Azaraxzealot said:
i tried playing Deus Ex recently... it touts "choice" but in the end your character is a pussy and the game is horrible with direction.
give me a pistol?
Game: HA! it only kills people after 5 shots and its COMPLETELY inaccurate even if the game says you're a master at it!
Me: How about a rifle?
Game: Zooming in is completely ineffectual! Your crosshair may SAY you're aiming at the head, but you're actually aiming slightly below it and he's gonna run off and alert a dozen guys to EXACTLY the location you're at and kill you in 2 shots. Also, we're only gonna give you 5 shots that will land in fuck-all places and never give you more ammo for it.
Me: Okay... can i go melee?
Game: The moment you go within 2 miles of anyone, they can pinpoint exactly where you are and kill you in two shots... pussy.
Me: Fine! I'll just sneak around them!
Game: Didn't I just tell you you can be seen within a two mile radius? In the shadows? and while crouching? And this is just the first level that's supposed to get you used to things?
Me: Fuck you game.
Human Revolution can only be an improvement from there.
These things aren't true. If anything, Deus Ex is too easy, tactically speaking. I've only played it on the hardest difficulty (though I experiment with lower difficulty levels) and it's a cakewalk.
Either you're bad at fpses or you didn't read the instructions -- or use the tutorial. There's a skill system. Short version: you suck at the things you don't put skill points in. Unless you're incompetent at shooters, you must have incompetently arranged your skills. There isn't any other sane alternative; it's easier to kill people with guns and knives in Deus Ex than it is in any modern fps, unless one is using one of the poorly designed weapons -- and you specifically didn't mention those! The stealth pistol is more than enough to slaughter everyone the first half of the game, and dropping all points into Rifles and going with the sniper rifle is, literally, the easiest way to play the game. And I've stealthed through the first level so many times I've lost count. Indeed, pacifist playthroughs where you don't kill NPCs are much harder than standard playthroughs and they require the tranq-firing minicrossbow, which uses the Pistols skill. You can get through the first level with nearly never being sighted and no fatalaties with even just a little fps experience.
As for Human Revolution, it's not the first game to put in social conflicts, but unless it has actual procedural mechanics, it's just script memorization and isn't anything that hasn't been done before. It could be fun, but it's not original. We'll see.