Deus Ex: Invisible War discussion

[CaptNKILL]

Im a HUGE Deus Ex fan, but after I read the reviews of this game, and I played the demo, I had no intention of spending $50 on it. I tried downloading it but never had any luck (its not illegal if i didnt succeed, right? :D). The thing that ruined it most for me was performance. On my 9600 Pro the game was barely playable at 800x600 with the settings at medium quality, let alone smooth enough to make me happy.

So I got my 6800 GT a few weeks ago and I played the Thief: Deadly Shadows demo. Amazing game, runs great, looks BEAUTIFUL. And it reminded me of DXIW (same game engine), so I looked on Walmarts website and the game is only $20! So I went down there and picked it up.

I'll start off by saying, Deus Ex was almost PERFECT, and thats not something I can say about any other games. So DXIW had a lot to live up to.

After plutting a good 10 hours into the game so far, I can safely say its a worthy sequel to Deus Ex. I dont think its as good as the original, but its VERY fun. DXIW isnt very polished at all, lots of things that could have been worked out better. And the game still doesnt run great, even on a 6800 GT. I play at 1280x1024 everything maxed in game, Bloom on, 4xAF and its smooth some times but usually my framerates are in the low 30s (where as in the Thief demo I could run everything maxed at 1600x1200 8xAF and it never drops below 40).

I think the 1.02 patch that was released for this game helped the gameplay out a lot. Its really fun, and id say, its more addicting that the original, because you keep getting more and more side quests, and they are actually interesting enough that it MAKES you want to do them. I dont really remember many side quests in Deus Ex, any extra objectives were still tied to the main one in some way.

I sort of miss the skills system and getting skill points, and having different kinds of ammo, but those were things that made Deus Ex more interesting, not DXIW. I dont think this game would play the way it does if they had left all of these features in. The pace of this game seems to be fast enough that those features would just get in the way (though the unified ammo system still baffles me... it works well, but its so damn wierd, i dont know why they did it).

Id like to comment on the graphics and sound as well. DXIW's graphics are in some ways great and in other ways crappy. I think they could have done more with LESS effects and MORE quality artists work. The fully bumpmapped textures look amazing, but some are too blurry to look any better than (or even as good as) flat high res textures. The dynamic shadows are AWESOME. They really do add a lot to the game.

And the sound: AMAZING. The guns sound GREAT. They all have punch, yet sound believable (unlike the original where they sounded really cheesey). And the ambience, music and voices are all well done, and nothing seems to be buggy or irritating. Even the sound engine works well, which is hard to believe.

One last thing, and its my biggest gripe with the game: the characters. They look bad, and have no depth. In Deus Ex I actually risks my character's own skin to save his brother because he was a good person and seemed real. The same goes for some other characters, like Mr. Carter and Dr. Rheyes. So far in DXIW, i dont give a damn about anyone. They look like zombies\cyborgs and in the game your character is too self sufficient to rely on them for help, so you never really have a chance to get attached to anyone. In Deus Ex, there was always some small talk between you and other characters that made them seem more real. This is the only thing that I really dont like about DXIW.

So theres my review so far... I havent gotten very far (still in Seattle) but im loving this game. I recommend anyone with a high end video card to go pick this game up. Its fun :)

[nVidi0t]

Pretty spot on review. The problem is I still have a Ti4600 so the game runs like a one legged sloth. It's pretty much unbearable unless I want to end up beating my head on my desk until my eyes fall out. So I'm going to hold out playing this game until I get my 6800 Ultra.

EDIT: I also forgot to mention I also bought the xbox version hoping I could play it on that instead, but even that runs like ****. That combined with the gamepad accuracy makes it all the worse.

[gigapower]

I just bought this game this weekend, never played the original and have been really enjoying DXIW so far.

[SH64]

I played DX:IW but didnt enjoy it really .

however Thief 3 is much much better , although they are not comparable . (DX is FPS RPG / T3 is Stealth FPS)

[Gaco]

I would give DXIW 8.5/10 and Deus Ex 10/10 (Im also a HUGE fan of Deus Ex!)

I really enjoyed playing both games, DXIW is NOT a bad game, if you somehow got that impression ;)

[Edge]

I agree, while DX:IW isn't as good as the original, it's still a very good game in it's own right and offers more than enough to warrent a few playthroughs. However I'm pretty sure DX1 had a LOT more side-quests and multiple solutions to problems, they just aren't always very apperent. For example in one of the first areas, you talk to a girl in a bar, and she mentions that her friend is in trouble from some guy in an alley. You can then proceed to that alley and help out the girl. It definatly isn't required, but it's a nice extra that highly aware players will notice. In DX:IW however, I'm pretty sure I completed 95% of all the sidequests, simply because they were very easy to find. Although I did apperently miss a few weapons along the way, I don't remember getting a Dragon's Tooth Sword or Stealth Pistol in the game, even though I've heard people talk about them. There were way to many biomod canisters though, I had all my mods up to lvl3 and had like 20 extra canisters by the end of the game.

However in overall story I thought DX:IW was actually better than DX1. I liked the setting and plot to DX1, but DX:IW adds some very interesting twists and really suprising revelations, but nothing totally outragous that doesn't make sense (they're the kind of things that make you go "oh, why didn't I realise that before"!). Though the characters in DX:IW are a bit more bland (though it does get more exciting later on), the only character that I was actually interested in was those NG Resonance AI stands, and when you meet the real NG...well...lets just say it's not a match made in heaven. Deus Ex did have some very interesting characters in it, even the AIs seemed to have a very distinct personality *points to avatar*.

Oh, and DEFINATLY get a hold of the Deus Ex: IW Rebirth texture mod pack. It increases the resolution of almost all the textures by 4 fold, and the characters look a bit more "lively" as well.

[CaptNKILL]

Oh, and DEFINATLY get a hold of the Deus Ex: IW Rebirth texture mod pack. It increases the resolution of almost all the textures by 4 fold, and the characters look a bit more "lively" as well.

Hmm... never heard of this, deffinitely looking into it. Thanks! :)

Is there a good DX:IW fansite that has tweaks and downloads and things like that?

[Edge]

Hmm, not really that I know of...I guess you could always try the official Ion Storm forums (they don't seem to mind modding/tweaking projects like that for DX:IW, they actually made the texture pack thread a sticky). Otherwise I'm not sure what other tweaks and extras there are, aside from a few modified INI settings (and most of those don't need to be tweaked anymore thanks to the patches). Oh, and here's the DX:IW Rebirth site: http://www.dx2rebirth.offtopicproductions.com/about.html

[OldOfEvil]

Their were some really good parts about DX:IW, but the bad parts really killed whatever "fun" may have been had. I had the game pre-ordered for a good few months, a huge fan of the first. Aside of the very annoying stability problems, the poor performance ( XP 2800, 9800Pro, gig of ram ) at even modest detail settings turned it into a fairly bitter game experience. I still beat it, and got all the endings. I haven't touched the game sense.

I may have to look into Thief though. My initial reaction was one of antipathy, being based of the DX:IW engine and by a console-ized Ion Storm..

[NAZCA M12]

Funny how people love this game all of a sudden. What's the big idea? Did anyone made a patch that removes the every 3 minutes loading or sth? John P has done an excellent job doing ISA's job and making high-res textures for the characters (he's doing the same for DS btw) but apart from that? IW, like Thief DS had a good story, and there was a good game underneath the **** they did to it. Any game can be said to be ok on its own. What matters for a sequel is how it's doing against the previous one. And both IW and DS have been bombed by Ion. They've turned them from original, complex games into more generic and simplified games with great graphics, tiny cramped levels, thousands of hints, big fat "you should go here" arrows etc (ie what the average crap games are). The PC versions also happen to be lame console ports. And since i'm not in the mood when it comes to such great games being ****ed up, the culprit is a POS console with 64Mb's (and Edge, no it's not PS2 as you usually like to bash in other threads) and the publisher who agreed with MS.

I could join in the ass-kissing of the game as seems to be the trend but i'm very angry on this and i feel someone's got to talk harshly here and say things as they are as much as it hurts. Both games, compared to the originals can't hold a candle. Unless of course a better game is the one with the better graphics. The gaming community has got to learn from these stuff and start demanding more from the publishers instead of sitting on its arse and saying "Sweet" when they see one more unremarkable game with remarkable graphics or yet another ****ed up console port. Otherwise, more "sweet" games with empty/unchallenging/kidstuff gameplay will emerge. More threads to try and modify them into decency will emerge too (have a looksy on the ISA fora).

OldOfEvil, DS is a lot better than IW. Problem is, after IW nothing could get any worse, and something tells me that after the angry reactions from the Deus Ex fans, they tried hard to correct as much as possible with DS (i won't call it Thief III) but eventually, they again run out of time (thanks Eidos). Like it has been correctly said in the past, even if they were willing to, they couldn't un**** in 6 months what they were ****ing up for almost 3 years.

Forgive my language, but i'm very bitter when it comes to Thief DS and even more when it's about IW. That is because a) i'm a veteran of both series (and not one of those guys who goes like "hey dudes, i've started IW/DS/ and it's great but i've never played the originals") and i've seen the "progress" made b) i value graphics as a bonus, it's almost every other part of the gameplay but the looks of it that counts, c) Both games had great potential, good stories and some of the best people in the industry (the Brosius couple for example), yet some of them had their hands tied (they had priorities such as cram everything into 64Mb's, use huge fonts, simplify as much as possible, try to impress 10-year olds, don't test the PC port, there'll be ample of time to fix stuff through patches etc). Although everyone's free to his opinion, it's sad to see people being very happy with games that are more of a step back than a step forward from the originals. That way, we deserve every lame, buggy console port, dumbed down junk that will run almost the same on a high end system as on an Xbox. God forbids that an SS3 ever sees the light of day if it is to have the same philosophy as these two games.

[Skrot]

Nazca: While reading your post I couldn't help but think of Halo. I'm still very bitter about how crap that game turned out to be. Yet another crappy console game on PC. **** you Microsoft! **** you!

[Gaco]

I absolutly agree with everything you just said there, I just pointed out in my post, that IW is NOT a 5/10 or 2/6 rating, as some users and a few reviewers have been making the game to be.

But i really feel your pain too. Having played System Shock 2, Deus Ex 1, Theif 1&2, i was also VERY disappointed in IW. But its still not a below average game. I must confess that I got grapped by the "ass-licking-atmosphere" in here, and I think 7.5/10 suits the game more. But thats also just because of my disappointed-feeling. The game properbly deserves 8/10 to a person, who has never played the original game before.
I just hope that they will make a DX3 and make it GOOD. Im a little tired of the Theif concept after played DS, so I would rahter see a new SS game, than a new Theif game :)

[Holy Smoke]

I actually like Thief: DS a lot. I'm playing it now, or was playing it till I reformated, and I think it truely kicks a$$. The only downside in my book is the non-industrialized part of it (always hated the trickster parts in the original), but apart from that, it's tha shiznit.

Figured I'd continue playing Thief, and give DXIW another shot, after an imminent vid card upgrade.

(My 2cents, you know the drill)

[CaptNKILL]

Funny how people love this game all of a sudden. What's the big idea? Did anyone made a patch that removes the every 3 minutes loading or sth? John P has done an excellent job doing ISA's job and making high-res textures for the characters (he's doing the same for DS btw) but apart from that? IW, like Thief DS had a good story, and there was a good game underneath the **** they did to it. Any game can be said to be ok on its own. What matters for a sequel is how it's doing against the previous one. And both IW and DS have been bombed by Ion. They've turned them from original, complex games into more generic and simplified games with great graphics, tiny cramped levels, thousands of hints, big fat "you should go here" arrows etc (ie what the average crap games are). The PC versions also happen to be lame console ports. And since i'm not in the mood when it comes to such great games being ****ed up, the culprit is a POS console with 64Mb's (and Edge, no it's not PS2 as you usually like to bash in other threads) and the publisher who agreed with MS.

I could join in the ass-kissing of the game as seems to be the trend but i'm very angry on this and i feel someone's got to talk harshly here and say things as they are as much as it hurts. Both games, compared to the originals can't hold a candle. Unless of course a better game is the one with the better graphics. The gaming community has got to learn from these stuff and start demanding more from the publishers instead of sitting on its arse and saying "Sweet" when they see one more unremarkable game with remarkable graphics or yet another ****ed up console port. Otherwise, more "sweet" games with empty/unchallenging/kidstuff gameplay will emerge. More threads to try and modify them into decency will emerge too (have a looksy on the ISA fora).

OldOfEvil, DS is a lot better than IW. Problem is, after IW nothing could get any worse, and something tells me that after the angry reactions from the Deus Ex fans, they tried hard to correct as much as possible with DS (i won't call it Thief III) but eventually, they again run out of time (thanks Eidos). Like it has been correctly said in the past, even if they were willing to, they couldn't un**** in 6 months what they were ****ing up for almost 3 years.

Forgive my language, but i'm very bitter when it comes to Thief DS and even more when it's about IW. That is because a) i'm a veteran of both series (and not one of those guys who goes like "hey dudes, i've started IW/DS/ and it's great but i've never played the originals") and i've seen the "progress" made b) i value graphics as a bonus, it's almost every other part of the gameplay but the looks of it that counts, c) Both games had great potential, good stories and some of the best people in the industry (the Brosius couple for example), yet some of them had their hands tied (they had priorities such as cram everything into 64Mb's, use huge fonts, simplify as much as possible, try to impress 10-year olds, don't test the PC port, there'll be ample of time to fix stuff through patches etc). Although everyone's free to his opinion, it's sad to see people being very happy with games that are more of a step back than a step forward from the originals. That way, we deserve every lame, buggy console port, dumbed down junk that will run almost the same on a high end system as on an Xbox. God forbids that an SS3 ever sees the light of day if it is to have the same philosophy as these two games.
Thats all good but if I enjoy the game, and so do many others, it doesnt mean we are wrong just because some are pissed off and unsatisfied.

I understand what your talking about, but a) I wouldnt (and didnt) spend full price on DXIW and b) I said it wasnt as good as the original. The game was selling for $20 only 4 months after it was released (where as some stay $50 for a year or more), i think thats enough of a kick in the pants for Ion, they dont need people saying we are WRONG for actually enjoying the game. I would have liked it to be better, yeah. And if it was, I would have spent more on it.

I was also unsatisfied with Morrowind and GTA 3 because of severe consolitis. GTA3 i have no intention of playing ever again, but Morrowind is still something i play once in a while. I dont call a game a total failure just because it doesnt live up to my expectations.

EDIT: BTW, no one is kissing the games ass. If Im totaly disapointed with a game, I'll say it. After the patches and a video card upgrade, im happier with DXIW. No need to kiss the game's ass, i actually do enjoy playing it, and i plan on playing it some more in a little while :retard:

[SH0DAN]

DXIW was and still is a very big disapointment,compared to the first game in the series.Which I have played 5 times now ALL the way through.even on the system in my sig,IW runs like ****e !!! and I payed FULL retail for it. :retard:
never again.I hope that IF System Shock 3 is ever made it is done right and I mean done by Irrational Games the makers of SS2.DS which I also payed full
retail for was good,but no where near the quality of the first 2 games...what did
IW/and DS teach me ???? that graphics arent everything...Morrowind ?? I loved
at the time of release and still love today.Butit also has a heavy touch of consolitis,on my old 1.6a@2.53 with 256 megs of ram and a TI4400 it hiccuped
constantly with "loading" screeens,in a game that supposedly had no "loading"
screens.Now with a 2.4A@3.47GHz with a 5900XT and 2 Gigs of very high quality
Pc3200 ram from Corsair and OCZ it still "pauses" every 30 to 40 seconds to "load" areas in a game that I've been told countless times has no "levels" :rolleyes: bull !!!!!! the NDL 3d Engine is crap,it looks very good,but its level load scheme is utter crap...when oh when will someone release a truly scalable 3d engine.....

[Edge]

Funny how people love this game all of a sudden. What's the big idea? Did anyone made a patch that removes the every 3 minutes loading or sth? John P has done an excellent job doing ISA's job and making high-res textures for the characters (he's doing the same for DS btw) but apart from that? IW, like Thief DS had a good story, and there was a good game underneath the **** they did to it. Any game can be said to be ok on its own. What matters for a sequel is how it's doing against the previous one. And both IW and DS have been bombed by Ion. They've turned them from original, complex games into more generic and simplified games with great graphics, tiny cramped levels, thousands of hints, big fat "you should go here" arrows etc (ie what the average crap games are). The PC versions also happen to be lame console ports. And since i'm not in the mood when it comes to such great games being ****ed up, the culprit is a POS console with 64Mb's (and Edge, no it's not PS2 as you usually like to bash in other threads) and the publisher who agreed with MS.

I could join in the ass-kissing of the game as seems to be the trend but i'm very angry on this and i feel someone's got to talk harshly here and say things as they are as much as it hurts. Both games, compared to the originals can't hold a candle. Unless of course a better game is the one with the better graphics. The gaming community has got to learn from these stuff and start demanding more from the publishers instead of sitting on its arse and saying "Sweet" when they see one more unremarkable game with remarkable graphics or yet another ****ed up console port. Otherwise, more "sweet" games with empty/unchallenging/kidstuff gameplay will emerge. More threads to try and modify them into decency will emerge too (have a looksy on the ISA fora).

OldOfEvil, DS is a lot better than IW. Problem is, after IW nothing could get any worse, and something tells me that after the angry reactions from the Deus Ex fans, they tried hard to correct as much as possible with DS (i won't call it Thief III) but eventually, they again run out of time (thanks Eidos). Like it has been correctly said in the past, even if they were willing to, they couldn't un**** in 6 months what they were ****ing up for almost 3 years.

Forgive my language, but i'm very bitter when it comes to Thief DS and even more when it's about IW. That is because a) i'm a veteran of both series (and not one of those guys who goes like "hey dudes, i've started IW/DS/ and it's great but i've never played the originals") and i've seen the "progress" made b) i value graphics as a bonus, it's almost every other part of the gameplay but the looks of it that counts, c) Both games had great potential, good stories and some of the best people in the industry (the Brosius couple for example), yet some of them had their hands tied (they had priorities such as cram everything into 64Mb's, use huge fonts, simplify as much as possible, try to impress 10-year olds, don't test the PC port, there'll be ample of time to fix stuff through patches etc). Although everyone's free to his opinion, it's sad to see people being very happy with games that are more of a step back than a step forward from the originals. That way, we deserve every lame, buggy console port, dumbed down junk that will run almost the same on a high end system as on an Xbox. God forbids that an SS3 ever sees the light of day if it is to have the same philosophy as these two games.

And yet, none of what you said really matters, since there are still many people (including those who played the first DX) who enjoy DX:IW very much. You're no better than the whiners who cryed about how System Shock 2 didn't follow the original System Shock exactly, and was a "disgrace" to the series (yes, there were actually people who were complaining about that when SS2 was released). It's sad when games become a political debate over console vs. PC while actual entertainment and fun take a back seat. Yes, forget about whether or not the game is actually fun, lets instead use it as an excuse to bash on game consoles and their owners, and talk about how all of these developers are in bed with "M$" and are trying to destroy gaming, or something like that.

And btw, since when do I usually bash the PS2? Though it's ironic that you point out that I bash a console, right after you have a field day saying that the Xbox is a POS.

[NAZCA M12]

And yet, none of what you said really matters, since there are still many people (including those who played the first DX) who enjoy DX:IW very much. You're no better than the whiners who cryed about how System Shock 2 didn't follow the original System Shock exactly, and was a "disgrace" to the series (yes, there were actually people who were complaining about that when SS2 was released). It's sad when games become a political debate over console vs. PC while actual entertainment and fun take a back seat. Yes, forget about whether or not the game is actually fun, lets instead use it as an excuse to bash on game consoles and their owners, and talk about how all of these developers are in bed with "M$" and are trying to destroy gaming, or something like that.

And btw, since when do I usually bash the PS2? Though it's ironic that you point out that I bash a console, right after you have a field day saying that the Xbox is a POS.

Yes of course, there is absolutely no doubt that this GOTY material since many people enjoyed it (which they are entitled to of course). You forgot to mention though, if there's "many" people who enjoyed it, how many disgruntled gamers are out there who most certainly didn't? Have you been at the ION fora when the demo and subsequently the full game were released? I wonder what all of a sudden negated the opinion that the game was a definite step back, the numerous angry threads, or the games' low PC sales? Because if you're referring to the Xbox crowd being relatively pleased with it (not that the Xbox sales went through the roof mind you), i'll remind you that the majority of them did not experience its predecessor, hence they cannot do comparisons. Others can.

FYI, i can be a lot better than a whiner. I can be a veteran of the series, a purist, a gamer who like thousands of Deus Ex fans, was promised quite a lot and was left with a half-assed game, a guy who's pissed off at seeing one of his favorite and quite original (and hyped too btw) games being simplified for the masses. What you call a whiner might be a realist who'd prefer to say things the way they are, instead of hiding behind his fanboyism/propagandistic viewpoint of a game just because it happens to be one he values the most.

But since you were so fast pointing out what i am, how about you give us a definition of the "good" gamer. Who's the right kind of gamer, the one who does not complain? The one who will take everything that is served to him, and prefer to keep his mouth shut so as not to be labeled a whiner? Would you say that the Deus Ex community would be a great one if they were to sit back, take stock and say "thank you very much, please do give us more poorly-tested console ports" or a more dynamic one that will make its opinion clear and pass the message to the publisher/devs that indeed "they have noticed"?

Have you seen what has happened to the Deus Ex community? Are you a part of it? Go have a good look over there. You know what most people see? Corpses everywhere, "dead" Deus Ex fans, disgusted new and particularly vets of the series who don't wanna talk about it, or disgruntled people who will just post once in a month to show their "gratitude" about the game, and a few Xboxers saying that they thought it was pretty awesome even though they had no experience of the previous game whatsoever. Occasionally, you might see a raised hand here and there, some heroes trying to reignite the flame of the game after that thoroughly enjoyable sequel but... Next time, try to distinguish the difference between whining/fanboyism for the hell of it and honest, genuine displeasure, sadness and frustration.

I've noticed that you occasionally let an innuendo or two about how crap the PS2 is. You know what? You're dead right. My problem is, everyone likes saying how bad it is but at the same time stresses the incredibly awesome power of the Xbox. Sorry, i have no problem to say that the PS2 nowadays is a POS console, however i don't see how all of a sudden the same does not apply to an Xbox. They used to be great a couple of years ago, not anymore. If you like to see a difference between junk and junk ****, i prefer to focus on the common word: junk. I used to be impartial in the past, i'm not even going to try and pretend to still be. I don't love Xbox anymore for what it did to Thief and Deus Ex alone. I hate Sony for their "if you want to be the first to play GTA: SA, buy a PS2" just as much as i hate MS for their "so you wanna play Halo 2? Buy an Xbox now or you'll get a lame port 2 years after release" attitude. I don't care about their owners, i am one of them. I couldn't care less about PC Vs Consoles. What it matters, is not to see PC's messing with consoles or consoles hurting PC's.

You seem to imply that i put the enjoyment at a back seat only to bash consoles and the companies behind them. First of all, i also stressed that publishers get half the blame for agreeing to do it. I like how you talk about supposed conspiracies between developers trying to destroy gaming but do you think companies like MS or Sonny if it makes you happier don't give a damn about what their market "adversaries" are doing? Do you really believe that they don't try to pry away gamers from other consoles (or even PC gamers)? Do they not try to get exclusive deals for their systems only? GTA, Halo anyone (a game that was originally slated for PC and ended up doing PC users a favour and getting a so-so Xbox port years later)? I think you got some pretty good examples here. How many PC gamers went for a PS2 just to play GTA3? How many bought an Xbox on the strength of Halo? I wouldn't call it a conspiracy. I'd call it, dirty antagonism. Antagonism between companies with a degree of focusing more on damaging their opponents rather than focusing on their own improvement.

But even though you were kidding, fun did get a back seat with IW. You seem to be of the opinion that it probably had nothing to do with its console release? So the Xbox (in our example), had nothing to do with this apart from being unfairly seen as a scapegoat by a bunch of whiners? I'll give you a few facts, questions to consider and also a few rhetorical questions in the end just to make a few of you ponder a bit.

Do you remember when WS started speaking about their primary target being to widen the game, make it less cerebral and more accessible to the increased public (Xbox and PC users combined)? Did that had nothing to do with the game being simplified, with half its RPG elements removed, a bunch of hints being littered all over it to make it easier? Even tiny details, like the resolution being saved in the save (i wonder is this a console trait?) rather than globally, forcing players to start the game in 640x480 mode first, then load their save and get their chosen settings back. For the record, ISA fixed that in the patch after an angry community pointed it out. What about the huge fonts? I reckon they'd look great in a big TV under 640x480 resolution. Coincidence? The consoley HUD? Did you see the first "proper" HUD the game initially had? I'd say for a PC it was pretty uncomfy but worked a lot better in a console. Another coincidence? To quote the Thief games, just my imagination i suppose.

How about the non-existent bug testing, the read only files that somehow passed in the PC RC (and then gold) versions? What about tiny levels? A coincidence too that had nothing to do with the console specs? Absolutely. I'm sure lots of you have read many interviews of the devs/Spector himself or read the IW diaries. Warren openly admitted that map design was affected and limited by the Xbox specs, he pondered what would they give for another 64Mbs of RAM. Also, another dev mentioned that the console version in Deus Ex 1 was more of an afterthought, while in the sequel they took into consideration the console version from the word go and build the game to fit in it rather than the opposite. The absence of the editing tools? Did that happen by accident too? In truth, the DE community was not that big but what about Thief? If they were to release them for Thief DS, they would work for IW as well (they use the same engine) so it wouldn't cost them an extra dime. Did we take nothing because of the proven Thief community and its 400+ fan missions or the 6000+ signatures on our petition to Eidos to release the tools? Did the answer from Eidos "make the game fly in sales and we'll think about it" had anything to do with the game having a console version and the fact that the editing tools and the extra FM's would lure customers? Maybe not. Maybe. Let me spice it up a little bit and make it more perplexed. In one of his interviews, didn't Harvey Smith stress that one of the differences between the two versions in the final game would be higher resolutions on the PC version and also the maps being broken down in small pieces only for the Xbox in order for it to be able to handle them? Did anyone see that happen in the final version? Either the Xbox managed to handle same sized maps as the PC, or the PC version got the consoles' tiny maps.

There are a lot of questions unanswered here. A few of them have been answered candidly by the devs themselves, most of them for the time being we don't really know, we may learn some more in a post mortem article in the future. But since all these stuff is according to some people speculation/excuses to bash honest console companies that only care about the betterment of gaming and not about their money or interests etc, here's a few more questions for them to consider. If a game is released in multiple platforms, would it be better (and when i say better, what matters to them is cost) for the publisher to have one studio handle all of them, or have different ones assigned to each version? Which one would be more convenient, to take the common denominator from two platforms and work on essentially one version then port it to the other platform or work on two different versions? A lot of games in the past few years have been quite short in length, is there any connection with the fact that most of them are multiplatform ones (especially those that have all of their versions handled by the same studio)? If a multiplatform game has quite a few versions, with one of them being a very complete one (say, with editing tools, MP etc) and the other one not so, is it not damaging for the company of the lesser version and its sales? Is it not in that company's best interests to ensure that its baby gets the better version or alternatively that at least others won't take it either? Am i wrong or are some multiplayer stuff (co-op for example) cut out from one version but are present on another one (the upcoming D3, Halo)? Quite a few people lean towards a certain version even if sometimes they did not originally plan to buy it just because a certain feature that they like a lot is exclusively present in it.

Now i could easily choose a simple, dismissive answer but since i had a VERY close look at both Thief DS and Deus Ex IW in the past few years, i chose to pose a few questions because some things just don't add up.

EDIT: Yes, if SS2 had half its features cut out, dumber gameplay, tiny levels, and was buggy as hell in comaparison to SS1, then those heretics would have been spot on.

[Edge]

Wow, now you're just going overboard. Do you have any idea how much of what your saying actually applies to this thread? If anything you've just proven how annoying people who DON'T like DX:IW can be, especially to those that do enjoy it. And yes, and this point you're whining, noone makes a post as long as yours in response to a 1 paragraph unless they're just looking for an excuse to complain.

Anyway, here's a few flaws I see in your "argument". For one, even after all of what you said, you STILL refuse to admit (or is that "conveniently forgot"?) that Deus Ex had problems, and IW had some good points. If DX1 had been released after IW, people would've said "well, it does add a lot, but some things sure are annoying". There was just so much filler in DX, sometimes it seemed like your time was spent as a janitor organising everything and trying to find what you're looking for. Was it really necissary for medpacks to only heal 30 points to a specific body part (which you had 6 of), or should you really have been required to turn on your energy recycling, fast running, and strength booster implant just to walk up to walk up to a damn guy and hit him? And what about the way that you could get a headshot on an enemy, from across the map, with a silenced weapon, and somehow every damn enemy within half a mile knew EXACTLY where you were and came running straight at you, even if you were peaking through a pin-hole in pitch-black darkness? Or how about the way that it was practically impossible to specialise in certain things, and the way that some skills were majorly unbalanced. These were annoying flaws in the first game, some quite severe, but strange that noone points them out a tenth as much as the "flaws" in DX:IW. You know what? At first I didn't like the idea of no skill system, smaller item blocks, condensed biomods, and universal ammo (ESPECIALLY this last one), but all of them were done for a reason (though of varying validity). I remember at the end of DX:IW, I started using a rocket launcher, and I thought to myself "wow, I never used a rocket launcher in DX1, it was impractical using this when I could just use a rifle with explosive rounds and not have to worry about the inventory space and skill upgrade cost from a rocket launcher". Similarly I found myself using bio-mods that in the original I avoided simply because they were so damn inconvenient. Some of these changes weren't even worse, just different, but because it wasn't exactly the same people assumed it was bad. People were so outraged that there wasn't a skill system, that they didn't even notice that the game didn't need it to be fun. Sure, I think if it had a well-done skill system the game could've been better, but considering the original had a horrible skill system that was badly dumbed-down compared to System Shock 2, I think it worked out just fine the way it is.

And it's quite laughable that you blame a CONSOLE (not the developer) for how a game turned out. Yes, blame a piece of hardware for how the gameplay was designed. Do you have any idea how rediculous that sounds at this point? I can point out a dozen games that are on both platforms and show no sign of "dumbing down" for the "console croud", and yet you use this ONE example as "proof" that consoles are destroying PC games. For every DX:IW, there's a KOTOR, Morrowind, Doom 3, Rainbow Six 3, Splinter Cell, Half-life 2, Max Payne 2, Final Fantasy 11 (noone who's played the PC version would say it's dumbed down for console gamers), and Full Spectrum Warrior. The ONE aspect of DX:IW that was cut back for the Xbox was the level size, as I believe it was Warren himself said that he was disapointed that they needed to make the levels smaller to fit in the Xbox's RAM. Otherwise, he said that NOTHING was changed for any specific platform, especially gameplay. Oh sure, I guess he could just be saying that to make the game look good, but if he was really trying to pimp the Xbox, why wouldn't he say something about "oh, the Xbox has PLENTY ram for what we're doing with the game, we never planned on making big levels to begin with!".

Oh, and BTW, since we're in the buisness of asking questions about which platform the game was designed for, here's a few: Why would the design the game for a controller, which is much more difficult to precision aim with than a mouse, and then have an enemy later on that has a weak point in a MICROSCOPICALLY small area on it's back? Why wouldn't they just have the weak point over a large portion of it's back, so that those poor console players would actually have a decent chance of taking it out in one hit? Or why would they still design the inventory and biomod selection system around a keyboard? What, they thought it would be just as easy to use a D-pad to cycle through a dozen different selections than it would be to press 1-6 and f1-f6 on a keyboard? Why didn't they just make it so that left-right quick-selected weapons, and up-down cycled through bio-mods? Why have a PC-esq selection menu at all if the game was designed for a console? As far as your comment about them "cutting out" coop from games like Doom 3 and Halo, it's pretty damn hard to cut out something that doesn't exist. What, are you saying that coop was supposed to be in the PC versions of those games to begin with? Gee, that's strange, I NEVER heard anything about coop being in those games, even before the console versions were announced. They said SPECIFICALLY in the case of Halo that they really wanted to add coop, but that it wasn't practical to add it because it was much more difficult than adding it to a split-screen mode like in the original Xbox version (yeah, like that game needed to be delayed even MORE). Again, you're grasping at straws while you're trying to prove that console games are "destroying" PC gaming.

So anyway, it's just getting annoying that people complain about things rather than look at the good points of it. And you know what the funny thing is? You have a good point: a lot of people that enjoy the game (both PC and Xbox owners) didn't play the first. You know what that tells me? That a lot of people who played the original were spoiled brats who couldn't live with the fact that their precious game was different than they remember (even if not all those changes are for the worst). So basically, we have people who are general game players and don't cling to any specific game saying that DX:IW was good and offered some interesting features, while on the other hand we have a group who played a game religiously that are shocked and appauled at how this new game is, and make 2-page posts about how much it sucks, and the company who made it sucks, and the console that the game was on sucks, and that one platform is destroying another platform's games, etc. I played through the first game a lot, I beat it around 4 times and did everything I possibly could (finding out how to save Jock, seeing what happens if I did/didn't tell Rhayes (sp?) to come with me, exploiting all the different options on what to do, etc), not to mention played through the Cassandra and Zodiac mods, and while I did enjoy the first one quite a bit more, I'm not so diluted that I can't see a game is good in it's own right without being examined and cut down to all it's parts and having those parts directly compared to another game. If anything is destroying gaming, it's players who are just looking for things to complain about (and I'm really confused as to how you're a "fan of the series" when you only liked the first one?).

[NAZCA M12]

Right, good thing use capitals in your answer, bash the length of my response and try to make an impression by a mistake I did. Yes of course I can’t be a fan of the series since I’m not pleased with the sequel. I probably had Thief in my mind when I said that. But reading your post it looks as if you had a bunch of gripes with the original game. Really, was it that bad? Are you sure you are a fan of the original? Your "problems" with the first one sound more like personal whinings to me (which apparently you like accusing others). There was one undeniable, really big problem with the first one that every fan of the original will readily acknowledge: bad performance even on powerful systems. A lot of people like you did not like stuff like the no skill system or the universal ammo on the sequel but if you do play the game and spend some time with it will you not eventually get used to the new changes regardless of them being positive or negative? You give a gamer a game with say, tinier levels than its predecessor that require loading all the time and ask him what he thinks about it the first day. Then let him spend a few days with the game, get a good few hours playing it, and ask him again. Up to a degree, one can always get used to sth that is not up to his liking. I don’t see why he should forget about it afterwards. Btw, ever heard of the "if it ain’t broke don’t fix it" saying?

Lets take the skill system you talked about. Fair enough, you didn’t like it in the first one. Fact is, from having even a so-so skill system (according to you), we got it ripped out on the sequel. From having sth we got nothing. I see the improvement. And btw, the skill system was dumbed down from SS2? Don’t know if anyone told you, but Deus Ex 1 was not a sequel to the SS2. Those games weren’t even made by the same studio (Irrational Vs ISA). That "other game" you said in your paragraph that I compared Deus Ex 2 against, happens to be its predecessor. Hardly another game. You should better compare the sequel with its predecessor too. Instead, you talk about things being cut off in DE2 and people focusing on their absence, not on the fact that the game continued to be fun even if it was simplified. Under normal circumstances one could have agreed with you, but since you’re a fan of the original, you will know that complexity was its middle name. In fact, lots of people were put off by the first game being too complex for their liking but essentially, it was exactly that complex cerebral and immersive experience that distinguished Deus Ex from the other games. Where’s the immersion when you’re asked every 3 minutes if you want to do a map load? Where’s the complexity if half the game is cut out, and the PC version handles like a console? Simplification cannot go hand in hand with games like Deus Ex, not without altering their character. You want a bit of proof of how much "fun" that game was compared to the original? Find the games’ thread on this site, go to the developers’ side, switch to TTLG and see for yourself. You keep mentioning that many people liked the game therefore the argument of it being worse than the original simply does not stand. Instead of generalizing, how about you tell me what was the general response of the majority of the community? What about the sales? Surely with so many people who liked it that much, it must have been a big hit? But I see people saying "I paid for it full price. Never again." Look here dude, if you search the net hard, I’m sure you’ll find "many" people who will love Daikatana for example and claim to be the best thing since sliced bread and a thoroughly enjoyable game. Fact is, they’ll be a minority and most people did not like it. Same goes with Deus Ex 2. I don’t see how so many people complained about it if it was so much "fun".

What is laughable is not me blaming a console for the way it turned out, but you failing to notice that I clearly said its 50-50 between the company behind the console and the publisher that agrees with them. Most of the time, the developer has nothing to do with it. They’re in the middle of it. They don’t even pull the strings, they’re the puppets here. There are a few exceptions to the rule and you know it. If they’re told to do a game in a certain way, they will have to do it. No one can blame them, most studios are constantly fighting for their survival. It’s getting a deal that counts for them.
What is way more laughable however is that you used the examples that you mentioned to prove that consoles in no way affect PC games. Mmm, no. If those nine multiplatform titles were the only ones in the market your argument would be valid. Unfortunately (for your hilarious argument), you forgot the dozens and dozens of "quality" multiplatform junk that we get every year. Those games that go straight to discount and in obscurity, those games that get a half page review on the press (and they deserve it). You focused on the best sellers. How convenient of you. You also forgot to mention that some of those games come from the financially healthy studios/big publishers that have the luxury and the money to pick up secondary studios to handle another version while they focus on their one, instead of opting to work on the lowest common denominator, then port.

You complain about people focusing on the bad things neglecting the good ones? How about those people who constantly try to dismiss the tiny little problems one by one instead of trying to see the full picture, the gaming experience with every single feature missing put together? You know what? I remember lots of people like you back at the ION/TTLG fora when IW and then DS were nearing completion. Do you remember how IW looked at first? I’m sure we all saw the first videos. Did you noticed that all of a sudden there were 5 or 6 months of total silence with no new screenies, vids, any info at all? I remember it well, then all of a sudden the game reappeared and it looked and felt pretty close to what we finally got. It was also then that some bad news from supposed insiders like Bishop TX started floating on the fora. Forget about big levels, there won’t be any water, skill system is non existent, lockpicking’s automatic etc. In the end, those rumours were right. You had users seeing the game looking different now (to the worst), hearing stuff being cut out going "wtf is going on here" and you had the "mature" people on the other side, waiting in a corner to try and belittle everyone, accuse him of whining or immature behavior and repeat like a parrot "the skill system most certainly did not play a role in making DE great", "big levels had nothing to do with the games’ success", "water will not be missed since I didn’t like it" etc. Same happened with DS. When one by one some people started throwing little bombs in the fora (cramped levels, load zones, big focus on the 3rd person camera which was the default one on the box, neglected 1st person movement, no swimmable water, no more introductory cut-scenes before each mission etc) those same people were trying to dismiss everything but always dodged the usual question: "what about missing ALL of these stuff?". Do you know what happened to those guys? When both games were out, most of them never posted again, a few of them being the egoists they were refused to back down although you could see a degree of frustration in their posts, and only one or two openly admitted that the games were indeed worse than their predecessors and they were wrong.

You have every right to like the game as much as you want. I don’t care about that. But don’t give me that overgeneralized crap that all of a sudden lots of people enjoyed it as it was and that the old hardware that the game was built around had more or less no effect on it...

[Edge]

OK, this is getting complex, so I'll start quoting things directly and responding to them:

Your "problems" with the first one sound more like personal whinings to me (which apparently you like accusing others).

Yes, and that's exactly the point. They are problems, and they do affect the game, but like the flaws in DX:IW I didn't let them destroy the game for me. Why IS it that few people point out these flaws in the original DX, but then those same people go on to say what was wrong with IW? Why do people "whine" about the flaws in IW and yet you don't see nearly as many people whine about the flaws in DX1? One could say that IW has more flaws, but that doesn't explain why almost noone talks about the flaws in the original game which are present and do affect the game in a detremental way (especially the AI issue of knowing exactly where you are after you fire a shot).

And btw, the skill system was dumbed down from SS2? Don’t know if anyone told you, but Deus Ex 1 was not a sequel to the SS2. Those games weren’t even made by the same studio (Irrational Vs ISA). That "other game" you said in your paragraph that I compared Deus Ex 2 against, happens to be its predecessor. Hardly another game. You should better compare the sequel with its predecessor too.

And that's exactly it: it is a different game, they have totally different stories, but 5 minutes with Deus Ex 1 and it's easy to see the similarities to System Shock 2. Different developers, but key team members were the same, and their influence is very noticable. But that's the thing: with DX:IW everyone was expecting it to be a better version of DX1, whereas with DX1 there were really no expectations. If IW was released in place of DX1, do you REALLY think the game would've been bashed as much as it did? Or if DX1 was being heralded as "the next step from System Shock 2", or "From the creator of System Shock 2", don't you think more people would've been quick to point out it's lacking skill system? In the end it seems advertisement and hype affect our perception of games more than we realise, I wonder if they didn't put the Deus Ex title on Invisible War how many people really would've complained about the game. No, IW is not as good as DX1 overall, that's been established, but saying it's simply a terrible game because it doesn't match up to another game (even it's predecessor) is foolish. Not to mention it baffles me why games like Homeworld 2 weren't given the same treatment even though they receved a similar amount of "dumbing down" and taking steps backwards from previous games in the series (while taking a small step forward in graphics). System Shock 2 was just as different from System Shock 1 was DX:IW was from DX1, so why shouldn't we see threads about how much System Shock 2 sucks and that it's a disgrace to the series because it betrays the model that System Shock 1 set?

What is laughable is not me blaming a console for the way it turned out, but you failing to notice that I clearly said its 50-50 between the company behind the console and the publisher that agrees with them. Most of the time, the developer has nothing to do with it. They’re in the middle of it. They don’t even pull the strings, they’re the puppets here. There are a few exceptions to the rule and you know it. If they’re told to do a game in a certain way, they will have to do it. No one can blame them, most studios are constantly fighting for their survival. It’s getting a deal that counts for them.

No, what is laughable is that you think the platform has any sway at all on the GAMEPLAY of a game. Technical issues are one thing, but saying that it was a piece of hardware's fault that they removed a skill system from the game? Even if MS did strike a deal with these PC companies to bring their games to the Xbox, I highly doubt part of that deal included "dumbing down" the gameplay (especially when they've worked to secure games like KOTOR and Full Spectrum Warrior, though I'm not sure how much influence MS actually had on those deals).

What is way more laughable however is that you used the examples that you mentioned to prove that consoles in no way affect PC games. Mmm, no. If those nine multiplatform titles were the only ones in the market your argument would be valid. Unfortunately (for your hilarious argument), you forgot the dozens and dozens of "quality" multiplatform junk that we get every year. Those games that go straight to discount and in obscurity, those games that get a half page review on the press (and they deserve it). You focused on the best sellers. How convenient of you. You also forgot to mention that some of those games come from the financially healthy studios/big publishers that have the luxury and the money to pick up secondary studios to handle another version while they focus on their one, instead of opting to work on the lowest common denominator, then port.

Umm, and what "PC" games have honestly SUFFERED from being developed along-side the console version? And I'm not talking about ports done a year after the original game is released, both platforms get crappy ports from the other platform, I'm talking about games that have always had the PC version in mind while they worked on the console version. Go ahead, name a few games that were developed simultaniously on both platforms where the PC version actually got shafted due to the console version (I'll even help you by starting out the list: Oni. Your turn). I'm willing to bet a majority of the games you would list are simply bad ports that never had the PC version in mind to begin with.

You complain about people focusing on the bad things neglecting the good ones? How about those people who constantly try to dismiss the tiny little problems one by one instead of trying to see the full picture, the gaming experience with every single feature missing put together?

No, it's not OK to totally neglect issues with the game either, after all, how are companies supposed to make their game better unless they know what we want? But pulling reasons out of your ass for why a game should have something is hardly progress either. People complained greatly about the lack of a skill system in DX:IW, but how many REALLY played the game and actually thought the game would be better with a skill system, but DIDN'T directly compare the game to the first Deus Ex? How many people OBJECTIVELY looked at what was wrong with the game, rather than immediatly complaining about things that they remember were in a game that they played years ago? Why is it for every hundred people that complain about the lack of a skill system in DX:IW, there's maybe 1 that complains about the removal of the formation system in Homeworld 2 (and THAT is one game where I was CONSTANTLY thinking how much better the game would've been with that feature, I don't know how many times I wished I could set up my fighters up in a pattern where they could constantly attack an enemy from all sides rather than flying around like drunk bumblebees). Read my earlier post on this forum: I point out that IW isn't as good as DX1 and has it's flaws, so I'm certainly not one of those people who are ignoring issues with these games. On the other hand, you make a HUGE deal about the small areas and loading times in IW

Oh, and just one more thing I have to mention:

lockpicking’s automatic

Umm, lockpicking has ALWAYS been automatic in the Deus Ex games (both the first and second one), are you sure you're thinking of the right game? If you're complaining about automatic lockpicking in IW, why didn't you complain about it in DX1?

[jsn117]

I just started playing through this game after reading angels and demons (a book about the Illuminati). This game was UNPLAYABLE on my 9800XT, I decided to give it another go. 12X10 AF 4X runs in the 40's with occasional dips into the 10's :lame:

but if you can get past the fact that the game has horribly written code (i've played betas - alphas with better rates :) ) then the story is quite enjoyable. I still can't believe that Far Cry runs better on higher settings :rolleyes:

it's painfully obvious that the game was made for the PS2, at some point the developers had a choice to make....create a work of art or make money by dumbing down your product and pondering to the console crowd.

[Ninja Prime]

I just started playing through this game after reading angels and demons (a book about the Illuminati). This game was UNPLAYABLE on my 9800XT, I decided to give it another go. 12X10 AF 4X runs in the 40's with occasional dips into the 10's :lame:

but if you can get past the fact that the game has horribly written code (i've played betas - alphas with better rates :) ) then the story is quite enjoyable. I still can't believe that Far Cry runs better on higher settings :rolleyes:

it's painfully obvious that the game was made for the PS2, at some point the developers had a choice to make....create a work of art or make money by dumbing down your product and pondering to the console crowd.


Wouldn't be so bad if it looked as good as that framerate and power-hunger implied, but it takes all that power and still looks like some game made 3 years ago...

[Edge]

I don't know of any games that had full real-time lighting and shadows 3 years ago. In fact, I can only think of two other games total that have that feature, and one of those games runs on the DX:IW engine.