Hitman 3 will no longer offer the ability to import levels from Hitman 2 when it comes out later this month, unless players first buy Hitman 2 again from the Epic Games Store. Near the bottom of a long and complicated pre-launch guide, developers IO Interactive said the change in plans was “due to several circumstances beyond our control.” Hitman 1 and 2 have both been released on Steam, while Hitman 3 is launching as an Epic Games Store exclusive.
Hitman 2 offered the option to import Hitman 1 locations at launch, and in August 2020 it was announced that Hitman 3 would have to do the same again. At the time of writing, the Hitman 3 website still advertises that “Form 1 and 2 locations can be imported at no additional cost to existing owners.”
That is no longer the case. The pre-launch guide explains that Hitman 1 will instead only be available for free for 10 days after launch to claim for anyone who buys Hitman 3 from the Epic Games Store. Hitman 2 is now available for everyone 14 days after launch with an 80% discount. In either case, this is not what IO advertises, or what players expected when they pre-ordered the game.
It’s not clear how this affects the ability to import progress between games. The pre-launch guide suggests that progress can be imported directly from Hitman 2 on Steam into Hitman 3 on Epic, without mentioning whether locations from previous games must be present in Hitman 3. Progress gives you access to items and suits for Agent 47 to use on the levels of Hitman 3.
Aside from the vague ‘different circumstances’, there is also no explanation as to why a change to the plan took place. Players, of course, assume this is due to the series’ move from Steam to the Epic Games Store, where the game is expected to be exclusive for 12 months. We’ve reached out to both IO Interactive and Epic Games for comment and will update this story if either responds.