Quiet As Kept: Our Favorite Stealth Killers in Video Games

From "Assassins Creed" to "Splinter Cell," some of our favorite gaming memories come from us creeping around on the sneak tip.

None

stealth
Splinter Cell: Conviction finally drops tomorrow! Of course, stealth kills in video games have been around for decades—Sam Fisher is just the latest, and one of the most polished, to do it. Back in the day, enemy AI was so "derp" that we couldn't tell if that idiot Barbarian in the NES Ninja Gaiden even knew we were in the room. He was probably running back and forth swinging his axe before we even got there. Was it a "stealth kill" if it involved killing an enemy who was too stupid to react differently whether we were in front of or behind him?

Nowadays though, the stealth game is a genre of its own. Enemy AI has graduated from fetus-level intelligence to at LEAST kindergarten-level deductive reasoning—so of course our protagonists have had to evolve as well. Let us tip our cap, quietly, to the men and women who always make us think twice before we loiter under a giant stone gargoyle...

AGENT 47, HITMAN SERIES
Complex Says: We really want to see what's on this guy's iPod. Rage Against the Machine is likely, but kinda too easy. We're hoping for the irony of something like Enya, because "ZOMG it would give the character so much depth because he's an employed killer." But if he was actually into obscure moe anime soundtracks, that would... actually make a lot of sense, for some reason.

CLICK FOR MORE VIDEO GAME POSTS!

Latest in Pop Culture