AGENT OF CHANGE

From 47 to 007: IO Interactive is bringing James Bond back to life

- ALEX SPENCER

Until recently, James Bond was dead. 2021's long-delayed No Time To Die put an end not only to Daniel Craig's record tenure in the role, but also Eon Productions' six-decade stewardship of the series, being the company's last Bond film before it sold the rights to Amazon. 007 himself was also killed off, blown up by a missile after contracting a manmade super-virus. For any other character, this would all be rather final - but we're talking about a man who, quite famously, lives twice.

The rumour mill is still churning over the identity of the next actor to star as Bond, but the director's chair for movie 26 (27, if you insist on counting Never Say Never Again) has already been filled by Dune's Denis Villeneuve. And this is just the beginning. Amazon is reportedly plotting an expansive 'Bond-iverse' across film and television. At the same time, thanks to a deal struck with the previous licence holder, Bond is making his return to videogames.

With the new film presumably still in pre-pre-pre-production and a fresh star yet to be announced, it makes sense that IO Interactive wants to wind back the clock and effectively start over. 007 Legends, released in 2012, is still the most recent James Bond game – between that and the other titles of the Activision era, such as Blood Stone and the Quantum Of Solace tie-in shooter, the studio most famous for Hitman has reason to try to reset the narrative and rehabilitate Bond's videogame image. In First Light, Bond is a new recruit, one of many young agents enrolled into MI6's freshly revived 00 programme. IO always wanted to build its own Bond from the ground up. Even in his very first pitch to MGM and Eon, the idea of a "becoming" story, as game director Hakan Abrak calls it, was nonnegotiable.