Despite launching just three years later and on the same hardware as TimeSplitters 2, TimeSplitters: Future Perfect looks like a title from a completely different console generation. This is both a good and a bad thing.
Visually, things are substantially better, with far cleaner textures, more complex environments, and so on. Controls are also notably better, and while they might not feel quite on par with that of a modern shooter, the gap is much smaller than it was with TimeSplitters 2.
The amount of content is once again staggering. You get an even more fun and varied campaign, as well as many returning modes: map maker, challenges, PVE arenas, and local PVP. The big new addition is online PVP, though sadly, while the menu option for it remains, the functionality is absent in this emulated edition.
While the brunt of Future Perfect has a “bigger is better” mentality to it, this does feel like it saps a lot of creative energy from the experience. Whether this is due to EA taking over publishing duties from Eidos, or just the trends of the gaming market at the time, the title is definitely missing a lot of the creative spark that made TimeSplitters 2 a classic in its day.
Much of the content, particularly challenge modes, are rehashes, and the vibrant insanity that you would often find while playing TimeSplitters 2 is notably absent this time. Future Perfect feels much more, for lack of a better word, corporate.
Even so, if you liked TimeSplitters 2 back in the day, then Future Perfect will unquestionably remain a fun time. But for all of the steps forward that the final TimeSplitters title takes, it loses a huge amount of the charm and creative energy that generated fan fervour in the first place.
