007 First Light Review: The Bond to beat

007 First Light is the best Bond game I’ve played, for sure, and it earns a 9 out of 10. To be fair, the competition is thin. Before this, my last Bond game was 007: From Russia with Love on the PSP, years and years ago, unless you count James Pond, the secret agent fish. IO Interactive’s origin story for a young 007 is the first Bond game that has felt like playing a Bond film.

It plays it safe in places, and quite a lot of its 21 hours feels like it’s setting up something bigger. Whilst that’s my main criticism, it’s a very strong origin, with stealth, gadgets, fights and set pieces that all land.

It’s also been a long wait. The last major Bond game was 007 Legends in 2012, and IO Interactive, the Danish studio behind Hitman, first teased its Bond project back in 2020. First Light was due in March 2026 before a two-month delay pushed it to 27 May, and it runs on the studio’s own Glacier engine, the same tech behind the Hitman trilogy.

The title song is a proper Bond opening. Lana Del Rey co-wrote “First Light” with David Arnold, who scored five Bond films from Tomorrow Never Dies to Quantum of Solace, and Push Square notes she had reportedly written a song for Spectre that lost out to Sam Smith. Arnold has said a title song “has to tell us about the world we are about to enter into”.

Patrick Gibson makes a reckless recruit worth following

Patrick Gibson is the right Bond for this game. His 007 is young and reckless, a recruit in MI6’s double-oh programme rather than the finished agent, and the whole game is built around that. There was some worry before launch about a younger Bond, and the critic reaction suggests Gibson won most of those people over. I’m with them.

He’s backed by a strong cast, and quite a lot of the characters are compelling. Priyanga Burford plays M, Lennie James is MI6’s John Greenway, Alastair Mackenzie is Q and Kiera Lester is Moneypenny, with Gemma Chan and Lenny Kravitz also in the line-up (full cast at VGC).

The game closes on the classic card: James Bond will return. Who knows whether that’s a nod to the next game or to the films, where Amazon MGM still hasn’t named the actor for Denis Villeneuve’s Bond 26. My pick would be Jack Lowden. He’s already a spy as River Cartwright in Slow Horses, and he looks a bit like the Bond in this game. He was reportedly among the actors lined up for the final screen tests.

007 First Light is Uncharted-style action done right

The closest comparison I’d make is Uncharted. 007 First Light is a cinematic, story-led action-adventure, and it’s that kind of game done right. Stealth and gadgets are fun, the hand-to-hand combat is fun, and you can talk your way past people with the Bluff mechanic or mix all three in one mission. The set pieces and pacing are good, and there’s a nice variety of missions and locations that keeps the story moving along.

All the Time in the World, one of the early chapters, is where it all came together for me. It starts as an infiltration of a luxury hotel and builds to Bond chasing down a departing plane, and it felt like a Bond film from start to finish. The title nods to On Her Majesty’s Secret Service, which fans will spot straight away.

The driving has split opinion. NME found the car sections clunky. I thought the driving mechanics were really good. For a game where driving isn’t the primary feature, the handling does its job. My issue is with a few of the car missions themselves, which dragged on a little and left me thinking, let’s just get on with it.

It’s also a familiar formula. Anyone coming from Hitman should expect a more guided game than IO Interactive usually makes, and the structure won’t surprise anyone who has played a modern action-adventure. That doesn’t bother me much, because the formula works.

The story spends too long setting up a sequel

The story is where First Light is weakest. Quite a lot of the game, whilst enjoyable, feels like it’s setting up something bigger, and the plot itself is predictable. I saw most of its turns coming.

The villain is underused, without enough screen time to become a real threat. The middle drags too, with a run of missions that feel more like filler than the chapters around them.

These are the reasons it’s a 9 and not a 10. They’re story problems, and the missions are strong enough to carry the game past them.

Should you play it?

Bond fans should play it, no question. Uncharted fans should too, because it’s the same kind of cinematic action-adventure with a licence to kill. You don’t need any Bond knowledge going in, and because it’s an origin story, newcomers start at the same point as everyone else.

It’s out now on PS5, Xbox Series X|S and PC, with the Nintendo Switch 2 version due on 18 March 2027. I reviewed it on PS5. IO Interactive has since released a free Extended Operations DLC, which I haven’t tried.

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