Is ‘007 First Light’ The Best Licensed Game In Years?

InnovationGamingIs ‘007 First Light’ The Best Licensed Game In Years?ByAlex James Kane,Contributor.Forbes contributors publish independent expert analyses and insights. Alex James Kane is a games writer from Illinois.Follow AuthorMay 31, 2026, 01:47am EDT--:-- / --:--This voice experience is generated by AI. Learn more.This voice experience is generated by AI. Learn more.For the antihero in Martin Campbell’s Casino Royale, 9/11 was a recent headline—something M brings up in casual conversation because it happened just five years prior to the events of the film. The James Bond we meet in IO Interactive’s 007 First Light, however, would have been about one year old, a toddler at most, when the World Trade Center fell. I say this not because 9/11 holds some grand significance, in Bond’s world or mine, though MI6 spends a lot of time talking about terrorism and doing their best to stop it. It’s simply the starting gun that marked the dawn of the twenty-first century, and it’s a little strange to have a Bond with no memory of that surreal, televised day in history.Instead, Patrick Gibson’s Bond is one who casually makes use of the cryptocurrency market, or relies on a quantum A.I., to achieve his objectives. (The game even acknowledges the reign of King Charles III with the occasional reference to “His Majesty.”) I’ll be blunt: I’m no fan of A.I. or crypto, and it didn’t thrill me to see those being treated, early on in the game, as whiz-bang, age-defining tech. This is a series where Bond himself might employ a laser watch or jet pack or an amphibious car, while technologies like gene therapy and orbital weapons are typically reserved for the villains in this globe-spanning drama. Still, it’s fiction, and I can look past these kinds of things in a story all about rooting for the imperialist government and its shadow army. I can enjoy a Michael Mann film without considering a career as a jewel thief. And James Bond works on a similar frequency, now more a figure of myth—...