Hitman 3: Contract Fighter January with Ray Tracing and VR on Steam

In line with the end of the Epic Store exclusive, IO Interactive has announced new features for the PC version of Hitman 3. The “Year Two” update scheduled for January 20, 2022 with a PC-VR version is the most successful spin-off of the Hitman series to date, along with stories, maps, and modes. Additional toys and ray tracing for next year.

Along with introducing new features, IO Interactive is celebrating the achievement of 50 million players and promising another full year with updates and new content.

Virtual reality with motion control

The announced VR app is not IO Interactive’s first attempt to translate Agent 47 into virtual reality. Already on PlayStation 4, players can experience the entire game with PlayStation VR. An approach that fails, according to most tests, due to poor control implementation with the DualShock controller and a lack of accuracy. Both are vulnerabilities that can be fixed with a good PC version VR.

Only IO Interactive will announce VR headset support at a later date, but the Valve (test) and Oculus Rift S (test) benchmark can be seen in the preview video. The Oculus Rift S is an unusual option here, as the Oculus Rift series for PC was discontinued by Facebook/Meta in September of last year. Thus, Valve’s index as the main SteamVR headset is more straightforward and points to Steam launching with SteamVR support.

Ray tracing and more will come later

The ray tracing update isn’t supposed to visually improve the game’s already good lighting on January 20th. It remains to be seen if the highly praised performance in the game’s test will suffer. The question of what ray tracing format will be used in Hitman 3 remains pending over the next year. More stories, maps, and game modes are also expected to be released during this period.

It will probably be posted on Steam

With the end of the exclusive deal with Epic, it seems reasonable to assume that Agent 47 will find its way to other stores in January 2022. In particular, the use of Valve’s benchmark in the video preview makes Steam Store the most likely option.

The editorial team thanks community member “-Stealth-” for pointing this out.