There's something strangely comforting in a film series that is older than you by a decade or two, and while Star Wars tends to secure a place in the hearts of boys sooner, eventually the venerable James Bond movies will earn their adoration as well. Ever since Dr. No in 1962, Commander Bond, 007, has been entertaining spy fans around the world with its unique blend of espionage, gadgetry and gorgeous girls. In 2006 though, Bond experienced his most dramatic reinvention ever with Casino Royale, which dropped the gadgetry, puns and frivolous fun in favour of a darker, more realistic tone. The reboot was a resounding success, and 2008 saw the first ever direct sequel in the Bond franchise with Quantum of Solace, which picks up minutes after the events of Casino Royale.
The Quantum of Solace game follows suit, and it sticks fairly close to the film's plot without spoiling the story. It does this by introducing a couple of new locations while extending scenes beyond what we saw on-screen, but more importantly, it also includes a sizeable chunk of material from Casino Royale for good measure. The end result is a game that is at once familiar and fresh, which is a tough ask for most movie tie-ins. Where the movie begins with Bond eluding enemies in his trademark Aston Martin with a baddie in the boot, the game starts with Bond actually apprehending said villain and skips the driving sequence in lieu of a cut-scene.
This sort of scenario is common in the Quantum of Solace game, and it's effective precisely because it does deftly sidestep the pitfalls that come with trying to shoehorn a first-person shooter experience into films that actually have very little run-and-gun action in them. Not only that, Treyarch have also eschewed the obvious driving, flying or boating sequences that they could have made you play, instead focusing on delivering the best shooter they can. So iconic scenes from the two films - like Bond pursuing a bomb-maker through a shanty-town – are well represented, while others have been slightly reworked to remove civilian collateral and give Bond more room to move...and to shoot.
At heart, Quantum of Solace is a by-the-books first-person shooter, made interesting by the inclusion of some third-person action in the form of a Gears of War style cover system. Most of your time will be spent seeing the world through Bond's eyes, but if you press the A button in front of suitable structures, the camera will pull back to allow you a better view of the action and allow you to target enemies from behind cover. This isn't the only time you'll see 007 in the flesh though: click the right thumbstick near an enemy and you'll enter takedown mode, which allows you to unleash some of the brutal melee moves that have become the trademark of Daniel Craig's tenure as Bond.
For a game that has chosen to focus exclusively on shooting, you'd expect that Quantum of Solace would do a pretty damn good job of it, and for the most part, it does. The gunplay is solid (albeit entirely bloodless), the cover system works well, and the A.I. holds its own except for the occasional lapse in logic and the obligatory poke-my-head-out-so-you-can-shoot-it-off dynamic that such games require. Although Bond's predilection has always been for the Walther PPK pistol, Treyarch appreciate that killing hundreds of henchmen with a handgun gets tiresome, and have included a bevy of ballistic goodies to mow down minions. Sadly the lack of blood is only part of the aversion to impactful violence, so it's often hard to gauge if you've hit your enemies or if they're close to carking it.
And while Treyarch don't force dodgy driving levels down your throat, there is a surprisingly heavy emphasis on stealth in Quantum of Solace. While the new Bond knows how to be discreet when absolutely necessary, anyone who has seen the two new films will know that he is much more inclined to barge into an embassy and blow it up than he is to diplomatically sneak his way in. Thankfully the stealth gameplay works well; a silenced weapon won't ever be heard by your foes so you're free to shoot with impunity so long as you don't do it in front of a camera or drop a fellow in front of his friends. You can also use your mobile to study the movement patterns of the enemy, but on normal or lower difficulty this isn't necessary. In fact, there's none of the usual instant-fail penalty for sloppy sneaking – if you want to go in guns blazing, well, you've got a licence to kill!
As you would expect from a game built around two films, almost every level features locations and scenes from the movies, some very faithfully recreated, others taking some poetic licence. The chase scene through the construction yard and the Venetian demolition from Casino Royale are the two standouts in terms of authenticity, while the levels in the science centre and Casino Royale itself are excellent examples of how to extrapolate exciting gameplay out of entirely gun-free scenes. In case you haven't gotten the hint yet, the irony for the Quantum of Solace game is that its most enjoyable moments are all from...Casino Royale. In fact, Quantum of Solace really just serves as bookends to what is probably the longest flashback sequence in the history of videogames – 7 of its 12 levels are based on Casino Royale.
This isn't a bad thing in and of itself, although fans would have to be forgiven for feeling a little misled given how there's barely a quantum of solace in the game. It's also an incredibly brief game, weighing in at less than 8 hours playtime on the default difficulty, so without Casino Royale, Quantum of Solace would barely rate as a mini-game. You only live twice, apparently, but your game probably won't – there's very little reason to replay Quantum of Solace unless you're after the Achievements. The unlockables are well presented, allowing you to wander around an in-game representation of MI6 to view them, but the chapter-select doesn't go so far as to tell you how many collectibles you're missing or anything helpful.
But if the solo world is not enough for you, there's always the multiplayer mode! Much like the singleplayer, the online component could be adequately described as "solid.” It checks off all the right features and presses all the right buttons – the now-standard online career with unlockable weapons and perks, coupled with all the usual gameplay modes like deathmatch, VIP and a juggernaut centred around the eponymous Golden Gun. The online progression lacks the depth of COD4 or World at War, but since you're just earning money rather than experience, you can easily focus on getting the weapons and perks you want as early as you can. Matchmaking is solid and quick in the more popular game modes, although you'll end up in a lot of European games, so expect plenty of love from Russia!
Graphically, Quantum of Solace is not a view to kill for, and despite using a modified version of Infinity Ward's excellent Call of Duty 4 engine, the game's cross-platform roots shine through like a bad dye job on a bottle blonde. It's particularly grim when you compare it to Treyarch's other big release of 2008, Call of Duty: World at War, which looked fantastic. It's not that Quantum of Solace looks awful, it just lacks the level of detail and polish that we've come to expect. Still, it performs well with nary a drop in framerate or a serious graphical glitch.
The game fares a little better in the audio department, with all the major players from the films lending voice to their on-screen characters. The soundtrack is great, although for some reason the actual theme song has vanished rather inexplicably. Sound effects are solid, but probably won't leave your sound-system shaken or your emotions stirred. Given the game's proclivity for stealth-sections and silenced weapons though, this shouldn't come as much of a shock to anyone.
