IO Interactive, the Danish game studio known mostly for its Hitman series, has said it expects and even welcomes controversy about the James Bond character it has created for 007: First Light. This Bond – played by Irish actor Patrick Gibson – is a new, younger take, and will chart the character’s rise from soldier to 00 agent.
Therefore, the smugness and bravado some people find abrasive: IOI says it’s intentional. Bond’s lopsided smirk, seen over and again in marketing material for the game, displays the arrogance of youth – Bond’s naivety. It’s a smile perfectly positioned to be wiped away over the course of the game.
“People having differing opinions about a James Bond: that’s great,” senior combat designer Tom Marcham told me at IO’s office in Brighton recently – the company has a handful of offices around Europe. “Everyone has their favorite Bond. If we made a Bond where no one had any opinions on them, it would be the dullest Bond ever made. So the fact that we’ve got a little controversy on that, I think it’s a good thing.
“I think every time a new James Bond is cast it’s talked about in every part of Britain, so let’s have it happen to us, let’s have people discuss it. I’m curious to see… One of the things I really like about Paddy’s performance of Bond is how much he grows on you throughout the game as well. So it’d be interesting to see what people think when they actually play through it.”
Martin Emborg, the game’s narrative and cinematic director, said there’s a confidence – “an unearned confidence” – that’s visible on purpose. Emborg hopes players will read that as glaring naivety, like, “Oh you don’t even know what you’re getting into,” he said. “[Bond’s] like, ‘Yeah I can do whatever,’ so he’s a reckless young man. This guy hasn’t seen death in the way that an older Bond has. When you’re a young man, you feel immortal […] and he’ll definitely learn that he’s not.”
Emborg thinks most people’s definition of Bond comes from watching older depictions of the character, “someone whose pulse never gets above a certain [level] even if he’s being shot at”. “But this is another take. This is a young man that isn’t all those things yet, and so there is maybe a little more on the line for this guy than your seasoned Bond.”
“We do have a strong character, and I will say he is as strong as those other Bonds” -Martin Emborg
Plus how much do people really know about Bond as a character anyway, beyond his famous cars and drinks and catchphrases? How much do people really know about what motivates him? That’s what Emborg said IO is trying to dig into and show here.
“We do have a strong character,” Emborg stressed, “and I will say he is as strong as those other Bonds. In terms of the audience putting themselves into this strong character: it does help us that it’s an origin story. We’re starting with him and that’s a great entry point for the audience for sure. But he’s his own man. It’s not like he’s a vanilla person. He has strong impulses and opinions and ways of doing things.
“Even when we meet him at the very beginning, before he has all this experience and before he’s been through all these things that will slowly mature him and take him towards being the seasoned 007 that we all know and love, he has those core qualities that he was born with, and it’s the reason that he’s able to become 007, and the reason that he blips on the on the radar for MI6 and gets pulled into that world.”
One of the things Tom Marcham said people will see in this Bond, especially in combat, is rage. “This character’s got some rage in him,” he said. “It’s an interesting take. He’s an orphan […] and there’s an attitude that maybe he didn’t have the greatest time growing up. Maybe he’s been in some tough fights before and he knows how to handle himself, and he’s got some inner rage that comes out every now and then.
“But you might not necessarily see it when you just see a face-shot of our Bond,” he added. “And I think [Patrick Gibson has] done an incredible job, and he’s definitely someone that has so much charisma that the more time you spend with him, the more you like him.”
“I would love to hear someone say, ‘Patrick Gibson is my Bond’, and I think some people will say that once they’ve been through the story that we’re telling” -Martin Emborg
Alex Donaldson talked to Martin Emborg last year about Patrick Gibson’s casting as Bond, and when talking to me, Emborg said similar things, praising Gibson’s “larger-than-life” character, his “restless kind of fun”, and his ability to “lock in and make it very serious”. “That dynamic within him makes him, in my mind, a perfect actor,” he said. There’s also a heightened public focus on Gibson’s performance as Bond in lieu of there being a cinematic Bond in active service at the moment. This helps create both a natural void for the game to fill and a natural separation from any cinematic depiction of Bond, so as not to be restricted by it.
Ultimately, we’ll have to wait until the game launches on 27th May to see how well IO Interactive and Gibson’s Bond will fare – and how fondly this iteration will be remembered. “I would love to hear someone say, ‘Patrick Gibson is my Bond’,” Emborg added. “And I think some people will say that once they’ve been through the story that we’re telling.”
Chris recently spent a few hours playing 007: First Light and came away entertained, but in an Uncharted kind of action adventure way, rather than a more strategical Hitman kind of way. Indeed, IO Interactive later told me it’s “really happy” that people are noticing 007: First Light is not like Hitman, because it wants expectations to be right. “That’s important for us that you go in with the right expectations, that this isn’t a Hitman game,” Tom Marcham said. “It’s got some inspiration from it, it’s got a few mechanics, but it’s definitely a Bond game first and foremost.”
