November 2nd marked an important day in video games, the return of James Bond to video games, not just with Goldeneye but the newest edition and 24th Bond game made with James Bond 007: Blood Stone. With Goldeneye on its way, Blood Stone fell under the radar for most approaching its release. Unfortunately compared to its Wii counterpart, Blood Stone falls somewhat short of expectations and falls into the territory of being an average third person cover based shooter.

Gameplay:

James Bond 007: Blood Stone’s action consists of two main gameplay types. The first and most widely used is the third person shooter. Players use a basic cover mechanic to pop out from behind walls and bunkers to take out oncoming foes. The shooting is fairly accurate and the autolock often aims are opponents bodies making players use some degree of twitch skill to move in to a head shot. Unfortunately, these head shots don’t always register as well as they should, even with the most accurate of guns.

Even on the Agent (normal) difficulty, some foes who are not wearing protective headgear or are shot right in the face take multiple shots to bring down. In a realistic setting (i.e. not zombies, superheroes or space aliens), this definitely pulls a player out of the game as they wonder what adamantium skull must be taking this kind of punishment. While the pop in and out shooting can be fun for some time, it does begin to get slightly repetitive as the enemy AI doesn’t effectively use cover to draw the player into a vulnerable position.

With only a few short months until it’s release, hype is building strong for the next 007 game. Piggybacking on the excitement of the upcoming Goldeneye revamp, James Bond 007: Blood Stone takes Bond through a new adventure in the realm of the Daniel Craig version of the character. Though not considered Bond canon, many are viewing the game as a replacement for the recent Bond movie that has been postponed indefinitely.

At Comic Con,  we got the chance to see a play through of one of the game’s early levels. Now, Activision has released a new trailer which showcases the game’s Istanbul level. Thought it is hard to tell from what we have seen so far just what the full story of the game is, it looks like Bond will be traveling far and wide across an array of locations.

Also included in this post are a group of screen shots showing a frozen tundra and shantytown village along with one of the game’s amazing explosions. Take a peek at everything and obviously stick close to the Flickcast for all your news on James Bond 007: Blood Stone as it becomes available.

The night before Comic-Con, Activision let the press see the upcoming third person action shooter James Bond 007: Blood Stone for the first time on the Xbox 360. Though it was not a hands on demo, the press was allowed to see a playthrough of the game’s first level.

In it, the Daniel Craig-inspired Bond makes his way through a pier-side estate using shooting and cover tactics similar to that of Alpha Protocol and Gears of War. The game incorporated a reward system to stealth take downs that would allow players to pull off instantaneous special kills. Bond then took part in an action packed speedboat pursuit before a high impact car chase.

During all of it, the game looked great. It looked as though gameplay ran smooth though its hard to really tell without actually getting a hands on play through. One thing emphasized during the demo was the variety in gameplay as the game had both fast paced sequences including shooting and driving contrasting the slower paced stealth sections.

While players think of 007 as a first person franchise when fondly remembering Goldeneye on the Nintendo 64, most forget the lack of success that subsequent releases on the PlayStation 2 garnered. Hoping to reinvent the wheel, Bizarre creations is releasing a new third-person action adventure featuring the British super spy.

Coming to the XBox 360, PC, PlayStation 3 and Nintendo DS, James Bond 007: Blood Stone will be an original Bond experience coming from screenwriter Bruce Feirstein (Tomorrow Never Dies and Goldeneye).

In addition to Daniel Craig (Bond) and Judi Dench (M), Grammy and BRIT award winning artist Joss Stone will be featured in a leading role in the game. Stone, as seen in the screen shots below, will also be creating new original music for the game as well.

“James Bond 007: Blood Stone captures the cinematic intensity of a Bond film by immersing players in an intriguing conspiracy that will require them to think and act like James Bond,” said David Pokress, Head of Marketing for Licensed Properties, Activision Publishing.  “In addition, the game will feature a diverse array of multi-player modes and debut strategic objective-based gameplay that will allow Xbox 360, PS3 and PC players to battle as teams of spies and mercenaries through authentic Bond locales.”

Check out the trailer and screens of Craig and Stone in James Bond 007: Blood Stone.