Choas Theory

SHAWN: It's a full-scale firefight between the Koreas--in short, more ballistic zap-pow in one late scene than the series' previous installments put together--and the perfect place to play secret operative. As silent-but-deadly superspy Sam Fisher, you'll shoot out streetlights, scale fire escapes, and stealth-kill guards by the dozen; the raucous machine guns and men in the do-or-die grip of adrenaline overdose just make your job all the easier. Sam can even take potshots at warring soldiers from either side of the DMZ (the demilitarized zone dividing the north's dictatorship from the south's democracy) without his previously touchy handlers at HQ pulling the plug. Chaos Theory isn't the cruel, ball-busting taskmaster of Splinter Cells past--the exacting details don't matter so long as the duties get done, and it's a better game because of it.

Chaos Theory's best bits occur between battlefields, but the rest is right on, too. Case in point: Chief spy Lambert details the workings of an alarm system about which Sam assumes, "triggering three means the mission's over." Not so: "This isn't a videogame," says Lambert. And in some ways it almost isn't--certainly not where rendering a realistic world is concerned, what with its rained-on rocks, crashing waves, and cobblestone walkways done up in makes-you-wanna-touch-it texture; the terrified peepers of the terrorists in Sam's strangleholds; and a camera--the most flawlessly functional in its genre--that captures every atmospheric detail from every conceivable angle.

What looks lifelike also acts it (maybe not flesh and blood, but more on that in a moment). Snuff candles to create cover, track a shadow across the walls of a teahouse and punch through the paper to get at the guy on the other side--some of it works to your advantage. Other stuff works against it, as anything out of the ordinary--open doors,