio tape which reveals that Jordan accidentally murdered Hannah during their argument and called Dexy after to tamper with the crime scene. It also serves as a MacGuffin as Dexy, Morgan and Thomas Cross seek to obtain the tape.
• Surprise Party: Thomas Cross arranges a surprise birthday party to his son. As part of the opportunities, 47 can make it his target's last.
• Title Drop: The episode title is "Club 27". A few NPCs speak about the alleged "Club 27", where stars that turn 27 die shortly after. Jordan turns 27 by the day the episode is set in, and he's one of the targets.
  Diana: [briefing 47] After all, today is Jordan Cross' 27th birthday. The age when rock stars die.
• Unusually Uninteresting Sight: If Morgan gets killed by Jordan, he plummets onto the hotel entrance's garden. Despite there being a groundskeeper and guard near where he lands, his body is never discovered. This is presumably so the game registers his death as an accidental kill.
• The Alleged Car: One opportunity for assassinating Ken Morgan involves a broken-down tuk-tuk.

Colorado: "Freedom Fighters"

Having discovered the existence of the "Shadow Client", the ICA manages to track down one of his cells in Colorado, and sends 47 over to investigate. While there, he must also kill four of the Shadow Client's top lieutenants: Sean Rose, a notorious Australian ecoterrorist the ICA believes to be the Shadow Client; Ezra Berg, an Israeli interrogations expert; Maya Parvati, former Tamil Tiger turned pirate turned terrorist; and Penelope Graves, former Interpol agent.

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• Action Girl: Per Diana, Maya Parvati is a "former terrorist turned insurgent". She demonstrates a lot of mental strength when held at gunpoint, as well as willing to constantly butt heads with Sean Rose if it weren't for him being the leader.
• Acceptable Breaks from Reality: The 3D printer in the hackers' den can print out an accurate mask of Sean Rose's face that's good enough to fool biometric scanners, and takes less than ten seconds to print. While the existence of such masks is Truth in Television, Real Life 3D printers take considerably longer to do such work (as in, 10 hours or more, not 10 seconds).
• Balance Buff: The Legacy iterations played in Hitman 2 onward change any loud accident kill on a target to not cause a target lockdown. One of the main criticisms of this level in 2016 is that this was not the case, and the militia would take ages to settle down again.
• Badass Israeli: Ezra Berg is a former Mossad interrogator, fired because he wanted to take his interrogation techniques to uncomfortable extremes. Despite this, his personality of being gentle and soft-spoken is in stark contrast when compared to his partners.
• Borrowed Biometric Bypass: The tornado shelter is sealed by a biometric lock that requires Sean Rose's face. You have to 3D print a mask of Sean Rose's face to get in.
• Clock Tampering: 47 can mess with the grandfather clock in the house to help trigger a neurotic episode for Sean Rose.
• Convenient Escape Boat: One possible escape has an outrigger with a small speedboat engine on it. It's one of the few boats in the trilogy that doesn't require a key to use.
• Crazy-Prepared: After Penelope Graves finds out Interpol tracked her down to the military base (which, in fact, didn't happen at all), she goes into a fact-check monologue listing every action she accomplished to make sure she left absolutely zero evidence behind her. Alas, the ICA still caught her.
• Cruelty Is the Only Option: One kill requires you to pump the Herald in the basement full of drugs used for torture, so the target decides to upgrade the next batch. You can't enter the room he's in and the glass is bulletproof, so killing him is not an option either.
• Crippling Overspecialisation: The chef disguise. Its sole purpose is to let you freely poison someone's glass, making the disguise a bit of a Joke Character. Other than that, it's identical to the regular mercenaries in terms of where you can go in the compound.
• Damned By a Fool's Praise: One of the militiamen, clearly a little unstable, converses with another about a number of topics, only to be rebuffed as needing professional help. The topics include his learning to breathe underwater, asking about what part of the body to shoot to disable somebody in graphic detail, and a glowing endorsement of "that billionaire presidential candidate with a famous hairdo".
• Defector from Decadence: The reason Penelope Graves joined the terrorists is because she was fed up with how much corruption had entrenched Interpol.
• Dream Team: The Freedom Fighters is a militia that can carry out any type of terrorist attack, ranging from cyberterrorism to chemical bombs thanks to the targets being experts in explosives, hacking, guerrilla warfare, and chemical torture. ICA believes that their leader Sean Rose is the Shadow Client, since his group would have the resources to pull it off, and it's partly true—the Shadow Client does employ them, but said individual isn't Sean Rose.
• Equal-Opportunity Evil: Members of the militia come from all sorts of national and racial backgrounds, and at least two women are in prominent positions.
• Everyone Is Armed: Everyone but the four targets has weapons; even the on-site chef has a gun.
• Fake Defector: A fake Interpol agent (or 47, if he's able to get the fake Interpol badge) meets with Penelope Graves and convince her to join them back, at least so she'd work as a mole. She declines the offer, until she learns it was ultimately a Secret Test of Character made up by Sean Rose, subverting the trope.
• Foreshadowing: This level is a very good source of Hitman lore, as events referenced here come back to be used as story beats or as part of some set up as events in later games or lore material:
  • Penelope Graves may mention "Blue Seed Agriculture". Blue Seed was the company that contracted Providence to send 47 and 6 to kill the Burnwood family, and the company "Blue Seed Pharmaceuticals" can later be seen advertised in Hitman 2's "The Finish Line" in Miami, on billboards and a racing car.
  • If Graves and Berg talk to one another, Berg will call Rose a monster, and Graves won't believe "The Boss" (The Shadow Client) to be a monster either. Grey mentions after Mumbai that "sometimes even monsters serve a purpose", alluding to this conversation.
  • "The Maelstrom" is mentioned by two separate guard groups; the Maelstrom would later become a target in Hitman 2's "Chasing a Ghost" mission in Mumbai.
    • A siege on a supertanker is mentioned, as well as the war on a Hamsun Oil^*a Providence-affiliated company rig. Both incidents are recalled to the player in the briefing of "Chasing a Ghost".
  • Olivia Hall is mentioned here as part of the Shadow Client's cyberterrorism division. While she's mentioned in this mission's briefing, she becomes much more important to the story later on.
  • The final cutscene of the level has the Shadow Client set up events later shown as the "Minnulescu Incident" in Agent 47: Birth of the Hitman; a comic series which was made after this game released. His words imply that him and 47 killed some wardens in a remote village and got caught, and he drops heavy hints that he knows 47 "better than anyone". The wardens in question were from "The Institute for Human Betterment", a precursor asylum to the Satu Mare Facility otherwise seen in Codename 47, and the wardens were sent to recapture two young boys; 47 and 6, the latter of which is revealed in Hitman 2 and in the comic to be The Shadow Client, explaining why he knows 47 and his movements so well.
  • "The Chameleon"'s Richard Foreman was mentioned by various guards while roaming around the compound several months before he became an Elusive Target.
  • Two hackers working in the house mention a vault in New York (referring to the vault The Shadow Client raided after Marrakesh). Another bank would be raided by 47 in Hitman 2 for information on The Partners.
  • William Candler, the Herald in the basement of the farmhouse, is being interrogated by Ezra with frequent drug doses, and this does get Ezra some answers. Candler describes "The Constant" as deliberately looking like an accountant, and, much to Berg's frustration, has no further knowledge to give on The Partners or Providence in general and actively taunts him to break his mind.
  • Two militants near the orchard mention a Noel Crest arriving earlier. Crest would later become a target in Hitman 3 after usurping Grey as the militia's leader.
• I Know You're Watching Me: Downplayed. In the ending cutscene, 47 appears to turn and stare down the Shadow Client, who's looking at him through a very long-distance sniper scope. What's more, after the Shadow Client removes his finger from the rifle's trigger, 47 turns back around and continues on his way like nothing happened, giving off this effect.
• It's Personal: The mission has no client this time except Providence indirectly pulling the strings; the ICA wants the militia's prominent figures dead since they're suspected of breaking the agency's neutrality. Although Sean Rose already had a contract on his head for his past terrorist attack.
• Leaning on the Fourth Wall: The soldiers by the main gate may mention a few videos of Hitman players doing weird things, and one's portrayed as quite the conspiracy nut:
  • One such incident is that 70 people died in a fashion show in Paris because of a faulty wire in a puddle. This is in reference to several videos that had players do this, as the generator outside of the dressing rooms can be turned on and off with impunity.
  • Another incident may mention someone being killed with an explosion in Sapienza, sending them sky-high and into the well.
  • And finally, another incident mentions players killing everyone in Sapienza, and there were claims it was a cover-up of some kind.
• Meaningful Name: The mission is named after Freedom Fighters, a game IO Interactive made back in the early 2000's about controlling AI army and militia teammates — itself named after the ideology of "fighting for the free world".
• Multinational Team: 47's targets are an Australian, an Israeli, a Sri Lankan, and a Brit, all working together on American soil. It's further mention that the compound's personnel come from all over the world.
• Mundane Utility: The militia has a fully functional high tech 3D printer in their possession, but the only apparent use they have for it is to fabricate Berg's mask. Subverted, as the masks can bypass biometric scans, which could have some use.
• Nobody Here but Us Statues: A variation; the map has several points where 47 can pose as a scarecrow.
• Obsessively Organized: Sean Rose has a couple of compulsions. He requires that his watch be synchronized with his grandfather clock and that the pencils on his desk be arranged in a line. Messing with these will agitate him and he'll have a smoke to calm down. 47 can lace his cigarettes with hallucinogens, which will make him isolate himself. He'll also wash his hands in his bathroom, which can also be used to isolate him.
• Pop-Cultural Osmosis Failure: Strangely enough, none of the militiamen, even the obviously American ones, seem to recognize Ezra Berg's mask as the reference to Halloween that it clearly is. One admits it looks like something from a horror film, but no direct allusions as to which one.
• Ragtag Bunch of Misfits: The militia unites hackers, terrorists, and CICADA soldiers, among many other different sources of defectors.
• Right-Wing Militia Fanatic: The Freedom Fighters pretend to be a militia as part of a cover for their operations. Dialogue in the "The Bookkeeper" Elusive Target mission reveals that they claim to have very left-wing beliefs (like pro-choice and pro-gay marriage) to scare off any real right-wing militia types that try to join. Additionally subverted by the fact Rose is a Marxist and Parvati was part of the LTTE (a Socialist organization).
• Scary Scarecrows: You can find a wearable scarecrow disguise in the level that lets 47 perch onto scarecrow stands to hide. The disguise has several challenges associated with it that require you to do either obscure sequences of actions or kill targets in gruesome and specific ways while wearing it, made difficult by the fact that the scarecrow disguise makes the entire map hostile to walk around.
• Secret Test of Character: One of the opportunities involves Rose wanting to test Graves's loyalty by having her be confronted by a fake Interpol agent and seeing how she reacts. Naturally, 47 can step into the man's place.
• Shout-Out:
  • The title is one to Freedom Fighters (2003), another game by IOI.
  • One of the challenge packs revolves around the Scarecrow costume. Three of the five challenges are also named after Scarecrow's lines^note They Scream, They Cry; Lighten Up; Taste of Your Own Medicine from Batman Begins.
  • In combat, a guard may yell at his colleagues to "make [47] suffer like G did!"
  • As noted above, Ezra Berg's mask looks remarkably similar to Michael Myers'.
  • There's a poster in the compounds main house that shows a cartoon film poster with a redhead in the middle of a windswept flower petal scene, and has a title and subtitle that reads: "Courage: Test your powers!", a shoutout to Frozen (2013) that features a similar-looking redhead and story motivation.
• South Asian Terrorists: One of 47's targets is Maya Parvati, an ex-LTTE fighter before she left Sri Lanka after it was defeated in an all-out offensive by the Sri Lankan military and became a mercenary. At one point, she was a pirate who operated in the South China Sea.
• String Theory: Rose and the Shadow Client have set up corkboards covered in pictures and string tracking both Providence's members and hierarchy and 47's past missions from previous games in the tornado shelter, which 47 discovers.
• The Big Board: The tornado shelter has several bulletin boards covered in information on Providence and the ICA.
• The Mole: The contract for killing the militia leaders was fast-tracked by Erich Soders, who’s actually working for Providence.
• Tranquil Fury: Diana slips into this when she finds out Providence has compromised the ICA, once she gets over her initial shock.
• Video Game Cruelty Potential: 47 can kill people as they pass under an elevated car receiving repair, by releasing the suspension and letting it slowly rise back up. Two challenges involve killing Maya Parvati this way, along with 5 other targets (the only way of achieving it is through user-created contracts), rewarding 5000 mastery points each.
• Western Terrorists: Many members of the militia hail from the Western world. Its leader, Sean Rose, is an Australian eco-terrorist.
• Wham Episode: It's revealed that not only is Providence real, they have infiltrated the ICA, and Erich Soders—Diana's former mentor and the ICA's training director—is one of their operatives.
  • We also learn that a militia team led by Sean Rose was actually involved in the kidnapping of Thomas Cross himself, presumably hired by the Shadow Client.
  • The Shadow Client has also been tracking 47 since he began working for the ICA, and has known him since they were children.
• Wham Line: After 47 finds an incriminating photograph on the desk in the tornado shelter, Diana has this to say:
  Diana: ...Soders? But that would mean... Providence has infiltrated ICA. And Erich Soders is their operative. Bastard!

Hokkaido: "Situs Inversus"

Having discovered that Erich Soders is a Providence mole, the ICA decides to get rid of him. However, he has been fast-tracked to the high-tech GAMA Medical Facility in Hokkaido, which is heavily guarded and nigh-impossible for the ICA to infiltrate. The result is that 47 must go in with absolutely nothing and find a way to conduct the hit. He is also tasked with killing Yuki Yamazaki, a lawyer with ties to the Yakuza and Providence who is underseeing Soders' defection.

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• Artistic License – Biology: In-game, fugu poison works like the lethal poison you put in food and drinks elsewhere in the game. In reality, ill-prepared fugu paralyzes the victim first as it's a tetrodotoxin (neurotoxin), after which they rapidly start to suffocate to death. It can even be survived if the victim either ate a small amount and/or receives immediate medical attention, something the GAMA facility can provide as it's a high-tech hospital. The fugu toxin also takes a lot of time to kick in; one of the reasons it's so deadly in reality is that people tend to eat it for supper, and the toxin kicks in a few hours later during the victim's sleep, killing them without them being able to get help or treatment.
• Artistic License – Medicine: Situs Inversus patients can receive non-mirrored heart transplants. While the surgery in question is much more complicated, a place like GAMA would surely be able to employ someone capable of performing it.
• As Long as It Sounds Foreign: A pretty easy to miss one, but the TVs in the rooms are manufactured by "Mitsaki", likely a play on Mitsubushi. "Tsa" is not a native Japanese syllable, and it's incredibly rare to hear it outside of loanwords.
• A Taste of Power: The "The Dexter Discordance" Escalation contract features the Striker (see Hand Cannon below), with which the player has to perform kills. It can be added to their inventory after they complete the escalation.
• Auto Doc: The GAMA facility is equipped with a state-of-the-art robotic surgical suite that can perform complicated surgical procedures under the direction of the KAI artificial intelligence (with appropriate human supervision). As one of the mission targets is currently put under while undergoing surgery in this surgical suite, there are a variety of ways to sabotage the robotic armatures and medicinal feeds to execute him.
  • Comes equipped with a Magical Defibrillator. It quickly and unfailingly resuscitates a flat-lining patient. The patient can be killed by overcharging it.
• Badass Boast: Given by the Providence Constant to Diana, after she tells him the Shadow Client is only a terrorist if they win.
  The Constant: Miss Burnwood. We won a long time ago. This? This is maintenance.
• Book Ends: Much like in Paris's "The Showstopper" mission, 47's greater goal in this mission is to prevent a confidential NOC list from falling into the wrong hands, specifically a list of ICA agents. 47 also reuses his cover identity "Tobias Rieper", and his uncanny resemblance to Helmut Kruger also comes up again.
• Call-Back:
  • 47 can kill Yuki by poisoning her sushi with fugu poison. For added irony, her profile directly states that it was the Hayamotos' assassination that started the chain of events that led her to be where she is today. The challenge name itself is a call back: "Sushi, Honshu Style".
  • Another option for killing Yuki is to crank up the steam room's temperature and lock her inside, as could be done to Fritz Fuchs in Codename 47 and Contracts.
  • One challenge involves pushing Yuki off a balcony while she smokes. One of the cleanest ways to eliminate Chad Bingham, Jr. in Blood Money is by luring him to a balcony to smoke, then pushing him off. On top of that, both "You Better Watch Out" and "Situs Inversus" take place in luxurious but isolated buildings built into a snowy mountainside.
  • Agent Carlton Smith can be found trapped in the morgue. In the ensuing conversation, he'll note that he now owes you for saving him three times,^*(though this is at least the fourth time you've saved him) and specifically mentions the clinic in Blood Money. He even wears his trademark "outfit".
  • If you tamper with the Curator's mood-enhancing chip, he becomes agitated and talks about "a place for everything and everything in its proper place". Sean Rose in Colorado says the same thing.
  • One patient, Jason Portman, is having plastic surgery to look like Helmut Kruger. If he sees 47, he thinks he stole his idea. Stealing Helmut's identity was one of the Opportunities in "The Showstopper".
  • The doctor escorting Portman to his checkup mentions that GAMA is the most advanced medical facility in the world, aside from Kronstadt HQ and the Ether R&D facility in Johannesburg. The latter was where the Shadow Client killed one of the keybearers at Ether to access the Providence information vault in New York.
  • If you upload Soders' kill list to Dr. Laurent's computer, one of the kills that he'll comment on is Soders' hit on Jasper Knight, the basis for the final training level.
• Chekhov's Boomerang: 47's Celebrity Resemblance to Helmut Kruger comes in handy again since it allows him to impersonate Jason Portman, who just got plastic surgery to resemble the male model.
• Cruel and Unusual Death:
  • The table on which Soders is waiting for surgery can be used for several rather disturbing kills, such as draining his blood out, repeatedly stabbing him with reckless abandon, and tainting his cells with poison. One kill leaves even Diana unable to comment, as while the target had it coming, it might have been a bit too much.
  • Another way to take him out is to destroy the heart he's preparing to have transplanted. His medical condition means that the donor hearts he can receive are precious few, and destroying the heart that could be found will condemn him to a slow, painful death.
• Developer's Foresight: You can use any poison to ruin Soders' stem cells; while sedative poison doesn't appear anywhere on the level, if you bring some in with you, it'll have the same effect as any other poison for this opportunity.
• Driven to Suicide: If you screw around with the manual remote to the Curator's experimental neurotransmitter-controlling neurochip, you can either send him into a manic episode or drive him into a deep depression where he has a Heel Realization and throws himself off a cliff.
• Easy Level Trick: Wearing the Director's disguise provides very straightforward kill opportunities on both targets:
  • Talking to Yamazaki while dressed as the Director immediately draws her to a secluded location where she can be easily killed.
  • The disguise provides the most direct route to sabotaging KAI as a way to kill Soders.
• Foreshadowing:
  • The briefing for this mission mentions Haven corporate services as a means for Providence to get to ICA contacts around the world. This would later turn out to be HAVEN Island, an island resort that runs a service that takes in clients and essentially starts their life anew by deleting their past.
  • The aforementioned Kronstadt HQ and Ether R&D facility in Johannesburg are of great importance in the following game. The former is visited by 47 to kill Providence defectors Robert and Sierra Knox, while the latter is visited by the Shadow Client in a cutscene to grab the antidote to 47's mind wipe, and he blows part of the facility up as well.
• Gameplay and Story Segregation: Hokkaido is a No-Gear Level, the justification being that GAMA is a high-security facility and 47 is unable to smuggle items in. This is despite one starting location option to sneak into the premises via a backdoor mountain pass which logically should have bypassed any security. Even more extreme is that once you reach mastery level 20, this restriction is lifted and you are now free to bring in whatever you like with no explanation how.
• Hospital Paradiso: GAMA is one of the most cutting-edge hospitals on Earth. Since it caters to a very wealthy clientele, it looks like a cross between a sci-fi hospital (with an AI overseer) and a Japanese resort (complete with a zen garden, hot spring, and sushi bar).
• I Just Want to Be You: Portman's desire to look exactly like Helmut Kruger. The surgeons note that their different facial structures make this difficult to do. 47 can take Portman's place on post-surgery checkup, and the surgeon is more than overjoyed by the fact that there's no bruises or cuts on "Portman's" new face.
  • If their paths cross, Portman berates 47 for "stealing his idea".
• It's Personal:
  • Another contract on the house, but this time there is more at stake, as Soders gave client info and agreed to deliver the names of the active ICA agents after his demands are met.
  • One of the more involved methods of assassinating Soders is by showing the head surgeon proof that his patient was responsible for his father's death, thereby convincing him to deliberately screw up the transplant.
• Meaningful Name: "Situs Inversus" is in reference to Soders' heart condition.
• Morally Ambiguous Doctorate: The morgue doctors locked Smith in a freezer possibly to be harvested. There’s also one master surgeon who’s a drug addict.
  • The Curator especially; he seems to do regular business with organ harvesters to the point of speaking with them jovially over his cell phone.
• McNinja: It's possible to start the mission in a stereotypical ninja outfit, complete with a katana and shuriken. There are several challenges related to this.
  • Amusingly, 47's usual MO is far more similar to real-life ninjas than most pop culture depictions.
• Mountaintop Healthcare: The GAMA clinic is situated in the mountains of Hokkaido.
• No-Gear Level: Initially, you're not allowed to bring any equipment with you because the location is highly secure, and no agency pickup locations are unlocked right away. You do gain access to pickups when you level up your mastery, though, and once you max it out, your gear slots are unlocked.
• No Kill like Overkill: A pair of challenges involve destroying Soders' donor heart and killing him by some other means in the same playthrough.
• Non-Indicative Difficulty: One of the challenges of a Suit Only run on this stage is that many doors only open for people wearing the right outfit; not being able to change 47's outfit means the most common routes through the level are cut off to the player. However, Master difficulty adds an extra guard near the sauna who isolates himself right next to a door that requires a guard uniform. This door directly leads to a console needed for the sauna opportunity kill for Yuki Yamazaki. This means killing Yamazaki without changing disguises is actually much easier on the highest difficulty, because without the guard, the only way to that console is to sneak through the heavily guarded garage.
• Organ Theft: It's made pretty clear that the heart the target needed was not a donation, as the briefing shows two people walking out of a slum with a gun and a cooler. Interpol even sent an agent (Smith) to investigate the theft, only for him to end up getting captured and locked in the morgue covered in surgery markings, heavily implying that his organs will be taken as well.
• Playing Possum: 47 can lie down on the morgue trolleys and play dead to blend in. In fact, achieving level 17 mastery will unlock the morgue as a starting location, where 47 has been smuggled in as a "corpse".
• Sauna of Death: It's possible for 47 to kill Yuki by tricking her into entering a lethally warm sauna and then trapping her inside it.
• Separated by a Common Language: One of the guards near the ski lift comments about Yamazaki "losing her fags" (British slang for cigarettes, but also a homophobic slur) on her ride to the hospital.
• Shout-Out:
  • One NPC mixes up Helmut Kruger and Freddy Krueger.
  • KAI is already a clear Expy of HAL, but the parody becomes even more clear when 47's sabotage causes a Red Ring of Death, mimicking HAL's "eye".
    • When you sabotage KAI, she starts rambling about her hope that the cake she was promised would be provided.
  • A yellow motorcyclist outfit identical to The Bride's iconic outfit from Kill Bill^note (itself a Shout-Out to Game of Death) can be obtained from a corpse in the morgue. There are a number of Kill Bill-themed challenges involving the outfit and a katana that can also be obtained in the level.
  • The music playing on the radios can also be heard in Kane and Lynch: Dog Days; tracks like Chinese Diva, Mandarin Dreams, Red Love Affair, and Watermills (which plays in the cafe).
  • Jason Portman can be heard asking, "Where's my Wolverine healing factor?" if you let him have his bandages unwrapped.
  • The names on the scoreboard of the Doki Doki Pow Pow! dancing mat game are in fact references to various people: "Rocco" (the kitchen chef from Sapienza), "Hiro" (the lead character in Mini Ninjas), "Matsudasan" (named after the CEO of Square Enix), "HHCHunter, White000, and Lillithakuma" (all Hitmanforum usernames), "Adam "Kane" Marcus" and "James Seth Lynch" (the leads of the Kane & Lynch series), A. Smith (Agent Smith), and "Aggemam" (an obscure Danish band member of Gramsespektrum), while "Onkel Nick" is a reference to IOI cinematic artist Nick Andersen.
  • The level being set in Japan means it's rife for a bunch of Mini Ninjas references:
    • The "Young Hiro" challenge involves killing 5 targets with shuriken while disguised as a ninja.
    • An Easter Egg tasks you with needing to shoot eight Mini Ninjas figurines; several of Hiro, Suzume and Futo, which can be found in and around GAMA in specific places that appear one after the other. Completing this will erupt the mountain and turn it into a volcano.
    • The opening musical cue when using the Ninja entrance is the exact musical cue for starting Level 1 of Mini Ninjas.
    • Level 1's music from Mini Ninjas can be heard in the Waiting room near the Operating theater, being piped into the room while a bunch of Bodyguards wait for Soders's operation.
    • If one does the Mini Ninjas Easter Egg, astute players will notice that Suzume's model has a red headband instead of a dark green one, while Futo is missing his Domino Mask. This is because their designs were altered to fit the then-new 2015 animated series' version of the ninjas, not the ones seen in the game.
• Skeleton Key: Getting the Hospital Director's disguise or acquiring the keycard from Smith acts as this. Like with Helmut Kruger and the Sheikh, the Director's disguise lets you anywhere in the level, giving you free access to all areas of the facility and literally opening all doors, and no one is an Enforcer to you on the level.
• Team Switzerland: The reason Soders is a target is because the ICA wants to keep themselves neutral.
• This Cannot Be!: The head surgeon utters something to this effect upon learning of his father's murder at Soders' hands.
  Dr. Laurent: That's strange, I don't remember leaving my— What is this? "Erich Soders, active 1973-1981. List of contracts." Contracts?
  [later]
  Dr. Laurent: "April 1978"... "Roman Laurent"? [Beat] No. Nooo, no no no no no, it can't be. Where the hell did thi—is someone trying to tell me... [deep breath] ...Erich Soders murdered my father?
• "Ugly American" Stereotype: There's a patient named Amos Dexter, an obnoxious, alcoholic Texan who tries to enter restricted areas, only to be refused by the security guard. Amos rants about how he should be able to go anywhere he wants because he's an American and America is the world's security. After the guard still denies him entry, Amos calls him a commie.
• Wham Line: The beginning of the briefing:
  Diana: Good morning, 47. The board has sanctioned Erich Soders for termination.
  • Again during the ending cutscene about Ort-Meyer and his experiment.
  Constant: Well, if you believe the questions died with him, we have nothing further to discuss.
• Written by the Winners: After the Constant calls the Shadow Client a terrorist, Diana responds by saying "he's only a terrorist if you win".

Bonus Missions:

Sapienza: "The Icon"

47 has been sent to Sapienza, Italy to eliminate Dino Bosco, a washed-up actor-director currently filming the live-action adaptation of the comic book The Icon, at the request of his own company, L'Avventura Pictures—his perfectionism is driving the company closer to bankruptcy.

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• Actor Allusion: The voice actor for Dino Bosco, William Mapother, was going to replace David Bateson as the voice of 47 in Hitman: Absolution, but Bateson returned role at the last minute after fans complained. Dialogue between a pair of NPCs can be overheard where one of them is suggesting Bosco be replaced in the leading role with another actor named Dave Bateson, even claiming they'll boycott the movie until L'Avventura do so.
• Armor Is Useless: Zig-zagged. Bosco's suit is bulletproof and can withstand damage that would normally kill other targets, though it will eventually give in. On the other hand, he's not immune to bladed weapons, explosives, or the fiber wire, and his visor isn't immune to headshots.
• Bad Boss: Dino is the source of irritation among both players and the in-game NPCs. He's Hated by All among the crew, he berates everyone for not doing their jobs, and he will get on your nerves with all that loud complaining. It's easy to forget that he's just a jaded Prima Donna Director rather than an actually evil person.
• Captain Geographic: The titular "Icon" is a superhero whose armor is colored like the flag of Italy: green, white, and red.
• Disproportionate Retribution: L'Avventura Pictures publishes an ICA contract to kill Dino Bosco, specifically because he's driving them towards bankruptcy with reshoots.
• Excrement Statement: When the producers re-edited one of Bosco's films without asking him first, he made his displeasure known by pissing on the screen at the film's premiere.
• Executive Meddling: In-universe. Bosco's last film, Il Brute, was re-edited by the producers without his knowledge or consent, something he only found out during its premiere at the Cannes Film Festival.
• Expy: The Icon is very clearly one for Iron Man, with styling cues similar to that of Captain America.
• Fatal Method Acting: In-Universe. Various ways of killing Bosco revolve around tampering with the film props (including a fire-breathing monster), or sabotaging an air ramp placed near the teeth of another monster.
• Kill It with Fire: High-octane fuel can be added to the fire-breathing alien Bosco fights to burn him to death.
• No Stunt Double: In-Universe example; Bosco does all of his stunts this way, providing various assassination methods.
• Troubled Production: In-Universe example; filming The Icon has proven very troubled indeed, so much so that L'Avventura Pictures has hired 47 to kill the director before he kills the company.

Marrakesh: "A House Built on Sand"

47 has been sent to Marrakesh to eliminate construction magnate Kong Tuo-Kwang and Hamilton-Lowe's chief designer-turned-mole Matthieu Mendola, who intends on trading non-disclosable company documents to Tuo-Kwang and his company.

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• Call-Forward:
  • Listening to the dialogue between the fortune teller and his customer has him ask if he should go with Strandberg's investments because "he's a genius", confirming that the mission takes place before the events of "A Gilded Cage".
  • In a phone call, Tuo-Kwang will ask about getting Hamilton-Lowe's documents from General Zaydan.
• Creative Differences: In-universe. Dissatisfaction with his job because of these problems is why Mendola agreed to become a spy for Tuo-Kwang's firm.
• Developer's Foresight:
  • The guard on Tuo-Kwang's rooftop drops a walkie-talkie that can be used to summon Tuo-Kwang to the meeting early, which the game makes no indication of.
  • The dialogue for the fortune teller opportunity changes if 47 knocks out Mendola and steals the documents beforehand.
• Escort Mission: Required to get Mendola and Tuo-Kwang to meet up, which is necessary for several assassinations. What makes it an annoying escort mission is that Mendola gets lost and irritated at the slightest break in his view of you.
• Fortune Teller: 47 can disguise himself as one to get close to Mendola. Mendola is very nervous about the meeting and takes any chance to know if it'll succeed.
• High-Voltage Death: Two potential kill opportunities involve some form of electricity: increasing the water pressure in the cafe's courtyard pond and dropping the lights when Tuo-Kwang stands by it, and short-circuiting the payphone Mendola attempts to use.
• Inheritance Murder: Discussed by the fortune teller's client, who wonders if he should kill his mother and find the money she's buried.
• Irony: Tuo-Kwang frequently chides a waitress he feels isn't doing her job. Said waitress ends up asking his bodyguard out on a date if Tuo-Kwang dies in front of him.
• Meaningful Name: The mission name is in reference to the adage of "A house built on sand has no firm foundations" (and variants thereof), meaning that a plan without any thought put into it will fall apart quickly.
• Properly Paranoid: Mendola rightly believes that Hamilton-Lowe will have him killed for his defection and wants to make sure the meeting goes correctly.

Sapienza: "Landslide"

47 has been sent to Sapienza to eliminate Marco Abiatti, a far-right Sleazy Politician and thug intending to run for mayor, at the request of bioengineer Silvio Caruso, who sees him as a threat to Italy.

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• Badass Preacher: An Opportunity allows you to disguise as an innocent priest Marco is trying to find. 47 has always had a soft spot for religion, and Marco can be pushed onto a church roof spike.
• Bilingual Bonus: The live band is playing cheesy pop music with actual Italian lyrics, all of which are themed around romance.
• Call-Forward:
  • Your client is Silvio Caruso, who was mentioned in the briefing of "World of Tomorrow" to have been a client of the ICA prior to being 47's target, and was discovered to have hired Abiatti's hit by Francesca De Santis.
  • A woman near the apartments mentions that a doctor was called for Isabella Caruso and that she wasn't allowed inside the villa, hinting that Silvio had just killed her. Another women tells her lover how glad she is that "the bitch is dead".
  • Two pedestrians in the town plaza mention how surprising there's no memorial for Dino Bosco despite his death. Abiatti also references his death as being a few years prior to Signora Bellini.
• Community-Threatening Construction: Abiatti intends on evicting the residents of Sapienza to turn it into a resort for the rich.
• Continuity Snarl: One of Monia Bellini's fans mentions that he wants her photo next to President Obama in his collection. In Hitman: Damnation, the President of the United States is Mark Burdett, who was elected in 2008 and reelected in 2012, clearly in place of Obama.
• Corrupt Corporate Executive: A woman can be found making calls near the promenade, all of which are mockeries of Nestlé and their practices (such as their promotion of baby formula as being better than breastfeeding, their treatment of Native American tribes, and their stances on water as a human right).
  "Yes we sell bottled water under 70 different names, therefore we buy springs, build factories and sell water. No, ha ha, it is not a human right to have drinking water. It's their job to have a job and buy our water."
• Developer's Foresight: If 47 is disguised as a bodyguard, he can escort Bravuomo to his office.
• The Dog Bites Back: Silvio Caruso, who Abiatti had bullied as a child, is the mission's client. In addition, 47 can disguise as a local lawyer Abiatti intends on bribing, or the priest he bullied years prior, to kill him.
• Driven to Suicide: While on his way to the church, Abiatti takes a photograph with a woman and proceeds to flirt with her. Her fiancé (named Gioele Bellucci in custom contracts) gets extremely upset and will throw himself off the pier if provoked, yelling about how he loves Sophia.
• Engineered Public Confession: Sabotaging the stage and leaving the mic on causes Marco to accidentally reveal his true intentions towards Sapienza. He'll then head to the stage to explain himself, even though it was just declared a safety hazard.
• Expensive Glass of Crap: Inverted. When Abiatti is served a glass of expensive wine, he disparages it as being "too fermented" for his taste, clearly unaware that all wine is fermented. The waitress continues serving him the same bottle out of spite, believing he'll never taste the difference. Abiatti doesn't, believing the wine is "better" than before.
• Eye Scream: Like with Jordan and his birthday cake, you can shove Marco face-first onto a pen. 47 pulls it out of his eye socket afterward.
• Impaled with Extreme Prejudice: You can push Marco from the church tower, where he falls onto a spire underneath. The camera even lingers on the body for a few seconds.
• Local Reference: After his Engineered Public Confession, Marco explains that he was just joking and asks the public to forgive his weird sense of humor. He just came back from Scandinavia,^*(IO Interactive is based in Copenhagen) where gallows humor is common and everyone is a hashish-smoking communist.
• Self-Deprecation: Bravuomo mentions that he has a bladder condition and he needs to use bathrooms frequently. While he only uses it a few times, the past games have a reputation of NPCs using the bathroom every few minutes.
• Shout-Out: One of the challenges is named "Wanna see a magic trick?".
• Wood Chipper of Doom: The cemetery behind the church has one that Abiatti can be dumped into.

Paris: "Holiday Hoarders"

47 has to take out Harry "Smokey" Bagnato and Marv "Slick" Gonif in the Palais De Walewska in Paris, France. A free bonus mission, partially created in support of the World Cancer Research Fund, with IOI encouraging players to donate to the cause, it was made a permanent mission in this game and Hitman 3, but was initially a temporary mission in the sequel, with it being made permanent there on December 17th, 2019.

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• An Ass-Kicking Christmas: 47 is going after two thieves who want to steal presents.
• And Your Reward Is Clothes: Completing the challenges associated with the mission nets you the "Santa 47" suit, a red Santa outfit, complete with glasses and fake beard.
• Blatant Burglars: They infiltrate a gala event wearing black street clothes with long jackets. Yet nobody seems to notice them or care when they enter restricted areas.
• Bad Santa: 47 can disguise himself as one.
• Chuck Cunningham Syndrome: Played straight on release of the Hitman 2 Legacy Pack as this mission was completely absent, but subverted come christmas time... as it returned as Temporary Online Content, and was removed a month later. Averted now, as the mission was permanantly added into the Hitman 2 Legacy Pack the following year.
• Christmas Episode: Pun intended. While there have been Christmas themed levels before, this is the first one to have a Christmas-themed objective. (Not counting Hitman 2's flash game spinoff where 47 shoots attacking elves.)
• Disproportionate Retribution: Stealing presents is worthy of death, it seems.
• Easter Egg:
  • Santa himself teleports around the map with an echoy "ho-ho-ho" and a flash of magic pixie dust. You can also take his clothes and become Santa 47. Killing a target while dressed like this causes 47 to say "ho-ho-ho".
  • If you're Santa 47, you can escape via chimney.
• Expy: The two targets in this mission are near-explicit stand-ins for the Wet Bandits from Home Alone, right down to the Christmas-time theft, habits, and names (Harry and Marv)
• The Grinch: Those two darn thieves: Harry "Smokey" Bagnato, and Marv "Slick" Gonif.
• Shout-Out: The entire mission is one to Home Alone:
  • The targets' real names are Harry and Marv, same as the Wet Bandits.
  • Marv has a habit of flooding the sink in bathrooms for no reason other than his own amusement.
  • One challenge requires you to knock out Marv with a brick three times, a reference to a similar scene from Home Alone 2: Lost in New York.
• Temporary Online Content: Averted for 2016, as players requested it be added into the game permanently (largely because Paris has no extra missions), but initially played straight when it was released into Hitman 2 and Hitman 3, which both lacked the mission until it was made available for the Christmas holidays, then Hitman 2 removed afterwards, but Hitman 3 made permanent. Hitman 2 made the level permanent the following christamas.
• Timed Mission: After completing their routes, the targets will meet up. A challenge requires you to steal all the items on the target's lists before they do. The challenge fails if either one dies, but you can freely knock them out. Another requires you to kill them both in a propane explosion while wearing the Santa suit after they return empty handed.
• Troll: During his route, Slick occasionally enters bathrooms only to flood the sink. He also giggles whenever he does so or steals something.
• Unusually Uninteresting Sight: As noted above, no one will bat an eye as they slip into restricted areas in plain sight. While Smokey does at least try stay low and move fast to avoid detection while searching for loot, Slick just walks around cluelessly looking for stuff to steal.
• Writing Around Trademarks: The targets have similar names to the thieves in Home Alone.

Bonus Campaign Patient Zero:

In General

• Ambiguous Time Period:
  • The main campaign of 2016 never mentions anything about the Cassandra Snow franchise or anything else Patient Zero related, and the developers did not go back to add any world building references into these missions, which made this campaigns' canonicity debatable (much like how the Elusive Targets had a similarly questionable canon status prior to Hitman 3). This was rectified from Hitman 2 onward, as their levels do contain minor references to this campaign; the above-mentioned Cassandra Snow novels get referenced many times.
  • The timeline of the campaign itself, from what little info the game gives us, seems to take place directly after "Club 27" (and in the gap between that mission and "Freedom Fighters"). Given the urgent nature of the campaign, The Class' sound crew are still in the hotel, the two NPCs in the outside bar from "Club 27" are still there discussing the events of "A Gilded Cage" as if it were recent news, and a female NPC named Sujin Noppachorn will mention "that rockstar" and the gassing of the hotel's atrium, meaning Jordan is unambiguously dead, Diana doesn't yet recognize the compound in Colorado, and "Are We Stars" (which is stated to have been released shortly after Jordan's death) can be heard playing in Hokkaido.
• Apocalypse Cult: The campaign centers around taking down Liberation, a death cult attempting to create a global pandemic.
• Cool Plane: 47 travels in a private jet between the locations in this campaign's cutscenes, and in the Hokkaido briefing cutscene, the plane is going through a storm. Notably, this is different from other cutscenes in 2016 in that 47 is actually seen travelling to his locations, instead of being in an airport or it otherwise being ambiguous.
• Cult: A death cult named "Liberation". The client, "Locksley", contracts the ICA to end the cult, and 47 has to murder its figurehead and second-in-command. It goes horribly wrong after that.
• Extremely Short Timespan: The events of the campaign take place roughly within the same week. Diana considers the whole thing "an emergency", and we see 47 travelling the globe via plane, which further emphasizes this. The reason for the lack of starting locations and dead drops is due to the rush.
• Leitmotif: This three-bar melody, which increases in number when you go loud or in the later missions.
• Milkman Conspiracy: Liberation has way more power than it appeared to when the contract was issued, and Yulduz is even in touch with several pharmaceutical companies (like Ether) so she can short-sell them. The cult itself has sleeper agents in Sapienza, Colorado and Denmark should things not go according to plan in Bangkok, as well as the virus' creator willing to become its Patient Zero on arrival in Sydney. As 47 later postulates to Diana, he finds it very hard to believe that Nabazov by himself could pull this off, and must've had outside help from somewhere—come the next game, 47 is proven right, as a manifesto of Nabazov's◊ can be found in the Isle of Sgàil in The Keep, which heavily implies that either the Ark Society or Providence (or perhaps both) were the ones responsible for the creation of the Nabazov virus.
• Patient Zero: The name of the campaign and the final mission, as well as the goal of Owen Cage in order to distribute the Nabazov virus.
• Race Against the Clock: This campaign takes place over about a week, due to the nature of the targets trying to release a catastrophic virus into the world.
• The Virus: The Nabazov virus is a man-made virus that infects its host and anyone nearby via breathing in the same air. Symptoms include coughing, loss of skin color, and your body increasingly deteriorating. The notes Klaus leaves behind in the "Patient Zero" mission conclude that the Virus is intended to affect large cities, but not those in the countryside. He also notes that the virus rapidly dies off once a host is killed. It’s also lethal to 47, as we find out in "Patient Zero".

Bangkok: "The Source"

At the behest of a reclusive millionaire going under the codename "Locksley", the ICA contracts Agent 47 to kill Oybek Nabazov, leader of a death cult called Liberation, and his second-in-command, Sister Yulduz. Locksley provides evidence that Liberation is planning to use a bioweapon at the Himmapan Hotel in Bangkok, where they are presenting an art exhibition as subterfuge. Hopefully, the consequences of this contract won't have ripple effects... right?

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• Artificial Stupidity: Even if Nabazov dies in front of her, Yulduz will think he's gone missing and flee.
• Continuity Nod: Jordan Cross' death and the atrium previously being gassed are mentioned by a woman outside the exhibition.
• Cult Defector: A Liberation member called Jeff can be found refusing to do the cult's suicide ritual, to the chagrin of his girlfriend. 47 can enter his hotel room and take his cult uniform.
• Deadpan Snarker: Quite a lot of the guests in the hotel are skeptical of the death cult and see it as nothing more than new-age ritualists wanting attention, though a woman by the name of Sujin Noppachorn near the exhibition entrance's curtain doorway does actively make dry remarks in between Oybek's teachings.
• Explosion Propulsion: One challenge requires 47 to use explosives to blast Sister Yulduz on top of the canopy the cult is meditating under.
• Explosive Leash: Explosive consequences, at least. Killing the targets triggers a Dead Man's Switch that Diana detects when you leave the level, which activates other agents of the cult from all over the globe.
• Leaning on the Fourth Wall: The 151-proof Vodka has a hard-to-read label on the back that reads the following:
  This vodka is highly flammable and should be kept away from open fire. Should you accidentally apply the vodka somewhere on your body, like, let's say your hands for instance, rinse immediately with water, and do not under any circumstances try to perform fire rituals or the like.
• Not in This for Your Revolution: In private phone calls, Sister Yulduz reveals she has no interest in the cult's agenda, only hoping to benefit from the impact of the virus' destruction by short-selling pharmaceutical and security companies.
• Playing with Fire: Nabazov puts his hands underneath fire during his ritual to show that he’s the chosen one. One of the methods of killing him involves replacing his flame-retardant hand mixture with extremely flammable vodka.
• Scam Religion: Oybek Nabazov is a master at creating these, having the members commit ritual suicide, then leaving just in time to not get caught by authorities.
• Screw This, I'm Outta Here: If Nabazov is killed and hidden, Yulduz will correctly theorize that something has happened and head to the back of the hotel, where she has hired a private militia escort.
• Swiss Bank Account: Oybek's bio mentions that the ICA looked into bank activity for Oybek and traced it to completely unrelated corporations, and the ICA couldn't identify who owned them.
• Unwitting Instigator of Doom: 47 completing his mission activates a network of sleeper agents around the world.

Sapienza: "The Author"

...Yeah, about that. Turns out eliminating Nabazov activated a ring of sleeper agents around the world. This leads 47 in pursuit of two such sleeper agents: Craig Black, writer of the Cassandra Snow novels, as well as Brother Akram, a Liberation operative who is giving Black a sample of Nabazov's virus to use on his audience. 47 heads to Sapienza, where Black is holding a private book reading in the local church, where he's tasked with killing him and Akram, alongside retrieving the virus.

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• Caustic Critic: One of the invitees to the book reading is Mike Vogt, who’s purported to be one. He considers the writing in Cassandra Snow "dross and amateur" and he refuses to attend the book reading in protest, and just chats up a waitress at a nearby cafe instead.
• Cover Identity Anomaly: If 47 disguises as Akram and meets up with Black, the latter will ask for the virus sample. As 47 can't hand it to him, Black will eventually unmask "Akram".
• Creator Cameo: Mike Vogt, the Caustic Critic in the cafe, shares his name with the head of IO Interactive, Michael Vogt.
• Creator Backlash: In-Universe. Craig Black despises the "Cassandra Snow" series, in part due to overshadowing his other books, and intends on using the virus at a fan convention to be remembered for what amounts to terrorism instead.
• Cutting the Knot: Shooting down the church bell will stop the timer and prevent the targets from meeting, allowing you to take out Brother Akram and Craig Black however you wish.
• Developer's Foresight:
  • Shooting the bell itself will make it chime, forcing the two targets out of their current routine and making them meet up early. This isn't really that useful of a trick unless you're speedrunning the level for a specific kill.
  • The clock in the town plaza moves until it reaches midnight.
• Disproportionate Retribution: Craig Black intends on using the virus to kill unaware fans of his book series at an upcoming "Cassie-Con" book convention, simply because his other, more mature books have been completely overshadowed by "Cassandra Snow".
• Driven to Suicide: You can find Jeff throwing himself off a cliff after losing his girlfriend in the previous mission.
• Easy Level Trick: Slipping into the sewers (which aren't even locked or guarded) to knock out the Superfan and grab his disguise provides easy access to the church where you can then freely roam around to eliminate Craig Black, grab a Bodyguard disguise, disable the security cameras, and tamper with the church bell to either accelerate or delay your targets' meeting.
• Eye Scream: Just like Abiatti, Black will occasionally stand near a pen that his eye can be shoved onto.
• Fan Hater: In-Universe, Craig Black hates his own fans so much that he's planning on killing the attendees of his upcoming convention with the virus.
• Not on the List: One potential way in is by looking around for an invite to the book reading. Trying to go in without an invite will cause the guards to turn you away.
  • Curiously, Salvatore Bravuomo isn’t allowed in the church hall's book reading, even if you manage to swipe an invite from someone else. It's not even a trespassing zone if you infiltrate manually, so him not being allowed in is a bit strange. The game gives no reasoning for this.
• Production Foreshadowing: The simulated signal tracking globe graphic Diana shows in the briefing is meant to show the theoretical locations of where the dead man's switch could've sent the signal to each operative. Those locations are Columbia in South America, Vermont in North America, and Denmark in Europe. This is some nice foreshadowing to Hitman 2, which was in the production stages when this campaign was being made, and Hitman 2 did release featuring the locations of Columbia and Vermont (more specifically Whittleton Creek, a Fictional Province in Vermont) that 47 travels to. The only real outlier here is Denmark, which is likely just a Shout-Out to the developers themselves (which does actually turn out to prove Diana accidentally correct two missions later).
• Room Full of Crazy: Akram's room features various cult insignias smeared on the wall in red paint, a shrine of Nabazov, and lots of skulls. Diana immediately notes his dedication if 47 walks in.
• Take That!: The Cassandra Snow novels revolve around a woman in a relationship with a vampire and have a wide following despite being critically panned. Not unlike The Twilight Saga.
• Timed Mission: Craig Black and Brother Akram are scheduled to meet at midnight (when the in-game timer reaches 10 minutes), after which Craig will leave Sapienza and take the virus sample with him. If he makes it out, the mission ends immediately. The timer can be stopped by shooting down the bell or making it chime.
• Unintentionally Unwinnable: If you have no keys, lockpicks or crowbars and enter the apartment below Brother Akram by using the doorbell and sneaking in, you'll be locked inside when the door closes. Both doors to the apartment are locked from both sides and there's no key anywhere in the apartment. If you took out the lady who opens the door for you, you can't even scare and follow her out when she runs for help.

Colorado: "The Vector"

The ICA has managed to find the exact coordinates of the Dead Man's Switch Nabazov activated upon his death. This leads 47 to a paramilitary compound in the middle of Colorado, where he’s tasked with killing Bradley Paine, a doctor and sleeper agent of Nabazov, as well as any infected mercenaries on the compound, in order to stop the spread of the virus.

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• Ambiguous Situation: Paine's presence on the Shadow Client's paramilitary compound is never touched upon in-game, so it's not clear whether this is a different farm-turned-compound, or that he's really that good of a Sleeper Agent. A phone call in "The Source" explains that Nabazov told him to enlist.
• Ascended Extra: This mission's gameplay is based on Absolution's Hitman: Sniper Challenge pre-order bonus, which at the time existed more as a way to kill time than anything else. 'The Vector expands upon this premise by only giving you one named target (Bradley Paine), with the rest of the targets being unknown to 47; intel for them must be acquired on-site.
• Call-Forward: To Colorado's "Freedom Fighters" mission in the main campaign, as Diana fails to recognize the paramilitary compound from said mission.
• Damn You, Muscle Memory!: The sniper rifle has some travel time, but it's not the 400-500ms you may be used to in Hitman 2; rather, it's closer to 100ms, so bear that in mind.
• Every Car Is a Pinto: You can make Paine's car explode, though the Legacy Pack rendition obscures the car behind tree cover, so while it's not impossible to, it's a bit harder.
• Hyperspace Arsenal: Averted; unlike in the rest of the game, you only have the Sieger 300 Ghost.
• Immune to Bullets:
  • Averted. Part of the mission is finding destructible "accident kills" to cover up your kills, such as setting fire to oil drums or exploding gas canisters.
• Luck-Based Mission: The challenge of killing all 5 targets in accidents. Not only do the 4 soldiers need to be ones whose "loop" allows you to set them up for an accident, one of them might start fleeing if another target is killed near him.
  • You can't be killed due to how far away you are, though messy kills do bring enforcers up temporarily.
• Moe Greene Special: You can invoke this by aiming at a targets eye, assuming you can account for the sniper sway and whatnot.
• Poorly Disguised Pilot: This level essentially acted as a pilot test program for the developers to see if there was any fan interest for a level like this to return for future releases. Come the second game, we get a minigame that does exactly this; Sniper Assassin.
• Plague Doctor: Doctor Bradley Paine in terms of his role, as he otherwise wears dapper attire. He infects four militia members that you must take out.
• Sniper Rifle: ...We'll let you figure this one out.
• Sniper Scope Sway: Played with. When you aim normally, this happens. However, using "focus" mode will slow down the scope sway.
• Sniping Mission: 47 sets up on a tower overlooking the camp with a sniper rifle making the mission play like Hitman: Sniper Challenge, Hitman: Sniper, and the later released Hitman 2: Sniper Assassin game mode.
• Sharp-Dressed Man: Bradley wears a nice dark blue suit and a tie.
• Stuff Blowing Up: You can kill targets by making them explode with the various gas canisters laying about the place.
• The Voiceless: You can't hear any of the guards or targets on the map, because you're so far away from them, though they are all visibly speaking to one another.
• Timed Mission: To an extent. If you wait around for too long, targets will start to flee, regardless if Diana and 47 has identified them or not.
• When All You Have Is a Hammer…: You can use your sniper shots to set up traps around the map, as well as to bait the targets to secluded locations.

Hokkaido: "Patient Zero"

The ICA intercepts a memo that Owen Cage, a Liberation operative who developed the Nabazov virus and injected himself with it to become its Patient Zero, has been arrested at an airport en route to Sydney, spotted by nervous passersby doing cult rituals. As he was already succumbing to the virus, he has been sent to the GAMA Medical Facility in Hokkaido for treatment. 47 is sent to eliminate Cage, as well as Klaus Liebleid, an Ether doctor sent to extract samples from Cage before he dies (in order for Ether to reverse-engineer it, spread the virus, then make a profit selling the cure). There's also a complication—Cage is highly contagious, so if anyone on-site gets infected, you must kill them to contain the spread of the virus. Because of this, Diana and everyone at the ICA has allowed all infected people to be permissible targets for this mission, given what's at stake.

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• Artistic License – Medicine: 47 has to kill Owen Cage and all of those infected by the virus to contain it, and not just in the sense of "prevent them from leaving GAMA and spreading the virus"—Liebleid's notes in the mission state that killing the person stops the virus dead in its tracks. This wouldn’t work in real life, as a dead body can still be contagious, and spilling bodily fluids would be a good way to spread it further.
• Continuity Nod: In the hospital's lounge, a patient is ranting about Amos Dexter to a cleaner apparently being exempt from the no smoking ban, and brings up "the one from South Dakota", referencing the previous game's Big Bad Blake Dexter, implying the two are related.
• Developer's Foresight: Just like in Situs Inversus, 47 can destroy the replacement heart kept in the morgue. Doing so gets you a Non-Target Kill penalty. Even if the virus goes AWOL, there's no reason for the player to even enter this room in this level; the doctors are cut off from the rest of the hospital, as nobody goes downstairs.
• Easy Level Trick: It's entirely possible to circumvent the need to take out the nurses that otherwise spread the Nabazov virus around by getting to Owen Cage before his first checkup (which is in about 2 minutes after the level starts). This does require some decently precise timing, but the route to get to him is actually fairly easy (the window leading to the bathrooms on Owen's floor can be accessed by climbing down to it). After that, it's a matter of killing Owen and stuffing him in the wardrobe in the room next to him before his escort arrives.
• Godzilla Threshold: The threat of the virus spreading and causing a deadly global pandemic is so serious that the agency considers all infected victims targets, and they must be killed in order for you to leave.
• Hazmat Suit: One of the possible disguises in the mission. It's also the safest way to get to Owen Cage without catching the virus and is needed for going into the operating theater. There are white ones people in the medical wing wear, while Klaus wears a black variant to denote his high access status in the facility.
• It's the Only Way to Be Sure: The only way of destroying the virus is to kill anyone infected. You can see where this is going...
• Kill It with Fire: One of the methods of eliminating both Cage and Liebleid involves triggering an incinerator during the former's check-up.
• Loophole Abuse: As mentioned below in With Cat Like Tread, the Hitman 2 GOTY Legacy pack allows you to murder your way through the levels' infected, even if they see you. And so long as they don't tell the guards about what they saw, it's fair game, and you can get a Silent Assassin ranking, the highest score in the game! This is because "Silent Assassin" in Hitman 2 got changed that lets you kill any target who has seen you, and since infected people count as targets... well, this rules quirk comes into full effect.
• Mercy Kill: 47 has to kill all the infected. The disease is fatal, and given its effects on Owen Cage (including Tainted Veins and being so delirious he can't even notice 47 no matter what he's doing), this is ultimately a more merciful way to go than letting the virus run its course.
• Milkman Conspiracy: As mentioned above and discussed by 47 and Diana at the end of this mission, Liberation seems far too powerful and too well-connected to be a mere new-age death cult, given its extensive global operations. Come the next game, Nabazov's profile can be seen in the Isle of Sgàil, implying that Liberation may be connected to the Ark Society, a cabal of billionaire survivalists who intend to rule the world once they survive a civilization-ending cataclysm, which the Nabazov virus was capable of setting in motion.
• Necessarily Evil: Killing the infected is the only way to contain the potential world threatening pandemic. And it spreads fast. Diana even says the agency will consider all infected victims as permissible targets, and it's clear she's not happy about it.
• New Work, Recycled Graphics:
  • The briefing for this mission shows off Owen Cage meditating in the airport lounge, which is blatantly just the top floor of the Consulate building seen in Marrakesh, specifically in "A Gilded Cage".
  • In the end cutscene, 47 is on a phone call to Diana, with the apartment he's set up shop in being a reused apartment from Sapienza (more specifically, based on the "Landslide" mission), with assets lifted from Bangkok to make up the scenery.
• Never Hurt an Innocent: Averted. Cage carries a deadly virus and can spread it to others, who then spread it further. The mission requires 47 to stop the virus at the hospital, and anyone who carries the virus must be eliminated. It’s possible to prevent anyone from getting infected by Cage, allowing you to complete the mission without killing anyone innocent.
• No Plans No Prototype No Back Up: There’s only a single dose of the cure for the Nabazov virus, kept in a secure location in the Gama facilty. Its only gameplay purpose is so that 47 has a means to save himself if he gets infected with the virus.
• NPC Scheduling: Two minutes into the level, a surgeon will always go to the first floor corridor as Cage walks to his appointment, ensuring she catches the virus. She will then pass it onto a guard who goes for a smoke break, who will pass it onto the outside guards and the helicopter pilot. The helicopter pilot will eventually pass it onto the staff canteen. After a period of time, a doctor may walk to the first floor waiting room to get coffee, potentially spreading the virus when she returns to the second floor.
• Nintendo Hard: IO Interactive's official stats show this to be the most difficult level in the two games, especially to achieve Silent Assassin in, mostly due to the very strict timer you're running against to prevent the infection from spreading. You have less than two minutes to kill Owen Cage, or all hell starts to break loose...
• O.O.C. Is Serious Business: If the virus spreads, the concerned Diana starts her warning to 47 with "shit".
• A Storm Is Coming: 47's plane starts taking a battering from an incoming storm while on his way to Hokkaido, signalling the final climax of the mission.
• Shout-Out: The mission briefing shows the final location for the dead man's switch was sent to the coordinates 55.676098, 12.568337, which leads to Copenhagen, Denmark (where IO Interactive are primarily based).
• The End... Or Is It?: In the ending cutscene, 47 points out it’s highly unlikely that a simple death cult was able to attempt to pull off a global catastrophe all on their own, and must've had outside help from somewhere. In the next game, a manifesto of Nabazov's◊ can be found in the Isle of Sgàil in The Keep, which heavily implies that either the Ark Society or Providence (or perhaps both) were the ones responsible for the creation of the Nabazov Virus and its plans for a global pandemic.
• Too Dumb to Live: The virus escapes containment because a nurse not wearing protective gear decides to hang out in the biohazard area for no apparent reason, catching the virus from Cage when he passes by and going on to spread it to a security guard outside, who goes on break and spreads the virus to the rest of the hospital. If you take out the nurse beforehand, an unprotected doctor will wander into the waiting room several minutes later and become infected, seemingly just because she was looking for a cup of coffee (why she couldn't use a machine other than the one in the restricted area is anyone's guess). The biohazard area also has a number of guards not wearing protective gear, although they at least keep far enough away from Cage to avoid infection under normal circumstances.
• Unwitting Instigator of Doom: The virus escapes containment entirely because two unprotected hospital workers ignore the warnings and end up in the wrong place at the wrong time. Taking them out and avoiding infection yourself can actually keep the virus from escaping at all.
• Useless Accessory: The surgical face masks worn by the quarantine zone guards do absolutely nothing to protect them from catching the virus. Only the full hazmat suits worn by the doctors directly interacting with Cage provide protection from the virus.
• Violation of Common Sense:
  • The "Silent Assassin" loophole, as discussed above and below.
  • Triggering the fire alarm while in the tactical turtleneck will make all the regular NPC's no longer be suspicious of you (guards will still be enforcers, however). This is despite the fact the entire facility is a hostile area when the fire alarm is not active. You can use this to get to certain parts of the facility without fear of being spotted so easily.
• With Cat Like Tread: Hitman 2's GOTY Legacy pack has a specific rules quirk that pertains to how Silent Assassin ratings work. So long as anyone infected doesn't report you to the guards, you're free to murder your way through the level's infected and still get the Silent Assassin rating. Even if NPCs that haven't been infected get knocked out, then get infected, it still counts towards the rating.

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