DX: The Nameless Mod

[Korgan]

Its quality is incredible. The gameplay is as engaging and variable as the original.
It's also completely fucking unplayable for me. I want my motherfucking Deus Ex to be serious motherfucking business, not a giant fucking self-insert fanfic about some motherfucking forum.
This is the very fucking definition of wasted effort for me. I probably won't put another hour into it.

Sincerely, a butthurt fanboy.

 

[Fat Dragon]

I made it about halfway through, and it was well designed, but yeah. The setting was just fucking stupid and impossible for me to enjoy, I couldn't finish the mod.

 

[Shiny]

Sincerely, a butthurt fanboy.

This is what sells it for me...

 

[Admiral Rimjob POOBUM]

I was told the setting was well-realised enough you could get over it if you tried

 

[Rohit_N]

I managed to finish it. I may have missed a few OTP specific jokes, but the setting was still accessible. Besides, the mod was fun enough to finish.

 

[Jaesun]

I was told the setting was well-realised enough you could get over it if you tried

That is quite true. The setting did not bother me at all, it was well done.

 

[Serious_Business]

I'm getting spectacular crash-freezes with this thing. My computer just stops working, and if I try to stop the damn thing, it just chokes on my boner like a shitty hooker. Then everything crashes down to hell. All the time. Great experience.

But anyway, I also agree with the OP. Someone should have told those guys setting is not a secondary thing. Everything doesn't make any sense if you dig too much into it, which breaks the whole experience. You have to wonder how these guys run with this idea for 7 years, how it fueled their creativity. Hey guys - this is a great concept, certaintly not something we've made on the spot for shit and giggles, come on let's do dis, this is so deep guys, hell yeah baby.

However, it seems to be spectacular, but yeah... they fucked it up.

 

[ghostdog]

I dropped it after about 10 hours of play. The atmosphere is great, the maps are amazing. But I agree the backstory and setting are silly. There was one particular map where you face an AI that tries to kill you. The structure is absolutely amazing, but eventually the experience sucks because they try to do a shodan parody (with some inside jokes probably) that completely fails.

It's obvious that they have decent writing skills, they just made the fundamental mistake to continue working on their silly first idea. The moment they saw how serious and large was the scale of their work, they should have changed the setting. It's definitely worth a try though.

 

[Mackerel]

These tell you all you need to know about the Nameless Mod.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GBzmHLZ4dUk
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2F-GK9p523o

 

[Cimmerian Nights]

Level design, new content, voice work, music are all top notch - stunning really for a mod. Probably unparalleled. I wince everytime there's some plot exposition and they mention these dorky forum handles and shit. Too self-indulgent. But still well worth it IMO.

 

[Multi-headed Cow]

These tell you all you need to know about the Nameless Mod.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GBzmHLZ4dUk
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2F-GK9p523o

That not only made me not want to try the mod, that made me want to destroy my Deus Ex discs so that it can't accidentally get installed and modded on my machine. Jesus.

 

[Jonas]

Damnit, I thought we went over this already in this other thread:

http://rpgcodex.net/phpBB/viewtopic.php?t=30409

Have no worries guys, our next game will be a completely bog-standard science fiction setting. You know we've been working hard to make it original and different from the usual Space Marine shit you see in Halo or Aliens, but maybe you'd prefer if we just pick the standard stereotypes and run with the normal save-the-world-from-evil-aliens routine?

 

[Korgan]

Damnit, I thought we went over this already in this other thread:

http://rpgcodex.net/phpBB/viewtopic.php?t=30409

Have no worries guys, our next game will be a completely bog-standard science fiction setting. You know we've been working hard to make it original and different from the usual Space Marine shit you see in Halo or Aliens, but maybe you'd prefer if we just pick the standard stereotypes and run with the normal save-the-world-from-evil-aliens routine?

YES PLEASE
The usual shit would really be far superior and more atmospheric, believe me.

 

[ghostdog]

Damnit, I thought we went over this already in this other thread:

http://rpgcodex.net/phpBB/viewtopic.php?t=30409

Have no worries guys, our next game will be a completely bog-standard science fiction setting. You know we've been working hard to make it original and different from the usual Space Marine shit you see in Halo or Aliens, but maybe you'd prefer if we just pick the standard stereotypes and run with the normal save-the-world-from-evil-aliens routine?

I don't think anybody asked for generic marine shit. On the other hand making a forum parody in a deus ex style setting requires an absolutely brilliant writer and I wouldn't bet my money that even Ron Gilbert or the guys that made Anachronox could pull it through. All the inside jokes didn't help either.

As for the actual content some of the characters were good, but some other stuff were not so good. The Llamas and Goats were just retarded, the yellow faced villain was incredibly generic, and even though you were given choices as to which side to choose, nobody would really want to side with the corporation because it's so painfully generically evil and moronic. Ultimately it was the Shodan parody level that made me drop the mod. This incredibly stupid parody managed to destroy one of the best structured maps I've seen.

Let's leave it at the fact that TNM is one of the most well structured mods ever, with very high production values. Unfortunately, it fails to realize it's potential because of the silly setting. But I'll say this once again: TNM does some things so good, that It's really worth a try by all DX fans.

 

[Jonas]

Noted.

Especially Korgan's post...

 

[Korgan]

Ho, ho.

 

[MetalCraze]

These tell you all you need to know about the Nameless Mod.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GBzmHLZ4dUk
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2F-GK9p523o

Ahem.

Have no worries guys, our next game will be a completely bog-standard science fiction setting. You know we've been working hard to make it original and different from the usual Space Marine shit you see in Halo or Aliens, but maybe you'd prefer if we just pick the standard stereotypes and run with the normal save-the-world-from-evil-aliens routine?

Don't mind the haters - this mod has lots of originality, just like Bethesda's Fallout 3.

 

[Tolknaz]

Meh, silly premise only bothered me before i actually played The Nameless Mod. Once it was on, it was ON. The story actually held my interest and have rarely seen mods with such production values. Even the jokes were mostly well done.

 

[Mackerel]

Jonas, do you always reply so ineffectually to any criticism about TNM? You certainly give me an unfavorable perception of you when you somehow translate dissatisfaction with the setting to a desire for a generic storyline. People have different tastes, and not all of us are able to get over the internet forum setting or the incredibly lame jokes.

 

[Fat Dragon]

Jonas, do you always reply so ineffectually to any criticism about TNM? You certainly give me an unfavorable perception of you when you somehow translate dissatisfaction with the setting to a desire for a generic storyline. People have different tastes, and not all of us are able to get over the internet forum setting or the incredibly lame jokes.

Not that big of a surprise, that's just typical modder behavior. Even if someone praises everything else about the mod, if you criticize even one thing they'll just plug their ears, act like a smartass, and start throwing out straw men.

 

[Jonas]

No, I should've been more specific in my reply.

I actually appreciated especially ghostdog's comments. Reading back over it now, the only remarks I really take exception to are "This is the very fucking definition of wasted effort for me." and "Someone should have told those guys setting is not a secondary thing." Does the latter strike you as a little presumptuous? We spent a hilarious amount of time fleshing out that setting, and pretty much the entire mod was built up around it. The setting is the point of the mod

Everything else here seems fairly reasonable. It does make me sad when people praise the gameplay and the structure of the mod and then announce that they couldn't finish it because of the setting, though. But it's a question of priorities I guess, and if you don't like it, you don't like it, and there's nothing I can do about that.

 

[Jonas]

Oh and this:

These tell you all you need to know about the Nameless Mod.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GBzmHLZ4dUk
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2F-GK9p523o

No it doesn't. No it really, really doesn't

But it seems most people who've posted here have actually played the mod, and I think their opinions deserve more respect than a poster just picking 2 lines of incidental dialogue out of more than 13,000 lines and extrapolating it to the entire rest of the mod. Most posters here seem to agree the mod is fairly well written, no?

 

[MetalCraze]

We spent a hilarious amount of time fleshing out that setting

Exactly. It's a goddamn internet forum in Deus Ex. A setting based on a forum I guess quite a number of people doesn't even know.

 

[Admiral Rimjob POOBUM]

Responding with "well next time we'll just make a generic space marine story like Halo would you like that better" did come across as pretty petulant.

I can kind of see the point of view of both sides. I love... uh... what would you call it? Extra-forum media? You can tell that from my comics pretty easily. But I know my comics are made for a specific audience, the Codex, because that's what all the jokes, meta themes and storylines revolve around. Someone from outside here would just be baffled by them.
In the same way, I'd probably love the idea of TNM if I was a member of the forum it's based around. As it is, even if you have fleshed it out and made it accessible (I'll check it out, honest, I've just reinstalled Deus Ex today), it's still going to hold a certain lack of appeal for people who aren't "in" on it. Obviously, you have the right to make what you like and you seem to do it very, very well, so I don't really hold with the people criticizing or insulting it; but I still can't blame them for wishing that you'd put that skill into something more serious or less, well, niche. The forum setting just isn't that interesting if you're not a member.

And that's probably the first time I've seen this place complain about something being too niche, that is gold

 

[Cimmerian Nights]

I'll back you up on that. Those are two intentionally goofy lines that aren't really indicative of the whole game.

The mod is well written and executed overall, it has some great "holy shit" moments. I could just do without some of the inside jokes and whatnot that tear down the fourth wall. It's Fallout 2-ish in that regard.

In the same way, I'd probably love the idea of TNM if I was a member of the forum it's based around.

That's the thing, without that the setting is inaccessible and I become ultimately ambivalent to it.

I think people are shortchanging it by dismissing it wholesale for that reason though, it is good enough to overcome that issue.