James Bond is a mythical character. Ian Flemming’s creation has had a huge impact on popular culture, and for good reason. His elegance, sarcasm, and ability to adapt to the times is absolutely enviable. Also a little frightening. That doesn’t take away from the feeling that someday the times will leave him behind. It can’t be that he can always adapt, take on a new form for a new generation, and still remain attractive. But at IO Interactive, they seem to believe the opposite and have wanted to prove it with their new game, 007: First Light.
A different James Bond
The biggest peculiarity of 007: First Light is that it presents us with a James Bond before he becomes 007. His first mission is not even as a spy. As a soldier in the British Army, he accidentally gets involved in a MI6 mission and decides to follow (and of course, disobey) orders when he finds himself in a situation that overwhelms both him and his future superiors. This will ultimately lead him on the journey that this game represents: his training, his first missions, and the discovery of a great conspiracy that will earn him the title, officially, of 00.
Because the charm of this game is that it is James Bond, but not exactly. The 00 program no longer exists and is being revived, James Bond is not yet the suave badass we know and everything has a more youthful and straightforward touch. A bit John Wick, a bit young adult, almost like a version of James Bond from the famous 90s series The Adventures of Young Indiana Jones.
Also, it is a game by IO Interactive, the people behind the excellent Hitman games. This translates to the fact that a good part of our missions will require us to know how to infiltrate, remain unnoticed, and gather information. However, since we are not a 00 agent, without a license to kill. This means that although it resembles Hitman in structure and form in its missions, the absence of assassinations gives it its own personality: it feels like a methodical spy job.
Because the most surprising thing is that it also has a more dynamic component. As if it were a Naughty Dogs game, like Uncharted or The Last of Us, sometimes things get out of hand and give us a license to kill. In those cases, shootouts, chases, and set pieces of things exploding and collapsing follow one after another, and the game is a pure spectacle of adrenaline. But especially regarding combat, IO Interactive’s work is nothing short of excellent. Their shootouts are exquisite, and their fistfights are fantastic, even able to give one or two lessons on the subject to Sony’s most beloved internal studio.
But he is still James Bond
That doesn’t mean it doesn’t still have everything we expect from a James Bond story. All the classic characters from his stories are present. M, Q, and Miss Moneypenny make their appearance, although they do so in a way that is different from what we are used to. They have a different and more contemporary role.
The entire Q team also appears, with whom we will have to work closely, because an important part of the game involves James Bond’s gadgets. Having to choose between two and three before each mission, what we can do will also depend on what we decide to equip ourselves with. A poison dart is not the same as a blinding laser that can also be used to break locks and chains, just as a pen that launches explosives is different. And in those decisions, not only the kind of James Bond we want to be is defined, but also how much of a James Bond this game is: it is impossible to progress without resorting to our gadgets.
In addition to our charm. Because he is still James Bond and part of what we can do is to come out on top by lending an ear to the people we meet. Although that will spend a series of action points that we will only recover by successfully taking actions, so it will only be a last resort for the trickiest situations.
But that is the charm of 007 First Light. It wants us to feel like James Bond. Also in wearing a Rolex, driving an Aston Martin, and getting out of a situation that isn’t going as we planned by pulling off a tremendous bluff, but it works. Because that is part of the character’s identity. Of what he is. And IO Interactive understands this and manages to implement it brilliantly with a few masterful strokes.
Just a contemporary James Bond
In the end, the charm of this James Bond is that he is not the James Bond of our parents and grandparents. He is a millennial James Bond, irreverent and completely contemporary. He still has the traits typical of the character, but he also has other different aspects: he has his own personality.
This helps that the story is set in the present. It focuses on the dangers of AI, the need for the human touch, and how people cannot be replaced by machines in truly important matters. That no machine can or should make decisions for a person. Because it makes it feel like it speaks to us and does so in elegant, simple, and interesting terms. As movies and books about James Bond used to do.
With a planned release on May 27 for PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X|S, and PC, and a release in the third quarter of the year for Switch 2, 007 First Light is one of the most interesting releases of the year. A proposal that offers us a different, yet very current, James Bond that could captivate the audience in ways they do not expect. If they give it the chance.
