007 First Light Reviews Call the Spy Thriller One of the Best Bond Games Ever Made
Reviewers give 007 First Light an 88 on Metacritic and a 90 on OpenCritic, calling it James Bond’s strongest game in 14 years.
- Tomorrow, May 27, 007 First Light launches on PlayStation 5, Windows PC, and Xbox Series X to strong critical acclaim, earning 88 on Metacritic and 90 on OpenCritic. The first Bond game in 14 years is widely considered the best since 1997's GoldenEye 007.
- Review copies arrived at the last moment before the holiday weekend, causing many outlets to miss the embargo. Late review code typically raises red flags, though this release appears to be an exception to that pattern.
- The Guardian's Matthew Castle awards five stars, praising IO's integration of action with Hitman's "social stealth" gameplay, writing "Very few fans get to play in the sandbox of their obsession like IO has here." VGC's Jordan Middler also awards five stars, calling it "a real frontrunner for 2026's Game of the Year."
- Hitman franchise fans register slightly lower enthusiasm; Kotaku's Jackson Tyler finds the game suspended between cinematic action and stealth mechanics, calling it "too expensive for its own good, it's smarter than it has any right to be and so much dumber than you wish it actually was."
- The 14-hour campaign spans 10 chapters as Bond enters MI6's 00 programme in an origin story, with developers planning post-launch missions to sustain engagement. Technical performance reaches upscaled 4K at 60 frames per second, particularly striking on PS5 Pro using PSSR technology.
24 Articles
24 Articles
Does "007 First Light" have the license to enthuse? After the end of the embargo, the first impressions of the German-speaking and international testers were revealed. And the tenor is clearly ...
007 First Light reviews call the spy thriller one of the best Bond games ever made
007 First Light is earning strong early reviews, with critics praising its mix of stealth, cinematic action, gadget-driven gameplay, and globe-trotting spy missions. Several outlets are already calling it one of the best James Bond games ever made, highlighting its replayability and authentic Bond atmosphere.Read Entire Article
James Bond's return to games after 14 years is one of the highest-rated games of 2026
Appropriately, perhaps, for a game about a secret agent who loves to defuse bombs with seconds left on the clock, 007 First Light is coming in hot. The James Bond game from Hitman developer IO Interactive is out tomorrow, May 27, but review copies only arrived in journalists' inboxes at the last moment before the long holiday weekend, with the result that many sites missed today's review embargo or posted reviews-in-progress. (Polygon's review w…
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