As a big fan of good single player FPS games, I am trying to play the ones I have in good memory from time to time but also I am trying to find new ones which I have missed in the past. NOLF was one I had played when it came out and still have great memories of it. Because NOLF is constantly mentioned on GOG and other platforms as one of the games that need a remake, I wanted to play it again. Also, from what the media says, the rights of the game might be lost in some archive because lots of companies which had it went bankrupt.

For my play-through I used the NOLF GOTY because it had an extra level (Kate goes on vacation) which I never played before. I chose the hard (not hardest) difficulty level.

Graphics:
The graphics are just great, plus they really catch that Austin Powers 60s vibe. I am was impressed that NOLF also had some relatively wide areas for the motorbike and skido sections. I had no graphics errors on the WinXP, Radeon HD7770 setup which was good. What I really liked was how they reused the character models up to a ridiculous level. Sometimes you would see the same person in a cut-scene, but with a bald spot on his head. Not sure if the funniness was intended.

Sound:
The weapon sounds are great, even the silencer-weapons sound cool. The best part of the game, if not the highlight, are the conversations of all the henchman of H.A.R.M. The game does not force you to listen to them but if you stop and listen to them, you will laugh in many situations. My highlight is a conversation where one of the main evil villains tells a henchman that he was not aware that H.A.R.M would kill so many people. The henchman than explains to him that it kind of is implied that this would happen if you join an evil organisation like H.A.R.M. and so on...

Gameplay:
In my eyes the gameplay gets a minus if you are not a patient person. There are 3 ways to complete the game from my perspective.
1. Guns blazing, alarms will be a constant background music
2. Silent, killing off the guards silently in your way
3. Sneaking without killing which the game tries to lay out as the intended way to get the highest rating

The problem with option 3 is that it is taking way too long. You have to study every path but you will accidentally run into situations where you have to quickload because you had no chance. Sometimes guards or cameras are behind closed doors and see you instantly and you have to load again to avoid this door. Also the system is a bit glitch-y because you can sneak up on a guard and try to beat him from behind which sends him to sleep. But this does not work in every attempt. Sometimes you just punch him, he turns and fires. Alarm triggered... Some alarm cameras are also seeing farther than others for some reason or trigger faster. Alarm triggered... If you like Thief and patience, this will be a great option for you. All others pull the gun at some point and "short-cut" the game.

Sometimes it makes no sense at all from a story point of view: The fight against the opera singer is in the middle of a construction site. You have to sneak in level 1 but you are also allowed to shoot if you want, fight her with guns in level 2, then level 3 starts with sneaking. The entire building has almost no walls and there were multiple gunfights. Still, level 3 enemies enjoy their day as if the war downstairs is not interesting enough to worry.

Enemies:
Great enemy design and NOLF is one of the games where they start ducking and moving so dodge your attacks. Just the snipers are a bit annoying because they seem to hit almost every time and, because you are a female spy, your cannot take more than 1-3 hits.

Story:
The story is great and ends in a funny way. It is a bit cliche but I think that is intended. There are a lot of changes and its executed pretty well. From a "how good is your attention span" perspective, the game has a lot of loooong cutscenes which only have conversations but for me that was not a problem because they mostly revealed some background information. Some people might find that boring, especially in a second play-through.

All in all I like the game BUT I still prefer the second part NOLF 2. I really like that they increased the goofiness even more and modified the stealth part a "bit".

Whats your opinion?