Zero Punctuation: Deus Ex

[Kennian]

i dont have time to read all of this, sorry if it's been said, but there are mods for Deus Ex that fix a lot of the graphical problems... google it!

 

[CardinalPiggles]

It's probably not worth it. Like Yahtzee said, it hasn't aged very well.

I think I played through about half an hour before getting completely bored, modern standards for action are too high.

 

[Firia]

Am I the only person in the world who really really really liked Deus Ex Invisible War? I've never played Deus Ex 1, but I bought the third partially on the merits of the second game. And it's pretty good, too.

Someone once said, "Invisible War has the unfortunate disadvantage of being the sequel to Deus Ex. It's not that it's bad, it's that it's no where near as good as the first." Which really sums it up. If you played the first, there's an expectation that the brand name generates, which basically dooms it right away.

 

[Jozxyqk]

Once again Yahtzee continues his trend of retrospectively reviewing games that have been name-dropped in several past reviews. And I had my money on Beyond Good & Evil for the 3rd time in a row.

 

[oktalist]

Very good call on covering the original game before the new'un. I just got through playing it again for about the 20th time, before starting DX:HR. It's odd, everyone hates on the dated graphics, but I've never found it to be a problem. At all. I just don't notice it. I bought G. K. Chesterton's The Man Who Was Thursday because of that game, it's brilliant.

"First of all, what is it really all about? What is it you object to? You want to abolish Government?"

"To abolish God!" said Gregory, opening the eyes of a fanatic. "We do not only want to upset a few despotisms and police regulations; that sort of anarchism does exist, but it is a mere branch of the Nonconformists. We dig deeper and we blow you higher. We wish to deny all those arbitrary distinctions of vice and virtue, honour and treachery, upon which mere rebels base themselves. The silly sentimentalists of the French Revolution talked of the Rights of Man! We hate Rights as we hate Wrongs. We have abolished Right and Wrong."

"And Right and Left," said Syme with a simple eagerness, "I hope you will abolish them too. They are much more troublesome to me."

 

[BookBeast]

Thank you, Yahtzee! I've been hoping to see a Zero Punctuation retrospective review of Deus Ex ever since you mentioned it was one of your favorites.

I too hope that someone will re-release it with better graphics - and if that ever happens, I hope it won't be exclusive to the PC (I'm a Mac and Xbox person nowadays).

 

[Something Amyss]

Heh, a Zero Punctuation that ends with the promise of a sequel!

It'll be a letdown, like all sequels. >.>

That'll be the be the aftermath. First, we need to create a tonne of hype and say it's streamlined with less swearing to appeal to a larger audience.

Zero Punctuation: Now rated G.

 

[Breaker deGodot]

Huh, guess this can be seen as a 2 parter which is a first for Yahtzee.

And I get the feeling he really doesnt like John Romero, but that could just be me.

Really who DOES like John Romero?

 

[FallenMessiah88]

I had a feeling it was gonna be something Deus Ex related this week. Glad to hear what Yahtzee had to say about the Deus Ex games, well mostly the first one. Really looking forward to next week.

 

[bombadilillo]

Am I the only person in the world who really really really liked Deus Ex Invisible War? I've never played Deus Ex 1, but I bought the third partially on the merits of the second game. And it's pretty good, too.

Someone once said, "Invisible War has the unfortunate disadvantage of being the sequel to Deus Ex. It's not that it's bad, it's that it's no where near as good as the first." Which really sums it up. If you played the first, there's an expectation that the brand name generates, which basically dooms it right away.

never mind misread

 

[antipunt]

It's too bad the game aged badly. I'll probably resort to wikipedia-ing the plot of the first game, then jumping straight into #2

 

[Skizzo321]

Funny how he gave people grief for saying deus as "deuce," yet goes on to mispronounce "macramé."

 

[ewhac]

Also, few days ago I just like Yahtz have installed Deux Ex, and it's very playable (after you download 2 gigabytes of community fixes and mods).

Which fixes and mods would these be? I have an original installation that still works perfectly well, but it would be nice to make it even better.

 

[Signa]

The first level is BRUTAL. People were telling me all the way back in 2000 how great it was, but I never got into it. I finally played it with a friend in 2010 and fucking loved it. You really have to die a lot if you aren't used to the game and what it is asking of you. Once you get past that point, it becomes pretty clear why everyone says the game is as good as it is.

I actually played it on hard, as I do most of my games, HR included. Always up for a challenge.

Hm, see, I didn't think that the beginning of DE was hard as much as just "what the fuck I'm I supposed to do? I think it wants me to do this *fail* Ok, guess not, let's try this *fail* Maybe I built my character's stats wrong? *Fail*"

Nothing I did seemed to be good enough for the game. The area was too open for stealth, there was no real gobs of ammo and weapons to go in full assault, and exploring seemed impossible while there were so many bad guys and robots around. It wasn't until those few hours taking turns dying with my friend did I find that you didn't need the ammo I thought you needed, and enemies are actually blind and deaf, as long as you know how to exploit their bad AI and patrol routes.

Having played the Thief series previously probably didn't help with the stealth much either. It just has different expectations for the player.

 

[Inconspicuous Trenchcoat]

Also, few days ago I just like Yahtz have installed Deux Ex, and it's very playable (after you download 2 gigabytes of community fixes and mods).

Which fixes and mods would these be? I have an original installation that still works perfectly well, but it would be nice to make it even better.

http://forums.steampowered.com/forums/showthread.php?s=0854a290a60f2a59dea9f056e769faa3&t=1235278

EDIT: Right I didn't even read the "original installation" part. These instructions are obviously for the Steam release, but maybe you can get it working on the original? I'm not sure, you'll have to research it. At the very least, that link contains links to several nice graphical improvement mods for Deus Ex.

That'll make the game look much better, especially the lighting. Really helped me get back into it. As far as fixes go, I have no idea. But I didn't experience any bugs at all in my playthrough after installing the above stuff. I have the Steam, GOTY edition.

 

[McShizzle]

Also, few days ago I just like Yahtz have installed Deux Ex, and it's very playable (after you download 2 gigabytes of community fixes and mods).

Which fixes and mods would these be? I have an original installation that still works perfectly well, but it would be nice to make it even better.

Shifter [http://www.moddb.com/mods/shifter1] - fixes some remaining bugs, spruces up gameplay

New Vision [http://www.moddb.com/mods/deus-ex-new-vision] - High-res textures

HDTP [http://www.moddb.com/mods/project-hdtp] - Higher poly models (not finished, only a few models right now, but still nice)

Deus Ex Revision [http://www.moddb.com/mods/deus-ex-revision] - A remake of some levels that were bland (optional, but I like it quite a bit so far)

Kentie's Launcer [http://kentie.net/article/dxguide/index.htm] - UI and rendering updates (very nice)

Deus-Ex Enhanced [http://www.moddb.com/mods/deus-ex-enhanced] - Fixes some more UI stuff

Go on to ModDB [http://www.moddb.com/] to look them up.

Takes a little to get them to work together, but it's awesome when they do.

 

[Helscreama]

I didn't get past the first hour either. Not when the game was new due to an old crappy monitor which made everything simply too dark (damn you stealth tutorial!) and not now since the game is simply too hard to get into without nostalgia mode which I lack for this particular game.

I'll be crucifed for this but I've never played the other Deus Ex games and I really like Deus Ex HR

 

[triggrhappy94]

A REFERENCE TO THE SCRODUM CRAB!!!!
I remember that that boss was almost impossible.

 

[Mangue Surfer]

I'll be crucifed for this but I've never played the other Deus Ex games and I really like Deus Ex HR

Isn't the contrary?
At this point, the hysteria behind this game already achieve critical mass at the point of anyone who do a little critic will be attacked by the fanwatchers.

 

[Babitz]

You can kill 10 year olds in Deus Ex. I am sure Yahtzee appreciated that very, very much. Sadly, you can't do it in HR.