Sure, there's some variation in how the guards react, but basically the challenge here is to figure out the proper series of steps that will enable the hitman to accomplish his grisly goal and get out alive. Since there's no in mission save option, you will replay each mission over and over until you figure out all the steps in the assassination puzzle. For instance, a limo that you need to blow up arrives at a specific time, and the crime boss will leave the restaurant to get in the limo at a very specific point after that. So you'll have to figure out how to get the bomb inside the limo within that time limit, without alerting the guards. Before each mission, you can use the money earned from the last one to buy equipment, guns, and ammunition.
Hitman plays in third person, with a control scheme that seems a tad over-complicated.
You can click on usable world objects and equipment, and a sub menu will appear over the pointer offering various choices of interaction. There is also a problem with doors, all of which seem hell bent on stopping the hitman. Dragging a dead body into a side room becomes an absurd exercise when you have to repeatedly open the same door that somehow keeps closing behind you under its own power. With its graphic, stylized violence and emphasis on stealth and assassination, Hitman seems styled to appeal to the shooter crowd. Unfortunately, it feels as if the developer lavished too much attention on making the violence stylized and realistic, and then just threw a game around it.