No one, but no one, is sexier than a spy -- no one, that is, except a female spy. A chick who can infiltrate any base, slip into any disguise, and nix any Nazi without sweating a drop. Violette Summer, the star of the game Velvet Assassin mixes deadly menace with smoky eyeliner and the kind of ass you only get from sneaking around behind enemy lines. If anything, I feared the game would get too sexy. Would the trim S.S. uniform with the stilettos go just a little too far over the top? Let me tell you: she totally pulls it off.

But to understand the appeal of this character, you have to know the history of Violette Szabo, the real life hero who inspired the game. When World War II started, Szabo was working behind the perfume counter of a department store; by 1941, she was a war widow signing up for special operations. She trained in combat, communications, jumping out of planes, and blowing things to hell. She parachuted into occupied France, sabotaged roads and railways, and helped bombers find their targets. She rallied the French resistance. She hated the Nazis.

She braved two missions, and the second ended in tragedy.Szabo found herself pinned down by Germans at a road block. As the London Gazette tells it, she fought back, "exchanging shot for shot with the enemy" 'til she ran out of ammo, and then they caught her. The Germans interrogated her, tortured her, and raped her. She was executed in February, 1945 at Ravensbrück concentration camp. She was only 23.

Szabo's the stuff of legend - a legend that's been retold in books at least one movie (Carve Her Name With Pride, starring Virginia McKenna). But the story hooked me - and I suspect, a lot of people - because she was so brave, and so young, and no one even asked her to be a hero. Yes, she saw her country bombed and besieged. She already had more life experience than most of us would ever want. But still, if it were me? I'm sure I would've stayed behind that perfume counter.

I was intensely curious what a video game would do with a legend like this. Now, I'm a gamer. I love games more than just about anything. In my dreams, I play games for days, perched on a futon amidst a cadre of vigilent manservents who bring me cool beer and hot take-out. Seraphic women with peacock feathers fan my Xbox to keep it from overheating, and two gigantic, muscular men prop up my flat-screen with their - oh sorry, I forgot I'm on deadline.

So, I love gaming. But games aren't always, you know, subtle. The characters rarely show depth or nuance. The scenarios rarely stray from, "Do A to B, before B does A to you." I didn't expect Velvet Assassin to shed light on Szabo's story. The cornball title pretty much tells the tale: they've taken the Szabo story and cranked it to 11.

This is no rookie on her first mission: Summer comes off as stern, smoldering, and war weary. She's not just a secret agent: she's a super-assassin. She can take a flurry of bullets without flinching. She knows fifty ways to stick a knife in a Nazi, from severing his spine to stabbing him in the ear like she's sharing a Q-Tip. And she always works alone, because who needs a squad? In fact, why didn't they just send her after Hitler? This war could've been over in three missions!

When I think of Szabo, I imagine a woman training to be a heroine. But in Velvet Assassin, Summer is already there. When she signals a bombing raid that kills 30,000 civilians, or murders an Allied agent so he won't talk to the Gestapo, she barely winces at her acts. Yes, there's a little bit of a guilt and redemption story here, and a little flicker of humanity. But for the most part, the girl is hot death in leather - and nothing more.

That's the difference between a video game and real life. Violette Szabo was a flesh-and-blood heroine; Violette Summer is a paragon. She's nothing but an ideal. And that's what brings me as close as I'll ever get to feeling like Violette Szabo: minus the kinky SS suit, we're both trying to live up to the same ideal. Every time I hide in the shadows scared that one false footstep will give me away, I get a glimpse of what Szabo felt; every time I score one for Britain, I feel like the super-spy that Szabo aspired to be. But unlike me on my futon, Szabo never got second chances.

Rachael Webster (a.ka.a SG member PixelVixen707) is SG's Hit Play games columnist. A game lover and game blogger living in New York City, she also writes at PixelVixen707.com and tweets as PixelVixen707.