In that vein, Splinter Cell was, by any stretch of the imagination, an intensely satisfying experience. You had plenty of high-tech gadgetry, with custom-made machine-gun bullets and the handy Optic Cable, but most of the time, you were still relying on a few polished acrobatic moves, your night-vision goggles, and your wits. Hiding bodies, avoiding surveillance devices, knocking civilians unconscious... it was a good time.

Sam Fisher's capabilities have not changed, to any great extent. You are still one of, if not the, sneakiest badasses to ever drag a body into a dark alleyway. His split jump has evolved, to some small extent; no longer does it let you bounce off walls, like Jackie Chan, to reach much higher ledges, but you can use it to shimmy up alleyways.

In a similar vein, the elbow strike has become more useful. Now, when you smack somebody across the face, they're briefly stunned, if they aren't instantly knocked unconscious. They will no longer react to being punched in the face by a previously-undetected guy in black by pulling a pistol and shooting you seven times in the chest. Instead, they sway for a second, giving you enough time to put them away with a second shot.

What's really changed is the control scheme. Splinter Cell had a lot going for it, but using Fisher's gadgets was not the most intuitive thing in the world. Pandora Tomorrow streamlines his inventory. Now, your lockpicks and Optic Cable become simple options on the pull-down menu, whenever you're confronted with a closed and/or locked door. Hugging a wall is now done with the left thumbstick, with the option of a fast, quiet "SWAT turn" to let you safely get across doorways. Medical kits have been taken out of your item bag, and placed on walls in safe rooms throughout the game. Each one's got the capability to restore maybe 150% of Fisher's health, and he'll only use as much out of them as he needs to.

Fisher's arsenal returns in full in Pandora Tomorrow, with a few new options. From the beginning of the game, you'll be equipped with thermal vision, night-vision goggles, a handy rappel line, and a pair of binoculars. In addition to his specialized rifle rounds, Fisher's packing chaff grenades, emergency flares (just the thing for distracting a heat-sensitive automated turret), and motion-sensitive wall mines.

Fisher is called into action again, when Indonesian terrorists take over the American embassy in Dili. Sahadi Sadorno, a deeply paranoid and charismatic man, is up to something that threatens the interests of the United States, and worse yet, he has popular support across the world. Fisher's job is to follow Sadorno and his contacts across the world, to find out what they want, what they're doing, and how they can be stopped. As usual, he has to do all this without anyone knowing he was ever there.

The real draw of Pandora Tomorrow is probably its multiplayer mode, complete with functionality over Xbox Live. Up to four players can compete against each other in teams of two, as either spies or mercenaries. The spies play in a third-person viewpoint, with only Sticky Shockers to defend themselves, and must try to evade the other team long enough to accomplish their objective. On the other side, mercenaries operate in first-person perspective (it looks a bit like the Rainbow Six games), and have the advantage of pure lethality. A spy can get the drop on a mercenary and put him in a headlock, holding him hostage just as Fisher can in the main game, but the mercenary can feed a spy thirty silenced bullets. It's not wholly without balance.