Collection essentials #590: TimeSplitters: Future Perfect (Xbox)

British company Rare had previously found success with first-person shooters on the Nintendo 64 such as the incredibly popular Goldeneye 007. For the following console generation, some Rare employees who worked on those games founded their own company, called Free Radical. They birthed a new FPS series called TimeSplitters, the first of which was a launch title for the PlayStation 2 in America and Europe. They followed it up with two sequels in the same console generation, both of which would be released for each of the three major competing consoles at the time. The second was simply called TimeSplitters 2, and the third is the subject of today’s post, TimeSplitters: Future Perfect.

A major theme of these games, as you might imagine from the title, is time travel, and the TimeSplitters are the name of a naughty alien race that causes trouble throughout history. For the game’s story mode, you control Sergeant Cortez (who hails from the 25th century) as he jumps across history to try and thwart the TimeSplitters once and for all. This is the first game in the series to spruce up the main story’s campaign with proper cutscenes and voice acting, which makes it a whole lot more fun. TimeSplitters doesn’t take itself super seriously, so the cutscenes feature a delightful variety of amusing characters and humor. The time-travelling aspect gives the developers an excuse to incorporate a wide variety of locales, and for single-player it makes for some really neat missions that I’m not going to spoil in case you play the game for yourself.

In terms of gameplay, this game does feel very much like a successor to games like Goldeneye. In comparison to something like Halo, the action feels a little faster and streamlined, lacking the ability to jump and a separate grenade button, for better or worse. 

Future Perfect’s story mode is really good, but like many FPS games, the biggest draw of the game is competitive multiplayer. There’s a large amount of variety on offer for players to have the type of multiplayer experience they want. There are lots of characters to choose from who have different attributes, and they all have usually-humorous dialogue when you select them, meaning that it’s often fun to simply go through the roster and listen to all of it when you’ve got friends to enjoy it with. There are many different maps, game modes and options, including the ability to add a bunch of computer-controlled participants. The game also offers the ability to create your own stages for multiplayer play, which is a nice addition you don’t usually see in the genre.

I remember getting TimeSplitters 2 as one of my early Xbox titles back in the day, and also when Future Perfect came out the following year. I got it not long after release. Though I didn’t play it a whole lot back then, I did like what I had seen of it. Eventually, I finally decided to get serious about playing story mode for 2 and Future Perfect, and did so in 2020 early in the days of COVID lockdown. They were the first FPS games I had ever beaten in my life! I’m not a huge fan of the genre, but Future Perfect is possibly my favorite FPS. I fired it up again in 2025 with some teenage gamers who wanted to try out some kind of FPS with me. 

There have been plans for additional TimeSplitters games over the years, but sadly none have materialized in an actual release for various reasons, which is a real shame. Future Perfect also hasn’t been rereleased, and its online support is long gone. But if you like the genre, it’s still definitely worth checking out. As a genre exemplar in my opinion, it’s certainly got a spot as an essential in my collection.