James Bond 007: Agent Under Fire

James Bond 007: Agent Under Fire is a first-person shooter video game based on the James Bond franchise. Developed and published by Electronic Arts, it was released for Nintendo GameCube, PlayStation 2, and Xbox.

Agent Under Fire is the fourth Bond game which is not based on a film or book in the James Bond series. It follows Domark's James Bond: The Duel, Nintendo's Game Boy RPG James Bond 007, and EA's own 007 Racing.

Story
CIA agent Zoe Nightshade, a mole in Identicon Corporation, based in Hong Kong, is discovered and captured. Identicon, a botanical research firm, is a possible front for a weapons-smuggling ring. James Bond infiltrates the facility in an attempt to rescue her, as well as retrieve a suspicious courier case in the same building. After freeing Nightshade from a submarine set to launch, the pair flee the facility with the courier case. Nigel Bloch, the head of Identicon, has his forces chase the agents through the streets of Hong Kong. The two steal a second case of vials from a nearby Identicon factory. They then rendezvous with R, who provides Bond with a gadget-laden BMW Z8. A limousine pulls up, as an assassin inside launches a rocket at the agents, killing Zoe, and steals the case. Bond gives chase, stopping an armored van which contained the stolen vials.

The vials contain nine blood samples, eight of which contained blood of world leaders. One contains the blood of British diplomat Reginald Griffin, serving in Romania, who is obsessed with protecting a room, outside of his jurisdiction, in the embassy. Bond investigates the embassy, finding Griffin dead, before a similar-looking man attacks him. After overcoming him, Bond finds a message from Bloch on Griffin's computer that mentions Malprave Industries, based in Switzerland. Bond takes the information from the computer and escapes.

At Malprave Industries, Bond, posing as a journalist, sees that the CEO is a woman he met at the embassy, Adrian Malprave. After collecting evidence, he makes his escape from the faciilty. Analyzation of the computer message from Romania mentions "Damaged Goods," believed to be a codename for Dr. Natalya Damescu, formerly in the employ of Malprave, now under protection at the British embassy in Romania. She also has inside information to offer. Carla the Jackal, an infamous terrorist who also killed Zoe, leads a raid on the embassy. Bond fights the terrorists before running into Damescu. After a confrontation with the Jackal, Bond picks up a data chip on something known as Poseidon, and delivers it to R for analysis.

The chip leads Bond to an oil rig in the South China Sea. After running into Bloch, Bond follows him into Poseidon, an underwater base devoted to clone development. After destroying the lab, he climbs onto a submarine bound for a Royal Navy aircraft carrier. On the submarine, Bond finds Zoe, who reveals that the woman he "saved" from the Identicon facility was a clone meant to infiltrate the CIA, and that the Jackal intended to kill Bond.

Depending on whether or not the player picked up the verification code, Bond and Zoe are either captured or are taken to the carrier unharmed. In either case, the pair investigate the ship. It is discovered that 8 world leaders have been cloned, and are to be replaced by the clones. Bond destroys the craft carrying the clones, and the pair make their escape. They arrive at Malprave's base in the Swiss Alps, where Bond saves the eight world leaders. Before he can escape the base, however, he encounters Malprave, who has set the base to self-destruct. She reveals Bloch is still alive, and that Bond had killed his clone. After an encounter with him, Bond follows him into the main office and kills him. He manages to escape the base before it explodes, taking Malprave with it.

Multiplayer
Starting with GoldenEye 007 and continuing on with The World Is Not Enough, multiplayer support in a James Bond game has become a staple. The multiplayer mode in Agent Under Fire features up to 4 players, with the option for AI bots in the Xbox and GameCube versions.

Weapons and Gadgets
Agent Under Fire features over fifteen different types of firearms as well as other weapons. Each firearm is based on a real firearm, but is given a pseudonym, the same manner as the weapons in GoldenEye, and The World is Not Enough. Most of the gadgets are concealed in a mobile phone, including a decryptor, grapple, laser, and remote transmitter. Bond is also provided with a card that disrupts electronic signals, as well as a jetpack.

Reception
Upon release, the game received generally mixed reviews. Many critics praised the game for it's technical qualities, with the GameInformer reviewer calling the character models "astounding". Likewise, some reviewers felt that the game was a step up from the previous entry in the series. However, many also felt that it was far from living up to GoldenEye. The Gamespot review criticized the game's difficulty, citing the game as too easy and providing little challenge and poor level design.

on Metacritic, the game has a metascore of 74, 72, and 71 for the Nintendo GameCube, PlayStation 2, and Xbox, respectively.