TA Playlist Wrap-Up: GoldenEye 007

By The TA Playlist Team,

August, 1997. Hong Kong is back under Chinese rule after more than 156 years as a colony of the United Kingdom. Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone was in its first month of publication in London. The very first episode of South Park aired on Comedy Central. And a little game called GoldenEye 007 was released for the Nintendo 64.

The April 2023 TA Playlist theme was Retro Revenge, with four classic game franchises up for the vote, all of which had seen recent remasters, re-releases, or re-imaginings in the last couple of years. We had Turtles, Toads, and Hellspawn all in the mix, but it was Britain’s greatest superspy, James Bond, who easily won the poll with this classic first-person shooter.

The development for GoldenEye 007 began way back in 1994 when Nintendo contacted the British studio Rare about doing a video game tie-in for the next installment of the James Bond movie franchise. At the time, the movie was still in production, and the release of the next-generation Nintendo 64 console was still more than a year away, which led to some interesting challenges for the developers.

FlopsyTheRabbit said:

The development of the game is fascinating. GoldenEye was developed by a tiny core team of about a dozen people, only one of which had ever made a game before. It was planned as a 2D SNES platformer, before becoming a 3D on-rails N64 shooter and finally a full FPS. It was originally intended to be single-player only, work on the multiplayer was started in secret as an experiment a few months before launch.

The story follows the basic plot beats of GoldenEye, the movie, Pierce Brosnan’s first turn as Bond, James Bond (spoilers ahead in case you’re still trying to catch up on the last thirty years of the 007 franchise).
The game begins in 1986 with Bond infiltrating a Soviet chemical weapons facility in Arkhangelsk, completing the mission at the cost of the life of his friend and fellow 00-agent, Alec Trevelyan.

Several years later, after the fall of the USSR, Bond tracks a stolen helicopter to a remote satellite installation in Siberia and learns of the launch of the GoldenEye satellite, a Soviet-era space-based weapons platform that can deliver an electromagnetic pulse capable of knocking out all electrical circuits in entire cities. With the help of a rescued programmer, Natalya Simonova, Bond hunts down General Ourumov and the criminal Janus Syndicate, who are believed to be in control of the weapon.

Bond is shocked to learn that the head of Janus is none other than his old friend Trevelyan, who seeks revenge on the British government for perceived wrongs against his family. Trevelyan plans to fire the EMP on London, throwing the global financial system into chaos to cover a theft from the Bank of England. The final showdown takes place in the jungles of Cuba, where Natalya reprograms the GoldenEye satellite to destroy itself while Bond exercises his License to Kill on Trevelyan.

Since the movie was still in production when development on the game started, the developers spent time on the actual movie sets and location shoots to draw inspiration for the level design. The game does a pretty good job matching up the levels with the plot of the movie, although the focus is definitely on the action of infiltrating facilities and mowing down guards rather than trying to retell the story from the film.

Scoli said:

I Never played the original, never seen the movie. I actually had zero interest in playing this ever. Glad I did, though, because the gameplay is simple but surprisingly fun for a 26-year-old game. The speed runs are generally reasonable and not the burden I thought they’d be. That all said, I feel like the story is way too disjointed. Watching the movie would probably make more sense, but as a self-contained experience, I don’t really know what’s going on…but I don’t especially care either.

When it finally released in 1997, GoldenEye 007 was hailed as one of the best movie-to-game adaptations ever, with stunning (for the time) graphics and sound and a plot that not only stayed truthful to the film but expanded on it, featuring levels that put the player in the middle of events that were not directly seen on the big screen.

But that was nearly 26 years ago, and the reviews from the TA Playlist community regarding the recent Xbox Series X|S port were decidedly more mixed. Some were very enthusiastic about GoldenEye’s place in gaming history…

Rinckenstock said:

All time classic game, it's as simple as that

ASUnknown1 said:

Stone cold classic. I have good memories of playing this on the N64 back in the day, though I was never anywhere near skilled enough to go for the cheats. Played it a few years ago after unearthing my old console, and I think it still holds up better than people gave it credit for. […] People may take its innovations for granted nowadays, but this was revolutionary stuff, particularly with how atmospheric and real it felt compared to more 'gamey' FPSes of the time.

… but those who didn’t play the game back in the late 90s were generally less positive:

Slayer Reigning said:

I Never got the appeal, but probably cause I didn't grow up on it.

Brasshande said:

I've never had a Nintendo console, so I never played this when it was originally out, having given it a go now, it seemed pretty much exactly what I was expecting, something that would have been amazing when it was state of the art but that you really need to have been into first time around to get the full benefit of nowadays.

Lurking Lawyer said:

I Missed this in its heyday as I was still part of the PC Master Race at the time, and I'm afraid I can't really see what all the fuss is about now. I guess you really had to be there to be able to view it in Nostalg-O-Vision...

“Nostalgia” was indeed one of the major themes of the forums this month, with many of our commenters reminiscing about their time with this game a quarter century ago.

TangledAlloy21 said:

Me, my brother, and my cousin spent all night into the morning playing this and other n64 games. The only thing we knew how to "cook" was hot dogs, and we ate our weight in them playing Goldeneye. To this day, if I smell a hot dog, I remember those nights. Sorry for the weird story, just feeling a bit nostalgic.

Catching ZZZs said:

I still have a very vivid memory of my Dad bringing home this game for me. I was eight years old. It was the one and only video game my Dad ever played with me, and I kicked his ass. He got so frustrated he refused to ever try another video game ever again. 25 years later, I told him it was being re-released, and I watched as the vein in his forehead began to throb, and his entire face turn red as he yelled: "THAT DAMN GAME WHERE THE BLOOD ALWAYS RUSHES DOWN THE SCREEN!? ARRGH!"

Ginn0rz said:

I held off on starting this so I could play it with my "little" brother (he's 34). I'm really glad I did, it was so much fun revisiting this old gem together. […] Really grateful this finally got released. It's such a treat to earn achievements in this game (and I just hit my 150,000 GS milestone with GoldenEye, which felt special too).

However, nostalgia is a double-edged sword, and sometimes it’s hard to go back and revisit something that you have such fond memories of.

opG v1 said:

I remember this game being way more fun as a kid.

Thragg Avenger said:

Played this to death on the N64 but, while playing a couple of levels for some nostalgia, have been completely unable to recapture the magic

Canucklehead X said:

This takes me back to university in the mid to late 90s. While I did play a couple of levels, the real appeal was the couch MP with friends (good times). I did try to play this a few years ago when I broke out the N64. There’s a nostalgia factor, but the SP and N64 controller does not hold up. I do think the SP will improve with modern controllers, but I am hesitant to begin playing this due to the memories of what was.

While GoldenEye was innovative for its time in many different ways, it was the four-person split-screen multiplayer that really cemented its place in gaming history. For my part, I was a freshman in college in the fall of 1997, and GoldenEye tournaments were a staple of my collegiate experience. It’s fair to say that GoldenEye was the go-to console game for my friends and me, right up until it was supplanted by a little game called Halo: Combat Evolved. First-person shooters have come a long way over the past few decades, but GoldenEye seemed to hit at just the right time to capture a place in many gamers’ hearts.

Iceman2pnt0 said:

This game is still fun, but it really does seem like one of those "you had to be there" games for the most enjoyment. Being a young adolescent with few worries and a ton of Goldeneye multiplayer matches with friends is the textbook definition of nostalgia. I honestly don't know how younger gamers will respond to this, with dated graphics, no waypoints, rudimentary gameplay with no reticle, and a heavy emphasis on auto-aim, etc. But hopefully, they can at least appreciate the great step forward it was for FPS games. Goldeneye and its predecessors walked so that current games like COD could run. Plus, I'll never get tired of shooting a guard mid-roll and then watching his pained reaction once the animation completes.

Almost every month it seems like there’s one commenter who steps up and drops a post in the forums that could basically be the wrap-up article for the game. Go check out FlopsyTheRabbit’s full post in the GoldenEye 007 Spoiler-Free thread for an excellent all-encompassing analysis, but here’s a small portion:

FlopsyTheRabbit said:

I have to say I've really enjoyed revisiting this game, I spent a large amount of my childhood playing this and the sequel Perfect Dark.
GoldenEye pioneered so many features we take for granted now. It was one of the first FPS games (or possibly the very first) to have location-based damage and animation. There are gadgets that admittedly don't do much in GoldenEye but laid the foundation for Perfect Dark. You've got difficulty-based objectives which add tons of replayability, as well as the unlockable cheats and the ability to change the enemy characteristics, which are both just pure fun for messing around. In 2023 this may not sound that impressive, but compared to the other big-name FPS games around in 1997, such as Doom, Quake, Blood, and Shadow Warrior, GoldenEye was completely different and was treading new ground. Maybe it's just a coincidence that the release of GoldenEye coincided with the beginning of the end of the boomer shooter era, however, its influence is easy to see in many of the games that came later.

It's hard to overstate the importance of GoldenEye 007 on the gaming industry, so ever since Microsoft acquired Rare back in 2002, a remaster or remake seemed inevitable. Indeed, developers at Rare worked on the project, which at one point was stated to be less than two months from completion. However, with rights to the game and the James Bond IP spread among Rare, MGM, Danjaq, Eon Productions, and Nintendo, Microsoft was unable to negotiate terms to allow the remastered version on Xbox Live Arcade.

The project spent the next decade gathering digital dust until a full two-hour playthrough of the Beta version leaked on YouTube, featuring updated graphics and character models. For most fans, it was a bit of a letdown that the version of the game that was ultimately released in January 2023 was not based on the XBLA remaster, but instead was a basic port of the original N64 version, adapted by Code Mystics. It’s a very faithful recreation of the original game — some would say, a bit too faithful…

vSully said:

This game is consistently ranked in "greatest video games of all time" lists. But as with all older games (and especially those that get remakes), it's clearly not going to appeal to everyone. It's from another time in gaming, and things were a lot different- some people just can't get on board with older stuff like this, and that's fine.
The version we got was a bit of a letdown after playing the canceled 2007 XBLA remaster that leaked a couple of years ago :/

The XBLA version would also have featured online multiplayer, something that was absent in the final Xbox release, but included in the Nintendo Switch version of the game. This was a sorely-missed feature, according to our forum posters.

Kariyanine said:

It is still fun, but it clearly hasn't aged well with some lazy visuals (the park is awful looking) and poor level design. The lack of online here, though really meant this got shelved quickly for me. If I could have played some with some of my high school friends online, we probably would have poked at it a bit more.

Flumptigan said:

It's a shame that online multiplayer is only on the Nintendo version but it's nothing short of a miracle that we've got this at all so it feels like complaining would be churlish

jimbobvaquero said:

I echo both sentiments is that it's a damn miracle that this even came out at all.
I also realize there was a great remake that never got released. That's a damn shame, too.

Despite this shortcoming, there’s one aspect of the new version that was almost universally praised, and that was the updated dual-stick controls. This revamped control scheme brings GoldenEye in line with modern FPS standards, as opposed to the N64 controller’s single-stick and c-button design.

Catching ZZZs said:

It was a shame the game was not upgraded in any way but I still had an absolute blast playing through it again. It was actually the first time I ever fully beat it on the hardest difficulty! I could never do some of the harder levels as a kid, like Control and Aztec. I think the biggest help was the modern dual sticks, they certainly made it a better experience.

FlopsyTheRabbit said:

I don't know if it's the updated controls or the improved resolution and framerate, but I found it much easier this time around. Even the cheats were mostly done in my first attempt. Even stuff like Facility which I never unlocked on N64 only took about six tries, and most of that was trying to get a good Doak spawn.

Stevo6483 said:

I Loved playing this game again, especially with modern controls. Tried playing on my old N64 a few years back, and it was awkward, to say the least (but hilarious trying to play multiplayer with friends).
It's a shame no online play was added, or even adding bots like Perfect Dark (I know PD already had them originally), as it's practically impossible for me to get the guys round now.
Regardless I still had a blast with the campaign and managed to unlock all the cheats without too much trouble. […] Overall, this was a good remaster of a groundbreaking game. It's a bit dated now, but I think most people would appreciate that, and it won't bother fans who were there back in 1997.
For England, James?
No, for me.

I really don’t think I can add much else to that, so let’s move on to the stats!

This being a relatively new, high-profile game, April’s TA Playlist stats are pretty strong, with 6,581 tracked gamers unlocking at least one achievement in GoldenEye 007 during the month. 2,902 of them started the game for the first time, and 174 finished up the last of the game’s 55 achievements in April. All told, the TA Community unlocked 33,807 GoldenEye achievements in April, worth 648,450 Gamerscore and a whopping 1,606,999 TrueAchievement score.

The most common achievement during the month, with 2,508 unlocks, was RUN!, awarded for completing the first level on any difficulty. At the opposite end of the spectrum, unlocked just 182 times in the month of April, was Better Than 2x Klobbs, which requires you to finish the Caverns mission in less than 9 minutes and 30 seconds.

GoldenEye’s speedruns unlocked various dual-wield abilities, cheats, and other extras in the original N64 version, so it makes sense that there’s an achievement tied to each one. TA ratios for the 20 speedrun cheevos range from 2.87 to 5.51, so some of them can be pretty challenging, but one benefit of the achievement system is that it can give gamers an incentive to try some of the more challenging parts of games that they might not have bothered with in the pre-achievement era.

AUSSIE NUGGETT said:

As a kid, I loved this game but could never get many levels done on 00 Agent, let alone speed runs. 25 years later, and I'm finally getting that sense of accomplishment!

Speaking of accomplishments, 31 agents of the TA Playlist community managed to unlock all 55 achievements during the month of April, so a big Shout-Out to these superspies. The fastest completion for the month went to XwolfanX was the first gamer to earn a spot on the Shout-Out list, starting the game on April 4th and completing it the next day, but in terms of fastest completion, the leader of the pack was DarkDan88 at just 11 hours 42 minutes from first achievement to last. Congrats!

May’s TA Playlist featured another second-chance poll, with four previous runners-up getting another shot at Playlist glory. If you haven’t jumped in for this month’s featured game, ReCore, there’s still some time left to explore the colony of Far Eden with your trusty Corebot companions. Don’t forget to leave a comment in the Spoiler-Free and Spoiler Discussion Threads to discuss your thoughts on the game.

Finally, the voting is still open for the June 2023 TA Playlist poll, with four great detective adventures going head to head. Cast a vote for your favorite sleuth story, and we’ll see you next month!

Thanks as always to BetaSigX20 for writing this Wrap-Up.

More GoldenEye 007 stories:

TA Playlist

Written by The TA Playlist Team

The TA Playlist is a monthly community event. Everyone votes on which of four games to play, and then we all play through it in the following month. There's a dedicated hub to discuss everything about the game, from story beats to gameplay tips – and of course, you can track your achievement progress during the month as well. TA Playlist was created by Mark Delaney and is now run by Miles, Nici and Chewie.