65 replies to this topic

[Zipster]

First, only being able to regenerate a single energy bar no matter what augs you have is just dumb. A terrible design decision, and it makes the lack of any melee other than takedowns a real problem (and why does a takedown take energy anyway?). It DEFINITELY makes a lot of the manual activation augs like Stealth, pretty darn useless until they release their first DLC--a GNC Nutrition store to supply you with the hundreds of energy bars you'll need to fuel them.

Yeah, I also found it annoying, but the more I've played, the more I've begun to understand why they did it this way. First off, most augs are automatic and don't require additional power, so no issue there. However the ones that do need power require you to carefully manage when and how long you use them, since there aren't a huge number of power bars in the game. As for take-downs taking energy, I could see how they were going for a balance so you're not exclusively using take-downs for the entire game. So despite how frustrating it can be at times, I also realize that it's meant to help mix things up and keep me from relying elusively on a single tactic, unless I can muster the patience to wait for the damn battery to recharge all the time.

The augs also feel mostly worthless. Other than the hacking augs, are any of them TRULY useful or exciting to get? Sure, it's nice to pick up refrigerators, and stand in electricity or poison gas the one or two times per game that it was useful, but otherwise I didn't feel like any of them were a big deal. On my second playthrough, where I intend to go guns blazing, I might feel differently about some of the combat ones, but for a stealthy/pacifist character, they're pretty useless.

Cloak is a lifesaver for just about any character build. You shouldn't use it for very long periods of time if you're watching energy, but it's great for quickly getting from cover to cover without being seen, or making a hasty tactical retreat when you're spotted. Plus, you can cloak up to someone to do a takedown, and so long as you didn't use a full battery with the cloak, it's essentially free since it will recharge. The aug that lets you takedown two guys at once is also pretty cool and exciting, since I've noticed TONS of times two guys were standing together just chatting away. Combine with the cloak aug so you don't have to worry about being spotted, and it's basically free XP just waiting to be collected. I also use the aug that negates fall damage all the time, especially in China, since it's all rooftops and drops, plus there are plenty of locations in the game where it gets you to a secret area or past hazards. The stun attack on land will also have you looking for all sorts of new opportunities to "drop in" on groups of enemies
Admittedly, a lot of the augs were just nice-to-haves, however I found most of them useful or convenient in some way. Hacking, of course, undoubtedly begin the absolute most valuable of them all!

How long did it take everyone to find out that if you just capture the "enemy CPU" node in hacking segments that you got all of the rewards as if you hacked each Datastore node itself? I must have been more than 3/4 of the way through the game before I figured that one out.... lol

Considering I would always capture every data node before capturing the goal node(s), I had no idea until you mentioned it just now

[ChurchSkiz]

Yeah the game changed for me when I got super jump and no fall penalty. My favorite move is to jump onto two guys and then do a double take down while they are getting back up.

[way2lazy2care]

Yeah, I also found it annoying, but the more I've played, the more I've begun to understand why they did it this way. First off, most augs are automatic and don't require additional power, so no issue there. However the ones that do need power require you to carefully manage when and how long you use them, since there aren't a huge number of power bars in the game. As for take-downs taking energy, I could see how they were going for a balance so you're not exclusively using take-downs for the entire game. So despite how frustrating it can be at times, I also realize that it's meant to help mix things up and keep me from relying elusively on a single tactic, unless I can muster the patience to wait for the damn battery to recharge all the time.

I think especially for takedowns it feels like it nerfs being sneaky somewhat. Even when I do a takedown, hide the body, and get in position for another person I still have to wait for the bar to fill sometimes. If I had the option to take people down without wasting ammo or energy in some totally non-lethal non-flashy way I would do it every time.

I noticed this being a problem mostly in the beginning before I started hording ammo because I would get situations where a guy is clearly meant to be taken down ("I'm just going to stand here with my back to the door whistling"), but I'm left sitting there standing no more than 2 feet behind him debating whether I really want to waste the energy.

They way they did it also kind of breaks my suspension of disbelief. It's like any batteries you don't use up completely recharge except your last one, which recharges anyway. Why would they not just use the same technology for all your batteries? I would almost prefer it if the last battery didn't recharge just so it was more consistent.

[Zipster]

What they really needed, was an augmentation that lets you increase the number of batteries that would recharge, maybe with diminishing speed for each higher battery to make it less OP.

[way2lazy2care]

What they really needed, was an augmentation that lets you increase the number of batteries that would recharge, maybe with diminishing speed for each higher battery to make it less OP.

yes.

[Aardvajk]

Only just started but so far so good. Better be actually as Steam update took 10 hours and cost me £15 on my pay as you go internet dongle. This is the last Steam game I buy until I have a flat with proper internet again.

Love it so far. The relationship with the original seems great and, like Drew said, you seem to be able to transfer over the way you played 1 very easily. The cover system seems to work really well and Adam really feels like JC Denton all over again.

Not got to any hacking yet so can't comment but glad to hear it is more involved than in DX1.

Mandatory gripe - the take downs are a bit over the top. After sneaking around for ages being really stealthy, its a shame I have to leap out and do some massive Matrix-style set of moves involving waving my arms about when what I want to do is just grab them by the neck and drag them into cover.

But sure as hell looking forward to finishing work today so I can get home and play this.

[EDIT] Wow, this just gets better the more patiently you play it. Take it all back about the takedowns, they work superbly well once you get your head around them. This is about as much stealth fun as I've ever had in a computer game and then some.

[n3Xus]

Haven't finished it yet but i don't see anything special in this game at all.

I expected an epic conspiracy theory story or something like that but instead I'm doing side quests 90% of the time which don't have to do anything with the story and make me run across the entire hub up and down like an idiot so I usually end up forgetting what the main quest is all about.

Not to mention that Megan women that we're supposed to care about though we only walked next to her in the intro sequence for about 2 minutes.

Also that conversation analyzer thing totally distracts me from the the conversations, constantly glancing at the alpha, beta & omega bars and trying to read the analysis of the character at the same time as the conversation is going on.

But the most stupid thing was the 1st and the 2nd boss fight: me being totally stealthy, had only stun gun and tranquilizer rifle and then the game throws a kill-or-be-killed guns blazing action sequence in my face.

[Sirisian]

Random thought. There needs to be a Crysis 2 mod called Passive Crysis where you can do Deus Ex take downs on enemies. I'd play Crysis 2 again just for that.

[tstrimple]

I'll second Arrdvajk's comment. I finished the game, and was rather underwhelmed. None of your choices really matter throughout the game, there is a final choice which dictates the ending you get. I enjoyed aspects of the game, however the story was quite plain and predictable. I enjoyed it overall, but definitely won't bother with another playthough.

[Gaiiden]

ok finally got internet back after Hurricane Irene blew through. Was without power for 5 days but had a generator to keep me playing ;) (really need it to keep basement pumps working so we don't flood but it has enough extra juice to power my rig too) - playing offline Steam meant my game time was not tracked (well it was but I didn't realize it was tracked per session and never saved) and the save game files seemed to reset their timer for each new game "chapter" I started (the numbers at the bottom of the recap load screen). So I have to guesstimate but I do believe I spent about 80-90 hours on my first play through.

Part of this was the fact that I am a quicksave "cheater" and will retry enemy encounters and hacking multiple times to get the outcome I want - the only thing I let be were the outcomes of my conversations with various NPCs. So sometimes I would kill all but one enemy in a room without being seen and then that last guy would spot me and I would have to jump back to my last quicksave which was when I first entered the room - I never got good at always quicksaving after dropping an enemy so that was a good span of time lost a lot

The other reason it took so long was I was hacking *everything* regardless of whether I had a passcode so I could stack my XP up. I was also making multiple runs to and from the various gun dealers to sell off everything I found that I didn't need. I like money what can I say? Also had a personal goal to break 100,000 credits, haha. I was also making multiple passes through the hub areas, mostly walking the whole so I wouldn't miss things. I spoke to every NPC and continued to do so the whole game once I realized the number of generic responses you received was very small. Almost everyone in the game areas had their own unique opinions and commentary on the current situation so it was well worth it to better immerse myself in what was happening around me.

I was also reading every single email and pocket secretary - the email is key though if you are a Deus Ex 1 fan. They have embedded a SHITLOAD of Dues Ex 1 references in the emails that are really cool to uncover.

Plus I really had nothing else to do this week without power and internet ;)

I tweeted a lot of stuff while playing - will be compiling all the tweets into a blog post with additional commentary over the weekend.

Oh final stats: 104,911 credits and 210,290 XP (I was 5 Praxis away from being fully aug'd at the end - a load screen hint says this isn't possible - but you can come close)

[szecs]

Shit. You'll ruin my social and romantic life (and maybe my budget too). I have to play with this.

[Gaiiden]

Shit. You'll ruin my social and romantic life (and maybe my budget too). I have to play with this.

well that's your fault for having them to begin with

[Zipster]

Part of this was the fact that I am a quicksave "cheater" and will retry enemy encounters and hacking multiple times to get the outcome I want - the only thing I let be were the outcomes of my conversations with various NPCs.

The irony here is that the NPC dialogs (the ones you can succeed/fail) are the one thing that actually change every time you do them On my second playthrough I thought I had "figured out" all the conversations, but quickly learned that each NPC had multiple conversation trees and the same sequences of responses I used a previous time, even between quickloads, would fail horribly. You really do have to pay attention to the conversation to choose the correct response, which I thought was fantastic.

I was also reading every single email and pocket secretary - the email is key though if you are a Deus Ex 1 fan. They have embedded a SHITLOAD of Dues Ex 1 references in the emails that are really cool to uncover.

Did you get the achievement for finding every eBook? I thought I had, but apparently not. When I checked a few days ago, Steam reported that 0% of players had it, but I'm not sure if it was just rounded down from a very small number (pretty sure it was, there are tons of people with a lot more free time than me!).

I was almost fully augmented as well by the end, doing all the same things you did with regard to hacking and maximizing XP. Eventually I didn't even care about the XP anymore. However I'm playing again to get my pacifist achievement, because I did everything right the first time but something must have glitched :/

[Antheus]

Well, it's like Deus Ex. Considering how so much IP gets destroyed, that counts for something...

But having slept over it, I find the story to be a total letdown and worst of series. SPOILERS incoming.


-----
So apparently it's about Megan, we need to revenge hear death. But wait, boss wants us to run errands, so get over yourself and protect corporate interests. You might want to be non-lethal, just because.

Suddenly, FEMA. Oh noes. I'm not really sure what I'm doing there or why, when some big guy drops on me. I don't know who he is, why he's there, but apparently I must hate him enough to finish him off because I'm was told in the intro video he's one of those who killed Megan. Well, I kill him, then go to Starbucks for a mocha simply because I just don't care about it enough to even fight him let alone kill him. I felt more animosity at guard_light_07 who traveled across patrol_wpt_54a that took 3 minutes to take down. But the boss? Never met him, don't care.

Then there's China. Stuff happened, don't really remember what. Oh look, Megan might apparently be alive. What a twist. What's next, Eliza is a hologram? Oh, wait...

Another boss fight. I don't care about this one either, but again, fight to the death, just because.

Let's visit the port, because original had it. It wasn't until writing this that something ocured to me. There was this kid, who apparently had something to do with Tong and he leaves on a ship called The Tracer. But, I finished the game long ago and wasn't given a chance to care.

Suddenly, plot twist. Forget everything you know, Darrow is the big villain now.

Then we get to meet Megan. Turns out, all she wants is a sugar daddy. First she went with Sarif and kept Jensen as her pet, then went with Darrow and she'll end up with Page. And she doesn't even have any ambition, all she wants is the fanciest lab. I can't even hate her, she's just shallow. Paris Hilton of sorts, just hangs around and fanciest party and goes to next one on a whim.

Suddenly, zombies. Seriously?

Panchea. There is a hole in the ocean. A freekin hole in the ocean reaching to the bottom of the floor. But no, you can't see it or walk on its edge, but here you can get a glimpse of low resolution skybox. If this is supposed to be a throwback at original NY city landscape which was notoriously bad, it was done in bad taste.

Oh, final boss? The rest doesn't matter. We decided to do another plot twist, you are now a minority report and we had some dragon lady models lying around we'll throw in. I don't want to kill her, I don't care about her, she's not even threatening me.

Now press one of four buttons... So I do, still not really caring about anything.

There is no character development through entire story, except perhaps for that old police buddy who's working the station entrance before flipping out. I felt more compassion to the guy outside the pods who couldn't pay the rent than to any of the main characters. There is namedropping of Illuminati, probably because it's a fancy word.

-----
Invisible War had premise, character development, actual plot twists, ideas and people I could care about. And IW is considered bad.

At the end, human revolution and augmentation and advancement of society gets mentioned again. Which is interesting, because since watching the trailer I had completely forgotten about that.


Or put differently. It was decent gameplay, but nothing at all beyond. I just wasn't given a chance to care about anything. At least I'll have no expectations of sequel or prequel or whether they happen at all. It was just a bunch of LOS blockers with patroling guards.

[Fox89]

I've decided that this game (which I rate as an A+, did I mention?) could be vastly improved by the elimination of the XP system altogether.

Not the Praxis system, that works great. But stop collecting XP and just award more Praxis points at the end of objectives, and hide some more Praxis kits around. First time I played through I didn't notice the issues, but second time? Even when I have the passcode to a door, I hack for the XP. Once I've accomplished my objective I go and find all the alternate routes I could have used...just for the XP. Which isn't the way this phenomenal game is supposed to be played. You're supposed to improvise and experiment. Difficult hack ahead? Well, why bother, you have grenades! Just blow the door of its hinges! You can do that kind of thing in the game, but why would you? There's no XP in that.

So yeah, that would be my number 1 change

[Sirisian]

But no, you can't see it or walk on its edge, but here you can get a glimpse of low resolution skybox. If this is supposed to be a throwback at original NY city landscape which was notoriously bad, it was done in bad taste.

Really? I enjoyed that so much. Seeing the plane take off then fly into the horizon into a low resolution back drop really brought me back to the original. It has a certain art feeling to it.

Also Deus Ex by it's very nature has complicated plots which make little sense. I mean the original had a rambling plot that took your everywhere. I like just going along with it since you don't know where the game will take you next.

[Antheus]

Also Deus Ex by it's very nature has complicated plots which make little sense. I mean the original had a rambling plot that took your everywhere. I like just going along with it since you don't know where the game will take you next.

The locations are identical to original. Big city, Asian city (bar, versalife...), Big City (you even land on roof of your apartment), Port (no ship this time), secret base (M12 thing) and final base (A51). There was supposed to be another city (Montreal, cut during production) which would double as Paris.

But my beef is that individual parts of story are all disjoint and don't develop on each other.

Take trailer: "I'll never stop looking for her".

When you play the game, from intro to Barret fight, there is not a single mention of that. Nothing establishes any kind of motive for the fight. It's even worse, Barret complains about morgue. He could at least say: "If it isn't the adoring boyfriend, will you scream like your girl did?" Or something. After all, Megan's death/revenge/rescue is the leitmotif of entire story. The fight is completely pointless. And if he complains about the morgue, which I painstakingly sneaked through without being seen, it would only make sense to allow me to just run away. I spent a lot of time avoiding confrontation there, the last thing I want now is to fight the guy I annoyed.

Same for other two bosses, nothing in any way establishes any kind of motive. Not in some strict literary sense, but they are simply thrown at you. At least the mobs in Wolfenstein yelled "Halt!".

Meanwhile, there is a bunch of emails involving bestiality and Office Space, making sure I understand the culture and spirit of some cubicle dwellers.

The dragon lady and her "help me help me". Apparently, she's manipulated, puppet, etc... In the end, she acts on her own, conveniently ignoring everything. Is she Illuminati? Someone else? What about Darrow? Did she know what he'll do and did she orchestrate it or was it the other way around? Neither one makes sense, neither could have been behind each other, making all just a chance event. A wide departure from all the conspiracy premise. Also, there are 3 women as part of computer. "Looking for a different ending? Why not Zoidberg?"

And Malik. Suddenly, out of nowhere, they are flirting. And that's it. No prelude, no conclusion, time to fly.

I'm not big on deep story, but this one was a let down, mostly its absence. I'd consider System Shock 2 with its Many ending better, since everything before was mostly cohesive.

I enjoyed that so much. Seeing the plane take off then fly into the horizon into a low resolution back drop really brought me back to the original. It has a certain art feeling to it.

It's just utterly wasted opportunity.

Hole in the ocean is unique. Hollywood would call it trailer moment or money maker. And I cannot walk on the edge, to gaze into the abyss and see it gaze back at me? An incredibly immersive moment in ME2 was fighting on the skyscraper bridge, where wind gusts and you hear the whooshing sound and it throws you off balance. It makes you feel the height. Instead, here's a bunch of zombies, fight them in same rectangular rooms as through entire game.

There's mails about some draft in some section, but I never found anything. Just same rooms as before. Not even the slightest attempt to milk one of most innovative and impressive locations ever in recent gaming history.

[Gaiiden]

Did you get the achievement for finding every eBook? I thought I had, but apparently not. When I checked a few days ago, Steam reported that 0% of players had it, but I'm not sure if it was just rounded down from a very small number (pretty sure it was, there are tons of people with a lot more free time than me!).

No, and I wasn't counting to make sure either. Oh well maybe next time. I did end with 71% of achievements unlocked after my first playthrough.

[Gaiiden]

I had to share my own brand of Adam Jensen bad assedness

[Fox89]

That was pretty damn badass. Nice one ;)