TimeSplitters: Future Perfect

TimeSplitters: Future Perfect, the third and final entry in the series created by former GoldenEye 007 developers at Free Radical Design, delivered the most ambitious and cohesive campaign in the series, this time with a full-fledged, humor-laced story following soldier Cody Jones on a journey across time, from ancient Egypt through a Soviet space station to a futuristic metropolis, as he battles the alien TimeSplitter threat. The campaign also played with time travel mechanically: the player would occasionally cooperate with themselves from another moment, so their own earlier actions returned as part of the puzzles.

The series' trademark self-deprecating humor, parodying classic sci-fi and action films, was paired with an elaborate, for its time exceptionally extensive map and character editor, letting players create their own levels, weapons and fighters with advanced options for tuning AI behavior. The multiplayer component, a legacy of the successful GoldenEye, remained the core of the game's appeal thanks to a variety of game modes, split-screen play for up to four players, and a rich selection of maps drawn from the campaign's various time periods. Controls retained the series' famous snappiness, with the player moving noticeably faster than in the more realistic shooters emerging at the time. The visuals presented significantly more elaborate, stylized environments than previous entries, with a strong visual identity for each time period.

Although the game was received exceptionally warmly by critics and players alike, its commercial success wasn't enough to save Free Radical Design, and the TimeSplitters series went silent, making Future Perfect a dignified but bittersweet farewell to one of the generation's most beloved shooter series. Calls for the series' return remain among the loudest wishes of console shooter fans to this day.