Mission: Impossible: Operation Surma

Written by Chris Reiter  on January 29, 2004

Full Review: Dozens of gadgets at your disposal, and there's no option for "Cruise" control?

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The year 2003 has been, in its majority, a movie year for Atari (formerly Infogrames). Starting off with a couple of lesser-known shooters and then heading straight to one of the year's most anticipated titles (Enter the Matrix), Atari's publishing house had been made a key player for at least some of 2003. While Enter the Matrix was one of the most hyped releases all year (considering the game was simultaneously shelved the same day as the theatrical release to The Matrix: Revolutions), it was also believed to be one of the most disappointing efforts all year. Following both the game and the movie's mixed entries came to theaters Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines. Another film with mixed results, Atari had later released the movie's video game adaptation. That game, unfortunately, also ended up with less-than-stellar results. Finally, 2003 was coming to a close, and by the end of it, Atari had one more card up their sleeve to reveal. The hand was dealt, and as the game drew to a close, Atari threw down their last movie-based game wild card on the table called Mission: Impossible: Operation Surma.

The danger. The excitement. The women. To be a secret agent who can surpass the most unsurpassable of security systems is an impossible task. Or so you'd like to believe. For Ethan Hunt, it's an everyday activity. Party to an elite secret agency faction, the Impossible Mission Force Ethan stems from isn't involved in crippling any ordinary crime syndicate. Rather, it's the ones that are way beyond simple. The ones that are impossible. But even as well-trained as Ethan's organization has proven time and time again, every dog has its day. This is the day when the villainous Surma Corporation has its eye set on world domination, aided by their own batch of a harmful chemical production line to take control. That is, unless you manage to sneak like the unstoppable and invisible secret agent you are and put a stop to this business before the business begins.

Why this? Why now? Why a Mission: Impossible game? Why? Why? Why? The Mission: Impossible franchise has never quite achieved the same success as its major spy competitor, James Bond. Where the creation of British secret agent James Bond has spawned from novels and into more than forty years of theatrical espionage action releases, Mission: Impossible initially began as a television series in the late 1970's for a while, died off, and had since seen two motion picture adaptations. The last movie of which was featured in the summer of 2000. Presently, other than the fact that there's a Mission: Impossible film sequel on the way for a 2005 release, you've got to wonder why would a game developer conceive a Mission: Impossible product at a time when the height of its popularity is all but existent. Stealth is why. With the immediate rise of the stealth-action genre, sprang from the likes of Metal Gear Solid 2: Sons of Liberty and Tom Clancy's Splinter Cell in the past two years, other development teams are (as always) attempting to hop on the cash cow with what's "in" and "hip." Unfortunately, generalness and unoriginality are some of the common side effects inherited when being involved in such copy cat skirmishes.

Entering into a previously established and redefined genre, Operation Surma has a lot to live up to when it tries to compete with the big boys. It's expected that for a game to achieve a certain amount of success in any untapped portion of any genre, the game must carry at least one interesting selling point on its shoulder. While Surma has very little going for it when it comes to "new and improved" devices, the game still manages to be fun for what it's worth. In fact, when it comes to Surma, the devices do it for the game. More so than the second Metal Gear Solid and more approximately like Splinter Cell, Surma puts you into the role of Ethan Hunt who has in his hands and in his pocket's lots of little toys that can fool, give leeway to, and even remove the numerous road blocks that will stand in your way. Amongst these items are Snake's...I mean, Ethan's binocular/camera combo; Sam's...er, Ethan's electronic pulverizering weapon for knocking out camera detection; and then there's your ever-necessary mini-wire to reach elevated pipes for shifting across, a tranquilizer gun to immobilize pesky guards, and a tool for hacking into the level's select cameras to see what the enemy sees, just like...oh, you know who. But not everything is ripped from similar titles. Unique to Ethan are specialties such as a remote control camera device to stun guards from a distance or even to tail important people throughout the course of a level without being seen, and an item that gets you an inside view of a room from behind a door without ever having to pop it open. The point is that even though Ethan may be capable of similar venues already experienced before in other stealth titles, not everything is exact, and there's still enjoyment to be found in that.

Handling the long list of spy ware is the highlight of Operation Surma. It's tackling enemies on an otherwise man-to-man basis that puts a damper on the whole sneak situation. Two things you'll learn about the enemy patrols in Operation Surma are that they're very easy to make quick work of (even in large numbers), and they can't shoot for shit. Unlike in the Mission: Impossible movies, security isn't exactly an "impossible" feat to surpass. How does one guard on a foot patrol route, another keeping to a limited lookout, another off in the distance and completely blocked off to the major focal points of the area, and another not even paying attention make situations difficult to get in and get out of? Not that with a couple of cameras thrown into the mix makes everything a walk in the park for Ethan, but Ethan's always got the upper hand when it comes to shadow and stealth blows. In cases such as something like this, it'd be easy to employee Ethan's set of standard tactics. Scouting the area, knocking out the cameras, and moving through shadow to shadow, it'd be a cinch to creep up behind the guard in motion when he pauses, hide his body in the shadow, take out the one guard in the distance and lastly the idiot turned off to it all. In shadow, Ethan is entirely invisible, which is why it's always simple to get the drop on enemy guards from behind, considering that in sneak position, Ethan's approach is also completely bereft to the ear.

Even though enemies can totally be cut off from Ethan's presence, a lot of the time, there are certain advantages and further disappointing disadvantages' enemies and Ethan has alike. Similar to the second Metal Gear Solid game, Ethan uses a mini-map to detect the location of a camera's range of sight and where his next objective lies. This map, however, doesn't feature sight cones for enemies (lest you hit them with the electronic weapon device and waste ammo in the process) -- meaning, unless you're someone who'd rather reveal yourself to the enemy at any moment's notice, it's better to sit back and perform a little recon on each passing location of the stage. If you are seen and shot at, it's time to prepare for a brief laugh as once guards notice Ethan, they'll either use their guns on him or run and hit the alarm. Albeit, the alarm system is nothing more than taking up to 30 seconds to locate and disable the alarm with its shut off function (that's usually and conveniently paired up with the alarm itself) before the mission is disavowed. Afterward, the triggered alarm terminates and all enemy forces that were on their way previously are reported to return to their normal stations. It's mind boggling that a high-risk security station would make it that easy. Unless a guard isn't aiming his gun at Ethan, then on the other hand Ethan is able to run from side to side literally dodging bullets. Then again, Ethan can just finish off a guard with Surma's weak combo system, which involves a homing punching and kicking system that allows you to tap the attack button without ever having to worry about the guard ever getting another shot in -- because once Ethan begins attacking he can't. Sometimes it's even noticeable how enemies manage to still fire their gun at Ethan when he's hiding behind a wall, untouched by the stupidity of these enemy guards. Even with all of the faulty programming that went into designing Surma, it's still a fact that health kits aren't a common commodity when it comes time to when Ethan actually needs the refill. So it's usually better to stick to the plan instead of rushing into every situation, no matter how little each threat appears to be.

Being a spy, with all the cool gadgets that come along in signing up for the job, thankfully is a fitting role when it comes to manipulating Ethan's every maneuver. But even here there are gripes tied into the functionality of the game. Progress into Surma will have Ethan stockpiling on more cool gadgets to use. The problem with that is initializing each one of these devices is a bit of a tedious process. First you'll need to press left or right on the direction pad to open up the list of available items, then you'll need to scroll through the list either left or right until the right item is selected. Finally once say the binoculars are chosen, it's then by tapping down on the square key that they can be implemented. It's a process that isn't the biggest bother, but nevertheless it's a process too long that can wear on enjoying the game more so than not.

When Ethan's not choosing what type of toy he wants to play with, he's working his way through enemy territory and making use of the gadgets at the same time in a better uniformed manner. Crouching (L1) is probably the most essential of options Ethan can use, as enemies will never catch onto him while he's bent over and walking. Switching to crouch forces the gameplay to become slower by nature, but without its purpose the gameplay will end a lot quicker. Pressing R1 fires weapons, R2 lifts and lowers enemy bodies, and L2 accesses night vision to view laser beams hidden to the naked spy eye. Triangle's one of the buttons that serves as multiple purposes -- from zooming into the camera's range of view closer as well as submitting entry to certain doors by way of the laser cutter or digital code. The analog sticks are another pair of two-faced uses by controlling Ethan's movement and movement of the in-game's character as is pressing Ethan's back up against a wall to give enemies the silence treatment (that is, Ethan can grab nearby enemy guards before they round the wall's corner) and centering the camera on Ethan again. One thing about the camera system is that it works inversely. Instead of pressing left to go left, you need to press right to go left, which is a little confusing when learning how to play the game...but again a hitch that players can get adjusted to with about an hour or more of game time.

Impressive as the visuals in Metal Gear Solid 2: Sons of Liberty and Tom Clancy's Splinter Cell are, Mission: Impossible: Operation Surma that has followed in a year ahead of the other two is still not nearly as stunning as its comparable competition. Levels made up of European outsides and laboratory inside for one thing have much of a pasted-on look to them. Computers, chairs, tables and things of that sort are inside, with windows, bushes, and cars found on the outside -- all of which doesn't excel much in creating interesting locales. Character models, for another thing, seem to be most important when it comes to the few relevant characters in the game. Not that any model is drenched of its goodness, but this is another one of those games where most of the time everything you see is just plain and average. Luther's model is definitely the best looking of them all, and it's not because he's not in the game that much, it's because Vhing Rhames is one of the few actors who actually lent their likeness to the game itself. Unlike Tom Cruise, who has nothing to do with anything in Surma, the Ethan Hunt portrayed here isn't too interesting a guy to stare at. Well, actually that's not true. It's just the pretend, digital-made version of Ethan Hunt portrayed here isn't as visually exciting as a Tom Cruise in a video game might've looked. Other character models, such as guards and scientists you'll encounter along the way, usually are the same exact ones, except for some of the time. Thrown in is a bit of variety between mustached guards and ones without them -- or maybe one scientist will feature dark skin and another who has glasses. Each of the characters is right enough in appearance. They all fit into the game's world well, but don't expect every element in the person designs to sparkle with shine.

Being a spy is a balancing act, which Ethan and his enemies manage to correspond to fairishly. While enemies don't express as much movement as Ethan does -- whether they're on patrol and pausing momentarily, or standing and shooting, running, or getting knocked back in reaction to Ethan's presence -- Ethan does. Ethan is able to run, crouch, climb, shoot, shimmy, jump, punch, kick, drop, pick up, and press up against walls. And just like the famous Tom Cruise scene in Mission: Impossible where Ethan is suspended in the air by a wire with his body spread flat, Ethan in this game will have his share of "heightened" moments on the wire. Out of all Ethan's animations, though, none of them particularly strive to reach for a much better angle than most of what you see from the guards, with Ethan's qualifications set at just a good rate. But over, under, and out of this world are the special effects that lace the intricacy of Surma together. Peer upon the marble-textured streets as elemental fireworks or lightning flash and shimmer, illuminating watery cracks and holes in the stone floor. Gaze at Ethan's body as shadow darkens it in playful essence when moving through it. Or stare at the illustrious touch of night vision through a green glow all around Ethan, or through the glowing blue hues in the view of sonar vision straight through a door. Every effect is quite neat to glance over more than one time in bringing its own life to the game.

Aside from being known as the popular spy series that sparked the imagination of TV and moviegoers alike, Mission: Impossible has also been famous for one other aspect: its theme song. Surma now continues the tradition of Mission: Impossible in using this same music to heighten the action on and off through most parts of the game. Other times it's dissimilar electronic themes that, while not as memorable as the incredible Mission: Impossible theme, are subtly appropriate when mixed in to lend the gameplay a fair enough pattern in ear filtration. Opposite of the music in Operation Surma are a variety of your typical audio effects for your typical type of stealth-action game. A lot of the time what you'll be hearing sounds such as guards pacing the routine grounds, cameras buzzing to and fro, the knockout hits from unleashing your fists of fury, the blasting of bullets when guards with guns fire forward, alarms buzzing at the press of a button, and the whirs and whistles of your gadgetry going into immediate use. Other than that, though, what you won't hear a lot of the time is Ethan whose best crouched down in complete silence -- unless you're the type who prefers to traverse a level unlike a sneaky sneaker.

Seemingly, a standardized effect is growing toward the way the main character in a stealth game is to sound. Solid Snake, voiced by David Hayter, and Sam Fisher, voiced by Michael Ironside, are two stars whom both have the voice of a rough and tough operative. To that same ideal in mind, you'd think that just any actor with a gruff voice would be perfect to star in a game of the same genre. Apparently with Operation Surma, that's not the case. Opting more toward the Splinter Cell feel here once again, it's in Steven Blum's talent (who's probably best known as the announcer on Cartoon Network's Toonami) that Ethan Hunt can speak his mind. However, it's an opinion that he'd be better off not talking at all, as an Ethan with a scratchy voice just doesn't click well with the character. Even without Cruise present, Vhing Rhames and John Polson return to do the impossible -- the Mission: Impossible that is, in reprising their respective roles of Ethan's hacker and transportation backup nicely, as Luther and Billy. Add to the reminder of the cast though, which groups together an overall average lineup of miscellaneous Russian and American voice work used for guards and a few other story persons, and the game's dialogue is all but anything spectacular at a moderate level.