Thankfully last year's Blacklist saved the wayward Splinter Cell franchise from going completely off the rails following the dual-damp squibs that were Double Agent and Conviction by finally returning to what the series does best - silent sneaking and light-source-destroying terrorist-takedowns with a side of political espionage. At the top of that pile though - and the game that single-handedly represented the real-world alternative to Metal Gear Solid's completely insane plot - is Chaos Theory. With a graphics engine that still holds up perfectly well despite a HD respray over the years and a refined animation system that saw you stalking through the shadows in an incredibly realistic way, Sam Fisher's last time out in the iconic triple-goggled headset n' wetsuit would be his finest yet. It wasn't enough to just redo their entire animation system though, gameplay itself received the most notable upgrade since the series first landed, introducing a alternate-trigger 'lethal/non-lethal' switch that let you decide on-the-fly whether or not you were going to introduce any number of guards to the business end of your knife, or just pummel their temples in instead.
