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If nothing else, the days leading up to the release of Hitman have certainly been interesting. Between the Friday release date - unusual for a worldwide release, and for a digital one - and the episodic rollout of new content, this latest instalment in the contract killing series is launching in a rather atypical fashion. The fact that Square Enix saw fit to open the game's outdated beta to PlayStation Plus users just one week before launch was even more baffling. Unfortunately, for many players, this beta left a sour impression, thanks in part to its wildly inconsistent frame-rate. Now, with the launch-day version of Hitman in hand, we were eager to see if these issues have been corrected, and how the previously unseen Xbox One version stacks up.Starting off with the PlayStation 4 version, we were immediately pleased to see a noticeable performance increase right out of the gate. Compared to the beta, we're looking at a boost of 10 to 15 frames per second, with performance that remains above 30fps the vast majority of the time. The second training area fares even better now, and manages to turn in something approaching a stable 60fps throughout: a taste of what could have been. So while performance remains rather variable, the more serious drops in frame-rate we encountered in the beta have been completely eliminated here.
While the improved performance is certainly great news, we're still not huge fans of variable, unlocked frame-rates - a concern we expressed in our analysis of the beta. The good news here is that the game's developer, Io Interactive, is clearly listening to feedback and has taken steps to address our concerns. Hitman now includes the option to cap the game's frame-rate at 30fps. As a result of the improved performance, it's now possible to enjoy the game at an almost completely stable 30fps.
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