Hitman 3 will hit on January 20th, man
The end of the trilogy
Io Interactive today announced a January 20th release date for Hitman 3, the end of Ian Hitman's latest trilogy of stealthy murdering. He's been picking off pieces of a conspiracy for two games now, and getting ready to really bury it in this final part. Hitman 3 will be an Epic Games Store timed exclusive on PC, though it seems bits will transfer from the Steam versions of the first two.
So far, Io have confirmed that Hitman 3's locations include the gilded spires of Dubai and--very excitingly--an English manor house with a murder mystery to solve.
"Self-publishing Hitman 3 is a big step for IO Interactive in achieving our highly ambitious goals as an independent studio," Io CEO Hakan Abrak said when they announced the exclusivity deal last week. "Furthermore, this partnership with Epic has given us the freedom to create the game exactly as we imagined, for our fans and for our community uncompromised."
It's only been a few years since Io suffered layoffs while Square Enix tried to ditch the company. Without the backing of a parent company or publisher this time, the stability offered by Epic's cash must be a comfort.
Hitman 3 is coming to the Epic Games Store on the 20th of January, 2021. I know, it seems unlikely that next year will be 2021, but I have double-checked. It's also coming to Xbox, PlayStation, and Stadia. Hopefully a release on Steam and other stores will follow once the exclusivity period expires?
Seeing as the first two parts of this trilogy on Steam have merged into one big 'World Of Assassination' with locations and murdertools in one game, what exactly will transfer into the Epic version and how is quite a large question not yet fully answered. Io said they are "happy to have mastery and location carryover from their existing progress into Hitman 3 on Epic Games Store," which sure implies things will transfer as before. And it'd be awful if it didn't. But they haven't got into specifics yet.
Io plan to shut down Hitman 2's Ghost Mode before Hitman 3 launches, and the mode isn't returning in this game either. They also plan to disable co-op for Sniper Assassin mode at some point.
Correction: This post original said January 21st because all these 20s and 21s twisted my melon, man.