Velvet Assassin Review

Violet Summer ... or her ass at least

So I’ve been meaning to play Velvet Assassin for a while now, and before you all decide to heave rotten fruit at me let me explain myself.  Firstly because I’m a big fan of the stealth genre, and secondly (and probably more importantly) because the moment someone tells me a certain game is absolutely crap, I’m always curious to find out why.

And there was no shortage of people to tell me that this game was absolute crap.

But just like a car crash on a highway, I was compelled to slow down to take a look … once the price had dropped to around $20.

The game is “based on” the real life experiences of Violet Szabo (renamed Violet Summer in the game), an undercover agent for the British Special Operations Executive during World War 2. I haven’t personally read Young, Brave and Beautiful, the biography with which Velvet Assassin has taken it’s liberties, so I’m a little unsure as to the validity of claims that Violet once killed an entire squadron of sadistic Nazis wearing only a silk nightie.  I’m guessing that’s what Replay Studios are choosing to call “artistic licence”.

The plot is standard stealth game fare, so I can’t really rip into it for being too ridiculous. Violet’s missions usually center around a singular target that needs to be killed, which for some reasons necessitates the violent murder of every other soldier in a five kilometer radius. The missions are told in flashback, recalled by Violet as she lays in a coma on a French hospital bed. Every now and then you’ll regain lucidity long enough to overhear discussions about your eventual fate, but the majority of the game is spent inside the memories.

I'm no stealth expert, but should she be covering the Nazi's mouth and not the other way around?

The gameplay should be familiar enough for fans of the genre.  Stick to the shadows to remain undetected, isolate your enemies on their patrols then back-stab them for a silent kill.  While in stealth mode Violet is framed with a purple silhouette that gives the player an easy indication of their visibility.  It can’t show the degrees of illumination, however, which means in some situations you’ll unexpectedly lose your stealth at inopportune moments.

Aside from stealth, Violet can also disguise herself as a female SS officer for certain sections of the game, which allows her to remain undetected but removes to ability to sneak due to those pesky SS stiletto heels (oh, but they look absolutely GORGEOUS with the little SS cap!).  You’ll also have to keep your distance from other guards to avoid arousing suspicion.

There are twelve missions in total (split over six or so different operations) which, depending on your play style, should take you a decent amount of time to complete. There is a basic skill-levelling system that can increase Violet’s health, damage and ability to hide, but if you’re playing this game properly then you’ll probably only need to be interested in the stealth bonuses to help avoid detection. Once you’ve been discovered you don’t stand much of a chance of escape, because the AI simply tracks your current position with unerring accuracy until it gets bored. This means that escaping an alerted enemy can often mean a somewhat ludicrous game of circle-the-largest-available-object. Quite often I’d just save myself the hassle and reload a previous checkpoint immediately upon detection.

Even trained secret operatives love a good game of dress ups

Playing on a high difficulty level will have you reloading with an alarming regularity and, more often than not, exploiting the set-up for many scenes as your time to strike. There are many areas where soldiers will be having conversations (get ready to hear them over and over and over) and this can be the best time to remove as many enemies as you can before they return to their patrol. I found after multiple reloads I would simply have discovered the quickest, cheapest way to skirt detection and pick off surrounding soldiers before the discussion could end.

Which brings be to the checkpoint system, which is really where this game begins to grind the player down. Velvet Assassin sets it’s own checkpoints as you progress throughout a level. Some of these checkpoints are at quite reasonable intervals. Others demand around fifteen minutes of gameplay to reach safely. Part of what makes this so frustrating is the game’s slow pace. Like most stealth games, you’ll need to observe your opponents patrols, watching for a time when you can take out a single enemy silently. In Velvet Assassin, these waiting periods can last what seems to be hours, as you’re either forced to listen to another inane conversation before you can move on, or need to silently pick your way through upwards of four guards on a challenging patrol route. Compound this problem with the constant need for checkpoint reloads, and it can cost you two hours of your day to make it though three areas of a mission safely.

This guard was so suprised he spat out his raspberry cordial

This is where the game’s unrefined gameplay really turned things sour, and I’m sure what cost it a great deal of points with gamers.

As you might expect, the German soldiers are portrayed with the usual lack of humanity, and their character models do their best to remove any aspect of humanity you might wish to imprint on them. They appear quite ghoulish for the most part, with pale greying skin and dark black eyes. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not some kind of Nazi sympathiser, I just guess all those normal soldiers in All Quiet On The Western Front were too busy to appear in this game.

Look, a lot of bad things have been said about this game and admittedly some of them were well deserved.  There are far better stealth games on the market,  but for a title you’ll no doubt pick up out of the bargain bin these days Velvet Assassin is acceptably average.

The Verdict:

Pros: It’s chock full of hammy voice acting, but at least the plot is original, particularly in the tired old WW2 setting.  The experience points and skill tree thankfully bring a much needed extra dimension to the game.

Cons: A frustratingly slow checkpoint system only serves to accentuate  problems like homing beacon AI and unskippable guard conversations.  Gunplay is also quite clunky, which is made all the worse by sections of the game that force you into firefights.

Overall: OK, so it’s bad, but there are worse games, so may I conclude a generous 1.5 out of 5?  If you do enjoy stealth games and want a cheap title to add to your collection, then it could be worth a look … perhaps. Maybe.