I liked Convictions but I didn't love it like the first and third one. I'm not going to nut hug the game because its on one of my favorite systems, It has major issues when it comes to the series as a whole and thats a problem for some of the fans of the series. The AI is not what they (IGN) said it would be (There are times when the AI would breach a room through a door in a group of four or five, I would throw frag and no joke they would stand there for a second or two before attempting to move and by then its two late). The stealth elements from previous games are almost non existing. No alarms through most of the game, so the challenge of taking this guy out hide his body before this dude comes then take out the lights here to take this guy out without an alarm going off is not there.
The approach I took through most of this game was " Hey I'll just run up on this guy, use him as a shield mark three of four guys then take down the last dude so I can get another three mark and execute for group I run into next." The goggles don't come into play until late in game ( last hour or so) and it allows you to see through walls ( which becomes a problem later because its hard to see cover so I just didn't use them). They changed the whole game compared the first three in the series and that whats so disappointing. It just doesn't feel like Splinter Cell anymore.
