Hitman / Tropes D to L

Tropes A to C - Tropes D to L - Tropes M to Z -

This page covers general tropes found in the Hitman series.

Subjective tropes go to the YMMV page.

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D

• Damn, It Feels Good to Be a Gangster!:
  • By 47's own words, he doesn't perform "ordinary hits", and charges three times the usual Agency rate—up to $750,000 per hit. "I've got a reputation to protect." Also, the majority of his targets are either protected by the government or residing in some opulent mansion with round-the-clock security. Seems reasonable to demand a bigger salary if the risk is high and he's in such high demand.
  • Masahiro Hayamoto and son. Hayamoto resides in a six-story feudal castle which is guarded by high-tech shinobi ninjas, snipers, and electronic security measures. Not to mention the 4th floor is inhabited by his concubines.
  • Deewanna Ji does pretty well for a messiah who eschewed all worldly vices. His cult made him immensely rich and powerful, affording him two private islands, lavish medical treatment, and a 60 ft. yacht (moored next to your starting position in "Terminal Hospitality").
• Damn You, Muscle Memory!:
  • Anyone who switched from the later games to Codename 47 will be surprised with how different the controls and interfaces are.
  • The control system was also significantly revamped in between Contracts and Blood Money.
• Danger Room Cold Open:
  • Ort-Meyer's training facility is a cardboard cityscape with pop-up cutouts to shoot ("Red is for baaaaad guys!"). There is also a shooting gallery and a stationary doll to strangle. In the updated Contracts training level, there are SWAT officers to sneak up on and kill.
  • In the Hitman '16 training missions, the targets, guards and civilians are played by ICA employees. 47 can throw them off buildings, drown them in toilets or throw knives at them which remain stuck in their heads. Good thing Diana told him beforehand that all weapons are just "simulated".
• Darker and Edgier: Contracts, Blood Money, and Absolution have a darker and grittier atmosphere. Absolution in particular was inspired by grindhouse films and the works of Quentin Tarantino, and is particularly lurid and wanton.
• Dead Man's Chest: Yes, Body Box (tm) brand body disposal devices. Making Hitman games way easier since 2006!
• Dead Person Impersonation:
  • On rare occasions, 47 can assume the identity of a Target (the Red Dragon negotiator, Dr. Kovacs, Ort-Meyer's clones, Fabian Fuchs, Hendrick Schmutz, or Agent Martinez), but you'll have to kill them first. It doesn't always work, however: a lab coat alone won't permit you entry into Fritz's dental office, and Angelina will show you no mercy if you get caught with her hubby's Mardi Gras costume.
  • "Gunrunner's Paradise" involves ambushing and taking over an illegal weapons deal.
  • There's a VIP room in the Pink Mansion where the Franchise assassin waits out the mission, and if you go in there, she'll try to stab you in the throat. If you look behind the sofa, 47 spies the silhouette of a unfortunate hostess lying dead in the same room. Looks like the hitwoman killed the bunny and assumed her place.
  • If you hang around the Shark Club's garage, a guest will stagger out the elevator and puke on the pavement, claiming the bartender is to blame. He's refering to the hitman Maynard John, who obviously isn't very practiced in bartending. Also, if you chat up the waiter in the "Heaven" party upstairs, he mentions how awful the cabaret singer is and that they had to rush-hire another singer because the old one "had a fatal accident". That's a great clue right there as to "Eve's" real identity (a good assassin and a bad singer).
• Death by Gluttony:
  • "The Meat King". Most of the stealthy ways of killing him involve serving him a whole roast chicken. Once you're inside his booth, Jabba the Scotsman will dismiss his hoochies and demand the food. Draw the blinds, retrieve your weapon, and let him have it. The chicken that is. Once he starts eating, you can either shoot him or slash him with a melee weapon. Diana probably had a good chuckle at reading that autopsy report.
  • In "Flatline", Lorenzo seems to have an obvious problem with authority, as he was told to stay on a strict diet but is secretly cooking Italian food in his room with a small butane lighter. Give him a terminal case of heartburn by leaving the gas on.
  • Ditto Skip Muldoon from Blood Money, considering the stealthy ways to kill him involve smuggling things in a cake. In the mission which immediately follows that, 47 can also meddle with a wedding cake. Make yourself scarce, and eventually the groom will come in, sample the merest fingertip of icing, and perish from the poison.
  • The Hope Cougars are enjoying some Chicago-style pizza in celebration of their first big score. "Limp-Dick" Lenny Dexter plans to move north with his old man and take over the city with his alkie friends. You can safety neutralize him by adding sleeping pills to the pizza.
  • After gunning down the sushi guy, Layla will take his food platter and set it down in the banquet hall as though nothing happened. (Keep the change, we guess.) There's a vial of poisonous tree frog extract elsewhere in this level. Give her a case of indigestion. After a taste, Layla will decide she's a ladybug and jump off the top floor of the skyscraper to her death
• Death by Looking Up:
  • Chandeliers, cement blocks, disco balls, whale skeletons, cars, pianos...
  • The ability to rig up proximity mines in Blood Money opens up a whole range of possibilities.
  • In the winery, Manuel Delgado follows a set route, barring his one-time trip to the drug lab with the pony-tailed agent. After snorting in the wine cellar, he stands under the precarious elevator full of barrels, almost screaming out, "Please drop these on me!" And who are we to argue?
  • Strangely, in the winery, you can make the barrels drop by throwing items at them, but this doesn't seem to faze Manuel if he's under them. What gives? This was fixed in Absolution: the 'throw' function will cause much bigger problems for your enemies than just annoying them, if aimed correctly.
  • One of the most interesting accidents happens in "A New Life". If you check out the home extension with the indoors pool, the ceiling is made out of glass. If you shoot the ceiling, the glass will shower over everyone below, killing them. But watch out, since it can kill 47 also.
• Deep South: Death On The Mississippi and Till Death Do Us Part in Blood Money.
  • You would think South Dakota was also part of the South, based on the stereotypes it plays up.
• Delivery Guy Infiltration: When you absolutely, positively have to kill someone overnight.™
  • As 47 approaches the Villa Borghese, he spots 3 disguises right out of the gate: a mobster, a delivery boy, and a postman. If you run, you get the postman or the mobster before they're done piddling in the bushes. The delivery boy can't be replaced (he's a regular face around here), but hiding guns in his crate is a good tactic.
  • "Basement Killing": One large pizza with pepperoni, mushrooms and death. This plan is also fun, mostly because of the pink shorts. (It helps that the delivery boy is balding, just like 47.)
  • 47 has the option of stealing the caterer's suit in "A New Life" and First-Class Purser's uniform in "Death On the Mississippi". You can also dress up as Billy Jack (the red bird) and make the money drop, if you like.
  • Fodder for some black humor in "Blackwater Park". As 47 presses the elevator panel to go up, a gasping delivery boy carrying a big tray of sushi dives in the elevator at the last minute. His attempts at small-talk fall flat on the mute Mister 47. When the elevator doors open, he gets shot to pieces by Layla's guards while 47 zips up the emergency hatch unharmed. Layla will then fetch his sushi platter and bring it into the boardroom. You can still avenge the delivery guy by spiking the fish with poison.
• Desperation Attack: The "Last Man Standing" mechanic in Contracts and Blood Money. When the player has lost all health, 47 enters bullet time and has a small sliver of time to save himself. He must score at 3 headshots to escape the mode. Alternatively, if the player has completed all objectives and is very close to the exit, it is possible to escape while in slow motion. If the player succeeds in taking the shots, time will speed up again and the game continues, but another hit will kill 47 for good.
• Deus Ax Machina:
  • "In case of emergency break glass"? Don't mind if I do. Axes are found in a few Absolution missions. They can be used as throwing objects (to distract, or to hit someone with) or to kill someone from behind.
  • The loading screen to "Basement Killing" has 47 menacingly brandishing it. Not a whole lot of ambiguity to your objective, then? A firefighter's uniform will get you into the titular basement, as well as provide you a perfect murder weapon. This is quite possibly the most fun Silent Assassin rating you'll ever get.
• Developer's Foresight:
  • In Absolution mission "End of the Road", Lenny has several responses to various weapons you brandish at him, including a silenced pistol.
  • In Absolution, one mission has 47 in a courtroom. It is possible to subdue or kill the judge, disguise as him, and dismiss a case then order a recess in order to proceed and access to the next section. This is one of the rare moments (if not the only one) where 47 not only dresses but also acts as the person he impersonates.
  • Since it's possible to dress as a priest in Blood Money, the player is allowed to perform a wedding ceremony.
  • In Absolution, in the first level of "Dexter Industries", you must disable two security systems. While you are given a prompt to disable them by pressing a button, you could also simply shoot it.
• Devious Daggers: Used for cutting fish, veggies, throats, what have you.
  • In the fourth game, 47 can lob them at heads with laser accuracy at 95 mph.
  • And in Absolution, you can retrieve thrown knives. Always wanted to do that in Blood Money but never could.
  • According to her dossier, Angelina Mason grew up in a traveling circus, where she was trained as an acrobat and knife thrower. She carries a mean-looking combat knife and will slice and dice you if you engage in close quarters combat.
  • Eve, the psychotic assassin who tries luring you into an empty office. Once there, a cutscene plays in which she stabs 47 to death. If the player keeps at a safe distance, she will begin to cartwheel around the room and throw stiletto knives at 47, or use her Desert Eagle if she is fired upon.
  • The Brutus playstyle in Absolution encourages the player to invoke this by getting 5 knife kills.
• Diabolical Mastermind:
  • Dr. Ort-Meyer in Codename 47. Seeking to birth a new human race, the authorities condemned his experiments. He escaped to France, and later Romania where he concealed his illegal research in the cellar of a hospital. He has juice with the Hong Kong Triads as well as other gangs.
  • Cayne in Blood Money. He's a dirty political boss who intends to kill the President and install a puppet in his place.
• Digital Bikini:
  • "Traditions of the Trade". It's not every day you shoot a pair of Nazis in their speedos.
  • You gotta love the maids in Beldingford Manor. "I wear my clothes in the shower, but I make sure my thong is showing."
  • Talk to the bartender in the Rotterdam strip joint, and he'll tell you that he can arrange a private session for you. How thoughtful. But, being the efficient killer you are, you know that this session can be put to better uses: In C47, the dancer is more than happy to distract the driver for you (using the lamp post for a grinding pole, no less), but no more. In Contracts, she and the driver will neck in the alleyway for a minute, then both will return to their posts. Was that really worth $1000?
  • In Blood Money, if you slip a mickey into the martini at the bar, eventually the waiter in the white tuxedo jacket will bring the martini to Bingham and he will promptly drink it. From time to time, a woman in a red bikini will sit down next to Chad and flirt with him. He and the woman will go into a back bedroom for some privacy, so peek into the keyhole if you're feeling voyeuristic. After a VERY long...... lap dance. The woman will return to the party in her bikini while Chad (still clothed) will head for the to the cliffside balcony to have a cigarette.
• Dirty Cop: The Hitman series has several antagonists who are corrupt members of law enforcement.
  • Codename 47 has the Hong Kong Chief of Police. While he does his best to keep the bloodshed to a minimum, his relationship with the Hong Kong Triad is a cozy one. The big fear is that something might happen to the Chief to replace him a callow subordinate who refuses to play ball.
  • Contracts features one as the main antagonist. Albert Fornier is a police inspector with tendrils stretching all across Paris. He has been educated about 47 by the Franchise (as revealed in Blood Money), and sends a 51-man GIGN team to kill him. In Blood Money, the Tenor is making his big comeback after his acquittal on statutory rape charges. Although the lead witness was later found dead in a ravine, her death was ruled a suicide...
  • The client in "Rendezvous in Rotterdam" is a Mayoral candidate who is photographed with a prostitute in the back of a police van. Between that, and his relationship with Teller (the Target), it can be guessed that he worked for the police before entering politics.
  • In Absolution, pretty much the entire sheriff's department of Hope, South Dakota, including the sheriff, Clive Skurky, is on the take from Blake Dexter. Also, in some of the Chicago levels, police officers work for the crooks in some capacity (that is, when they aren't dealing drugs themselves).
• Disconnected by Death:
  • After getting the drop on Mr. 17, our hero overhears Sergei's voice barking orders at 17 over his earpiece. 47 decides to try some Clone-Jitsu and talks back like nothing's happened, since he and 17 share the same voice.
  • Reach out and touch someone. If you call Vinnie's cell phone from the FBI van across the street, you can snipe him through a window as he's answering it.
  • You can also shoot the Sheik as he's returning Tariq's call. The casino blocks all calls coming from outside the casino (to prevent cheating), and the Sheik is too well protected to kill inside the building, so this is a clever way to lure him outside. Just phone him from Tariq's suite on the 8th floor, and eventually, the Sheikh will emerge way down below in the outdoor area you can see (and aim at).
• Disney Villain Death:
  • If you dump bodies via the balcony, the game doesn't count it as kill, but an accident. For some reason, a fall from at 30 stories won't raise suspicion, but this is another way to hide bodies, anyway.
  • Any human shield can be picked up and hurled off a balcony. Dexter's secretary can fall to her death if you dose her with a hallucinogen.
  • If you're feeling wicked, you can also shoot out the bottom of the jacuzzi Chad is in, the glass will give way and Bingham will fall to his gruesome death. And we have it on good authority that the three bunnies in the tub with him were all habitual kitten abusers, so don't let them burden your conscience.You can also catch him during a post-coital smoke break, which is quieter. Shove him off the balcony, and he'll topple into the jagged rocks far, far below.
• Distressed Dude:
  • Agent Smith, often. No wonder he took up drinking.
  • Vittorio is a kindhearted priest in mob-controlled Sicility who does his best to keep his nose clean. However, Sergei Zavorotko and Man in Black have other plans... They enlist the Sicilian mob to abduct Vittorio as a ultimatum to his gardener, Mr. 47. This is really just a lure to get 47 had to accept a special contract which Sergei has already filed with the Agency.
  • Are you a bad enough dude to rescue President Stewart?
• Disturbed Doves:
  • The loading screen for "Redemption at Gontranno" is another nod to John Woo.
  • There are some doves nesting in the belfry of the Paris opera house. If you climb up and down the ladders, birds will scatter all over the place. Pigeons play a role in the Chicago levels of Absolution, too, namely in the library and the pigeon coop.
• Donut Mess with a Cop:
  • In Absolution, certain items can allow 47 to hide in plain sight if he has the right disguise; while an electrician outfit lets you pretend to fix a cable, the cop outfit naturally allows you to hang around the donut box. The scene is spoofed by Harry Partridge in this animation where our Master of Disguise is dressed not as the cop, but one of the donuts!
  • Hitman: Blood Money extends this trope to FBI agents. By far the easiest way to accomplish this mission is to inject a pack of donuts with anesthetic (or poison, if you're feeling mean) outside the unmarked surveillance-van and knock on the door, and run away. The FBI-agent pops out, goes "Ooooh, donuts! Score!" and then proceeds to share them with his partner. If you don't leave the donuts and knock, the FBI agents will eventually steal them from the catering truck on their own.
• Dragon Lady:
  • The brothel madam in C47 and Contracts. She's harmless enough in the PC game, but makes a much bigger impression in the remake. (Skip out on the bill at your own risk.)
  • Travis' lieutenant is Jade Nguyen, an ICA analyst. She is sporting a visible dragon tattoo on her abdomen, hair sticks, and the name is indictive of Vietnamese origin. As for her business suit....well, black vinyl isn't usually worn on weekdays, though it's not unheard of in ICA. (Still less conspicuous than the Saints.)
• Dressing as the Enemy: A simple method of infiltration, and the game's main feature. Beware, other assassins will use this same tactic against you.

E

• Eagleland: Amerika ist wunderbar. Blood Money takes 47 to New Jersey, California, the Rockies, New Orleans, the Deep South, Las Vegas and Washington D.C.; appropriately, a wide range of accents are represented. Absolution alternates between Midwestern accents for the missions in Chicago, and Southwest accents for those taking place in Hope, South Dakota.
• Easier Than Easy: The amount of health 47 has on "Easy" is too much for a stealth game, but is suitable for a shooting game.
• Easter Egg:
  • God dammit, Allan!
    • For those not in the know, some flavor text in Blood Money (a lobster in the sex club level) has no description in the inventory, but rather the message "Allan please add details". This has since become a meme where IO demands "More details, Allan!" as a form of mockery.
  • Dolph the Fascist Hippo, FCK soccer, Dopefish, Pokey the Penguin, Hiro and others make regular appearances.
  • The rubber ducky that appears in every installment is notable because it even made it into the film adaption and was referenced in a cross-promotion crossover with Team Fortress 2.
• Eiffel Tower Effect:
  • Happily averted in C47. Our globetrotting 'hero' rarely checks himself into a conspicuous place ("So this is Hong Kong...Not really my scene"), though Blood Money eventually led him into the White House.
  • Katsuyama-Jo bears resemblance to a real castle◊ in Central Japan, also named Katsuyama, on the Fukui Prefecture. The real castle, which is a reconstruction of the original 16th century castle founded by Shibata Katsuyasu, is a lesser-known tourist attraction in Japan. Just like the real Katsuyama, the in-game castle has 6 floors and houses a museum.
  • In Silent Assassin, 3 missions are set in and around the Petronas Towers.
  • "Terminal Hospitality". This level was originally going to be set in the Golden Temple, but due to pressure from religious groups, IO changed it. Sikhs said the scene looks exactly like the inside of the Golden Temple in Amritsar.
  • During the mission which takes place in the Shamal, it is possible to see models of real life locations such as the Belmondouz Hotel taking place for the real life Bellagio. The Shamal Casino bears a slight resemblance to the real-life Mirage Hotel & Casino in Las Vegas.
  • The opera house appears to be based off the real-life Salle Le Peletier opera house in Paris. The chandelier in the actual theater is almost identical to the one in this opera house, as are the murals on the ceiling and around the chandelier.
  • Pine Cone is very similar to real-life California luxury rehab clinics like Passages and Promises in that they cater only to very wealthy clients and have celebrity alumni. However, they are known for their lenient ("revolving door") policies as opposed to Pine Cone's very strict methods. The architecture of the building is meant to resemble that of Frank Lloyd Wright.
  • The church in "Requiem" is supposed to resemble Jubilee Church in Rome, although there are differences in the layout, and the in-game church seems to be somewhere on the American upper east coast. It's also possible that the church is based on the private chapel of the "Palácio da Alvorada," Brazil's presidential palace.
  • In Act 2 of Absolution, we fade in on Mt. Rushmore as Birdie is haggling with two Southwestern men. Blake and his henchman present their counter-offer: dangling poor Birdie over the gorge.
  • Averted on any occasion that 47 actually visits Paris: In Contracts, he's holed up in a hotel while recovering from a gunshot wound that he got after performing a hit at an opera house during the events of Blood Money. The 2016 game's first episode is entirely set at a major fashion event. None of these events occur anywhere near the Eiffel Tower.
• Elite Mooks:
  • SWAT officers are equipped with body armor, assault rifles, and have a unique A.I. that actually sweeps through the level in squads searching for you, instead of simply guarding one location and reacting to your actions like every other enemy type in the game. They also attack much faster than regular enemies.
  • There are Elite Mooks up the wazoo in Absolution. Chicago SWAT officers wield sub-machine guns and wear body armor, Blackwater Tactical Team members come equipped with body armor and silenced weapons, and the mother of all Elite Mooks, the Agency Heavy Troopers, who are covered head to toe in armor and use the most powerful assault rifles in the game.
  • The Saints are played up in the promos to be a badass group of assassins dressed as nuns, and 47 just barely survives the encounter. In-game, however, they are as susceptible to all the One Hit Kills the normal mooks are, from headshots to garroting.
  • Travis' last line of defense is referred to as the Praetorian Guard: a squad of white-haired special forces who hole in at the church and booby trap the outside. As badass as they may be, they go down just like everybody else.
• Empty Quiver:
  • In "Plutonium Runs Loose"/"Deadly Cargo", Boris arranges for the sale of a nuclear bomb under cover of nightfall. If 47 (or anyone else) tries to bring him to justice, he'll arm it, potentially engulfing the entire harbor in an atomic blast.
  • Charlie Sidjan and his brother created a missile guiding chip capable of fooling the United States automated missile shield by making hostile missiles appear to have been launched by the US.
  • In Silent Assassin, Sergei is the client you've been helping track down all the various missile components. But now he's crossed the line (acquiring a nuke), and the United Nations wants The Agency's help in ridding the world of this clown. It is against The Agency's ethics, such as they are, to perform a hit on a former customer, but they have decided to make an exception due to the business prospects associated with the UN.
• Enemy Chatter
  • In the remake of "Traditions of the Trade", you can overhear one of the male guests complaining about Fritz Fuchs reserving the entire indoor pool for himself only. "What's the point of staying at the Thermal Bath Hotel if you can't use the Thermal Bath?"
  • Blood Money was the first to let you eavesdrop on NPC banter, although it was still pretty limited. Mostly it's stuff to do with the upcoming Presidential election. In the rehab clinic, one of the nurses complains about a grouchy "albino" doctor lurking around the place, but he's already come and gone, so don't worry about it. (This is a hint for 47 to steal a doctor outfit.) Also, there's a funny scene where one of the "Gators" tries to charm a southern lass on the boat, only to receive "keep in your pants, Romeo" as an answer. Shove him over the side of the boat to really ruin his evening.
  • Hitman: Absolution, which advertises itself as having "a living, breathing world" ®, contains numerous irrelevant sequences with both enemies and civilians. For example, "Terminus Hotel" itself contains (among other things): a shoe salesman attempting to flirt with a maid; a woman arguing with her unemployed partner (who is having a midlife/existential crisis); a territorial landlady bickering with security; and two electricians discussing a friend who was struck by lightning and who can now light bulbs by touching them.
    Life is a wonderful thing. Full of hopes and fears. Comedy and tragedy. Thousands of lives intermingle. An intricate web of relations and situations. Desires and regrets. Plans. Allegiances. Watching from the shadows, 47 learns the most intimate of secrets.
• Enemy-Detecting Radar: The sat-map of the area you carry in a laptop is insanely accurate, even displaying which way doors open, where the fusebox is, and the movements of every person on the premises, yourself included. If only 47 could stay on the move while on his computer, he could navigate the whole level like Doomguy, never leaving his laptop. On the higher difficulty levels, crucial details are removed, making it a much more nerve-wracking experience (the "look through keyhole" action comes quite in handy).
• Exclusive Enemy Equipment: Most of your inventory has to be procured from enemies you encounter, such as the katana blade, snub revolver, Bull .90, and M14 (carried only by the Marines patrolling the White House).
• Escort Mission:
  • In both versions of the Hong Kong missions (in Codename 47 and Contracts) it's possible to secure a key to Lee Hong's living quarters by escorting Mei Ling to an exit (in Contracts, you can just tranq/kill her, if you prefer).
  • Agent Smith needs your help again in "Tubeway Torpedo". To get access to the bunker where Smith is being held, 47 needs to borrow a spare Russian officer's uniform. Congratulations on your promotion! You can also rescue Mei Ling again from Katsuyama-Jo ("Shogun Showdown"), if you so choose.
  • "A Murder of Crows". The U.S. Secretary of the Interior, Jimmy Cilley, is visiting New Orleans to stump for the re-election of Tom Steward. ("I grew up in 'Nawlins!") Since you can't control the movements of his float, you have to protect him from the roving Angelina as well as her husband, Raymond.
  • Subverted twice in Contracts. In the mission "Beldingford Manor", 47 must rescue the client's son - but he's a champion sprinter, so he's more than capable of escaping without 47's help. In the mission "The Meat King's Party", 47 is likewise tasked with rescuing the client's daughter who has been kidnapped. Turns out she's been chopped to pieces. (No refunds.)
  • Absolution has a segment where you have to lug Victoria (who is sedated) a short distance while avoiding Wade's crew.
  • In "The Ark Society", The Constant is needed for interrogation, so killing him will fail the mission.
• Even Evil Has Loved Ones: Some of the guard conversations you overhear involve them talking about their families or girlfriends. Dexter himself loves his son Lenny very much too, which is evident when you kill Lenny. Dexter takes it very hard. He's also willing to risk his life by staying behind to wait for Layla when evacuating Blackwater.
• Every Bullet is a Tracer: This was the case until Blood Money, when the franchise took on a more realistic flavor.
• Everyone Is Armed:
  • In "'Til Death Do Us Part", all of the guests, half the guards, the two targets, and the dog (probably) are packing heat. The Blue Crabs who don't have six-shooters have shotguns instead. This mission is one of the "heaviest armed" in the Hitman saga since every NPC apart from the bride and the priest carry weapons.
  • "Requiem" drops you in a confined space with 12 members of the Franchise, including Cayne himself. One of the agents in the crowd carries not only a stiletto, but also sometimes lobs an RU-AP mine at 47 as a grenade [!].
  • "Birdie's Gift": Shooting someone in the middle of a crowded gun range? Sure, nothing could possibly go wrong there! Well, unless you count 47 being turned into a human colander as something wrong...
• Every Man Has His Price:
  • Ort-Meyer is so rich and powerful, the Agency's Board of Directors agree to accept a 5th mission from him even after realizing they've been duped.
  • At the end of each level, you get your rating (as always) and, depending on how you performed, you may get a nice fat paycheck. In the original game, the Agency would deduct fees from your salary to pay for "cleaners" who tie up any loose ends you've missed, like witnesses or bodies. One perk of Blood Money is that you have the ability to decide how those cleaners are allocated. You can bribe civilians to lower 15 notoriety points, the chief of police to lower 40 notoriety points, or the US government to get an identity change for a maximum of 100 points!
• Everybody Smokes: Quite a few Sicilians and Russians go on smoke breaks.
• Evil Cripple:
  • All over the place in Absolution. The prosthetic voice box-equipped owner of the gun shop who keeps 47's Silverballers locked up, the prosthetic-handed Benjamin Travis, the prosthetic-legged Dr. Green...
  • Cayne from Blood Money. Due to an undisclosed accident, he was recently confined to a wheelchair. The left side of his face is completely flayed of skin, suggesting an explosion was involved.
• Evil-Detecting Dog: Don't go near any animals. Best case scenario, they will give you away with their noises. That includes horses.
• Evil Is Not Well-Lit: This is ridiculously common. Notables: Lee Hong's restaurant in Contracts, the Meat King's slaughterhouse, Cayne's mansion, and Dexter's penthouse.
• Evil Old Folks: Frantz Fuchs (ex-member of the Hitler Youth), Masahiro Hayamoto Sr. (the reclusive Yakuza boss), Don Delgado (retired Chilean spymaster), Lorne deHaviland (pornographer), Pappy LeBlanc (redneck gang leader), Blake Dexter (weapons manufacturer), and Erich Soders (former headhunter for ICA).
• Evil Redhead:
  • Diana Burnwood, not coincidentally, is a ginger.
  • Dr. Von Kamprad is the first female target of the series, as well as the second ginger (just behind Agent Smith).
  • Vaana, the owner of the Shark Club in Las Vegas, can be found presiding over the "Hell" section of the dance floor. The Devil wears...cornrows?
  • Margeaux LeBlanc a.k.a "The Bayou Beauty".
• Exposed to the Elements:
  • 47 almost never wears a hat, even in Siberia! Also, if you run around at full speed in California ("A New Life"), you'll bump into a New Age jogger who will compliment your "pace" but point out that you are not dressed properly.
  • In Silent Assassin, Mei Ling is wearing the same purple nightie from Hong Kong. ...Except this is Japan, and it's 5000 ft. higher in altitude and -0° outside the castle.
  • This is lampshaded in the Rocky Mountains by the Popqurn models you meet there. Most are wearing red bikinis and shivering from the cold.
• Extended Disarming: In SA, if you drop all weapons to, say, pass through a metal detector unnoticed, you'll drop: The two handed non-concealable weapon, a Beretta 9 mm, the same with a suppressor, a Tokarev (Russian handgun), a Desert Eagle, a .357 Python, 2 Hardballers, the same with suppressors, a sawn-off shotgun, a machine pistol, a kitchen knife, a combat knife, and a scalpel. You can still keep: the .22 silenced handgun (probably made of titanium, since it doesn't trigger the sensors), the fiber wire (for strangulation), and the chloroform. Made worse than other examples of the trope, since you can carry them all in a tuxedo, and this is supposed to be a stealth game!
• External Combustion:
  • In H:C47, one of the first missions requires Agent 47 to blow up a Triad limo. This is just a practice run for the game's most difficult level, "Plutonium Runs Loose": Remember the earlier mission, where Ivan tells you the location of his weapons cache (he thinks you are the arms dealer, remember?). That armory is in this mission. Just install the bomb in Boris' car and that's that.
  • Ditto for SA's "Kirov Park" — essentially a watered-down and less sadistic remix of the Harbor mission. Even if your shot barely grazes the targets, they'll both flee into their armored limousines, which 47 was kind enough to rig with dynamite.
  • In Absolution, the best way to kill using explosives is to do lure them to their car (either by throwing an object in the vicinity or triggering the car alarm). Once he's close enough, detonate the bomb from a safe distance.

F

• Faceless Goons:
  • You come across some sent from ICA in Absolution. Most frustratingly and bizarrely illogically, when you disguise yourself as them, you take everything but their masks.
  • The SWAT Teams from Contracts and the ninjas from Silent Assassin.
• Fake Aristocrat:
  • In "Beldingford Manor", 47 can conceal himself in hunting gear, complete with a tailcoat and riding boots. Steady on, old chap. Just don't unholster the shotgun while indoors.
  • In India, 47 passes himself off as "Lord Sinclair". No swag worth mentioning, unless you count those stunning hospital slippers. Apparently Hitman looks so ridiculous in his hospital gown that nobody thinks he could possibly be a world-renowned assassin.
  • Judge Strickland works in Hope, South Dakota as a criminal judge. After learning that he is of distant British ancestry, he became obsessed with all things British and started dressing in a full-bottomed wig and a British-style judges ceremonial robes at work, and even having court transcribers rewrite some profanities, such as "asshole" into "arsehole".
• Faking the Dead:
  • "Requiem".
  • Discussed in Absolution's final mission (of the same name). Benjamin and the ICA decide to exhume Diana's coffin because they aren't sure if 47 killed her or not. In the final cutscene, it's revealed that Diana faked her death, and she thanks 47 in the post-mission result screen.
• Falling Chandelier of Doom:
  • The majority of these appear in Blood Money, although 47 rigs one to blow in the trailer for the new Hitman (2016)
  • In "'Til Death Do Us Part", you can send a few crashing at the Bayou wedding. When the groom is playing the piano at the reception, use the remote-controlled mine to destroy the winch and can drop the chandelier on his head. Note that this will bring many men running to the attic, so you had best not be there at the time. Two more appear at the Opera House and the Pine Cone rehab clinic.
  • There are also many winches in the Chicago library.. You can use them to release large chandeliers to kill a cop standing underneath, or just or to distract them.
• Fan Disservice:
  • "Traditions of the Trade". After poor Fritz suffocates in the sauna, bare the horrors of seeing that purple g-string one more time and take his key. Just don't think about where he stashed it.
  • "The Jacuzzi Job". The only Jiggle Physics you'll find here is a fat naked guy. Feast your eyes as 47 struggles to drag Charlie's walrus form around the penthouse.
• Fat Bastard: Frantz Fuchs, Don Giuseppe Giuliani, the Sidjan Brothers, Campbell "Meat King" Sturrock, Joseph "Swing King" Clarence, Captain Skip Muldoon, and others.
• Fat, Sweaty Southerner in a White Suit:
  • Hitman: Blood Money: Skip Muldoon is a captain of a luxury riverboat, drug smuggler, and flaming gay stereotype. One half-expects him to break out into song.
  • John "Pappy" Le Blanc: a paranoid, senile, and dangerously rich head of the Mississippi drug cartel that his half-brother Skip worked for.
  • Blake Dexter, the Big Bad of Absolution and an industrialist who kidnaps Victoria.
• Fatal Family Photo:
  • In "Basement Killing", 47 stumbles across a family photo of Charlie and his twin brother, realizing he's just killed the wrong Sidjan. Looks like the Agency goofed.
  • In "Death of a Showman", 47 is hired to kill Joseph "Swing King" Clarence by the father of one of victims in a ferris wheel accident. His special request is that Swing King be shown a photo of the boy before he dies.
• Fed to the Beast:
  • "The Jungle God". If you really, really don't want to shoot a wild boar, you also put a dead guard on the cat's altar (they're of the pig species, too, aren't they?). Of course, you will have a lot of fun (not) dragging a body there since there are no guards near the altar.
  • During a gunfight, Pablo threatens to club 47 "like a piñata" and feed him to his piranha fish.
  • Alligators are present in the swamp surrounding the LeBlanc mansion. They will eat anything (or anyone) who falls in it, with the exception of 47. They can also be used to dispose of bodies. The best part is watching the feeding frenzy as they tear the victim apart in the water and carry him off into the sunset.
  • One of the targets in Absolution subverts this - According to some factory workers, when he was just a kid, Dr. Green and his little sister got locked in a pig sty by a burglar, left alone and defenseless against the ravenous hogs. One of them charged his sister and Green got in the way to protect her, somehow managing to kill the pig. Unfortunately for Green, the pig collapsed on top of his leg, trapping him. It wasn't until a couple of days later that the police found them and by then Green's leg had to be amputated. This created both a phobia and hatred of pigs which persists into his adult life... making his demise all the more ironic: you can shoot out a glass floor where he stands to send him falling into a pit filled with swine. Luckily for him, the fall alone may have killed him.
  • In Hitman 2, Rico Delgado has a pet hippo that he uses to execute people. 47 can shove him into its awaiting jaws.
• Feng Schwing:
  • When you start "The Jacuzzi Job", you will be on a ledge just outside a window looking into the bedroom, where 47 sees Charlie dallying with his three female Bodyguards. He's got a Jacuzzi, a wet bar, and a heart-shaped bed with a vibrate button you can activate. It should be pointed out that the windows are bulletproof, so you can't pop Charlie from here.
  • "A New Life". Vinnie Sinistra is kind of a playboy: If you break into his room, you'll notice a collection of mirrors on the ceiling.
• Film Noir: The later games started to veer into this territory by virtue of aiming for a more Darker and Edgier feel. Several missions in Contracts and Blood Money are genuinely noir in tone, as well as the two missions in Rotterdam from Codename 47. Absolution, instead, goes for something of an Exploitation Film throwback feel.
• Final Boss Preview: The final boss appears or is mentioned in the opener of each game.
  • Codename 47: Dr. Otto Wolfgang Ort-meyer is in charge of your education in the initial training level.
  • Silent Assassin: Sergei appears in the flesh in SA's second mission, "St. Petersberg Stakeout". Just like the bride in Blood Money, he's actually your mystery client, so sniping him by mistake results in a Game Over.
  • Blood Money: Cayne spends the entire game recounting how he 'caught' 47 to Rick Hendersen, a reporter from First Addition.
  • Absolution: Travis is steamed over Diana's defection from the Agency. He installs himself as your Handler to ensure the hit goes down smoothly. (It doesn't.)
    • In "Terminus", 47 sneaks his way to the top floor of Dexter's hotel, intent on killing him. Unfortunately, he didn't count on running into a pissed-off Mexican with gigantism.
  • Hitman (2016): Soders appears in your ICA Induction before becoming the last target of 2016 season 1.
• Final-Exam Boss: In Contracts, the final mission plays out like any other hit, albeit an extraordinarily hard one. But a hit nonetheless, with one target and a rating. Hitman and Hitman 2 have recently brought that old-school feel back.
• Finishing Move: Ever since Contracts, there are multiple kill animations for the Fiber Wire and a few other melee weapons.
• For Doom the Bell Tolls:
  • At the conclusion of Silent Assassin, Sergei rings the church bell in Palermo to summon 47.
  • The priest in Mississippi will ring a bell in the front lawn. This is to let the guests know to convene at the wedding gazebo. Obviously if you subdue him this will never happen.
  • As part of the "Pearly Gates" aesthetic, the Shark Club pipes in sounds of a belltower.
• Framing the Guilty Party:
  • As you learn by reading the Lee Hong briefing, the Agency wants you to kill two emissaries from rival Triad gangs, but you've also got to make it look like the opposing faction did it. At first, the Chief of Police agrees to mediate a truce between the two. However, once the Chief is killed at a gang summit, the police withdraw their protection and Hong has no allies left.
  • In Nuristan, you can stop the motorcade by shooting the engine of the front jeep, since that's pretty much the function of the M195 rifle in real life. If the Khan is killed in town, and nobody is immediately sure who did it, the U.N. guys will obligingly start a gun battle with the local soldiers. This creates some very nice cover for you on your way out, but don't let them spot you in a soldier's uniform. You can pretty much walk out with impunity, since nobody knows you did it.
  • In "Amendment XXV", Vice President Morris planned to have his boss whacked as soon as Air Force One returned from Los Angeles. The assassination attempt was thwarted when 47 killed Morris and his gunman, Mark Parchezzi III himself. In the media firestorm which followed, Parchezzi was blamed for Morris' assassination.
  • In the sub-mission "Chinese New Year" of Absolution, one of 47's targets is trying to buy info on Birdie from a Dirty Cop. If 47 steals the files without them noticing it, they start an argument which quickly descends into a Quick Draw fight, resulting in the death of the target.

G

• Gambit Roulette: Most of Agent 47's methods of causing "accidental" deaths, especially in Blood Money, might seem this way to the characters, but that's because they don't know that he's done this a couple of dozen times before getting it right.
• Gardening-Variety Weapon: Shovels and pruning shears make their debut in Blood Money.
• General Failure: Benjamin Travis is shockingly incompetent for a leader of an organization which seems to consist entirely of Consummate Professionals. He is unable to keep calm under pressure, makes hasty decisions that end up costing his subordinates their lives, bungles a ransom handoff losing $10 million of the Agency's money in the process and allows himself to be outsmarted by both 47 and Diana Burnwood. He also looks disheveled and out of shape, all of which begs the question: how could someone like that rise to the upper echelons of the Agency?
• Genre Shift: The gameplay is fairly consistent, but in terms of story and tone, Codename 47, Silent Assassin, Blood Money, and HITMAN (2016) are rather akin to conspiracy/political thrillers, while Contracts is very much in the vein of a Psychological Thriller. Absolution evokes a style akin to Grindhouse cinema, as noted in Pastiche/Homage.
• The Ghost:
  • Diana, 47's handler at The Agency. In the first three games, she's just a voice on the phone. In Blood Money, she's mostly seen at a distance and from behind (though you do see her face reflected in the window in the game's final cutscene). She's also seen in the tutorial mission of Absolution, where she's the target.
  • President Steward.
• A Glass of Chianti:
  • "A Vintage Year". What's a human rights violator to do in retirement? Why, open a vineyard of course! You can dump any inconvenient corpses that might be lying around the winery into the wine vats littering the cellar area. Whether or not this will improve the taste remains to be seen—though it is sort of ironic to have drowned a vintner in his own wine.
  • Alistair Beldingford sends his butler downstairs to fill his whiskey carafe several times. If it is collected, the carafe is described as being made with precious gems or metals, as well as being a family heirloom "used for nefarious purposes more than once".
• Go Out With A Bang:
  • The General in "Invitation to a Party" has only one thing on his mind... and it's not war. He occasionally wanders off down a hall for a dalliance with the maid.
  • Charlie Sidjan is a Malaysian electronics tycoon based in the Petronas Towers. Life has been treating him pretty good. When 47 breaks into his penthouse, he finds Charlie in a hot tub with three buxom ladies. ("You're all my favorite girls!") The catch is he's completely naked and defenseless under there, so he won't be leaving that hot tub alive.
  • Lord Winston is an "amorous" old croaker who preys on the maids in his mansion. He even built a secret passage and two-way mirror near his bedroom which allows him to spy on them showering. Anyway, he seems to have some sexual prowess in him (he shares his bed with a maid during this mission), but it's implied that they strongly dislike him. If you don't want to awaken his mistress, you can suppress the muzzle flash with a pillow to kill Winston. Bonus: you don't even have to dump the body. Waiting for Winston in the bathroom and killing him there is also a viable option.
  • The bartender at the Pink Mansion is handing out free aphrodisiacs. But 47 can put it to better use: pour it in the "Gubernatorial Mistake's" cocktail glass. Eventually, the hoochie who keeps asking for some private time will lead Chad away to a private room. You will need a VIP guest or bodyguard outfit to enter this section, but it is very poorly patrolled (for obvious reasons). After a few minutes, Chad's companion will wander off, and he'll go downstairs for a smoke—out to a lonely deck where nobody can see him. Once alone with Chad, feel free you have your way with him.
  • If you want to kill Dom quietly (as in a non-accident), you'll have to wait for him to get a lapdance in the VIP booth. Well, he'd better enjoy it, because it's the last one he's ever gonna get.
• Going for the Big Scoop:
  • In Rotterdam, a dapper reporter (the guy who looks like Inspector Spacetime) is helping himself to a smoke in an alleyway, working up the nerve to proceed into the lion's den: Rutgert's biker bar. He's there to bribe their leader for some incriminating dirt on your client, a Mayoral candidate. Obviously, this will not stand. He's not a target, but if you mug him for the money envelope and he meets with Rutgert anyway, he will get shot.
  • Inverted with Rick Henderson, a Washington reporter who just happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time. In the beginning, Rick thinks he's been assigned to record Cayne's "post-retirement reflections" and write an opinion piece on terrorism. This is actually a cover story for Cayne's real scoop: the capture of Mr. 47. Initially, Rick doesn't trust Cayne's account of events and attempts to poke holes in the story. But when he sees 47's 'body' being readied for cremation, he realizes that the "story of the century" has fallen right into his lap — just in time for the antidote to kick in, poor bastard. Although he will try to run away from the bloodbath, Diana locked the gates to prevent his escape.
• Good Guns, Bad Guns: If the target isn't a crack dealer or a pimp, they're most likely running guns. Hitman doesn't think too highly of merchants of death—forgetting that 47 makes full use of Kruger-Schmidt's services in each game. Thankfully he buys 'good' guns. A majority of enemies in Hitman wield SMGs and AKs.
• Goofy Print Underwear: Occasionally, when stripping clothes off of victims for disguises, you may find some people are wearing heart print underwear.◊
• Goofy Suit:
  • The bird outfit from Blood Money.
  • Charlie the Chipmunk, the "official company mascot of the world-renowned Charlie Chipmunk Hot Sauce brand."
  • Hitman 2's Miami level has performers in flamingo costumes, which 47 can steal. There's also an easter egg whereby all NPCs transform into a "pink army" of flamingo mascots.
• Gotta Catch 'Em All:
  • In Contracts, this is represented by unlocking a different bonus weapon for each mission by means of a Silent Assassin rating. These weapons are generally either dual or silenced versions of existing weapons found in the game. Collecting every weapon in the game is something many players strive for. It helps that the games tend to give you a wall to display them on and a firing range to try them out on.
  • Silent Assassin has this to a lesser extent, as there are only three weapons that are rewards for getting the Silent Assassin rank. Getting one Silent Assassin rating unlocks dual silenced Silverballers, while two will net you the Sawed-Off Shotgun. Unlocking the M4 requires five Silent Assassin ratings. Unlike Contracts, however, there is an actual advantage to collecting guns, as it provides 47 with much more firepower during the final confrontation with Sergei.
  • Blood Money doesn't give weapons as a reward for Silent Assassin ratings, with financial reward being the main motivation to keep things as clean as possible. 47 can still take weapons from missions to add to his personal arsenal.
  • In Absolution, your secondary objective is to collect pieces of "Evidence" that, presumably, incriminates you somehow. They are usually well-guarded. Apart from bragging rights, they don't give you any benefit.
• Gotta Kill 'Em All: Most levels have multiple targets, and killing enemy NPCs is a requirement for certain Achievements.
• The Group: The International Contract Agency, which is usually known as just The Agency. In the first movie, the group is called "The Organization". A competing group from Blood Money is The Franchise.
• The Guards Must Be Crazy: The guards are consistently incompetent throughout the franchise. From immediately leaving their posts when distracted to neglecting to notice the Black waiter with a full head of hair that was just lured into the broom closet walked out pale and bald, the ineptitude of the supposed security forces borders on comical.
  • Guards in the slaughterhouse are more thorough in their procedures. They will even confiscate the meat hook if you're dressed as a butcher. But the freshly-severed human arm in your inventory doesn't merit a second glance.
  • Apparently the penalty for running in public, using the wrong bathroom, walking into the EMPLOYEES ONLY lounge, or setting off a metal detector is always a bullet to the head.
  • Oh, and the general stupidity. Step one, flick the lights off. Step two, strangle the guard as he comes to switch them back on. Step three, wait for guard to find body. Repeat.
  • In "Tubeway Torpedo", Smith steals a general's clothes, the guards sound alarm, the gatekeeper is too engrossed in his book, ignores it. Finally, he starts to reach for the phone, but stands at attention for 47 and Smith.
  • In the Mardi Gras level of Blood Money - if you enter a (perfectly normal, ordinary-bar, not-very-fancy) party without a costume? The bouncer at the door will open fire (By the way, nobody else is wearing a costume). Instantly. In the middle of a huge crowd. On the same level, turning the lights in the hotel foyer on and off repeatedly sends a woman running to the nearest policeman, who decides that the best way to deal with a man harmlessly playing with a light-switch is to open fire.
  • Lenny. Despite having come face to face with 47 once earlier, he will not recognize him if he is in a barber disguise with his face visible. He will even reminiscence about what happened at Rosewood Orphanage while watching 47 through the mirror.
    • Layla will occasionally step into the panic room where Victoria is held as part of her route. If you follow, a cutscene will be triggered in which Layla strips to her underwear and tries to seduce 47. Note that this cutscene, which is required to complete the challenge "Skin Trade", will not be activated if 47 is disguised as a guard for some reason (even though Layla has already seen 47 up-close in Skurky's jail).
  • When Dr. Valentine goes to test his 'product', he will die in a rather spectacular manner (he turns into Ghost Rider and plummets down a shaft to his death), but his anguished screams don't alarm Dr. Ashford or the other people stationed in the silo. Time is money!
  • "Skurky's Law" is a laugh riot. Whereas in previous games, high-profile targets could not be impersonated without a face covering of some kind, Hitman can steal the identities of both the defendant (Tinfoil Hat Man) and the Judge, then walk into a trial still in progress and throw the case. The bailiff won't see through the disguise, despite having escorted THM to prison numerous times already. Shit is bananas.
• Guide Dang It!:
  • Getting SA rank or a Zero in most missions. "BODIES FOUND"? Goodbye Mr. Silent Assassin, hello Hitman.
  • Unlocking some of the weapons in some games, most notably the minigun and dual Desert Eagles in Contracts.
• Gun Accessories: In Blood Money, the Silverballers are given a wide range of accessories and different ammo types. There are just so many cool things to experiment with, turning it from a pretty inaccurate pistol to an apocalyptic nightmare with a jumbo magazine, scope, laser sight, full-auto capability, and other deadly extras. The M4 carbine (did anyone say "drum magazine"?), MP5 Tactical, SPAS-12 and WA2000 can be modded for similar purposes.
• Gun Porn: The whole series. You can slap a ton of mods to your five custom weapons in Blood Money.

H

• Hand Cannon:
  • Smith & Wesson Model .500 in Contracts and Bull .480 in Blood Money.
  • The Deagle has the largest caliber of ammunition of all of the handguns making it very powerful. Unfortunately, it also makes it very loud and you will attract unwanted guests in hurry. And it has a nasty kick which makes it hard to accurately fire off a quick burst of rounds.
  • There are also Agent 47's Silverballers. While they fire "only" a .45 ACP round, they are still amongst the most powerful handguns in the game, and often send people flying. It's at least justified in Blood Money, where you get customized magnum ammo for double the damage.
  • The World Of Assassination trilogy has the Striker and El Matador variants of the standard ICA19 that load Magnum rounds for extra power and penetrative.
• Harder Than Hard: "Professional" and "Purist" modes. The difficulty determines how much damage you can take, the number of guards on the map (Absolution only), their accuracy and sensitivity, the visibility of NPCs people on the in-game Map, and the number of in-mission saves you can make.
• He Knows Too Much:
  • In the aftermath of St. Petersberg, the three Generals who survived the attack start their own investigation into who ordered the hit. (One of them, Gen. Bardachenko, is interrogating poor Agent Smith to get to the truth.) This has made your client very unhappy, and becomes a giant plot cul-de-sac.
  • With the Hitman closing in, General Zhupikov sets up a meet at the German Embassy where he plans to trade some Russian nuclear specs in exchange for asylum. The Spetnaz agent is under orders to apply extreme measures to prevent this from happening, up to and including the assassination of the German Ambassador. The Spetznatz agent is labeled as a target, but you don't have to kill him. Likewise, the ambassador is labeled as a VIP, but you don't have to save him.
  • In the finale to Contracts, a wounded 47 remarks that his shooter is still alive and can't be allowed to leave the crime scene freely, since he "knows too much" about 47's past.
    [loading pistol] "I can't have that. Not even in my death."
  • The objective of "Requiem" is to kill everyone at the church who can positively identify 47, as Rick's story hasn't hit the presses yet. That means taking out the 12 guards, Cayne (a paraplegic who can barely roll away), the Chaplain, and Rick Hendersen himself. Depending on which directions your enemies scatter, Rick will probably be your last target. Put a cap in his dome to end the game.
• Hell Hotel:
  • The dreamscape hotel in Contracts. When signing in at reception, one of the rooms on the signature pad is listed as 666, even though the hotel only has around 310 rooms. There's also a ghost wandering the restricted wing, which is taped off by police.
  • In the final mission, the neon sign outside of the French hotel is burnt out, leaving only the letters "H", "E", and "L" in red.
  • Terminus, a run-down 19th century building with a very sordid history. In addition to the Accidents you can perform, we see a maid cleaning up after a 'suicide' involving a wrench.
• Heroic Second Wind: In Contracts and Blood Money, once your health is gone, the game goes into slow motion black and white. If you can score four headshots before 47 keels over, you get a minimal amount of health back. If not, it's game over.
  • Playing "Requiem" on Professional Mode means you are 99.9% guaranteed to enter near-death mode, so make those shots count. Once you make the headshots and clear out the church, 47 can only sustain one more hit before dying for good.
• Herr Doktor: Otto Wolfgang Ort-Meyer, his associate Dr. Odon Kovacs, and Dr. Hannelore Von Kamprad (currently settled in India).
• Hidden Weapons:
  • Silent Assassin introduced the concept of smuggling items into buildings. (Though actually, hiding guns in the men's room was introduced as early as Hitman 1.) Sticking guns in crates is a regular feature in Blood Money, starting with the training level. The contents of toolboxes will not be searched when you are frisked, and a carpenter's uniform seals the illusion.
  • Any checkpoint can be circumvented. Look for a delivery boy and stash your stuff in the groceries, or steal a cop uniform, or slip your pistol into with a tourist's luggage. Or heck, buy a foiled-lined sniper rifle case and carry it through the metal detector. As long as they doesn't SEE you do it, everything is cool.
  • The Agency's "recommendations" in the early games. These are marked with the ICA symbol on the map, and typically there are 1 or 2 of these boxes in any given mission. In James Bondian fashion, your Quartermaster (Diana) will leave you ammo—and maybe even a some tech toys—in a black crate somewhere in the level.
  • As we know, many weapons can be saved by completing a level with them in your inventory. But another way is by dropping them inside an ICA box. In Blood Money, they can also be used to store rare or customized weapons for later retrieval.
  • In the Patronas Towers, you can dump a smoke bomb down the laundry chute to set off the fire alarm. If you're feeling especially devilish, you can drop your gun down there, too.
  • Try using the dumbwaiter in "A Dance With the Devil" to get past the guards on both floors.
  • Diana will occasionally gift-wrap a 'present' for you, along with a personalized note at the coat-check area. FYI, this happens in both the Hotel Galar and the Paris opera.
  • In later games, guards will pick up discarded weapons and bring them to a security room. Depending on the location of said room, this can sometimes be exploited to get guards to smuggle weapons into secured areas for you.
• Hide Your Children: There are no children of any kind in the game. Although Victoria is treated with kid gloves by 47 and Diana, she's conveniently sixteen years old, and mostly appears in cutscenes, besides. (hand Waved in that all of the children were sent away on a field trip before the gunfight took place.)
• Hoist by Their Own Petard:
  • A lot of enemies can be killed in this manner. Lee Hong, for instance, has a personal bodyguard (Tzun) who follows him around. This man is also a taste-tester, so if you spike Hong's soup with laxative & pass it on to Tzun, Hong will be left totally defenseless. Here are some more unusual examples:
  • "Traditions of the Trade" in Hitman Contracts. In this hotel, the nice thing about Fritz's dental clinic is that the walls are lead-lined to hide his explosive, so nobody outside (or inside, if you fire a gun next door) will hear your gunshots.
  • Thanks to the dodgy a.i., it is possible to lure Vinnie out into the driveway after alerting the FBI, then sit back and watch as he gets run over by his own witness protection team.
• Hollywood Silencer:
  • In Blood Money, if you spring for the premium suppressor for your Silverballer, you can shoot someone in the head and guards standing less than 10 feet away won't hear it.
  • Averted in Silent Assassin: suppressed weapons can be heard by people nearby, sometimes even through doors/walls. Yet another thing the manual doesn't bother to mention.
• Homage:
  • The series owes a good bit to James Bond. From the well-dressed heroes with funny names (Agent 47 and his lovely assistant, Diana Burnwood), to the exotic locations, to the use of "Tomorrow Never Dies" (not the Sheryl Crow song) for the end credits, they're the greatest 007 games never made.
  • Try climbing a ladder in the Japan missions (Silent Assassin). By aiming the camera down, you can point it over 47's snow jacket to see he's still wearing his expensive suit underneath — just like the movie poster◊ for Moonraker.
  • "Seafood Massacre" is a lively mission, straight out of The Godfather. Before the Police chief and his henchmen arrive, you're allowed into the restaurant and can talk to the bartender. He'll give you a key to the bathroom. (Talk to your targets to heighten the drama if you like.) If you drop your gun in there, you can retrieve it when 47 returns while dressed as the mob negotiator.
  • 47's camo facepaint and army fatigues in C47's jungle missions are likely a reference to Predator. You can also nick a hat and minigun from the enemy camp, if Jesse Ventura is more your jam.
  • In "Traditions of the Trade", make sure to collect Frantz's mail and then talk to the florist. He'll give you a box of roses with a nice surprise inside; he's even nice enough to give you some extra rounds for your new Mossberg. (In Contracts, the florist is closed for the day, and the letter is addressed to 47 from Diana; she's sent along some "drop dead gorgeous" roses.) The point of getting the shotgun, other than making like Arnie in Terminator 2, is to make a quick and loud kill. If you've got a silenced weapon and don't particularly care for seeing roses fly around in the air as you drill someone, then by all means, skip it.
  • "The Meat King's Party" contains a possible homage to Twin Peaks. In your possession is a glamour shot of the client's teenage daughter, a blonde. The upper echelon of the slaughterhouse is where you'll find her. She's dead...wrapped in plastic.
  • The animation of someone in elevator being strangled from above is a tribute to The Professional. As is the option to dress as a SWAT member and cooperate in their armed raid in Contracts. Whee!
  • In Blood Money, the scene with a suit-wearing, Bible-quoting gangster with a gas can is a reference to Quentin Tarantino, namely Pulp Fiction and Reservoir Dogs.
    • The Achievement for using a Katana in Absolution is "Go Medieval on his Ass." Note also the reference to Bad Lieutenant.
  • An old Soviet-Polish movie called "Deja Vu" introduces its protagonist in a scene which can be recreated shot-for-shot (no pun intended) in "Curtains Down": here, too, a hitman has to assassinate a performer in a play of "Tosca", and his on-stage execution scene is the perfect opportune moment for it. In the movie, he is shot with a sniper rifle, though other options are available to 47.
  • The falling chandelier in "Curtains Down" is also a reference to a famous scene from ''The Phantom of the Opera, which takes place in the opera house on which this fictional one is based.
  • Blood Money: In 47's flophouse next to the newly-painted wall, there is a birdcage on the table with a yellow canary inside. This is likely a reference to Jean Pierre Melville's Le Samourai which, if you haven't seen it, was a French film about a contract killer named Jef Costello.
  • The scenes with Alexander Cayne call to mind Interview with the Vampire. Just like Malloy, Rick gets killed as soon as the interview ends.
  • In the shootout at Rosewood Orphanage, IO consciously evokes the bank robbery/hostage scenes from The Dark Knight. The place is crawling with Wade's henchmen, all wearing garish suits and masks.
• Hooker with a Heart of Gold: Mei Ling appears twice as a concubine who has a habit of obtaining keycards from her pimps' trousers.
• How We Got Here: When we first catch up to 47 in Contacts, he has been shot by someone who was lying in wait for him. But the assassin failed to polish off 47, and he is now losing consciousness in a Parisian hotel. When we flash forward to Blood Money, the focus has shifted to Alexander Cayne, who gives his first-hand account of what happened after Paris.
  • The main menu of Blood Money displays scenes from 47's impending cremation. How he has ended up on that cremation table is for you to find out.
• Human Shield: If you want to knock someone out, it's a lot faster to zip over, CQC and K.O. them than it is to prepare your syringe and then move the body. It is, however, slightly noisier, as the victim will usually yell something when grabbed.
• Hyperspace Arsenal:
  • Is that a shotgun in your trouser leg or are you happy to see me?
  • A crazy female assassin wearing nothing but Kleenex. In Blood Money, she turns out be carrying FIVE different stiletto knives if you examine her body.

I

• I Fought the Law and the Law Won:
  • C47: Whatever you do, do NOT shoot any cops. The only cop you're allowed to kill is the Hong Kong Police Chief. Kill any more and it's $5000 off of your income EACH, not to mention that if you kill too many, the Agency gives you a fail and you have to do it all over again.
  • The one exception is the final mission of Contracts: Your target is a Chief Inspector, the guy who drew first blood back at the opera house. You're still asking for a world of pain if you choose to fight the SWAT members, though.
  • In Contracts, the SWAT officers are much more cunning. The problem is that the SWATs are all monitored via GPS, so no matter HOW you kill one, the others in his squad will always know, and will always find you, even if you do it with the lights out. After all that work, it's not even worth the effort. (Don't say the status bar didn't warn you, though.) The trick is to find a SWAT who has been separated from the pack, ready your needle, and jump him. It's near-to-impossible to subdue a mobile SWAT from behind when his buddies are around. If you stupidly get into a gun battle with them, change into a SWAT outfit as soon as you can as the extra armor it provides will help a lot.
  • The Agency has a very cozy relationship with U.N. authorities. If you're trying for the M4 rifle in "The Motorcade Interception", remember that you can not be seen killing any of the U.N. escorts directly. They must be shot up by the Afganis or their own comrades. Alternatively, if you take out the Khan and then wait for things to cool down, you can sneak up behind a UN trooper and wire him. As long as he does not detect you (and no one sees you do it), The Agency doesn't care.
• I Surrender, Suckers:
  • In Absolution, if 47 is caught by a guard, he can pretend to surrender. The guard will then approach him, giving him a moment to disarm and hold said guard hostage.
  • The first time 47 runs into his brother, Mr. 17, he's grazed by a few harmless shots before 17 ducks into a crawlspace. If you follow him, you'll be caught in the blast of a bomb.
  • In the World of Assassination games, 47 can pretend to surrender when confronted by guards, giving him an opportunity to shoot them or knock them out when they close in.
• Immortality Immorality:
  • In exchange for the research funding, Ort-Meyer provided his former comrades with donor organs harvested from clone bodies, which significantly extended their longevity. In his correspondence with Lee Hong, Frantz Fuchs seems to be feeling his age more than the other donors, thus explaining his impatience with Ort-Meyer: "I'm sick and tired of waiting for this old man. As you know my work needs a steady hand and sharp wit. And I'm not getting younger. Therefore I support the idea about splitting the fruit. Let's split the fruit while we can still savor it!"
  • Mark Parchezzi III is the best clone that the Franchise could produce, but he is also a class 2 clone and therefore dies after only 18 months of reaching maturity. It is revealed that Parchezzi is haunted by this fact and seeks to acquire a sample of 47's bone marrow, which holds the key to reversing his rapid aging.
  • Soders suffers from a rare condition, Situs Inversus, in which his internal organs are reversed. He received his first heart transplant in 1995, a procedure which might have involved illegal, black market organ trading. However, being an ICA employee, no formal investigation was made. However, Intel suggests that Soders is once again dying and in need of a heart transplant. His second donor heart is from a Brazilian "guttersnipe", a pejorative generally used to describe a young, poor and often homeless person.
• Impersonating an Officer: Women love a man in uniform. 47 really can't go wrong with this disguise, though it can be tricky to get and some guards can see through it in the World of Assassination games.
• Improvised Weapon: Whether it's stabbing somebody in the ear with a screwdriver or knocking somebody unconscious with a can of soda, any sufficiently sharp or heavy object can be a weapon.
• In Love with Your Carnage
  • Just watching old tapes of 47 at work makes Sergei's heart go pitter-patter. He and Mr. X agree that a natural born killer wouldn't just up and "retire", and they resolve to look him up.
  • In Blood Money, Mr. 47's exploits have made him something of an urban legend in the States. (The Brits might be sworn to secrecy, but you can bet Agent Smith and Alexander Cayne blabbed all about it.) Now, every two-bit spy and third-rate assassin wants to take a crack at the "bald killer clone". It's at the point where Blake Dexter—a Texas businessman who shouldn't even have an inkling who 47 is—hops around like a schoolboy when he spots the barcode.
    "This ain't no fuckin "P.I."! This is a GHOST! This is a MYTH! This is a fuckin' HITMAN!!"
• The Informant:
  • Apart from Carlton Smith, many civilians have been paid off by the ICA to help you. Guys like Lee Hong have made a lot of enemies, and any number of people would love to see them dead.
  • Vinnie in "A New Life". Instead of just whacking criminals, now we're whacking criminals who are turning State's Evidence. How times change.
• In Case of Boss Fight, Break Glass:
  • In "Tubeway Torpedo" 47 walks in on General Makarov playing some sweet chin music on poor Smith. You could get at the General by shooting through the two-way mirror of his interrogation, but there's a quieter way. Dom Osmond can be disposed of in a similar manner.
  • In the Christmas-themed level of Blood Money, there is a glass bottom spa which your target is relaxing in.
  • "Death Factory": The floor of Dr. Green's control booth is lined with glass to enhance the vista. Turn him into fertilizer by shooting the glass while he's standing on it, sending him plummeting into the hog pit where he'll be promptly devoured.
• In Medias Res:
  • One of the objectives of the last mission of Contracts showed Richard Delahunt as a completed objective. He was one of the two targets in "Curtains Down", implying that Contracts takes place during Blood Money, after which Diana informs 47 of ICA agents getting picked off. (There is a bit of a continuity gaffe, however, in that the opera singer changed names from Philippe Berceuse to Alvaro D'Alvade between Contracts and Blood Money.)
  • This explains the ominous Dramatic Gun Cock in the ending cutscene of the opera mission in Blood Money, and in the next mission Diana asks, "How's that wound healing up?"
  • It's also implied that Albert Fournier, the Inspector you were to kill in Contracts was tipped off to 47's location by the Franchise.
    • Seeing as how Blood Money takes place during a very long timeframe, almost two years, with sometimes months between missions, there is plenty of time inbetween the missions for 47 to have been doing other missions.
• Inn Security:
  • The nameless Hotel in "Hunter and Hunted". 47 hides on the top floor to nurse his gunshot wound, but the cops aren't far behind.
  • The Hotel Galar in "Traditions of the Trade". Frantz sits out the entire mission in his room—in fact, he doesn't set foot out of the shower. Conveniently, there is a silenced pistol on a nightstand nearest him.
  • The Shamal Hotel & Casino in "A House of Cards". Talk about one stop shopping! Throw Tariq off a balcony, shoot Schmutzy in his room, then call the Sheikh and snipe him, all from one convenient spot!
• Inopportune Impersonation Failure: Throughout the game the effectiveness of any disguises often depends on how the player acts while wearing them, especially since some areas are strictly off-limits to everyone but the targets and their bodyguards. Consequently, it's possible for 47 silently assassinate a target and accomplish all the ancillary goals - only to end up blowing his cover anyway just because a guard just happened to see a waiter leaving a restricted area on the way to an exit point.
• Instant Death Bullet:
  • The plot of Contracts centers on averting this.
  • Mostly averted in-gameplay, where killing enemies (or other NPCs) depends on your weapon, where you hit them (even more so if they're wearing body armor), and random chance. Sometimes, they'll still be able to run, they'll be knocked out, they'll be incapacitated and might bleed to death or just die. Mostly averted because it doesn't apply to you.
    • It's also played dead straight with head shots. Head shots are universally fatal, regardless of caliber, distance traveled, or angle of impact. Victims crumple to the ground instantaneously and without a sound.
    • In Silent Assassin, head-shots with the suppressed .22 are not always fatal. Same with the SG220 in Contracts.
    • However, in Silent Assassin, the M195 anti-materiel rifle can kill the target no matter what part of the body is shot.
• Instant Sedation:
  • The chloroform-soaked rags and syringes filled with sedatives. Takes a few seconds of struggling against, so you better do it in an area that's not prone to have people walking in on you.
  • Chloroform averts this trope in a realistic fashion. It's possible to dial up the dose to keep enemies asleep for a longer stretch, but unless you're trying for Silent Assassin, it's generally not worth the bother. They only stay down for about a minute per "bottle", and if they awaken without their clothes, they will (sensibly) sound an alert. If you give him a full rags' worth, you'll have 5 minutes tops.
• Interplay of Sex and Violence:
  • Google "Hitman Shockingly Executed".
  • The shower assassination at the beginning of Absolution, considering who 47 is killing.
  • Here is a partial list of people Hitman has killed in the course of this series. Hitman in general has environments and targets that are really fetish-driven:
    1. Lee Hong: Pretty much Fu Manchu, owns a brothel.
    2. Campbell Sturrock AKA The Meat King, a half-ton meat salesman holding a BDSM party in an abattoir whilst defending himself from kidnapping charges for his brother's murder of a girl.
    3. Lorne de Havilland, a Hugh Hefner stand-in who you have to kill during a big Playboy-esque party.
    4. Anthony Martinez and Vaana Ketlyn, costumed fetishists who you have to kill in yet another erotic party filled with scantily clad men and women dressed as angels and demons.
    5. Angelina Mason and Raymond Kulinsky, an assassin couple who keep in contact with each other through sexually-charged radio banter. Oh and they're dressed as crows.
    6. A Mississippi skipper who enjoys hunting alligators with assault rifles, has an incestual relationship with his niece and also hits on his pursers.
    7. Fetish nun assassins in high-heels (I guess now we know what IO Interactive likes to do on weekends)
• Island Base:
  • In India, there are two island hospitals within a dinghy ride of each other. Both are run by affiliates of the local cult.
  • Pappy lives in a fortified mansion on a river island. The easy part is reaching the island, since 47 rents an airboat to get there.

J

• Jack the Ripoff:
  • Pablo Ochoa is probably named after the famous drug kingpin, Pablo Escobar, and the Ochoa brothers, members of the Medellin Cartel. Both were based in Columbia.
  • Fritz and Frantz may be an allegory to Franz Fuchs, a xenophobe who mailed bombs to people he felt were overly "friendly to foreigners."
  • Angelina Mason met Raymond sometime after public disgrace and embarking on a life of crime. Together, they developed a strategy for high-profile kills they called the "Grassy Knoll scheme." Also, Raymond Kulinsky is most likely named after Richard Kuklinski aka "The Iceman", a real-life mob hitman who claimed to have committed at least 250 murders.
• Jiggle Physics:
  • Charlie Sidjan looks like a New Year's Baby with glaucoma.
  • In Absolution, the female models' boobs jiggle even after they've been knocked out/killed.
  • Sanchez's belly wobbles during the match in "Fight Night". On closer inspection, it makes a full 360 degree turn when 47 appears in the ring, a graphical error.
• Joke Weapon: The air rifle. Also, some of the sillier melee weapons.
  • Lethal Joke Weapon - For some bizarre reason, some people consider it this, but considering it takes forever to kill someone with it...
    • The gun is as silent as the Silverballers with the fully upgraded silencer, and is still a One-Hit Kill if you aim for the head.
    • Any throwable object you care to pick up in Absolution is potentially a one-hit kill, including Bibles, radios, hula girl bobble-heads, plungers...
  • The cardboard tube in Contracts.
• Justified Tutorial: Five of the six games in the Hitman series (Codename 47, Silent Assassin, Blood Money, Absolution, and 2016) have one (Contracts has a dreamscape training ground instead)

  1. Ort-Meyer's laboratory in H:C47. The first thing it has you do is change 47's clothing. One of the most core mechanics of the game, discovered right away. Then you move around, it gives you a chance to get used to the controls, teaches you to jump across balconies, etc. It's also fun to pick up new weapons just for the sake of hearing the intercom describing them in detail. Then it's all target practice from that point, until 47 puts a few bullets in an orderly and makes his escape.
  2. Silent Assassin catches up with 47 after he's retreated to Sicily and given away all his possessions. There are some ruins behind his gardener's shack that serve the same function as Ort-Meyer's obstacle course. After the padre is kidnapped, Diana does the Judi Dench routine of suggesting 007 47 isn't up to Agency standards, is getting old, needs more training, etc. You can use the scarecrow, the melon patch, and even the church bell for target practice.
  3. Contracts drops you off moments where the first game ended. Given its purpose (as an introduction), it's not that representative of the rest of the game, but it has a surprising amount of interactivity and layers, for instance: multiple disguises that can achieve a different goal, being able to shoot a corpse hanging from the ceiling (and you can obtain his disguise faster that way), a cache of weapons to use against some difficult (armored) enemies, sniping in the courtyard, etc. The patients slaughtering clones and blood all over the place help establish the horror tone of the game.
  4. Blood Money opens on a relatively quiet mission in Baltimore. It's the most linear of the game's missions; each building is designed to show off the new game engine. (There's only one disguise, for instance.) It's the multiple ways in which you can kill the Swing King that set it apart from the training levels: A fire extinguisher, baseball bat, poison, bomb, strangling, pistol, shotgun, sniper rifle, or a good old push down the stairs. (Speedrunners hate this level like poison, but when they are forced to do it, it's pretty interesting to see their tricks for getting Silent Assassin.)
  5. It's the same story in Absolution. The tutorial lady holds your hand during the hit on Diana's place.
  6. Hitman (2016) flashes back 20 years to Mr. 47's induction. Ms. Burnwood drills you on the finer points of murder, using old ICA assignments (a luxury yacht and an airstrip) for reference.

K

• Karma Houdini:
  • Article of interest in a Nevada paper: "Lady Luck Gets a New Twang: Bajou Beauty Spreads the Chips". This "Bajou Beauty" is none other than Margeaux LeBlanc, the black widow bride from "Till Death Do Us Apart". Looks like she fled Mississippi after the spate of murders and became a local celebrity, thanks to your help.
  • Birdie from Absolution, who plays every faction in the game off against the others, yet emerges unscathed at the end.
• Karma Meter:
  • Generally speaking, it's a bad idea to kill everyone you come across, even if 47 gets away with it. The Agency doesn't like unauthorized kills and may penalize you for it.
  • Blood Money has a notoriety meter which is filled up whenever someone sees you commit a highly suspicious act and gets away to tell someone. Filling it up too much will make it easier for random people to recognize you and call for help, and the newspaper report you get at the end of each level will slowly start to build up a description and composite ID picture of Agent 47, meaning cops are more likely to shoot you on sight. You can bribe people to lower your notoriety.
• Katanas Are Just Better: Zigzagged. Katanas appear throughout the series as powerful melee weapons, although they have to be carried two handed, which means 47 cannot carry a long gun.
  • If only 47 didn't swing it around like a floor lamp. Also looks damn good when displayed on the wall.
  • His swordsmanship is improved in Hitman: Absolution. In fact, using a sword in Chinatown constitutes an Achievement.
  • A number of challenges in the World Of Assasination trilogy involve making kills with katanas.
• Kick the Dog: Absolution has the villains murder their way through an orphanage run by nuns.

L

• Ladder Physics:
  • Silent Assassin takes this to ludicrous extremes: Climbing a ladder forces the camera in to 3rd person perspective, and it doesn't restrict your firing capabilities at all, meaning you can and are forced to watch Agent 47 run up a ladder in third person while contorting his body so much that he can fire a shotgun directly below and behind him.
  • In Hitman Contracts, Agent 47 has forgotten his ladder skills. Try and descend a ladder in a rush and the great assassin leaps off in a suicidal swan dive.
• Large and in Charge:
  • Sergei is a goddamn wrecking ball.
  • Hitman isn't likely to introduce a bigger crime boss than the Meat King.
  • It's easy to see why Rutgert runs the biker gang. Oddly, the bald bouncers who guard the 2nd floor entryway are even bigger.
• Last-Second Ending Choice: In C47 and Blood Money, there are two endings to the final mission, depending on whether you hesitate to kill your adversary (Dr. Ort-Meyer in the original, and Alexander "Wheelchair Guy" Cayne in Blood Money), with the former being the bad ending.
• Last Stand:
  • If you've played Hitman, then you've done this at least once. Alarm goes off, and instead of (or at the same time as) cursing the gods for your failure, you whip out the Silverballers and make things messy as you go.
  • In Paris, 47 calmly knocks back drinks as the Paris police raid his hotel. The menu reveals the Police Inspector, Albert Fornier, is an escaped Target whom 47 is still intent on killing, "even in my death". You always remember the one that got away.
  • Subverted in Blood Money. "Requiem" starts on 47 cleaning his pistols in anticipation of a gunfight with Cayne which will make Normandy look like a tea party, but Diana wisely sneaks up and sedates him before he can act. The payoff turns out to be a combo of stealth and brawn, as Diana smuggles 47's body into the Franchise's lair and revives him while everyone else is distracted and at ease. (Although it is possible, albeit very difficult, to kill them all with "accidents".)
• Laughably Evil:
  • Somewhere in the middle of Codename 47, you just surrender to how terrible the voice acting is, and start to enjoy it on that level. Ort-Meyer's especially due to his ham-and-cheese delivery.
  • Since Absolution has such a big cast, only a few Targets other than The Saints stand out. The villains on view are mostly a pack of clowns led by the hammy Keith Carradine. Mind you, in Blood Money and prior, most of the Targets are characterized via Diana's messages. This means it's simply a short message where we're told how crazy they are. All the cartoonish acts they commit happen off-screen. On the other hand, we get to see all the nutso characters from Absolution acting out in cutscenes and their over-the top idiocy.
• Law of Inverse Recoil
  • Explained with a sort of hand wave in Hitman 1-3. Agent 47, being a peak-level human clone, handles any sort of gun with ease, minus the recoil.
  • Averted in Blood Money: All guns have recoil. His trusted .45 Silverballers can even be upgraded to full-automatic, making them even harder to control...add the "Akimbo" upgrade and say your good bye to your reticule.
• Leave No Witnesses:
  • In a Blood Money cutscene, 47 is seen rather pointlessly killing a postal worker for delivering a message from the Agency, now in its death throes. The message was a 'for your eyes only' type.
  • The final mission of Hitman: Blood Money starts with a whole lot of people learning something 47 can't afford for them to know (namely, that he's not actually dead). He has a way of fixing that.
  • Method of the Saints in Absolution. One wonders how firing off an RPG at a crowded motel is unreported by anyone.
• Leg Focus:
  • For 12 years, all we ever saw of Diana was her knees.
  • Jade is also introduced in this manner.
• Level-Map Display: On easier difficulties, it also shows positions of enemies.
• Let's Play:
  • Blood Money has Tom Bowen's "How Not to Play Hitman" series, which combines hilarious amounts of carnage and Soundtrack Dissonance.
  • There's also the more recent LP by TheAuZZieGamer, who goes through every mission with vulgarity, running gags, carnage and general surgical precision. There's only one mission he doesn't get Silent Assassin on, and it's the tutorial (which, as mentioned above, isn't very easy to get Silent Assassin on).
• Lighter and Softer: Codename 47, Silent Assassin, and the 2016 Hitman all have a lighter, more adventurous "international man of mystery" feel to them.
• Like Reality, Unless Noted: It's generally a very grounded thriller series, aside from the core premise revolving around human cloning and genetic modification.
• Limited Loadout: Varies from game to game, but generally downplayed; you start off with a limited loadout, but nothing is stopping you from acquiring extra weapons via On-Site Procurement.
  • Codename: 47 offers a variety of gear for each level, though not every weapon is available in every mission and budgetary concerns will determine if you're going to bring that shiny Sniper Rifle or Hand Cannon along for the hit.
  • Silent Assassin allows you to bring along every concealable weapon in the game once you've unlocked them, but only one rifle or two handed melee weapon.
  • Contracts has a default loadout (Fibre wire, dual Silverballers, silenced Silverballer, binoculars, lockpick, sedative syringes) for every mission, but exiting to the main menu and selecting a mission allows 47 to bring as many concealable guns (well over two dozen, including dual versions, Sawed Off Shotguns and Micro Uzis) as he likes, but again, is limited to a single long gun. However, melee weapons collected in the field, such as knives, are no longer selectable or collectable.
  • Blood Money only allows one pistol to be brought along, a Sniper Rifle in a briefcase, and one other long gun in an agency stash. 47 can still, however, conceal an unlimited number of pistols on his person once he finds them on hits, though this number is significantly toned down from those in prior games.
  • Absolution allows 47 to carry one pair of semi automatic pistols or one revolver, one rifle, one sniper rifle, and one melee weapon. In addition, the fibre wire and Silverballers get their own dedicated slots.
  • The World Of Assassination trilogy allows one pistol and two tools or small melee weapons on 47's person in addition to one of any other item in an agency pickup (though this is limited by whether it's a large or small pickup). Again, once 47 finds a small item, such as a pistol or a concealable melee weapon, he can carry as many as he pleases, but can only carry two two handed weapons, and that's if he's constantly holding one of those in his hands with the other on his back.
• Little Useless Gun:
  • The Derringer (found in Codename 47) is a gun you see in the movies, usually Westerns (though no self-respecting cowpoke would ever own one). There's always a point in the flick where the hero needs a bit of help and that's where the sassy lass in the big, frilly skirt offers her little pea shooter. That's the Derringer. Like the nail file in Blood Money, it was unused of the final product, possibly out of concern for 47's dignity. It's completely useless as there really is no need for a gun so pissweak and inaccurate. It is silenced, however.
  • As an inside joke, Lenny Dexter's only means of defense in Absolution is a Derringer.
  • Silent Assassin also had the Makarov and .22 pistols, both of which had little stopping power. The .22 is just about the only gun in any of the games that doesn't always kill with a single headshot — you can perforate a man's brain with this gun and it will just make him mad. As a consolation prize, it is undetectable and silent.
  • Contracts gives us the SG220, which basically functions as a watered down alternative to the silenced Silverballer. Headshots at close range aren't even guaranteed kills with this weapon, though it is much quieter than the Silverballer and uses the much more common pistol ammo.
• Living MacGuffin:
  • 47's bone marrow. Cayne's main goal was to wipe out the ICA and acquire a DNA sample from 47, which was required to create a successful clone.
  • The girl in Absolution.

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