Deus Ex Deus Ex: Mankind Divided

[ThoseDeafMutes]

Well that was much shorter than expected. I legitimately thought there was a whole other half to the game up until the ending slides/tv show thing.

Took me like 20 hours to get to the end so it would be a long arse game if that was only half the content. I heard some people did it in like 14-15 hours though, if they beelined the main quests only only did a bit of optional stuff.

I think MD has the shortest main quest, but the most optional content in the series.

 

[Seaking4]

I finished it in 15 hours (so much loading screen pad time) but I did most of the sidequests too. The only one I didn't finish that I received was the one about the mystery augs (Fake edit: LOL even that sidequest ends on a cliffhanger. I just googled it). I don't quicksave/load games though. If I get spotted I just start darting for the nearest exit and awesome button my way there. So that may have helped keep my hours down.

 

[ThoseDeafMutes]

I finished it in 15 hours (so much loading screen pad time) but I did most of the sidequests too. The only one I didn't finish that I received was the one about the mystery augs (Fake edit: LOL even that sidequest ends on a cliffhanger. I just googled it). I don't quicksave/load games though. If I get spotted I just start darting for the nearest exit and awesome button my way there. So that may have helped keep my hours down.

There are a few quests you can miss catching early on, but not 5 hours worth. The playstyle difference would be a large part of it. I quickloaded quite a few times to maintain perfect stealth in some quests. I played similarly in DX, HR and MD, and had about 23 hours for the original, 21 for HR and 20 for MD. HowLongToBeat reports that the original game is around ~24 hours for main story on average, HR is 21, and MD is 14.5. However, the "Main story + extras" and "completionist" runs show them all to be much more even on aggregate.

I think it is the shortest, but there definitely wasn't an entire half a game cut. The only significant villain we've come across in the story who didn't get dealt with is Bob Paige, who can't be touched for obvious reasons. The main dangling threads are - what the fuck was the deal with the aug clinic / mystery aug plotline, and who is Janus? While still laving those questions, neither feels like enough to base a whole game around, or even half a game. More like an hour or two of extra content.

Prague itself was very expansive and had a lot of care put into it. I would have preferred a smaller Prague with a second hub in some other part of the world, but also kind of see what they were going for, where we experience it in three phases, day, night, and after lockdown. The real sin, though, was how frequently the game forced you to move between load screens to complete sidequests. I had it on SSD so the load times weren't bad, but sneaking in and out of train stations under lockdown was

 

[TheChickenKing]

I think it is the shortest, but there definitely wasn't an entire half a game cut. The only significant villain we've come across in the story who didn't get dealt with is Bob Paige, who can't be touched for obvious reasons. The main dangling threads are - what the fuck was the deal with the aug clinic / mystery aug plotline, and who is Janus? While still laving those questions, neither feels like enough to base a whole game around, or even half a game. More like an hour or two of extra content.

I think that's more the big issue. As shitty as it would've been to charge for it, a DLC or two could've wrapped up the significant plot threads relating to the game quite easily. As it stands, MD needed a bit more time in development to be a complete experience, but its unfinished nature doesn't warrant a full sequel. Even if Eidos Montreal gets a shot at a sequel (seeming very unlikely given Square Enix's absolutely horrendous mismanagement of the series), I doubt that there'd be enough material left for it to be a particularly compelling or meaningful experience.

 

[ThoseDeafMutes]

As it stands, MD needed a bit more time in development to be a complete experience, but its unfinished nature doesn't warrant a full sequel. Even if Eidos Montreal gets a shot at a sequel (seeming very unlikely given Square Enix's absolutely horrendous mismanagement of the series), I doubt that there'd be enough material left for it to be a particularly compelling or meaningful experience.

There's no reason to do a full sequel, but there's also no major reason not to. They pretty much had to start from scratch to make this one since Adam's story ended pretty conclusively with HR to begin with, even though the world at large still had other plots that could have been pursued.

They want to keep Adam around as a recognizable protagonist, but they really failed to set up a compelling story for sequels, despite leaving some dangling threads. We're just treading water until the DX1 timeline.

IMO, they should make a new game, dump Adam as a protagonist (he can come back wrap up his story in like a 4 hour DLC pack equivalent to "The Missing Link"), and basically just finish bridging the events between games. Have the bombing of the statue, the formation of UNATCO, all that shit covered. Dumping Adam will mean they can bring in a new character progression system without straining credulity, one more like the original game where you make hard choices between augs in different slots and aren't just a swiss army man.

 

[MadMaxHellfire]

Prague itself was very expansive and had a lot of care put into it. I would have preferred a smaller Prague with a second hub in some other part of the world, but also kind of see what they were going for, where we experience it in three phases, day, night, and after lockdown. The real sin, though, was how frequently the game forced you to move between load screens to complete sidequests. I had it on SSD so the load times weren't bad, but sneaking in and out of train stations under lockdown was

brofisted for the post and the nick. you're a promising newfag.

also about adam: i think they can't change main character, mostly because if i recall correctly in the first deus ex you find some "adam" or "a." into a test tube in a lab containing the obvious ancestors of paul and jc. or something like that, after 10 years memory is a little fuzzy. adam is the chosen one since the beginning, it'd be silly to demote him now.

 

[Falksi]

There are a few quests you can miss catching early on, but not 5 hours worth. The playstyle difference would be a large part of it. I quickloaded quite a few times to maintain perfect stealth in some quests. I played similarly in DX, HR and MD, and had about 23 hours for the original, 21 for HR and 20 for MD. HowLongToBeat reports that the original game is around ~24 hours for main story on average, HR is 21, and MD is 14.5. However, the "Main story + extras" and "completionist" runs show them all to be much more even on aggregate.

I think it is the shortest, but there definitely wasn't an entire half a game cut. The only significant villain we've come across in the story who didn't get dealt with is Bob Paige, who can't be touched for obvious reasons. The main dangling threads are - what the fuck was the deal with the aug clinic / mystery aug plotline, and who is Janus? While still laving those questions, neither feels like enough to base a whole game around, or even half a game. More like an hour or two of extra content.

Prague itself was very expansive and had a lot of care put into it. I would have preferred a smaller Prague with a second hub in some other part of the world, but also kind of see what they were going for, where we experience it in three phases, day, night, and after lockdown. The real sin, though, was how frequently the game forced you to move between load screens to complete sidequests. I had it on SSD so the load times weren't bad, but sneaking in and out of train stations under lockdown was

Agree with a lot of that, especially the part about the hubs. I enjoyed MD for the most part and think one last game with Adam Jensen wouldn't be a bad thing.Much like Rogue 1 does with New Hope, it'd be nice to see it roll into the last few minutes/hours before "The Conspiracy" starts.

 

[Azrael the cat]

Here's the problem: Adam Jensen can't stop the illuminati, or even know about them too much, let alone proto-MJ5 without totally junking the idea that it's in the same universe as DE1. His story in that universe was finished with HR, i.e. the guy who almost stumbled onto something, but ended up being the tool that took them to a whole new level of power - plus the ending making the jarring feel of the game's acceptance of mechanised augumentations everywhere finally gelling with the Deus Ex 1 setting.

Worse, any prequel to Deus Ex can't end with a victory. Adam Jensen can only ever end up as a tool for the proto-MJ5's experiments, or else there is no Deus Ex 1 setting. They had that ending. Anything beyond HR is doomed to go in a circle.

You know what could be a great Deus Ex prequel game plot? One set after the current aug-pogrom has run its course, nobody really wants to hate augs anymore, but nobody in their right mind would become one either. A young german idealist named Deiter Hausen is the player character (yes, everyone will know he's Gunther Hermann, it's a story not a twist), and he's working for German intelligence. He trips upon a minor illumaniti contact, and they strike hard with their current preferred tech of robotics. He realises that he can't fight them as is, and he can't go through official channels because for all he knows, they might already own the 'official channels'. So he gathers a circle of trusted allies within his local intel unit, including a scientist who was around in the days when mechanical augs were common. He and his most trusted partner, Anna Navarre, secretly undertake mechanical augment surgery - inconspicuous and can be covered with makeup so long as they don't use it in public (feeding into the game's stealth mechanics).

Bit over halfway through the game, they're doing well and are on the edge of getting proof that a bunch of European illumaniti globalists are funding the NSF (without the NSF's knowledge; their investigation's roadblocks in the early game are that the NSF they find seem to be genuine idealists like them) to cause a 2nd US civil war (the one referred to in Deus Ex 1) for their own financial benefit. Then the illumaniti pull their trump card - they know who these two young german intel officers are, and they've taken their families as leverage. The PC and Anna Navarre change their priorities to rescuing their loved ones. At gunpoint (one holding the gun, while the other has the surgery, then swapping) they force their scientist friend to give them the 'old-school' mechanical augmentations, the ones that you can't hide and that will get them immediately thrown out of any reputable intelligence agency.

Deiter saves his family, but they find proto-Anna's entire family slaughtered. Player is given the choice near the end of the game whether to kill or arrest the mid-level illumanit boss that kidnapped their families - either way, Anna steps in first, shoots the bad guy in the gut, and locks the door so he can bleed to death in agony, while - without any emotion in her voice - telling Deiter that he's the only person in the world she trusts, but she'll fucking kill him right now if he interferes.

Game ends with them getting a call from Walter Simons. He knows about the illumaniti and has been helping them out under the guise of a hacker. He's going to help them take those fuckers down, and he's got the contacts to get them a new job at UNATCO. Not every billionaire is evil, and he's got a very wealthy philanthropist who wants to make things right in the world. Only thing he needs in return is their total trust - that UNATCO might already be infiltrated, so they've got to take orders from him, no matter what. But...he can't undo the fact that the illuminati know who Deiter Hauser is. If he loves his family, the only way of protecting them is to take a new name, and cut off all ties to his former life. MJ5 - the 'resistance' - is his family now.
.
.
.
Ok, that's shitty fan-fiction, but it's the style and genre I'm talking about. Deus Ex 1 starts with a dystopia. There's no 'great heroic stories' to be told if they focus on the big events. If they must insist on prequels (and I'm not sold on prequels as an idea full stop), then it's got to be the story of how ordinary people helped it to happen.

 

[MadMaxHellfire]

Here's the problem: Adam Jensen can't stop the illuminati, or even know about them too much, let alone proto-MJ5 without totally junking the idea that it's in the same universe as DE1. His story in that universe was finished with HR, i.e. the guy who almost stumbled onto something, but ended up being the tool that took them to a whole new level of power - plus the ending making the jarring feel of the game's acceptance of mechanised augumentations everywhere finally gelling with the Deus Ex 1 setting.

according to the test tube stuff i previously mentioned, adam jensen can perfectly know everything and fight to his last breath only to 1) be captured and be the subject of further experiments 2) being brainwashed/fed false informations/convinced by whatever reason that illuminati are the future for the greater good and blah blah blah.
pretty easy.
after all, by the time this third episode is out 90% of those who will play it probably never heard of the real deus ex, so MORE PLOT TWIST IN DEUS EX REBOOT! jensen joined unatco because they were good but THEY ARE NOT!
mind = blown.

 

[Zombra]

Jensen may be the test tube chosen one, but that doesn't mean he has to be the one climbing through air ducts and doing arm plank cinema kills. I never liked him in the first place and there may be another augmented person somewhere in the world who has an action-packed story of their own to tell.

 

[Gord]

Well, the guy in the test tube might as well be a clone of Adam and the DX1-era world might have been in a much worse state if not for the doings of Jensen in the prequels, so the actual limit is the capabilities of the writers.
Which are ok as far as game writers go, but not really great, imo.

 

[Sordid MCA/Prosper Hybryd]

Isn't Jensen supposed to be brainwashed into becoming Walton Simons at some point?

 

[Echo Mirage]

I'm just suprised at just how little the illuminati seems to know or even care about Jensen. From the Emails I've found I looks like they don't even know about his involvment in the events of the first game at all. So either they don't care, or he has Eliza or someone else (Helle?) covering his tracks behind him.

 

[Paul_cz]

I finished the game couple days ago. Took me around 60 hours - completionist playstyle, so I explored everything, hacked everything, knocked out every enemy, also had the two DLCs included.

Great game. Not as great as Deus Ex 1, but better than HR. In fact while mechanically it is a sequel to HR, high-level design-wise it actually reminded me of Vampire Bloodlines more than HR. The Prague hub, as imprecise and languagerotten as it was, was actually fantastic, probably the best hub in the series. Huge amount of detail and great atmosphere. And many very meaty sidemissions, with some cool choices and consequences involved.
The main storyline was ok, not terrible not great, but I would like to see those unresolved plot points resolved and then followed with full blown transition into DX1. Too bad Eidos is now gonna be saddled with fucking Marvel of all things.

 

[ThoseDeafMutes]

Prague itself was very expansive and had a lot of care put into it. I would have preferred a smaller Prague with a second hub in some other part of the world, but also kind of see what they were going for, where we experience it in three phases, day, night, and after lockdown. The real sin, though, was how frequently the game forced you to move between load screens to complete sidequests. I had it on SSD so the load times weren't bad, but sneaking in and out of train stations under lockdown was

brofisted for the post and the nick. you're a promising newfag.

also about adam: i think they can't change main character, mostly because if i recall correctly in the first deus ex you find some "adam" or "a." into a test tube in a lab containing the obvious ancestors of paul and jc. or something like that, after 10 years memory is a little fuzzy. adam is the chosen one since the beginning, it'd be silly to demote him now.

Paul Denton was born in 2018 and JC was born in 2029. Since MD took place in 2029, I don't think it's really important for Adam to be running around doing things. MD gives some evidence that the Jensen you're playing is not the same one who you were in HR. The game has a quest called "The Harvester" where a woman has neural tissue and memories implanted from a serial killer which changed the way she behaves and gives her flashbacks to the killer's own past crimes. During the game, Jensen reports that he didn't have memories initially when he went to the clinic, couldn't remember who he was, and was a "John Doe". During the ending credits, the psychologist from TF29 states that "the subject's memories are in line with the programming".

The two options are that Jensen is a copy with implanted memories from the original, who is probably sitting in an illuminate freezer as genetic material for the augmentation experiments, or that you are the original but have had some brain shit done to you to track down Janus in addition to them ripping out all your augs and replacing them with the same ones + some experimental new ones. Since Adam was always an illuminate experiment, it's possible that he himself was cloned early on and that the blank clone was just sitting around doing nothing for ages.

In any case, you can pretty safely retire Adam for the purposes of the DX1 stuff. He's already been used to help birth Paul and JC. If he's a clone, then the clone can die off or escape it doesn't matter. If he's not a clone, then he needs to wind up in the Illuminate lab eventually. But either way you can totally use another protagonist to bridge the games.

I'm just suprised at just how little the illuminati seems to know or even care about Jensen. From the Emails I've found I looks like they don't even know about his involvment in the events of the first game at all. So either they don't care, or he has Eliza or someone else (Helle?) covering his tracks behind him.

Based no the post-credits scene, he's inadvertently working for Bob Paige. So him being somewhat obscured to the illuminate in general makes sense considering the MJ12 stuff. The members of the group keep secrets from each other.

 

[Zombra]

I would play a Deus Ex game about an 11-year-old kid.

 

[ThoseDeafMutes]

I would play a Deus Ex game about an 11-year-old kid.

The Young Paul Denton Adventures

 

[LESS T_T]

A Criminal Past DLC is out now:

 

[Latelistener]

I guess it's time to say goodbye to Jensen (and Deus Ex in general for the next 5-10 years). You weren't a bad character, but not a really good one either.

 

[Zombra]

Glad I didn't waver when price dropped to $18. Wait for the $5 GOTY all DLC edition dammit.

 

[Gerrard]

What a shame.

 

[LESS T_T]

Oh, official DX Twitter account just linked fan's thank you letter to Eidos Montreal which also blaming SE: https://www.reddit.com/r/Deusex/comments/5w0vac/dear_eidosmontréal/

 

[Deleted member 7219]

Latest DLC is a good way to end the series. It's pretty incline. Several hours of gameplay, big levels, quite difficult, can't really blanket stealth your way through it without really paying attention to what you are doing. I had a hard time avoiding guards even with the cloak ability. And it is a prison. Games set in prisons are always fun.

I don't think we'll get another Deus Ex game again, and I'm ok with that. Mankind Divided had great moments, but they were few and far between. The ending was an insult. I don't think they could have made a third game and have it anywhere near as good as the best parts of HR and MD. Square Enix were too focused on the decline and too little on actually pricing it reasonably with all content included at launch.

The DLC was good, though. Play it for one last hurrah.

 

[LESS T_T]

 

[LESS T_T]

http://steamcommunity.com/app/337000/discussions/0/133260492053766541/

[22-03-2017] PC Patch notes for Deus Ex: Mankind Divided Patch build 795.0

We have just released another PC patch for Deus Ex: Mankind Divided, v1.17 build 795.0_P17, which makes the Japanese language package only available to play in Japan and focuses on issues raised by the community.

This patch will be applied by Steam automatically when you next start the game. If your game does not update, please restart the Steam client.

The following game changes are in this patch:

• Added the new Japanese language package.
  
• Fixed a crash when switching from controller to mouse & keyboard during a loading screen or pause menu.
  
• Fixed an issue when selecting a floor with the mouse on the elevator's panel in Dubai.
  
• Fixed an issue where the "Auto Complete" laptop feature was missing.
  
• Fixed an issue where swapping ammo types was not functional when holding [R] button was pressed to quickly, if the control scheme was not set to Mankind Divided.
  
• Fixed an issue where the loading screen art is affected by texture quality.
  
• Added an option to quit to desktop from the pause menu.
  
• Fixed an issue with the zoom acceleration of the mouse when pressing + and – on the map.
  
• Fixed an issue where conversations causes certain graphic effects to change when switching control input.

If you wish to delay this update to a later time for your convenience, you will be able to stay on the previous patch by switching to build v1.16_build761.0 through the beta tab within the game properties window.

We will keep monitoring for feedback and will release further patches as it seems required. We always welcome your feedback!