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If the devs bothered to add rewards for double kills/killstreaks then those double kills/killstreaks must be pretty common. Much more common then they were in CT. Which matches up perfectly with spies having instant kill melee from any direction, and having hacking where they can still move around and attack, which also takes ages so mercs can always get there in time so there's always a conflict.

Basically what I'm getting at is that this is a very aggressive game and I'm not so into that. Like DM in CT, it's just kinda hmm. If you like that then that's good for you and I hope you enjoy it.

Double kills are a mechanic in the game, that's why they're recognized by the system, not because they're common. Death from above is rewarded, and that's going to be far less common in a game without free jumping. The system exists because it's proven to be fun for millions of people across multiple games. It's implemented in BF3, a game with no killstreaks at all, and yet it's still a rewarding experience. In general, people enjoy the experience of working towards new equipment, and while the point system facilitates that in Blacklist mode, everything is open from the start in Classic mode.

There's a different between fast pacing and aggressive gameplay. There's a difference between dumbing down the game and removing a mechanic like grabbing, which only serves to slow down the process of snapping necks. And before you bring up grabbing mercs to immobilize them long periods of time, it would totally imbalance a game where spies can freely move around while hacking. Knocking people out is still possible, but you have to use gadgets like sticky cams in order to do so, which is still challenging.

It doesn't simplify the game experience at all. In the old SvM, things were a lot more simple in a way. You could simply kill the spies/mercs and you've won the match without even thinking about the objective. Rather than just getting behind a merc or jumping on them twice, and charging, beskering and shooting the spies, now you HAVE to think about the objectives. And taking the objectives is far more complicated than killing anybody, because otherwise you're back to square one. Infinite lives is the only way to completely satisfy this type of design. It doesn't dumb down the game at all, and also takes away an unnecessary barrier to entry. It's a win-win situation.

This is completely different to COD, a game where winning/losing isn't a major concern, at least in casual play. Success in COD is defined by points more than anything else, something you can simply facilitate by pulling a trigger. Comparing Blacklist's mechanics to COD is stupid, plain and simple.

And why is this problematic? If you think people will go for kills because of the point system, hacking is a far more rewarding way of doing this. Winning the match is a far more rewarding way of gaining points than losing, and hacking is the only way to win. Killing barely aids you towards this goal, and who plays games to lose? The point system simply rewards you for every note worthy action in the game, it doesn't change the way the game plays out, that's the important thing.

Maybe this will change your mind.

Losing a life, regardless of whether it's because of over confidence from infinite lives, really hurts your chances of success. That 10 minute time limit goes fast, especially when it takes a full minute and a half to complete a hack.
Relaunch times are slow also and then you have to make your way back to a terminal zone.
My basic point is, that it doesn't matter if you have infinite lives, rushing as a Spy gets you wasted fast and if you die twice or more, you've eaten up most of the clock already. You can keep re-spawning as much as you like, the more you do it, the weaker your chances of success get every time.
So at least the good player keeps getting fodder so they have something to do in the round.

A good player is going to know how each life lost increases his team's handicap and is still going to avoid it at all costs regardless of the feeling of 'safety' due to re-spawn. What I mean is, infinite lives is a red herring, anyone who buys into it being a support for a specific strategy for success is going to be very disappointed.
Taking infinite lives out will only lead to shorter rounds, and without the ability to still 'actually' play, in spite of failure, a lot of players are going to walk away. And then your beloved SvM mode dies in the womb and it's back to complaining to Ubisoft for years about making another one or playing with the same small player pool in an ever decreasing SvM community.

I can't imagine how crap a match would be if the Merc's killed both Spies and the round ended. New players would always be in loading screens. That would trash a mode before it even got rolling.

I understand nostalgia but some decisions are actually valid and do more to benefit certain concepts in spite of what the fans might think. IMO.

I understand where your coming from, but most of your criticisms simply aren't grounded in reality.

Hacking is the only way to beat the mercs. It's your absolute goal, it's the most important thing in Blacklist's version of SvM. Killing barely aids you towards this goal, and in general, attempting it in anything other than an ambush situation will result in death, setting you way back. Hacking is encouraged more than anything else in the game. You're having a battle of semantics with me here; killstreaks are in the very first Splinter Cell by your definition, along with PT and CT's SvM mode. Killing is encouraged to an extent, but by no means is it a high priority. It's far less of a priority than it was in PT/CT, that's blatantly obvious.

[The whole point is that there's much less of a penalty for dying as the mercs. There's very little danger associated with death in Blacklist as the mercenaries. They respawn in 10 seconds and they're back to hunting the spies, and they have infinite lives so it's not an option to simply DM one merc at a time.]

The whole point is that there's much less of a penalty for dying as the mercs. There's very little danger associated with death in Blacklist as the mercenaries. They respawn in 10 seconds and they're back to hunting the spies, and they have infinite lives so it's not an option to simply DM one merc at a time.

So wait, their solution to spies being overpowered at ambushes is just to give mercs infinite lives? That's the shittiest idea ever!

The reason infinite lives were implemented is to discourage killing as a means to an end, and allow the spies to keep going for the objectives until they succeed. It also makes the game far more accessible. I've explained this on the Blacklist forums before, check it out.

As someone who played PT/CT for almost 7 years before stopping, I fully support infinite lives. Things are going to change, they have to. You can't expect to have the exact same rules as you did in 2004, they were never perfect. The penalty of death is all about your position and the detriment to your objective; you lose all the headway you've made towards the objectives when you die.

It allows the game to become more accessible, because death isn't the frustration. It makes the whole experience far less negative, and let's be honest, noobs were dealt with pretty mercilessly in past games (instant kicks were common for newcomers). It also forces both the spies and mercs to play more strategically; they can't just go for kills, they have to think about the objectives.

CounterCellOps, I think you're taking minor points and exaggerating them as a result of nostalgia. I'm not saying they can't take the general ruleset of CT SvM, but it can't be exactly the same. Hardcore fans love CT, but when you take a step back it really is a flawed game, what with its needless lack of accessibility and minor imbalances (night vision MT, outlines in EMF, etc). As for rage quits, making a game that drives a lot of people to rage quit before the match has ended is a big problem, especially in a game revolving around team work.

Counter Strike is one of the most well balanced competitive games out there, especially with the newest entry, Global Offensive. If you look at the matchmaking in that game, you have two options; casual and competitive. In competitive mode, you actually get a penalty if you quit before the match is over. Now, these matches can last up to 90 minutes, and yet people generally don't rage quit in CS:GO competitive. Why is that? Because it always feels fair. Every time you fail in that game, it's almost certainly your fault, and you can learn from it. Even if the opposing team wins 15 rounds a row (16 to win), you still feel like you can come back from failure.

Now imagine this scenario in PT/CT SvM. You're playing as a spy, your mate is dead, you only have one life left and you haven't managed to take any of the objectives. If you're playing against evenly matched players, at this point you're totally screwed, you literally have NO chance to come back. Although this is your own doing as a team, it's not fun to lose in such a drawn out fashion. And it's also not fun to lose your team mate in a game that revolves so heavily around team work.

Hardcore fans like us can respect this and enjoy it, because it's really intense and it makes you feel like every move is very important to the team. But for the average player, this kind of thing drives them away, because it's so incredibly ruthless. It feels like you're playing against an impenetrable elite club, and that's not fun. This is only compounded by the fact that noobs get kicked out of most matches before they even have a chance to improve. This is why limited lives is such a big problem, and if we want to see the market for SvM grow, this is something we have to let slide. And as far as I'm concerned, it improves the gameplay considerably. This way, you've always got your mates by your side, and you've ALWAYS got a chance to change the tides of the match with smart play, no matter what the situation is.

and the Uzi was so unbalanced that most people didn't use it anyway.

Yeah, I, uh. Really? Did the people you played with not use MT because it was op too? Because wow.

In my experience, the use of the Uzi was extremely rare. It was fairly easy to get away from the mercs when they had rifles, and given that most people used the rifle, this introduces a new dynamic to the game. Motion Tracking doesn't exist in its old form either; no 180 degree detections or night vision effects are present in Blacklist. The same goes for EMF outlines, and many other flaws from the old games.

Quick ambushing forces to the mercs to be more careful, but it's not going to change the tide of a match unless the objectives are being hacked. But if you fail to ambush the mercs, you're dead instantly, and that's a huge setback when your only option is to hack the objectives.

Isn't that kinda the same in CT? Except now it's much easier to get kills as spy since you don't have to attack from behind/above and hacking doesn't immobilise you. And hacking is all or nothing, so you've got more of an incentive to hang around and try to kill mercs rather than backing off. So we're back to the game making spies too aggressive, woo.

It's much easier to die as the spy, and killing them doesn't result in anything game-changing except during hacking. That's why it balances out. Also, because hacking is all or nothing, you really do have to stay hidden, because if you get caught before you can ambush them, you're dead. It's rewarding for your team-mate to kill mercs to help you out during hacking, but it's not a good idea if you're the spy who's hacking the objective.

Eating pizza is very rewarding in my opinion; it tastes great, and appeases my appetite greatly. Does that encourage me to eat Pizza 24/7? Nope, not when considering the disadvantages of heavy weight gain among other serious impediments on my health. Killing is rewarding in three ways; points towards new gear in Blacklist mode, increased ranks, and prevents mercs from stopping the hacking process. But you gain more points from hacking the objectives, resulting in a higher ranking than kills, and the risk of death is so severe that it's often not worth the risk. It doesn't help you win the game unless your helping a friend who's hiding in the hacking zone. They can't go try going for kills by themselves because if they die, all of their progress is lost.

The game encourages you to avoid the mercs at all costs unless it's necessary to defend your teammates while they hack the objectives, and if you can catch them off guard with low risk. It's far less rewarding than in PT/CT, where killing them is actually an option to win the match.

Yeah except there's much less of a penalty if you fuck up. If a CT spy attacks a merc from the front the merc isn't in any danger. Like at all.
It's nice that you can't run straight at mercs and win (I don't know why you're acting like this is new though, uzi mercs in CT would fuck you up nearly instantly if they got a clear shot), but I'm more worried about ambushes. Like if a spy hides around a corner and then melees as soon as the merc turns it. I'm wondering how they're going to beat that.

The whole point is that there's much less of a penalty for dying as the mercs. There's very little danger associated with death in Blacklist as the mercenaries. They respawn in 10 seconds and they're back to hunting the spies, and they have infinite lives so it's not an option to simply DM one merc at a time. As for quick death as the spies, it's certainly new against unscoped rifles, and the Uzi was so unbalanced that most people didn't use it anyway. Quick ambushing forces to the mercs to be more careful, but it's not going to change the tide of a match unless the objectives are being hacked. But if you fail to ambush the mercs, you're dead instantly, and that's a huge setback when your only option is to hack the objectives.

If you were discouraged from killing there wouldn't be special bonuses for getting multi kills. You don't discourage behaviour by rewarding it, that's not how things work.

It's all about context, risk vs reward. The reward for killing mercs is unsubstantial next to the reward for hacking the objectives. And the risk to your objective from failing to kill very powerful mercs is substantial, because you lose all your progress on the objective. Your whole argument is invalid.

The game gives you points for everything you do, and it gives you far more for completing objectives than it does for killing anyone. Given that you have infinite lives and the mercs are far more powerful, you're actually discouraged from killing, because it doesn't benefit you in any way. The only way to win the match is by hacking the objectives, and if you get killed while hacking from trying to kill mercs, you lose all your progress.

[You couldn't grab from the front? In CT if you turned a corner and a spy was there then all he'd do was hit you and then shock you and run away. In Blacklist he'll kill you instantly.This is kind of a big difference.]

You couldn't grab from the front? In CT if you turned a corner and a spy was there then all he'd do was hit you and then shock you and run away. In Blacklist he'll kill you instantly.
This is kind of a big difference.

That's irrelevant, you were talking about the process of pressing a button before somebody else. You have to do that when trying shoot someone before getting grabbed, elbowed or even jumped on in PT/CT. It's no different from anything in the old games, it's always been about who reacts first. But don't take my word for it, ask ShadowFox, a community member on the Blacklist forums who was invited to play the new SvM.

• I really don't think this button mash race is important. People are assuming this is the case when in fact I didn't come into a single melee combat where both of us were going head on, trying to melee the other. If the spy is charging, the merc is shooting...not button mashing to melee him.
• Spies are extremely fragile and very easy to kill. As a merc, you will be very rarely killed from the front if you know the spy is there.
• There is really no button mashing. For mercs it's all above covering the corners and leading with your gun to put the spy down.
• Melee attacks are mostly for when you catch the spy by surprise.

There's a general consensus among the community members invited to play Blacklist; if you get into a situation where mercs and spies charge at the same time, the spies die before they can even get close. It only really works out for the spies if they catch the mercs by surprise, so the mercs can't reach the melee button in time.

What makes you say that?

Here's some more words of wisdom from ShadowFox, the guy who's actually played the game.

• The "aggro spy" isn't really that much a part of classic because it's so easy to get wiped.
• If the merc has his rifle trained on you, it's pretty much game over.

And now SolidSage, another majorly active community member and long time veteran of Splinter Cell.

• The Spy in classic isn't easily killing anyone. I don't think I have expressed clearly how easy it is to kill a Spy if the Merc see's them long enough to put a trigger pull on target. 2 Spies running around on the ground are 2 dead Spies. It doesn't even take half a clip to spray and kill 2. Let's get that straight by the way, I wasn't head shooting a lot, it was iron sights. So I see a spy, approximate aim, burst of fire = 1 kill. I see 2 Spies, aim, burst of fire with a bit of side to side = 2 dead spies.
• The run'n'knife mentality in Classic = death 99% of the time.

Evidence from reading the posts of people who've actually played the game, interviews, seeing the game in action and making my own judgements about Blacklist have lead me to these conclusions. Not from making unsubstantiated criticisms.

He killed 3 people in a row, and got 400 points for doing a double kill in a short period of time. Every competitive multiplayer game involving kills has killstreaks if we go by that definition. You can get a killstreak of "3" in PT and CT. I assumed that you were referring to killstreaks as in Call of Duty.

EDIT: Found this on the Ubisoft forums from SolidSage, who was invited to play the game at the Blacklist reveal along with 6 other community members.

All I saw was points. I had a 5 kill streak at one point but no perks or anything like that appeared to be available.

There's no killstreaks in the game.

Looks like both spies and mercs can autokill from the front.  So... will it come down to whoever pushes the kill button first?  Looks like both spy/merc can die faster and more frequently, will there be a life limit?

I would be worried, but I have no good expectations from this series anymore.

How's it any different from shooting before someone grabs you? The fact is that the mercs are way more powerful than they were in CT, so getting up close is actually a huge risk in Classic mode. In Blacklist mode it's all about fast pacing with more players, brighter map lighting and low-powered lethal weapons for spies. I don't see the problem, it forces the mercs to play more strategically, and in both moves you have infinite lives, so it isn't such a big deal.

Facts vs opinions, that's all I'm gonna say.