Your Mission: Assume the role of Cate Archer, a beautiful but deadly Operative working for UNITY - a super secret organization fighting to free the world from the clutches of H.A.R.M. From tense subterfuge to in-your-face combat, No One Lives Forever.

No One Lives Forever departs from other first-person shooters in the variety of ways you interact with the environment. Thanks to the advanced capabilities of the Lithtech engine, at different times in the game you'll find yourself riding a motorcycle or even falling through the air without a parachute.

A novel feature of the game is its array of gadgets, including a body-removing powder (for disposing of incriminating corpses), lock picks, and an electronic poodle to distract guard dogs. Additionally, the missions are littered with "intelligence items": textual notes which often provide humorous side-notes to the game.

Of course, No One Lives Forever isn't just a series of mindless exercises in avoiding or shooting guards. The game features a rich story that owes a lot of inspiration to its roots in the spy thriller genre. A movie-like video at the beginning of the game sets the stage for the action: Someone is killing off U.N.I.T.Y.'s agents, and it's up to Archer and fellow spy Bruno Lawrie to get to the bottom of the mystery.