- For the film, see GoldenEye
GoldenEye 007 is a first-person shooter for the Nintendo 64 based on the James Bond film GoldenEye. It was produced by then second-party Nintendo game developer Rareware. Notable for the variety of its multiplayer deathmatch mode and its incorporation of stealth into the single-player missions, it was considered by many to be one of the best first-person shooters of all time at the time of its release in 1997, and for some it retains this distinction.
Storyline and missions
The basic plot of the game is identical to that of the film. MI6 have given James Bond the assignment of investigating the mysterious Janus criminal syndicate, who have stolen a deadly satellite-based weapon codenamed GoldenEye.
However, details of the story movie were altered in order to enhance the gameplay (most notably, James Bond's first encounter with Natalya Fydorovna Simonova takes place under entirely different circumstances in each version). Game designer Martin Hollis said in a speech (http://www.zoonami.com/briefing/2004-09-02.php) that a reason for these differences was that he just wanted to put Bond in all the sets from the movie, even if the character hadn't originally visited them.
These original sets were first converted into complete, believable virtual environments by one group of game designers; when this process was complete other designers began populating them with objectives, characters and obstacles in order to create a balanced, fun game. As Martin Hollis explained in his speech:
- "The benefit of this sloppy unplanned approach was that many of the levels in the game have a realistic and non-linear feel. There are rooms with no direct relevance to the level. There are multiple routes across the level."
A list of levels is in the game can be found below. Each level is listed by its title on the mission select screen, with the name shown on the pause menu given in italics.
- Dam Byelomorye Dam
- Facility Arkangelsk
- Runway Runway
- Surface Severnaya
- Bunker Severnaya
- Silo Kirghizstan (called Launch Silo #4 in the level's opening cut-scene)
- Frigate Frigate
- Surface 2 Severnaya
- Bunker 2 Severnaya
- Statue Statue Park
- Archives Archives
- Streets St Petersburg
- Depot Military Depot
- Train Train
- Jungle Cuban Jungle
- Control Janus Control
- Caverns Water Caverns
- Cradle Antenna Cradle
- Aztec Aztec
- Egyptian Crypt
Sequels
Following the success of GoldenEye 007, Rare developed Perfect Dark in 2000 for the N64. Perfect Dark has many similarities and candid references to GoldenEye 007 (for example, the BAFTA Interactive award that Rareware were given for GoldenEye can be found hidden in a safe in one level). The game was even marketed and hyped as a "spiritual" sequel to it, as Perfect Dark is an original franchise and has nothing to do with the James Bond license.
 Screenshot of GoldenEye 007The Bond license was picked up by Electronic Arts, which created multiple games based upon other James Bond movies; however, their most recent James Bond games have had original scripts and have even had live actors playing the roles of many characters.
A number of the GoldenEye 007 developers eventually left Rare to form Free Radical Design, who have released the TimeSplitters series of first-person shooters. These are considered by some to be, like Perfect Dark, "spiritual sequels" to the original game (the dam setting of one level of the second game is one of the more obvious references to GoldenEye).
In the Fall of 2004, EA Games released GoldenEye: Rogue Agent for Xbox, PlayStation 2 and GameCube video game consoles. This is the first game based on the 007 franchise in which the player does not take on the role of James Bond himself, but rather an aspiring 00 Agent recruited by Auric Goldfinger, the villain in the movie Goldfinger. The game has little to do with either the GoldenEye movie or N64 game, and was released to mediocre reviews.
See also
External links
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