Deus Ex: Human Revolution...sort of

Well blow me down, as my old man would say. This 'review' is going to be brief, to say the least. So I might as well just get on with it.

The first title in the Deus Ex series was released back in 2000 and I didn't notice. The second title, Deux Ex: Invisible War, hit the shelves in 2003; I didn't notice that either. When the Deus Ex Episode III: Revenge of The Sunglasses barreled it's way into the gaming world I was pinned against a wall by all the press releases, hooting fans of the original title and general rumpus regarding how amazing it would be. I still ignored it because, quite frankly, I saw the Square Enix stamp on it and nearly passed out from the terminal case of Final Fantasy Avoidance Syndrome I suffer from. 

Then Steam had it on sale for £7.99 with all the DLC and I thought to myself, "Why the hell not. You've been missing a good story/shooter of late, what with Hydrophobia only being a few hours long and most other shooters out there being devoid of a compelling narrative, lets give the Japs a pop at impressing me then."

So I did a buy, (my first mistake) followed by a install (and there's the second mistake).

What I'd assumed from the hype surrounding this title, and the metacritic score of 90, is that it would be halfway decent. What I've ended up spending 4 hours of my life playing is a bland and unengaging chimera of various decent genres and/or gameplay mechanics stuffed together and failing to achieve across the board. Think "Ripley7" in Alien Resurrection.

I shall now attempt to surmise why I didn't enjoy this game. Caveat: most of these words are opinions, if you disagree with them then let me know and I shall meet you on the field of valor. 

<-- Pic related.

I booted the game, ran through the titles screen and was greeted with a fairly standard menu screen. My first instinct with new titles is to bolt for the options section and crank everything up to 11 before launching the game, which I did. My second instinct is to check what Steam Achievements/PS3 Trophies are available for playing the game on a certain difficulty or without doing a certain type of kill-move etc. I did this too, saw that I could get two achievements for finishing the game once on hard, three if I never killed anyone, so I decided to begin on Hard and see how that went.

First problem encountered: a boring, extended rail-ride of an introduction where various characters and plot points are thrown at you whilst Adam, the protagonist, gruffly grumbles in a gruff way about gruff things like some shitty Bale/Batman reject mixed with Timothy Olyphant (voiced by Elias Toufexis, who's career involves not being the main voice actor in some medium-to-large titles). Even with my settings at 11 it looks pretty run-of-the-mill, boring, dated and a few other words for shit. The character modelling looked like Goldeneye, but with less rectangular breasts.

This first section just failed to grasp my attention at all, something that the first few minutes of anything, be it game or other media, should be able to do. The Extra Credits team did a great episode that relates to this, comparing the openings of Skyrim and Call of Duty: Modern Warfare and I've no interest in ripping those guys off, so for more information on what I mean, go watch their great vid.

Got pimp slapped by a pre-rendered ring hand

So after the intense rollercoaster-ride of being led about a lab and put in a lift, some shit goes down and then you're given control of Adam. Adam, for all his gruffness, handles like a puppy on a waxed floor. I spent nearly 5 solid minutes tweaking the sensitivity to get him to stop pirouetting every time I even looked at the mouse. So navigating the first few rooms and tutorial sections, which mostly involved some light jogging, a few seconds crawling about through some air ducts and far too much time rifling through peoples private office drawers for candy bars and credits, Adam comes across a few ruffians with firearms and ill-favored looks about them. These gentlemen are preceded by a short tutorial about aiming and firing from behind cover, moving between cover and general combat. This is precisely what I'd expect, and to an extent demand, from a tutorial. Obediently, I trotted into combat, fired off a few rounds at each from cover and emerged victorious. Then, I was nearly sick, because I had flashbacks to the PC/PS3/360 title Quantum of Solace. The combat feels frighteningly similar to the horrific memories I have of that game.

MFW

Now hang on, this game is indeed described in it's Wikipedia entry as "a stealth/science-fiction action role playing game," and not a shooter, so the combat was never going to be of a very high caliber. Having noted that my original reaction might have been a tad over the top, I decided that from now on I'd stick to the stealth aspect and try to get that trophy for not killing anyo.....oh fuckballs. 

Right bunch of cocks, maybe

Skipping a bit forward, through the rest of the tutorial and some frighteningly poor voice acting and exposition, we get to some cut-scenes I can wail on. For some clitting reason there are both in-game as well as pre-rendered cut-scenes.....well, it is Square Enix, so I guess they like doing what they're known for. But the problem with pre-rendered cut-scenes is the gargantuan break in (if there were any) immersion you feel as you watch Adam's oddly pointy chin and uber-slicked hairstyle move from what frankly resembles Half Life 2 polygon modelling (not a slight at HL2, but it is 8 years old now) to deleted scenes from Advent Children. 

Utter bastards

Finally on to the first proper mission. Sneak into a place, find a guy, stop him from doing a bad thing. Right, time to flex those stealth muscles! Something which I very much enjoy, especially coming off the back of my recent Arkham City play through. A quick tutorial about how to silently take down a guard and hide the body and.....HANG THE FUCK ON. You tell me how to knock out a guard NOW?! After I've already been through the combat tutorial and been forced to kill at least 7 people? For fuck's sake, I wanted that trophy.....y'dicks.

Anyway, so a there are a few guards between Adam and the door into the building where the guy with the...etc.etc. and you're told how to take them down individually without detection and where to hide the bodies to avoid raising the alarm. First one goes down, nice and easy. Come round a corner and there are 3 more. So naturally I wait behind cover for an opportune moment, pop out and take down another, and another until they've been dealt with. T'was very easy, but I figured that was just because it was the tutorial area.

Skip ahead a few areas and I'm faced with a large room of computer terminals, with several armed guards patrolling along fixed routes who pause to scratch their balls with the barrel of their gun before turning abruptly around and walking back the other way. Anyone played Ocarina of Time? Remember trying to sneak into Hyrule Castle in order to get to Zelda and you had to get passed her guards? Well, the stealth in Deus Ex: HR is precisely that. But lots. Oh no, I'm wrong, the guards also have a little wiggle/sideways walk that I assume is supposed to look like their scanning the area, y'know, actually doing their job, but it's purely aesthetic. They don't see shit.

By this point, I'm thinking to myself "The combat is shit, the stealth is shit. I'm playing this game why, exactly?" I press on, encouraged by the prospect of a stunning story and Mass Effect-esque dialogue choices that will genuinely have me pausing for minutes on end to reflect upon my choices.

This conversation is balls

Instead, I was rewarded with a series of options for answering each question that are given arbitrary labels; stuff like "AGGRESSIVE" or "EMPATHETIC," which gives little or no indication of the outcome of your choice, other than it'll be vaguely in this sort of direction maybe. Not only is this conversation mechanic pretty damn basic, but I've been told that it can have a serious effect on the outcome of certain parts of the game. From my experience of it I would've assumed it was completely inconsequential, there is no effort made to highlight the fact that it IS indeed important. Lazy. Or stupid. Either/or.

I can't really comment on the plot of the game, as I've only played the first 3-4 hours of it, but the best I can say is that it's completely unengaging, with a protagonist who generates less emotional investment from the player than Kratos does.

I was very disappointed with my experience with Deus Ex: HR, but I'm fully willing to chalk everything up to a combination of three things:

1) I'm not a fan of the way Square Enix games are constructed, narratively and mechanically

2) There was some serious over-hype surrounding this game, that just makes all the flaws seem so much more obvious

3) The game probably gets much more involving were I to sink more hours into it

All three of these points are things that cannot change what I experienced, I'm quite saddened because, on the surface, it sounds like this game is completely my cup of tea, down to the 2 sugars and buttered crumpets. I shan't give a recommendation, because I feel that I've not truly experienced enough of the game to warrant a fully rounded opinion. So, have this instead: