Editorial What made Deus Ex so great?

[Azrael the cat]

Hey I was not talking about minigames, I hate that stuff with a passion. What I meant was cleverly hidden solutions as in Ultima Underworld, Wizardry 8 etc.

Perhaps I just missed those in the short time I played DE. What I do remember is messages popping up how much skill points were needed for this and for that, which the programmer part of my brain immediately recognized as pseudocode ( if skill > requirement => profit else => wait ). so all I constantly had to do was checking if I had the required skill points otherwise I needed to find another solution.

But that's the thing: there always WERE other solutions. Hell, I've played the game at least 10+ times through now (play it pretty much once a year, since release), and on my current run I just found a convenient 3rd entrance to the MJ12 tunnels below Hell's Kitchen, from a random sewer grate I hadn't tried yet - might just be me being retarded - I did miss the hidden medbot that you need to use a multitool to get to about 3 steps off the starting ramp on the very first level of the game, for about my first 5 runs.

 

[Reptilian Shapeshifter]

I think the setting and undertones (messages) of DE are the real draw, why many people consider this a great game.

Same thing with The Matrix. There are many layers of meaning to the story, and as your awareness increases, you get something new out of it each time you watch it.

 

[Black]

Speaking of deu sex
http://au.gamespot.com/xbox360/action/d ... ailer?hd=1
Ironsights, popamole cover system, flashy takedowns, quest compass (kind of).
Enjoy.

 

[Carlos' Bitch1]

Speaking of deu sex
http://au.gamespot.com/xbox360/action/d ... ailer?hd=1
Ironsights, popamole cover system, flashy takedowns, quest compass (kind of).
Enjoy.

I am shocked! I never expected that at all.

 

[Radisshu]

What I come up with is Maggie Chow confronting you, wielding one of those super swords, just before you blow up the machine that manufactures the virus, if you don't kill her in her apartment. I guess there are a few more examples, but they still don't add or remove significant parts of the game

Define "a significant part of the game" please, because...

(BG2, for example, at least has a few companion quests during which you can lose your companions permanently)

removing a character is hardly what I call a 'significant part of the game'. How does this add or remove 'a significant part of the game'? What is the significant part we are talking about in regards to BG2?

You've got a point, but a useful party NPC is a much larger part of the overall game (gameplay-wise) - although not significant, so BG2 was a bad example - than JC's brother or Maggie Chow is in Deus Ex (since they are of no consequence, despite some extra dialogue in JC's brother's case and an extra fight in the Chow case).

 

[Jaesun]

Speaking of deu sex
http://au.gamespot.com/xbox360/action/d ... ailer?hd=1
Ironsights, popamole cover system, flashy takedowns, quest compass (kind of).
Enjoy.

OK I watched that whole video.

What I liked:
1. A need to hide bodies.
2. Areas seem much larger, and multiple paths to your objective (they still seem a bit small though, compared to Deus Ex, fucking consoles).
3. The video dialogues briefing you while on the mission, just like in Deus Ex.
4. Also those mission dialogues tell you there might be alternative ways in, like in Deus Ex.
5. Movable boxes.
6. Acknowledgement you went in an alternate way. (Which makes me wonder if they will also acknowledge you (and possible consequences) for doing a mission killing people or not).
7. I kind of like the default FPS view and you only go into 3rd person when doing the Cover System™, instead of it being entirely 3rd person.

The pop-a-mole
1. Auto item highlight. ugh. I hope there is an option to turn that shit off.
2. giganto interface text. Jebus christmas, if you can't scale that down on the PC version Fuck you EIDOS.
3. Like all console ports, I doubt they will take the time to actually give the PC port special and careful attention.
4. While there does include stealth take downs, wasn't it ammo limited (like the cattle prod and other weapons with ammo) or having strength augmentation and using a melee weapon in Deus Ex?

Still have a mild interest in this....

 

[zeitgeist]

1. A need to hide bodies.

Haven't noticed much need to hide bodies in that particular level myself. I mean, the option is there, and the narrator does it, but it seems to be completely useless since there are no guards with overlapping patrol routes or anything like that nearby, and she even states the hiding is "just for fun" each time.

 

[Silellak]

Speaking of deu sex
http://au.gamespot.com/xbox360/action/d ... ailer?hd=1
Ironsights, popamole cover system, flashy takedowns, quest compass (kind of).
Enjoy.

 

[Jaesun]

1. A need to hide bodies.

Haven't noticed much need to hide bodies in that particular level myself. I mean, the option is there, and the narrator does it, but it seems to be completely useless since there are no guards with overlapping patrol routes or anything like that nearby, and she even states the hiding is "just for fun" each time.

Yeah that might be true. I would like some clarification on if there does exists a "enemies are alerted if they see a body AI" element (I've always like that personally).

 

[praetor]

I forgot- Desu and Dark Messiah are, I think, games which represent THE BEST experience system.

You gain exp/skill points for completing objectives, exploration and advancing the story. No bullshit exp from killing goblins or something like that.
Just playing through DE and DM and then switching to Arcanum with its retarded exp system makes me cringe.

i disagree. they're both shitty because, as some other codexer put it in another thread some time ago (iirc, it was draq), both systems suffer from the same "i did some fetch quests and now i'm better with the sword" problem. the best exp system would be a non-retarded, abuse-impervious implementation of the TES system

TES system (or any use based system that has been used in RPGs) sucks almost as much experience based at simulating how learning works in real life. Both are extremely abstractive and from two abstractive, I'll always choose one that is more fun and rewarding, not the one that is only marginally more realistic.

rather than "more realistic" i'd say it's "more plausible" or "it makes more sense" (given what we know how the real world works) because at least it would avoid extremely scenarios like the one described above. of course, i'd also take the DE system over the TES one any day of the week, but that's because the TES implementation is quite shitty and if someone made an actually good implementation of a TES-like use-based system, i'd never go back.

that's also kinda my main problem with CRPGs these days. they don't really use the C part as much as they could (should?) so it's mostly used for graphics and faster calculations of the same old pnp rules. nothing really cool or interesting or creative happened in.. well... forever. come on, people, use what you have to it's fullest potential! with the power of pcs these days you could implement complex, realistic, simulator-level "rulesets" instead of the 5th grade-level-math pnp ones

 

[Vibalist]

rather than "more realistic" i'd say it's "more plausible" or "it makes more sense" (given what we know how the real world works) because at least it would avoid extremely scenarios like the one described above. of course, i'd also take the DE system over the TES one any day of the week, but that's because the TES implementation is quite shitty and if someone made an actually good implementation of a TES-like use-based system, i'd never go back.

Personally I just don't understand the need for realism in an experience system. Surely the system that provides the most enjoyment is the one that should be used, rather than what's most realistic.

I prefer the DX/Bloodlines experience system because if allows people to play the game however they want. That's all an XP system needs to do. Allow the player to gain XP regardless of his playstyle.

 

[J1M]

Similar it is to my favorite games, but I only still wonder how the game fares against my references like Ultima Underworld, System Shock, Thief, VtmB, even Stalker Call of Pripyat and such like.

I will see how it goes.

Blackadder, I didn't mean it literally when I said "popping up a message", but I do remember that the game made it explicitly clear to me what was the exact number of skill points and tools I needed. I remember it felt like I was "paying" for the lock to open, not as if I was really picking it.

Yes, the tutorial throws some game fluff around it but basically there is a cost to open a lock / electronic device and you spend items to open it. As you increase in skill in the related area you become more proficient and require fewer of the items to open the same difficulty of lock.

Alternatively, you can often just blow the door up with a rocket. (Oh no you paid 1 rocket to open the door!)

 

[Bigot_]

Jesus fuck guys, I liked desu-X just as much as the next hard and edgy codexian, but if you can't admit it's overrated as shit you're lying to yourself.

If deus ex had never existed, and that exact same shit came out with newer animations and grafixXXX, half of you would immediately call it new-gen modern streamlined decline with no C&C, then immediately do a scathing review.

Stroyline is generic as fuck. Along the same lines as alpha brotocol with even less C&C. The only major choice you get are whether or not to save paul and the little bit at the end to determine which ending cutscene you get. The whole pacifist thing and not killing innocent guards is only major C&C if you LARP it, since all the game does to reinforce that aspect are what? Two conversations with paul and the weaponmaster guy at HQ? AP (which I thorougly enjoyed, by the way ) has better and more abundant C&C than desu-ex.

Also the stealth system, which is really the only reason the combat isn't garbage, is broken as fuck and guard sight range is horribly easy to abuse. Sure you need to hide bodies but since the guards don't have many overlapping routes it's more for LARPing purposes than anything. Character skill based hacking and shit isn't exactly revolutionary either.
Not to mention that aside from the direct dialogue, a lot of characters and npcs feel so unbelievably artificial it's not even funny. For example it doesn't even make sense how the other trenchcoat-cyborg just lets you waltz right into the rebel's cell during interrogation and sits there watching while the revolutionary ignores him and starts talking viva la propaganda at you, instead of kicking you out or just bitch slapping the guy. Or how the hilariously bad AI lets you block some of the bosses with objects while you complete your objective five inches from his face.

The only thing that really stands out is the atmosphere and the fact that the writing, while it's isn't great, is still better than bioware or beth's.



It's like half of you assholes just hate everything to be hard and edgy instead of having a solid opinion, you contradict yourselves so fucking much.

Edit: Fixed grammar. Tired. Going to sleep. Will respond to rage in the morning.

 

[Jaesun]

Bigot_
Joined: 04 Mar 2011

*yawn*

 

[Bigot_]

Hey jaesun are you aspiring to be to new volourn
If you're going to pussy out of responding to legitimate points by pointing out my join date, I'd say you're well on your way to being a shitposter

Oh wait

You already are

 

[MasterSmithFandango]

Deus Ex is awesome for the same reason that Thief is awesome. It sets you down in an area, tells you to complete an objective, and then lets go. How you complete it is up to you.

The story is fun, but really cliche. The C&C is almost completely cosmetic. The combat is mediocre. The way the levels are designed make up for all of those flaws, and the whole ends up being much greater than the sum of its parts.

 

[Azrael the cat]

Hey jaesun are you aspiring to be to new volourn
If you're going to pussy out of responding to legitimate points by pointing out my join date, I'd say you're well on your way to being a shitposter

Oh wait

You already are

I agree that SOME folks make criticisms of new games that easily apply to DE, but the same applies to almost every crpg that ever existed. If you held all crpgs to Skyway's standards, then barely any would be playable and you'd have to say you always hated the genre - RoA MIGHT get through (though pretty shite C+C) and FO might just get over the line, but that's about it. Hell, the fact that folks rubbish FO2 says a lot. But - and you might have missed this if you've only rocked up recently - people rubbish the SHIT out of skyway for doing that. The folks who love DEx are not the same ones raving about how shite 'blue shirts v red shirts' C+C is and then saying about how great DEx's 'different character says the same lines' stuff is a meaningful choice.

Thing is, there are a bunch of us here who are fans of a whole sub-genre of computer games that are now extinct - just like the tactical rpg and the artistic-rpg are pretty much extinct. Not all of these games are crpgs, but they were part of a lineage that was fucking awesome: Thief1+2, System Shock 2 and Deus Ex (Ultima Underworld was a predecessor, but I'd put it as a slightly different style of game). The modern tps/rpg is a different genre altogether - Mass Effect, even if greatly improved, doesn't allow for exploration or multiple paths. AP had some brilliant story branching, but the underlying style and the third person w/cover setup, even with AP's stealth focus, doesn't really make for multipathed maps.

I'm halfway through 'yet another replay'TM of Deus Ex now, and loving it still. It's got flaws, of course: retarded AI in particular, though the AI is still fun despite its stupidity, and Spector had an unparalleled talent for emergent gameplay, in all of his PC games (on emergent gameplay, even IW had more than most games). It's just got amazing map design and a really fun set of mechanics. If you need perfection then obviously ANY game will fail. But its map design is just plain flat out better than the corridors of Mass Effect and similar recent games - that isn't nostalgia, it's a different design mentality.

What you seem to be complaining about is one of the things that I think DEx does really well in - its simplicity. Underneath all the great level design, the underlying crpg system, choices and mechanics are no more complex than Mass Effect, and significantly simpler than FO3. Anyone who played FO3 or ME could easily play Deus Ex. But the fact that Deus Ex shows how much you can do with a system that is at heart so simple just reinforces how good the design is.

 

[Azrael the cat]

Speaking of deu sex
http://au.gamespot.com/xbox360/action/d ... ailer?hd=1
Ironsights, popamole cover system, flashy takedowns, quest compass (kind of).
Enjoy.

OK I watched that whole video.

What I liked:
1. A need to hide bodies.
2. Areas seem much larger, and multiple paths to your objective (they still seem a bit small though, compared to Deus Ex, fucking consoles).
3. The video dialogues briefing you while on the mission, just like in Deus Ex.
4. Also those mission dialogues tell you there might be alternative ways in, like in Deus Ex.
5. Movable boxes.
6. Acknowledgement you went in an alternate way. (Which makes me wonder if they will also acknowledge you (and possible consequences) for doing a mission killing people or not).
7. I kind of like the default FPS view and you only go into 3rd person when doing the Cover System™, instead of it being entirely 3rd person.

The pop-a-mole
1. Auto item highlight. ugh. I hope there is an option to turn that shit off.
2. giganto interface text. Jebus christmas, if you can't scale that down on the PC version Fuck you EIDOS.
3. Like all console ports, I doubt they will take the time to actually give the PC port special and careful attention.
4. While there does include stealth take downs, wasn't it ammo limited (like the cattle prod and other weapons with ammo) or having strength augmentation and using a melee weapon in Deus Ex?

Still have a mild interest in this....

Replaying at the moment - depends on weapon and build, and enemy type. With lots on melee you can stealth whack anything from behind with a blunt object.

Otherwise, the stealth knocks/kills work as follows:
- early game, prod pwns everything, but later on some types of enemy have insanely high resistance, chewing through a full charger of ammo without dropping if you haven't put any points into low-tech. Remains useful for stealth takedowns if you invest a couple of points into low-tech, even on MiB (important, because using the sword on them results in them exploding in your face).
- early game, a whack with even the baton will drop any NSF or MJ12 ordinary soldier from behind, even with no investment - but needs to be directly behind to the arse, or mostly behind and straight to the head, to take them in one shot with stealth. You can definitely do that up to being captured, as its part of the escape route before you get your gear back - you can always stealth-whack the guard, even without melee investment, and same holds true right until you get up to the UNATCO troops. With them you need at least one point of investment in melee, 2 if you want to get away with not being directly behind, if you're using the baton. Same for very late-game MJ12 troops w/helmets. MiB and Commandos require you to really pump low-tech if you want to stealth-whack them using just the baton.
- dragon-tooth sword (you get it so soon after the regular sword that I'm skipping that) can stealth-kill any humanoid (including MiB and Commandos) without any investment (multiple hits needed for not-stealth kills) in low-tech nor any ammo required. But it's near-useless against enemies that blow up if killed like the MiB (which is why the prod remains useful til the end).

So not quite melee limited, and you won't have any difficulties with having enough prod ammo so long as you make judicious use of the baton and sword (or just invest in low-tech - one point is good enough to make the baton/sword substitutable on enough occasions that you won't run out of prod ammo - once I get the sword, I only use the prod on MiBs anyway). But is certainly made MORE DIFFICULT if you don't build for it.

That's Deus Ex's rpg-elements philosophy in a nutshell anyway, and the difference in its rpg elements compared to SS2. SS2 makes mechanics impossible or ammo/item-limited unless you specifically build for it, Deus Ex leaves all options possible, but makes them easier and more convenient if you actually invest skill points or augs towards it. It's one reason why Deus Ex was so accessible to Doom/Quake players at the time, whilst SS2 had inexcusibly low sales - SS2 requires an understanding of rpg mechanics, and a plan for character build, from the start, and those rpg elements were actually less well known to the FPS-players of the day than they are to hybridised shooter players today. Deus Ex allowed players who had come straight from Doom to play around with different mechanics before deciding what they wanted to commit to. They could try every weapon regardless of type, but just be slower, or less accurate at distance, or with lots of recoil, or use up heaps of tools/picks, but they were never shut out of the mechanic. It's why Bioware's 'ease them in, make it welcoming' philosophy is no excuse for a retarded intro - Deus Ex managed the same thing without retardation being necessary.

 

[Azrael the cat]

Stroyline is generic as fuck.

god was a dream of good government.

'If God did not exist, it would be necessary for man to create him.'

Yep, that's what I think of as the natural Voltaire quote for finishing your generic dragon-slaying computer game storyline.

 

[Bigot_]

Hey jaesun are you aspiring to be to new volourn
If you're going to pussy out of responding to legitimate points by pointing out my join date, I'd say you're well on your way to being a shitposter

Oh wait

You already are

I agree that SOME folks make criticisms of new games that easily apply to DE, but the same applies to almost every crpg that ever existed. If you held all crpgs to Skyway's standards, then barely any would be playable and you'd have to say you always hated the genre - RoA MIGHT get through (though pretty shite C+C) and FO might just get over the line, but that's about it. Hell, the fact that folks rubbish FO2 says a lot. But - and you might have missed this if you've only rocked up recently - people rubbish the SHIT out of skyway for doing that. The folks who love DEx are not the same ones raving about how shite 'blue shirts v red shirts' C+C is and then saying about how great DEx's 'different character says the same lines' stuff is a meaningful choice.

Thing is, there are a bunch of us here who are fans of a whole sub-genre of computer games that are now extinct - just like the tactical rpg and the artistic-rpg are pretty much extinct. Not all of these games are crpgs, but they were part of a lineage that was fucking awesome: Thief1+2, System Shock 2 and Deus Ex (Ultima Underworld was a predecessor, but I'd put it as a slightly different style of game). The modern tps/rpg is a different genre altogether - Mass Effect, even if greatly improved, doesn't allow for exploration or multiple paths. AP had some brilliant story branching, but the underlying style and the third person w/cover setup, even with AP's stealth focus, doesn't really make for multipathed maps.

I'm halfway through 'yet another replay'TM of Deus Ex now, and loving it still. It's got flaws, of course: retarded AI in particular, though the AI is still fun despite its stupidity, and Spector had an unparalleled talent for emergent gameplay, in all of his PC games (on emergent gameplay, even IW had more than most games). It's just got amazing map design and a really fun set of mechanics. If you need perfection then obviously ANY game will fail. But its map design is just plain flat out better than the corridors of Mass Effect and similar recent games - that isn't nostalgia, it's a different design mentality.

What you seem to be complaining about is one of the things that I think DEx does really well in - its simplicity. Underneath all the great level design, the underlying crpg system, choices and mechanics are no more complex than Mass Effect, and significantly simpler than FO3. Anyone who played FO3 or ME could easily play Deus Ex. But the fact that Deus Ex shows how much you can do with a system that is at heart so simple just reinforces how good the design is.

Fair enough, I can agree with most of that, I actually did state that I enjoyed dx (albeit in an, uh, agressive way)

Actually that was the whole point of my original rant, which I seemed to have butchered in my blinding rage. There are a decent number of games out there that have a lot of flaws and don't match up in terms of individual RPG elements to whatever arbitrary standard a lot of people here use (alpha brotocol being one of them) but do end up being a lot of fun, as well as often being more than the sum of their parts.

The part that annoys me are people (here) looking at games that do a lot of those same things right, and then calling it complete shit because the individual elements dont always meet "standards" via piece-by-piece scrutiny. Then those same people have the gall to come to threads like this to praise "classic" games which don't stand up to the same procedure, and more infuriatingly they attempt to do it by praising the same medicore individual elements that they were bashing in a different thread about a different game less than ten days ago.
Hell you can find examples of the above hypocrisy in nearly every dx thread on the codex.

Now, you might be thinking, "wait, so you don't have a problem with deus ex but just want to call half the people here faggots?"
Which would be correct. I'm tired of having to smear my eyes on four or five posts worth of this kind of bullshit in between legitimate points.

 

[Bigot_]

'If God did not exist, it would be necessary for man to create him.'

Yep, that's what I think of as the natural Voltaire quote for finishing your generic dragon-slaying computer game storyline.

No, the storyline itself was generic conspiracy bullshit.

The implementation of that generic storyline and how it was told (the Dialogues with the different AIs in the game being one good example of such) was what made the story very enjoyable rather than painfully boring, not because it was this amazing, sensational new idea for a plot.

Example:
Mass effect 2 had a similar idea with legion and was on the right track trying to get a (pun intended) completely alien worldview, but the reason that legion isn't on the same level as icarus or daedalus is because of how it was written, not because of vastly different base ideas.


Have bethesda do a deus ex remake, using the literal EXACT SAME storyline with rewritten dialogue, and it will be absolute, mind-numbing shit. Because the major appeal of the story in Deus ex is the delivery.

 

[Jaedar]

1. A need to hide bodies.

Haven't noticed much need to hide bodies in that particular level myself. I mean, the option is there, and the narrator does it, but it seems to be completely useless since there are no guards with overlapping patrol routes or anything like that nearby, and she even states the hiding is "just for fun" each time.

Yeah that might be true. I would like some clarification on if there does exists a "enemies are alerted if they see a body AI" element (I've always like that personally).

Some previews mentioned that if a guard stumbles upon a knocked out friend they will set about to revive him. Nothing about what happens when a guard sees a dead body though.

 

[Jaesun]

snip

Thanks Azrael the cat, it's been a while since I have done a no kill run-through in Deus Ex, so my mind was hazy on this.

Some previews mentioned that if a guard stumbles upon a knocked out friend they will set about to revive him. Nothing about what happens when a guard sees a dead body though.

Hopefully we will hear more about them finding dead bodies then Jaedar.

 

[Burning Bridges]

That's Deus Ex's rpg-elements philosophy in a nutshell anyway, and the difference in its rpg elements compared to SS2. SS2 makes mechanics impossible or ammo/item-limited unless you specifically build for it, Deus Ex leaves all options possible, but makes them easier and more convenient if you actually invest skill points or augs towards it. It's one reason why Deus Ex was so accessible to Doom/Quake players at the time, whilst SS2 had inexcusibly low sales - SS2 requires an understanding of rpg mechanics, and a plan for character build, from the start, and those rpg elements were actually less well known to the FPS-players of the day than they are to hybridised shooter players today. Deus Ex allowed players who had come straight from Doom to play around with different mechanics before deciding what they wanted to commit to. They could try every weapon regardless of type, but just be slower, or less accurate at distance, or with lots of recoil, or use up heaps of tools/picks, but they were never shut out of the mechanic. It's why Bioware's 'ease them in, make it welcoming' philosophy is no excuse for a retarded intro - Deus Ex managed the same thing without retardation being necessary.

But that's exactly what I was trying to say, that what little I saw of Deus Ex gameplay is not in the same league as the really great games like System Shock 2. This is not to say that it is not an innovatively open and rewarding game, but it doesn't challenge me the way I like to be challenged.

 

[SCO]

I didn't even kill anyone in game. (except half the secret base on a scripted cutscene )

Playing this way is a good way to see what alters. In all cases, whenever anyone of your allies dies you could avoid it on a previous level, even if it is the shady gun smuggler guy.

You don't even need to kill navarre, though it is a bit gamey (it really should be possible ingame as a script, make her retreat open the door) i admit it.

In fact the only one that i'm sure dies is lebdev (sp) at the plane, (if you knock him down the game treats it the same i think), if you kill Anna he dies later during questioning anyway. You can even knock down the NFS prisoner that Simmons is "questioning".

The game did a lot with little (voice overs).