Yes and this is ok so. But the new Hitman seen to give the player also an "gun down everything" options and this seen for me to be a move into the wrong direction.
There is this feeling of over-design, which i see as an negative trend in gaming. Over-Design in the meaning of giving the player too many options and also too many helpful tools (like the Hitman Spider Senses).
They're improving gunplay, because it was always subpar. You can still ignore it, or use it to kill every living being in every level(which was always possible).
Hitman "spider sense" has ALWAYS EXISTED. The map ALWAYS showed everyone moving at all times. It just now has an ingame implication to not have you starting at floor plans, and instead maneuver around people closer by. This is actually more "hardcore" in theory, because the map was infinite use, this is a limited resource. It's also a limited shared resource, and you burn it when you're in a disguise and walk by people suspicious of you. Spend the entire level 'wall hacking'? Well, when you actually get into a costume, you're likely not going to be able to properly move past your targets. If you want to shoot the level up and use a wallhack-esque ability to shoot people as they cross a corner and go through a door, that was ALWAYS possible with the map.
There's little reason to doubt the high difficulties will limit intuition like they always did to the map. Pro map only showed targets, so this could do the same, or it could burn faster if you use it for that ability. By the time you're at Pro you're meant to know the general routes, so any time spent using it is going to be a waste.
No, it allowed fucking up the mission and still getting through. That's a difference. And on the higher difficulties it's even impossible to go mental without cheats.
You get your target. A proper hitman will only get his target and noone else. The goal was never to kill anyone else. The games are open, so you can play like a psychopath - same is true for MGS games. For example in Blood Money you get less money for such behaviour, you may even have to pay to decrease notoriety. Which means you get penalized by the game for playing like a jackass. In Contracts + Hitman 2 you unlock special weapons for beating missions with SA rating, which means none or almost no shots fired and pure stealth.
This paragraph has absolutely nothing to do with the original way you brought it up. A trailer that mentions "Are you a silent assassin, or do you want to kill anyone in your way?" was what you had issue with, but that line is viable in every single hitman game. It's not the "proper" way, sure, but that doesn't change much about the phrase's intention. Hell, Blood Money had achievements tied to killing 47 people in a level, and reaching max notoriety...something obtained by being a
really shitty assassin.
Based on the sniper challenge, Absoultion offers a hefty multiplier for silent assassin, and has unlocks based on overall score. So there's already an incentive to play better.