What Went Wrong With The Hitman 3 Steam Launch

I’ve been a big fan of the Hitman series since I played Hitman 2: Silent Assassin on a PlayStation 2 demo disc. While there have been some aspects of the World of Assassination trilogy of games that I haven’t been the biggest fan of, I would still consider it a high point of the series. That being said, I had waited on buying the recent Hitman 3 until it came to Steam. This wasn’t a pushback on Epic Games Store, but just my personal preference to have it all on Steam. My backlog was certainly big enough for me to wait anyway. Plus, maybe there would be a sale!

This was a common sentiment. Whether it was up to preference like me or just a strong dislike for Epic Games Store and having to use another launcher, there were a lot of fans who have been waiting for the assumed exclusivity period to end. IO Interactive would make all of these fans happy when they confirmed that Hitman 3 would be launching on Steam for the beginning of the second year of content on January 20th, 2022. Unfortunately, the game launched to a negative reception due to the pricing, confusing purchase options, and bugs.

It is best to break this down by talking about the pricing first. Nearly everyone that was looking forward to this was expecting or at least hoping for a discounted launch price. The reason for this is because it’s very common for a game that was initially an Epic Games Store exclusive to launch a year or six months later on Steam at a temporarily reduced price. I cross-checked a lot of prices for games that had been exclusive and the only game I found that did not launch on Steam with a discount was Mortal Shell, which instead offered the game’s DLC for free over the first few days.

From big AAA titles like Borderlands 3 and Control to smaller titles like Journey and Maneater along with the recent Super Meat Boy Forever, no other games launched on Steam at full price. The discount varies from 10% to 50% with bigger titles usually falling into the latter. Of course, there’s no rigid rule saying that a title needs to have a discount if it’s launching on Steam after being exclusive to Epic Game Store. At this point, it’s just expected. This is what makes IO Interactive’s choice to put Hitman 3 on Steam at full price surprising, but not inherently wrong.

Something that I think is always important to keep in mind is that the primary goal of a business is going to be to make money. I’m sure that everyone at IO Interactive is passionate about the projects they work on. However, the company and everyone that makes decisions for the company wants to make as much money as possible. It’s normal to have expected them to launch the game on sale, but they didn’t have to.

What complicates it a little bit is that the game has regularly been on sale on the Epic Games Store and was even 60% off two weeks before the launch on Steam. This isn’t the same as a first-party Nintendo title rarely being put on sale. Hitman 3 has been marked down quite often since it was first released a year ago now so it is a bit puzzling that it released full price on Steam. To make matters worse, the regional pricing for the game is all over the place and some have posted prices even higher than the typical full-price. This seems accidental, but it doesn’t help when a fanbase has decided you’re greedy.

I wish I could say that was the only problem with the pricing, but there’s even more. All of the Hitman games in the World of Assassination trilogy have faced some degree of scrutiny in regards to their content options. Multiple editions, upgrades to better editions, and separate DLC have all been carried over from game to game.

I’d imagine it would have been easier to just group content into general bundles but it seems the goal is to ensure everyone has the chance to pay for specific content. I can’t tell if it’s negligent or just to earn more money, but it’s definitely not consumer-friendly.

If you’re only interested in the base Hitman 3 game, all you need is the standard edition at $59.99 (USD). The deluxe edition which costs $89.99 provides the base game, a soundtrack, a digital book, and exclusive suits and items that are unlocked through deluxe escalation contracts. It currently has a mostly negative score on Steam because it’s seen as far too overpriced. For new players that want to experience the previous two games, the $99.99 Hitman Trilogy comes with the base game and two access pass DLCs which include the base content from Hitman 1 and Hitman 2.

What isn’t included in the Hitman Trilogy offering is the DLC for both original games. If you want those, you’ll also have to buy the $9.99 access pass for Hitman 1 GOTY Upgrade and the $34.99 access pass for Hitman 2 Expansion respectively. Alternately, there’s also the $59.97 Hitman Trilogy Premium Add-Ons Bundle, which features the extra content from the deluxe edition (without the base game) and both of the above access passes. Also for those who want base+DLC content from just one specific game, there are two separate bundles for that as well.

Finally, we get to the Hitman 3 Seven Deadly Sins DLC content. Each of these seven DLC packs revolves around a unique escalation contract and unlockable suits and items. They’re $4.99 on their own or $29.68 when buying them together through the Hitman 3: Seven Deadly Sins Collection. As they’re not plot-important as the Hitman 2 DLCs were nor necessarily as in-depth or cohesive as the Hitman 1 DLC, the seven deadly sins content is seen as very overpriced and very unsatisfying.

If someone hypothetically wanted to experience all of the content from the entire trilogy, they’d need to buy Hitman Trilogy, the Hitman Trilogy Premium Add-Ons Bundle, and the Seven Deadly Sins Collection. All together that comes out to $189.64. People can obviously evaluate what’s more important to them but either way, it costs a lot to play content from games that are from last year, 2018, and 2016. Especially when you consider how much all of these games and their content have gone on sale over the years.

For the awful cherry on top, the game didn’t exactly launch in the best state which is questionable as this game isn’t a new release. Players complained about progress not carrying over from the Steam versions of the previous games, a lot of issues (and negativity) were focused on the Elusive Target Arcade mode. On top of that, the VR mode that so many were looking forward to is little more than a port of the PSVR mode once you get past the bugs, killing off any hope that it would be more refined and in line with other VR experiences on PC.

Many players also reported having to wait in a queue to connect to the servers and play the game. Being forced to wait to play a single-player game that’s relaunched in a buggy state doesn’t sound the most appealing. Having the full price slapped on there isn’t a great look either.

After a week of silence, IO Interactive did finally comment on the Steam launch. They didn’t go into specifics with why fans are unhappy but in an attempt to rectify this they’ve made it so anyone who bought or buys Hitman 3 Standard Edition until February 19th, 2022 will receive a free upgrade to Hitman 3 Deluxe Edition. Likewise, any buyers of the deluxe edition or Hitman Trilogy will have a free upgrade for the Seven Deadly Sins Collection.

If you bought it all or imported the Trilogy content from the previous games then it seems you’re out of luck. Needless to say, this isn’t the fix players are looking for either. It might just be the best they receive though.

This whole situation is a great reminder to keep expectations in check. Arguing that they’re greedy or just focused on money doesn’t mean much when you’re talking about a business. While a part of the outrage can be attributed to some who feel a bit more entitled, such as whoever hacked and harassed the mod team of the Hitman subreddit and caused it to go private for a few hours, I do understand why many fans are mad.

Even from a business perspective, I’d wager that a small discount likely would have earned the game a better reputation. It would have prevented so much goodwill from the community from being lost, and might have bolstered initial sales. I know I’m disappointed but thankfully my backlog is still large enough for me to wait for the game to go on sale before I decide if I want to buy it on Steam. Unless the game has some big sales soon and everyone forgives and forgets, this will remain as an example of how not to successfully relaunch a game.