As I told Amitage the other day, the graphics seem to have "Halo 3 syndrome," impressive metallic surfaces and good lighting but awful human faces and random low resolution objects. However, I've become accustomed to the look now, and it doesn't bother me much anymore. I have some pictures posted of a few different areas in the game through my Steam account. It looks quite nice much of the time, although you can always find out of place elements that look like they are from last generation or something. BTW, I think I saw good benchmarks with the GTX 460 1 GB for this game. Also, the augmentations that allow you to punch through walls and to survive falls from any height have been more useful than expected. I have also spent half of the game or more just breaking into stuff with hacking and sneaking around. I've enjoyed the story so far. I have pulled some late night sessions driven by curiously.
It runs fine for the most part, but I get some nasty stuttering whenever it loads anything. It seems to be a very common problem. Maybe a patch is on the way.
I've found sneaking though vents and hacking into robots and turrents to be among the most amusing ways to defeat enemies. They clean out the area very quickly. As a heads up for later in the game, if you are building a hacking/stealth type of character, don't neglect combat survival augmentations too much. Combat picks up later in the game, which led to multiple consecutive deaths for me, although occasionally I've found ways to escape even when ambushed by groups of armored soldiers. It's a good idea to keep an eye out for vents and escape routes. Also, EMP grenades are brutally powerful against the big mechs. I was stunned that I took one out with one well-placed EMP grenade. I'd recommend always carrying a couple of them just in case.
I haven't really decided what direction I want to go in with my character yet. I'm not much for stealth, so I may go with a walking tank type of thing.
My impressions so far Pros: -The augments are fun to play around with -good music -some art direction is really good, especially for the Chinese super city you travel to later in the game -bleak, dystopian atmosphere Cons -graphics look quite dated and ugly even on high settings -stutters horribly whenever it needs to load anything, which happens frequently in the cities -Horrible, face palm inducing dialogue and voice acting -Forces you to use the stealth/hacking play style or you get jack for upgrade points -Enemy AI is dumb, which makes the emphasis on stealth kind of ridiculous. The console versions might be harder because of the bad controls, but on the PC the enemies are really easy to kill. You'll be resisting the urge to just walk in and blow everyone away. -crappy boss fights
Killing enemies isn't difficult. Finishing an area without ever being detected is a different matter. If you think the combat is too easy, why not try stealth and non-lethal weapons only? That's how I usually play MGS4 and this game.
I think I may switch to that play style. It's way too easy to clear out a room with a bunch of silenced headshots before the enemies even know what's happening. This game kind of threw me a curve ball. Deus Ex was not a stealth game, and I'm not a huge fan of stealth games.
Borrowed this from work the other day, overall I thought it was a pretty solid game albeit not spectacular, I would describe it as a poor man's Metal Gear Solid. I enjoyed the stealth aspect of the game and fact there were multiple ways of completing an objective, however there weren't enough Bosses for my liking and I thought the augmentation system was a little Lacking, glad I didn't pay for it.
I actually disliked the boss encounters somewhat and found them to be somewhat jarring and unnecessary. I decimated the tough guy from the cutscenes in seconds with a powered up shotgun. If anything, I would have preferred less of boss encounters unless they can outsource that component to Kojima. To me, sneaking, hacking, and uncovering new information was how I preferred to spend my time. I may like this game more than most because I am such a Metal Gear fan. I played through MGS4 close to a dozen times and earned the coveted Big Boss Emblem. The stealth and multiple paths and gameplay style approaches are very appealing to me. I also think stealth and hacking are highlights of Human Revolution and the way I'd recommend one approach it.
That's exactly how I would describe it. This game isn't Deus Ex. It's a Metal Gear/Splinter Cell knockoff. And the thing is, I hate stealth games. I'm glad I didn't pay for it either. This is a bargain bin game. It's really not that great, and I would even go as far as to say that Invisible War was a better game. Anyone considering this should wait for it to get very cheap on Steam. It's a shame that now that Ion Storm no longer exists someone better didn't get the rights to Deus Ex. Bioware probably could have made a badass Deus Ex sequel, but instead we got this mediocre thing from Eidos/Square Enix. On another note, I'm finding the stuttering in the cities very annoying. I can't believe that issue hasn't been patched yet. Did anyone play test this?
Steam has a massive thread on the issue. Even people with monster setups are seeing it. Although it seems far more prevalent with nvidia cards. The only people not seeing it seem to be a handful of people with AMD/ATI cards. http://forums.steampowered.com/forums/showthread.php?t=2075294
It appears to be sponsored by AMD and may have been programmed with preference for AMD cards. I get flickering when I Tab+Shift and occasionally elsewhere related to Crossfire issues (it usually takes awhile to get that sorted; it's not uncommon unfortunately), but otherwise it has ran quite well for me.
My attitude towards this game is changing as I play further into it. The levels in Shanghai are pretty damn cool, and would feel right at home in the original Deus Ex. The two level Chinese super city is like something out of Blade Runner. It's a cool idea, and some of the art direction is brilliant. I'm not sure why the early missions in Detroit sucked so badly, but if you slog through them you will be rewarded. It's a slow starter I guess. Right now I'd say this is a solid 8/10 for me.
That's a vast improvement over your previous verdict. You were beginning to persuade me not to buy it, now I just don't know!
I’ve played through the first mission and here are my thoughts. The graphics are sort of annoying. Everything is so flat and bland. Lighting effects seem to be missing. As mentioned character models are a bit weird but I can chalk that up to artistic style. Game play seems fine and the story has potential. Everything runs smooth and I haven’t seen any stuttering. If I had to score it right now I’d give it a 7/10.