I never played IW but every video I go there is a lot of hate.same with some forums on HR(which is a great game)always saying that there is no tactical combat and health regen.even though on DX there is an augumentation that restores health and when you get the Dragon Tooth sword there is no tactical combat anymore.
*note:I've never plawed Invisible War,my first DX experience was HR*

I wasn't aware of any DX purists hating on Human Revolution. I personally enjoyed it until I got to the first boss fight (with Barret) at which point I nearly put my controller through the wall a couple times. Never did beat him.

As for Invisible War, I haven't played it, but what I've heard is that it's an okay game on its' own, but bad as a Deus Ex game.

In my opinion, Invisible War is not an enjoyable game, because:
-Long loading time due to the game engine
-Bad stealth mechanic. Even the most basic silent movement requires certain augmentations to achieve, IIRC, and forces the player to give up Health Leech Drone or Speed Enhancement if one does sneak; Taking down an enemy from the back with non-lethal weapons is not silent, and will alarm all nearby foes; Power Armoured Paladins cannot be taken down by non-lethal melee weapons, while Illuminati Elite Troopers explode regardless of lethal or non-lethal...
-Cannot hack without certain augmentations, which forces the player to give up Cloak.
-Everything including the inventory and the augmentation system are heavily simplified.
-Universal Ammo.

Human Revolution is great.

The first Deus Ex set the bar too high. None of the sequels could match its well-researched, multi-layered story, ease of interface and fresh and exciting gameplay. Both sequels fell short of the fans' expectations, so it's not really hate, just sore disappointment. Deus Ex 2 in particular was so villified because it was oversimplified, or "consolised" if you will.

as I said the Dragon Sword is a "WIN"button.just take it and slash away.it felt out of place to me

It's not that easy if you take the non-lethal approach, eg. use only the electric baton and tranquilizer darts to incapacitate all human enemies. Then it's all a matter of stealth, timing and tactics.

I enjoyed Invisible War but it holds no candle against the original Deus Ex and HR as well. It's much more simplified and its UI stank of early Xbox look. However, it did have some nice inputs at how the story continued (although that was also quite simple).

because there a lot of bigoted purists that stupdly fill themselves with expectations and then ask themselves why they don't like anything new these days. HR is a great and very enjoyable game. it only come close to the original DX, but still a great game. Don't trust the gaming mainstream.

Charon121 has a good bit of the truth, here.

Let's face it. After 10 years people are still playing the original Deus Ex, modifying it, talking about it and playing it some more. Though some call it overrated the track record shows that true to this Website Deus Ex *IS* the ultimate, 'Good Old Game.'

That's a LOT to live up to. IMO the MAJOR mistake that was made with Invisible War was that it was originally produced for the xbox--and the xbox button-smashers of the day, then grudgingly shoehorned into a port for the PC.

The compromises the IW devs made for play on the xbox resulted in a game that had all the limitations and negatives listed above plus relatively TINY maps and a kind of linearity that fans of DX:GOTY found unacceptable.

My view is that if Invisible War had been called just that and not a sequel to Deus Ex it would have been more favorably received.

As for HR I don't have a box that can play it but I've seen a pretty good playthrough. To me it looks like quite an interesting prequal with a TON more replayability than Invisible War EVER had. I also appreciate how it's a true prequel--Not a Deus Ex universe reload/reboot/restart/rebirth/redo/reHASH. I'm sick and tired of that stuff in ALL media and I'm glad they didn't go there with Human Revolution.

As a BIG fan of the first Deus Ex I hope I can play HR one day. As for IW I played it through a few times and now it's off of my hard drive.

Regarding the dragon's tooth sword: Yeah, it's overpowered, and that doesn't really gel with the rest of the game. That being said, it's still a melee weapon and you still need to get up close to use it before things start shooting at you.

Regarding regenerating health: Regenerating health in DX:HR is not comparable to the healing aug in the original DX. The augmentation requires investment and resources; it takes up an augmentation slot and uses energy. It's overpowered, sure, but it's also not free.

I'm not touching HR because the first Deus Ex is my favourite game and has a lot of great memories for me and after IW I don't need to take it any further. For me, it begins and ends with the first game.

IW was awful. No atmosphere, no soul, no humour, no meaningful links to the first game and none of the little touches that made the original so great. Not to mention the dialogue and cutscenes are wooden as hell. Deus Ex was the gameplay over the graphics and game mechanics, IW was the other way round. All the time was spent making ragdoll corpses and stuff. I genuinely struggled to complete it because it was so dull.

I've completed the original loads of times, a different way each time too! The funny thing is about DX, there's a lot of stuff that's a bit ropey (dodgy accents, conspiracy theory overload, etc.) but it shines as a game that totally draws you in that makes you care about what you're doing. How many people played the game a certain way the first time and then realised that they were 'wrong' to have done that, or that thing that happened that you wish didn't could have been prevented? (trying not to spoil anything ;-)

The guys who made IW even realise how much it sucked. This video is really interesting:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MGIdYl2oN74

I don't really know much about HR, but I hear it doesn't have a lot linking it to Deus Ex and after IW I don't really want to check it out. If anything, it's catering to the mainstream that killed the potential of the sequel, among other things. It's not that fans' expectations are too high, it's that after the travesty that was IW, a lot of people are wary of that same disappointment. I know I am.

First I want to thank Crowbar for posting that vid. I hadn't seen it before and found it VERY illuminating though given IW's shortfalls not surprising.

What struck me in the vid was how they acknowledged that they had done many things wrong in the game they just couldn't let go of the basic attitude that colored the (relative) disaster that was Invisible War. Instead of agreeing that they shouldn't have catered so much to xbox button-smashers they took the same line that producers of lame remakes of movies do. "Sure a few fanboys would be happy if we'd made it more true to the original but we wanted the money a wider audience could bring in and we didn't want to do the work that would have been required to bring that new audience into the sophisticated world of the original."

In the end those...two...guys...learned...SQUAT. After over a decade people are still playing, modding, talking about and LOVING the original Deus Ex while its sequel continues to be held up as an example of what NOT to do.


I'd advise Crowbar to watch one of the playthroughs of HR available on YouTube. My computer is a pile of crud so that's how I had to see it. From what I can tell HR does actually have some decent linkage and forshadowing of the original Deus Ex. Its play mechanics might be in question but from what I can tell on the outside looking in it's nowhere NEAR as bad as Invisible War.

No problem :-) There's a full version on YT that's like 2 hours or something if you've got the time.

I have seen gameplay footage of HR and was interested in the press releases and stuff leading up to its release but one thing that really put me off was how self-consciousy 'cool' it is. JC's Matrix vibes were dated even in the DX game world (love all the remarks he gets about his wardrobe).

What I'm getting at is that that dude with the metal arms moving around all fluidly and stuff is no badass, but JC in his cumbersome coat and boots jumping around woodenly like Keanu Reeves most definitely IS.

"It insists on itself." Gotcha, Crowbar. :-D