Al Pacino is probably one of the only actors who could have upstaged Marlon Brando in the original Godfather movie. His ability to change from a wide-eyed soldier in love, intent on bypassing the family business and marrying his sweetheart, and then slowly transitioning into the next Mafia don was simply amazing. Close-up scenes focused just on Michael Corleone's face were griping, mostly because you could get inside his head and imagine what he was thinking. Ah, if only computer games had this kind of character immersion.

Instead, we typically get a generic Serious Sam shooter where the good guy has about as much character as a postage stamp. This was not supposed to be the case in Eidos' Hitman: Codename 47, released around Christmas 2000, where you played a ruthless killer who also had some misgivings about his occupation. With nothing more than a barcode on your neck and a faint memory of life in the mental ward, your actions became a bit more philosophically challenging as you progressed through the game, although -- as noted in our review -- the ending was nothing more than a brutal and bloody fragfest.

Well, the big bad baldie is coming back for more in Hitman 2: Silent Assassin. This time, he'll start out in a monastery where he has retreated for a respite of quiet seclusion. And who wouldn't? In the first game, he hacked and slashed his way through blood-soaked missions without even an ounce of conscious understanding. Apparently, once the game gets going, our anti-hero will get pulled back into his former life. He'll also travel to even more diverse locations, according to Janos Flosser, managing director of Io Interactive.

"You'll be going everywhere from cold St. Petersburg, to a sterile office building in Malaysia, to a feudal castle in Japan," said Flosser. "Just like in Hitman: Codename 47, we have strived to keep locations as different in visual style as possible and to have a healthy mix of indoors and outdoor missions."

Those missions will also include some incredible variety, again providing multiple means of -- excuse the pun -- execution. "Expect every mission to contain, wholly or in part, the element of stealth," explained Flosser. "What we're striving for is to open up the gameplay as much as possible in order to allow the player to completely determine the means to a given end. We believe in leaving the player in control of events - we're merely here to create an environment for the events to unfold in."

Some of the options available will be a chloroform treatment that knocks your enemies unconscious, and a crossbow for silent attacks. Use of stealth will take different forms, including one mission where you will impersonate a surgeon to complete your deadly task. This diversity is all part of the development plan to allow the gamer to make decisions about the gameplay.

"Our job is to tell the story that will bind a series of events together," said Flosser, "so the player will be left with a sensation of having gone through a coherent and exciting story but not been forced to do things in a specific manner. We're also aiming at designing the game in a way that we'll be able to create memorable moments for the player without the player realizing it was something we designed. There is no right way to reach your destination. Who are we to decide that snipers are better hitmen than those who employ poison or car bombs? We'll let the player decide whether to use stealth or not - as long as they're having fun."

Another area of focus this time out is a completely updated graphics engine. Because Hitman 2: Silent Assassin will be released simultaneously on multiple platforms, the underlying architecture had to be airtight and highly portable, but also use the advantages of each system as much as possible. For PC users, we can expect much more geometric detail and more characters on the screen at one time, plus enhanced lighting techniques and weather effects. "The new engine allows us to have a massively increased polygon count and is highly optimised when it comes to memory and CPU consumption," said producer, Neal Donnel.

Enemy AI will also be greatly improved in the sequel. In typical FPS fashion, the original game was a bit lacking in this regard, often spewing attackers one after the other like an empty-headed arcade shooter. Obviously, AI is difficult to code, and each action on the screen must have some realistic and obvious motivation.

"It's extremely important to convey the mood of the AI to the player, so you won't find yourself being punished without a clue as to why," explained Flosser. "Therefore, apart from giving the AI more states of consciousness towards the player, we're also implementing a way of alerting you to the level of tension around you. It will be very unobtrusive and subtle, but it will give you a sense of the general mood around you."

Some of the complaints about the original game will be addressed in the sequel. Most players found the lack of an in-game save infuriating, especially since the most lethal attacks occurred towards the end of the mission. Granted, most console games do not allow in-game saves either, but they are usually smart enough to allow saving just before the most intense battles, and not immediately after. Hitman 2 will allow the gamer to save at any point, solving the problem once and for all.

Camera movement was another detriment to gameplay. Often, a circling third-person perspective interrupted and even obscured the action. Donnel explained that this problem has been rectified. "The camera system has been simplified greatly. We have added a first-person option, although personally I think third person has an advantage as you are more aware of your surroundings." Thankfully, the first-person mode will be fully interactive, as opposed to a game such as Metal Gear Solid 2 where first-person was nothing more than a method for aiming and shooting.

One lingering question about Hitman 2 will be whether it stands out as an ultra-violent shooter when even the sequel to one of the goriest releases of recent years (Soldier of Fortune) may be lessening its viciousness. It's clear, however, that most game companies are hesitant to connect violent games with violent behavior.

"It ultimately depends on your moral disposition how you react to computer games, films, what you see on the street - everything. I'm having a hard time figuring out how violent outbursts could possibly be blamed on computer games or other media. If anything, I would say they enable you live out some adventurous fantasies, violent or otherwise, in a perfectly harmless way. It's so convenient and easy to blame games and films for the recent tragedies - instead of revising the way we treat each other."

It's yet to be revealed whether Codename 47 develops a conscience about his own actions, in the same way that Michael Corleone eventually tried to turn from his wicked ways. Interestingly enough, Corleone ended up paying dearly for his actions anyway - we'll just have to wait and see if the nameless assassin follows a similar, but hopefully less painful path, this spring.