Conviction has been in production for quite some time and has made a number of changes along the way. The original preview focused on blending in with crowds and using things such as chairs and monitors as weapons or distractions. It's now looking much more like a standard Splinter Cell game, albeit with more elements of conspiracy and choice than the previous games. There's even a much older Sam Fisher still doing what he does best, which is interesting considering his age in the first game (sometime in his 40s).

The first element of hype that has been downright refuted by this point is the crowd-blending and interactive elements of the environment. While Fisher may still be able to use the environment to his advantage, it is doubtful that he will use crowd-blending at all, and non-linearity of the levels is up for debate. This may be a response to another of Ubisoft's franchises, Assassin's Creed, which utilizes crowd-blending, open-world gameplay, and parkour to great effect. However, the developers have maintained the original story and introduced several other elements to compensate.

One of these new elements is the Mark and Execute system. When surveying a room, Sam Fisher now has the ability to mark enemies for execution. This will then let him instantly execute them when he gets close, Jack Bauer style. While this is an intriguing element of gameplay, it's arguable how much of the stealth portion it will compromise, and just how difficult it will make the game as developers up the amount of enemies to accommodate the new system. While it sounds cool on paper, it's unclear whether or not it will be implemented in a way that retains the core of the Splinter Cell franchise.

Fisher no longer has his set of gadgets from Third Echelon, which means that he has to find some on his own. This leads in to the most exciting aspect of the game for most people: the new goodies to use. While some gadgets have been revealed, such as Fisher's new Sonar Goggles, others have yet to be revealed. We do not think that they will be all that different from the previous games, given that every game in the franchise has gone through a slow, iterative process with its gadgets. However, as Conviction is slated to be a complete revamp and reimagining of Sam Fisher and the world he lives in, we may yet be surprised.

Conviction has been the longest Splinter Cell game in production at almost four years. While we have no doubt it will be a good game (as the rest of them were), we are unsure whether it will live up to those four years of hype and a constantly changing design. It's slated for release (finally) in early 2010, and it's definitely on our wishlist.