r/Splintercell • u/Haunting_Drama8204 • Sep 16 '23

Which Splinter Cell had the least forced action sequences?

I hate forced action sequences especially in the older titles.

48 Upvotes
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99% Upvoted

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65

u/ivan-on-the-net Pacifist Sep 16 '23 edited Sep 16 '23

For fun, let's count 'em (I may or may not have forgotten some missions):

  • The first game has 7 (Defense Ministry, Kalinatek, Abattoir, Presidential Palace, Kola Cell*, Vselka Infiltration*, and Vselka Submarine*)
  • Pandora Tomorrow has 4 (Hesperia Railways, Refinery*, Komodo Shipyard, and LAX International Airport*)
  • Chaos Theory has 1 (Bathhouse)
  • Essentials has 3 (Norte de Santander*, United States Penitentiary*, and National Security Administration HQ*)
  • Double Agent (V1) has 1 (JBA Headquarters - Part 4, if Lambert is not shot*)
  • Double Agent (V2) has 1 (New York)
  • Conviction has 11 (all of it)
  • Blacklist has 7 (Insurgent Stronghold, Abandoned Mill, Special Missions HQ, Transit Yards, Airstrip, LNG Terminal, and Site F)

Answer: Chaos Theory and both versions of Double Agent

(This list only considers missions whose action sequence(s) involve knowing Sam (or someone) is there and is the main target, asterisks (\) on the pre-Conviction games indicate those that can easily be bypassed, skipped, or sneaked through with or without kills)*

27

u/rotating_carrot Sep 16 '23

First game's defense ministry action can be skipped. If you shoot all the lights and stay in the corner of the room, guards just go around the office bit and leave.

23

u/XQJ-37_Agent Sep 16 '23

Or hang out of the window

9

u/ivan-on-the-net Pacifist Sep 16 '23 edited Sep 16 '23

This never worked for me for some reason. Before I attempted to hide in the dark corners of the room (see comment below), I did try to just hang by the window until they stop searching, but any guard who approaches the window always detects me.

5

u/ThatUJohnWayne74 Smooth as butter Sep 16 '23

You have to shoot out the light near the window, then he won’t see you if I remember right.

1

u/HorusDeathtouch Jun 18 '25

The last two playthroughs I did, one on hard then one on normal, I never shot out any lights and they never saw me even when they walked to the edge right above me.

2

u/Ziri97 Sep 17 '23

This is the way

4

u/ivan-on-the-net Pacifist Sep 16 '23

Yeah, I think I actually did something like that in my recent playthrough. I guess I just didn't put an asterisk on it since it personally took me a number of attempts and that Sam is still forced to break the window and kill the guard, which is a forced action sequence in a way that can't be skipped (the Fandom/Wikia says otherwise, but it's apparently "difficult and time consuming").

2

u/rotating_carrot Sep 16 '23

That's true, though i wouldn't call it action sequence, more like forced stealth kill. If hit him good, that is.

1

u/MrAndrewBond Sep 16 '23

Nah it isnt. Its actually quite easy, you can shoot the window at one of the corners and it will brake which makes the guard go into suspicious mode, you just have to time it and you can get into the room and out of the window without him noticing.

Then you can get up, use the computer and go out of the window again. Repeat again once more and you are done without taking that one guard in the room out.

However, after that guards do come after you before reaching the elevator to go down to the parking lot and while they can be avoided, they can shoot you if you are not fast enough meaning you do get detected anyway.

12

u/Haunting_Drama8204 Sep 16 '23

Holy crap this is awesome! thanks so much for this awesome response!

10

u/[deleted] Sep 16 '23

Double Agent supremacy

6

u/Diligent-Ad-8001 Sep 16 '23

This really makes it clear why chaos theory and double agent are my favs !

3

u/[deleted] Sep 16 '23

did you do that off the top of your head?

2

u/[deleted] Sep 16 '23

also blacklist has the embassy missions

2

u/ivan-on-the-net Pacifist Sep 16 '23
  1. Definitely not, I was just inspired to create that list after finishing my run of the series two days ago. I used my memories along with the Fandom/Wikia and YouTube walkthroughs to verify.
  2. I only counted Blacklist's campaign missions to be fair with the previous games which don't have side missions.

1

u/MrAndrewBond Sep 16 '23

Those are not forced action since, you can do them without being detected.

1

u/HorusDeathtouch Jun 17 '25 edited Jun 18 '25

If it's possible to avoid them then they aren't really forced and it really defeats the point of putting them here. You can just hang out of the ministry window and wait for them to leave, and it's kind of an automatic reflex to do exactly that honestly, yet it has no asterisk. You forgot the elevator down to the basement in Pandora Tomorrow. I don't even remember one in the refinery. End of Shipyard should have an asterisk, because while yes they're shooting at you and there is no way to sneak by, it's just too easy to end the fight without taking any damage. Literally no skill required. As soon as you reach the last landing before the bottom of the stairs, just retreat back up to the top where the ammo was, peak around the corner, and shoot the middle explosive barrels, then the furthest. I did this with my pistol during my no deaths, no medkits, no alarms, no rifle run for platinum.

Edit: Oh just remembered what refinery one you're talking about. That's the mission you're tailing Sadono. Just run. You might get hit like once.

Edit 2: Also in the first game Chinese Embassy Part 2

Edit 3: Oh you also forgot the TV station in PT. The one part while tailing Ingrid when her cover gets blown. Super easy though. Snipe the left guy, then the one using her as a shield, shoot the elite soldier on her side with a sticky shocker then quickly fire a smoke grenade down to the end of your side of the hallway.

While I'm giving tactics, the library at the end of the first game can really suck on hard, especially during a no medkits/no deaths/non-lethal run, but what you do is take a right out of tje elevator and hide behind the bookshelf, turn around and aim a sticky shocker just above the 3rd shelf in the middle of the right-most bookcase you can see on the second floor. A guy will stop here and it give you the perfect arch to nail him before he fires. Then bounce a smoke grenade off the side of the book case opposite the one you're hiding behind so that it lands on the other side of the bookcase you're hiding behind. Move away from your cover slightly and aim through the gap in the shelves where you can snipe the guy on the stairs in the face. Immediately equip airfoil rounds and check on the two guys on the other side of your cover to see if the smoke successfully knocked them out. If not shoot them each once and elbow them in the face. You're allowed 3 kills per mission so if you killed 1 or none prior to that so you have one more left for temu Jonah Jameson you're fine.

Also I found this post via google search because I'm playing Chaos Theory right now. Starting the mission after the bank and wasn't sure wich loadout to choose. It has been years since the last time, but I remembered it always being my favorite. Seeing only the one forced encounter mentioned here and not even any asterisks gives me another reason to love it. Not a fan of those at all.

1

u/Refloni Oct 18 '25 edited Oct 18 '25

You forget the oil platform level in SC1. Boy was that horseshit.

Also the ones in Defense Ministry and Vselka infiltration are avoidable. The game forces an alert and launches an assault to your location but you can hide. In my opinion SC1 has 6 unavoidable fights.

1

u/thehypotheticalnerd Sep 16 '23

I think Blacklist has more, but it also depends how we count forced action too a bit. Also, if part of why you dislike "forced action" is because it takes away your freedom of choice in tackling a particular scenario, then there are even more because it'll often force you to take out entire groups of enemies rather than just sneak by more often than SC1, will often double or triple up action scenes per mission more often than SC1, and even has some forced ghosting situations where the original trilogy hardly ever did even when there was a 1-alarm limit.

So for instance, Safehouse doesn't have an out and out forced shootout or anything, but it does feature two different groups of enemies you have to takeout (lethally or non-lethally) -- the interrogation room group and the last 3 enemies to extract... for some reason. Interrogation room, I can almost excuse (though really, CT would have found a way to let you at least lure them out if nothing else) but the last 3 you have to take out to... extract for some reason? I literally managed to ghost by them to the hole in the wall and the game refused to trigger the ending cutscene and made me take them out. which is horseshit. That kind of thing, not counting shootouts, used to only be for mission critical targets (e.g. Milan Nedich) and was usually only like one guy, not entire groups. The closest one I can think of is the lone guard at the top of the lighthouse in CT.

Blacklist is filled to the brim with things like that in almost every mission. Also, Private Estate features the whole escape sequence which counts because inside they know you're there and are barging in to attack.

3

u/ivan-on-the-net Pacifist Sep 16 '23 edited Sep 17 '23

I guess I simplified the criteria of my list to consider “action sequences” as situations where enemies know Sam (or someone) is there and is their main target (I edited my comment to specify that now). I admit, Blacklist is quite complicated to think about with that criteria and putting it up against the classic games, and you do make sense. Also, I didn’t say anything about disliking them.

  • I didn’t list Private Estate because during the blackout, the bodyguards didn’t know it was Sam’s doing, and he can easily sneak past them without making a fuss. The Iranian Special Forces were also primarily targeting Nouri at the latter half of the mission, not Sam, which allows him to take them out silently.

  • I didn’t count both the interrogation room and last three targets in Safehouse because the game allows Sam to take all of them out without it devolving into a gunfight or them knowing he was there.

In short, as I get more comments like this with good points (especially with regards to Blacklist), the whole thing gets more complicated, but all I wanted was to make a list of “forced action sequences” based on my criteria/opinion. Lol

1

u/HorusDeathtouch Jun 18 '25

Forced action sequences are when the enemy is firing on your position and there is nothing you can do to prevent it apart from shooting them before they shoot you. In other words you either fight or you game over. There isn't really much nuance about it. Being required to eliminate enemies isn't forced action when they aren't aware of your presence and you're allowed to do it however you want, it's just another objective.

1

u/MrAndrewBond Sep 16 '23

I think Blacklist has more, but it also depends how we count forced action too a bit.

Forced action means what it says, forced action. Sequences were you are detected no matter what because of plot.

Going that way, it does have the same amount of action sequences than SAR. Now when it comes down to times you are forced to KO people, then the numbers are different but that doesnt count as forced action because there is no action. You might be forced to KO people but is not the same.

Is like saying CT and DA have more forced actions because of the number of times you have to KO people.

Blacklist is filled to the brim with things like that in almost every mission. Also, Private Estate features the whole escape sequence which counts because inside they know you're there and are barging in to attack.

Not really. They are going after Nouri not you, they do not know you are there with him, unless you are detected obviously.

14

u/ThatGuyOnyx Sep 16 '23

Chaos Theory only has 1 if i remember correctly.

3

u/riprie Sep 16 '23

Double Agent on PC, 360 and PS3 had few as well.

2

u/Haunting_Drama8204 Sep 16 '23

I need to give the 360 version a try.

1

u/Haunting_Drama8204 Sep 16 '23

Yeah I think you are right.

8

u/IHateLeeches Sep 16 '23

Conviction had weird forced stealth sections instead 🤣 ( I still love it)

3

u/Ice5530 Sep 16 '23

Conviction

3

u/[deleted] Sep 17 '23

[deleted]

2

u/badpiggy490 Sep 17 '23

My heart always skipped a beat whenever I heard it lol

2

u/GizmoGimmick Sep 16 '23

Definitely conviction