Zero Punctuation: Deus Ex

Signa

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CrawlingPastaHellion said:
Signa said:
Having played the Thief series previously probably didn't help with the stealth much either. It just has different expectations for the player.
Didn't play Thief before "Deus Ex" (the only one I played was "The Deadly Shadows"), but I used the same tactics I used in Thief: baton the hell out of them unnoticed. ^_^ That's what I call "guerrilla" style of gameplay, not really stealth, since you leave corpses behind, but rather stealthy assault (MGS3 had the same style of gameplay for me).
yeah, but your blackjack didn't have ammo like the prod charger does, and I rarely, even when I get the jump on a guy, have him go down in one hit. The retracting prod was worse because usually I have to beat them a lot before they go down. It might have to with the fact that there are melee headshots (or so it would seem while I'm playing) in Deus Ex which is something I've not seen in any games before or much after. In Thief, as long as the foe didn't know I was there, I could smack them on the ass with the blackjack and get an instant KO.
 

Babitz

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AverageJoe said:
I don't get it. I really really don't get it. I don't understand the love for this game, and I never have. Its unituitive, its dull, its clunky and unpolished. The graphics are awful as well but that has absolutely nothing to do with my hate for this game.

I clicked on the review hoping Yahtzee would be the first critic to tear it a new one (since he normally seems to hate unintuitive gameplay and we tend to have similar tastes in games) but it sounds like even he found it quite good. I'm just at a loss now to be honest, I feel like I've played an entirely different game to everyone else, and I'm really starting to lose interest in what other gamers think about games since the majority seem to have such different opinions to me and discussing it all is so futile.

I've been playing Human Revolution and it absolutely destroys Deus Ex in every. single. way. The irony is, it's not even an excellent game. Its very good, and probably in my top 5 games of this year, but thats it. But it does everything Deus Ex did in a more entertaining, fluent, intuitive way. It is totally beyond me, how anyone can say a dated dinosaur of a game like Deus Ex can in any way hold a candle to Human Revolution, or for that matter, any decent game released in the last 5 years.
I don't understand anything in your post. Why is the gameplay unintuitive, unless you suffer from ADHD? It's a game that has a very rich and detailed world, excellent level design approachable in many ways. I suggest you watch this video [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dOIx_i8dTLA] to see why we love this game so much. It has NOTHING to do with nostalgia. The game has complexity and depth, and every game released in the past 10 years just pales in comparison during this cookie cutter bastardized streamlined era.
I have played the game for the first time 7 years ago and replayed it numerous times because I always try different approaches with alternative solutions, find out different dialogue bits and new areas.

The game is a beacon of brilliant design and if you think it doesn't hold a candle to mediocre modern games like Bioshock, I sincerely pity you and everyone else who can't appreciate a game despite a dated look. It's noteworthy how the game grows in popularity every year. Lots of people have played it for the first time in the past few years and had a blast so no, no nostalgia here. And everyone reinstalls it every time it gets a mention. No other game gets the same treatment.

Apart from the dated look, Deus Ex didn't age at all. It's a timeless classic that has yet to be surpassed, but at this rate never will be because every developer caters to the widest audience possible, removing such depth and complexity.



edit
Here's [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JeoQEJkGW1I] the intro with graphic mods for you guys who don't know whether they'll be turned off by the dated look. Decide for yourself if this is decent enough.
 

Ithikial

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Still the best game ever made in my book. I think we can chalk this game as one that Yahtzee likes.
 

Firia

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Helscreama said:
Pscyon said:
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
You're fine. :) Those that should be in fear of judgment are those that say "I liked Invisible War." Cause wow... that's a bold claim. :) Deus Ex 1 is old enough that it's understandable that people will have never played it. I've got a friend older than me that tried it well after its "expiration date" and couldn't get passed the dated textures. It's okay. :) But if you can, or can at least beef up the graphics with a mod, you're in for a treat.

Still, Human Revolution is a nice successor.
 

putowtin

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uguito-93 said:
And I get the feeling he really doesnt like John Romero, but that could just be me.
does anyone?

OT great look back, alas it is so true
 

Buizel91

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WouldYouKindly said:
I think he'll like DE:HR for what it is, but when comparing it to the original, he'll probably not like it as much.
Yeh, kinda like Portal 2, he enjoyed it, but he enjoyed the first one more.

OT: i loved the part where he said "it's as hard to break as a wet Weetabix" i nearly died of laughter (but then again i laugh at pretty much anything)

Can't wait to see what he thinks of Human Revolution.
 

Marik Bentusi

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Aug 20, 2010
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I played the original Deus Ex just prior to Human Revolution and I finally completed it, too.

While it's true that Human Revolution isn't as complex as the original and it does suffer from a minor case of Modern FPS Must Haves, I think it's much better in the story department. Not how it's told, but the actual story. Don't worry, no spoilers. I liked the GITS and Blade Runner influences a lot, even if it meant a few un-twists for me, but it's dragged down by Deus Ex' incredibly cheesy plot.

Towards the end Deus Ex' philosophical depth gets really interesting, but the overarching plot just sounds like a bad Bond movie. Too cheesy for today I think. Human Revolution has a much more serious tone to it in my opinion, and it's dragged down by the original DX' plot it still has to weave in.

Human Revolution also has much better characters you actually care about. I put all my points into sneaky approaches and reloaded X times to win against impossible odds to save a minor character because they grew on to me. On highest difficulty level, too.
 
Nov 12, 2010
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I still think that "System Shock 2" was better than the original "Deus Ex". Don't get me wrong: I loved the original (even if I do admit I like HR more overall, except for the music), but "System Shock 2" just clicked more with me: it had a much more involved character progression, story was much, much better and I up to this day consider Shodan to be the best villain of all time.

But as Marik Bentusi said: the philosophical conundrums and the A.I. events aside, the story in "Deus Ex" is very cheesy and I understood that better after I replayed it only recently on my PS2 (I was 15 when I played it the first time, was hardly a critically thinking fellow I am now). What "Deus Ex" got that "System Shock 2" didn't have was the freedom from which one could approach a problem. "System Shock 2" suffered from a more "head-on" approach, as most games suffer from (except for "Hitman: Blood Money", the only other game like that in my memory). Still, even "System Shock 2" had that to some degree, it was just more prominent in "Deus Ex".

[WARNING: might be considered a spoiler]

I was delighted when I hacked a terminal at the Spec-Ops base in HR, killing about ten soldiers through a hacked turret. That's what "Deus Ex" is and should be: freedom of choice.

[WARNING: end of a potential spoiler]
 

Babitz

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CrawlingPastaHellion said:
replayed it only recently on my PS2
Why would you play the dumbed down version? =\
Smaller maps, worse UI and no limb based damage.

Also, SS2 is unbalanced. But I agree on SHODAN.
 

pepitko

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I was waiting all through the video for him to say and now on to the Human Revolutions, oh well. But I quite liked the history detour, similar thing to what MovieBob does, well done.
 

Doug

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uguito-93 said:
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.
To be fair, very few people like John Romero - he did cause the collapse of a major part of the good gaming world through financial mis-management and project mis-management - either one of those could have been survivable, but both together wasn't good.

Stabby Joe said:
While haven't completed it yet, I am really enjoying Human Revolution so far. I didn't play the original when it came out yet it still held up years later, mostly for still having original gameplay mechanics...

...now at this stage there have been imitators and now found myself wondering what else can first-person style perspective gameplay can do. In regards to the next review, some of those issues have been addressed in Human Revolution such as the tranquilizers... but on the other hand it has the opposite of others aspects such as regenerative health. On that basis I have no clue what next week will be then haha!

Now I'm also going to wonder how many comments will come up before anyone actually watches the video and comments about JUST Human Revolution, not the original.
Also enjoying Human Revolution so far - I imagine Yahtzee will be mostly pleased, though he will harp on about his in game hates - as we do love him for that.
 
Nov 12, 2010
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Babitz said:
CrawlingPastaHellion said:
replayed it only recently on my PS2
Why would you play the dumbed down version? =\
Smaller maps, worse UI and no limb based damage.
Yeah, it was dumbed down a great deal, but I just had to play it. I though if I was going to replay it, why not give the PS2 version a shot? Still, the PC version is superior in almost every way, PS2's has cool cut-scenes though.
 

Loki J

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NameIsRobertPaulson said:
From what I have heard, HR combines Bioshock with Gears of War.

Gears gives the regenerating health, the zero skill required guns, the large bosses, and the cover based shooting while Bioshock gives the decent story and upgrade abilities.

Would this be correct, cause a game like that sounds awful, frankly.
No, that would not be correct thinking. You would be mistaken to think that it's X + Y = XY. Try it out and let it stand on it's own; it's nothing like either game, though it uses some gameplay mechanics that have become common in modern games.

Z