Scot shaves off his precious hair for his Hitman: Contracts review.

In the third outing for everyone's favourite slap-headed hitman, we join Agent 47 shortly after what appears to have been an attempted hit gone terribly wrong. As he slowly bleeds from an apparent bullet wound to his torso, he drifts in and out of visions depicting some of the most memorable assignments in his seedy career. Unsurprisingly, following the success of the previous title in the series, the game takes a similar approach in that you've given a few mission objectives and left to your own devices as to how to go about completing them. A multitude of weapons are available throughout the missions, as well as a variety of unique items used for "inventive" assassinations.

Contracts' main appeal though lies in the level design and the sheer number of ways any given assignment can be completed. Most of the missions take place in impressive, large-scale environments populated with an assortment of characters, items and objectives - many of which can be interacted with on some scale. Take the time to explore a map and you'll often find that the missions - which can initially appear to be challenging and occasionally frustrating - become progressively clearer, offering simple solutions to the objectives.

It's a game you'll need to heavily invest time and patience in, and one you should never expect to breeze through without considerable thought and planning beforehand. Since you've got very little to go on at the beginning of an assignment, you need to fully explore your surroundings in order to get a grasp on the situation. For instance, a brief look at one of your assassination targets would reveal he's drinking whisky. Harmless enough, it may seem, but a quick recon to the basement would reveal the butler topping up the glass at periodic moments. It immediately strikes you that the bottle of poison previously found upstairs could do wonders for your mission status if used correctly…

Yet, of course, there's always another way. Grab the materials for a makeshift bomb and drop it down the chimney, obliterating anyone sitting in the furnace-adorned room. Or you could always knock the butler out for the count and steal his outfit in order to get up close and personal with your target. Because you're not being held by the hand and told exactly how things need to be done, Contracts offers a refreshing element of gameplay commonly missing from most games out there - the ability to make your own decisions.

However, despite this form of open-ended gameplay working in favour of Contracts, the daring, almost subversive attitude against the book of videogame basics almost threatens to tear the game apart. Levels occasionally degenerate into tedious cases of trial and error as you wander around, experimenting with the scenery and number of combinations open to you. Since it only takes one mistake to completely blow your cover, carefully-placed saving is essential if you want to breeze through the level without any unnecessary casualties. It's lucky that the missions offer significant replay value or the repetition would really start to grate a little.

But assassins don't always need to remain inconspicuous. Those with no regard for the big master plan and would rather blast a hole in the flesh of every character they meet can do so, as long as they're prepared to take on oncoming waves of security guards packed with heavy firepower. And although shooting your way through a level may be the quickest way to the end objective (helped somewhat by Agent 47's remarkable resistance to pain), it's certainly not the most rewarding. There's no fighting off the sense of pride within after completing a mission utilising the proper instruments available - something missing when you leave the scene with infinite amounts of blood on your hands. There's nothing better than leaving the scene of the crime with your objectives completed, content that everyone inside is none the wiser to your actions.

Unfortunately, it's very difficult to remain completely surreptitious at times - especially when the game refuses to notify you as to why you've been discovered. There were too many instances of being discovered without reason or having guards alerted despite careful concealing of dead bodies. I mean, don't get me wrong; it is possible to complete the missions without alerting anyone, but expect a fair amount of bother and experimentation before you're fully aware on how to do so.

On an aesthetic level, the game rarely fails to impress, especially on the PS2 where it boasts some of the more impressive graphics and touches seen in a game on the console of late. It's hard not to be taken back by some of the environments, most notably the steamy streets of Hong Kong or the cold atmosphere of the slaughterhouse - home to some of the game's more disturbing and adult scenes. The sound suitably accompanies the alluring graphics engine, and while not immediately as striking as the visuals, definitely prominent in the heightening of the atmosphere.

Despite the fact that Hitman: Contracts isn't a remarkable improvement over Hitman 2: Silent Assassin, it does enough to fully establish itself as the finest game in the series. There's a lot to love here, but for all the enjoyment it offers, there is still room for improvement - something that will undoubtedly be worked upon in the next instalment of the series. For now though, Hitman: Contracts stands up as a great game representing a step forward for the franchise and a positive outlook for the entire genre.