Official gameplay for Hitman has been shown off and released into the wild to show us all how far the new Hitman title has progressed to

We've seen plenty of Hitman footage "leaked" out by those testing the alpha build of the game. It never looked to eye-poppingly amazing before as it was always someone who doesn't know how to play Hitman, from the looks of the gameplay, as well as people with PCs that could barely seem to run the game. To fix this issue for all of us looking forward to Hitman on December 8^th it looks like Io Interactive has taken it upon themselves to give us a real play through of the same area we've seen leaked and not plugged up by Square Enix to date. All of which right out of PAX over the weekend so we know it is as fresh as they can make for now.

As we get ready to sit back and have a look at Hitman's 'Showstopper' level again it also looks like we are actually getting some fresh details as well. Makes sense as it is Io Interactive giving us a look and not someone trying to claim "first" on the internet. It will be warned here though as it doesn't look like anything 'new' is coming to Hitman since Absolution but it does look like we are getting the 'improved' features here. The really big one being the fact that we are getting over six times the amount of NPCs in the levels whom all interact differently based on how you play the missions in Hitman and all the side contracts.

There is at least one new feature that looks to add a level of difficulty to Hitman above and beyond though. It really is the only thing that is focused on here as new and that would be the new 'Enforcer' NPCs that will be roaming the levels of Hitman. Pretty much these are just beefed up NPCs that have the ability to see through disguises as they are kind of worded to be 'managers' of sort who know all the employees working the levels. In Hitman most of the 'mook' NPCs will let you pass by in disguise but now we have characters that can see through a disguise of specific type and those who can see through all Hitman disguises. Io Interactive is just giving us all more to worry about when trying to kill people.

Looks like I overlooked something here for Hitman in the 'new' department as it looks like we will be able to stash weapons before a mission as well as hide them around levels too. Okay, I didn't really forget about that but I left that to be shown off here by Io Interactive as Square Enix has paid for them to do all of this already and they should get a lot of the Hitman limelight along with my text here. It is a really cool feature to add in as it makes a lot of sense in the franchise although I don't see how we could easily walk around the levels of Hitman with a full on sniper rifle as teased but I am going to chalk that up to sizzle for the game and not something we will actually do.

Now that you've seen official Hitman gameplay what are your thoughts on the game now? Does it look like Io Interactive has improved on so many things in the franchise that this Hitman will feel completely new or does it sound like they are just giving us the same spiel that Ground Zeroes did while they work on a larger version of this Hitman? Are you more or less excited in general? We want to know and you can do that by commenting and keeping the discussion rolling. I am sure this is not the last we will see for Hitman from Square Enix here so be sure to keep checking in for more on Hitman as the news and updates flow like the blood of 47's victims.