Hitman movie: Officially rubbish

Ridiculous as it seems, we had hoped that the Hitman movie might not be rubbish. After all, you've got one of gaming's coolest cats, Agent 47, and his globe-trotting career choice of killing people for money. He's a bald, mercenary James Bond. How could the film not be a winner?

Well, by the looks of this first trailer, there are plenty of ways to foul up a perfectly good idea. For example:

1. Reinvent the lead character - a man who's been born artificially and raised purely to kill - as some kind of savior of mankind.
2. Introduce the inevitable damaged-but-blisteringly-hot love interest, because a man firing guns for two hours just can't maintain our attention.
3. Dress it all up in some weary, sub-Dan Brown prophecy nonsense about Agent 47 being the man "to strike down evil."
4. Script it with your traditional, seen-it-all-before plot about someone trying to betray Agent 47.

Ben Richardson is a former Staff Writer for Official PlayStation 2 magazine and a former Content Editor of GamesRadar+. In the years since Ben left GR, he has worked as a columnist, communications officer, charity coach, and podcast host – but we still look back to his news stories from time to time, they are a window into a different era of video games.