Deus Ex-cellence, Genius (Deus Ex (PC))

Member Name: geddes-i

Product:	Deus Ex (PC)
Date:	07/10/08 (212 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Immersive gameplay thats well balanced, fantastic missions, amazingly well made in every aspect !

Disadvantages: None to be honest unless your real fussy

Deus Ex - Mind Blowingly Good

Intro
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Deus Ex is a First Person Shooter/RPG game set in the not too distant future. Its set in New York and revolves around JC Denton on his first day of work at UNATCO (United Nations Anti-Terrorist Coalition) You are sent in to New York to uncover a cure for the gray deth that is sweeping around killing hundreds of people. The NSF (National Secessionist Forces) have claimed a shipment of the cure known as Ambrosia and are hoping to distribute the cure evenly to those who need it most such as poor working class families. UNATCO on the other hand want it for the upper class people such as the president, vice president and many bureacats. So your sent in to clear up the mess and find the cure. Sounds simple ? But along the way you discover many conspiracys which need answering leading you into an ever increasing plot which grows bigger and bigger as you play on. JC Denton and Paul Denton are both nano augmentated agents (basically many parts of their bodies are super increased through use of roboticular cells and processes) This adds an exciting element to the game as upgrades and skills become available.

Gameplay
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Deus Ex wasnt voted game of the year over and over again for no reason you know. Its success comes mainly from its gameplay and its easy to see why when you play it. Its extremely well balanced and structured no matter how you tend to play. Every action you make during the game has a consequence (kill somone early on and they cant offer info later on, hurt and annoy someone and they will hurt you, run into ladies bathroom and you will get reported as a perv to your Chief in command etc...)

The way the actions you make infulence the gameplay is brilliant and enables much variety as every choice is your own. Instead of being told how to do a mission, you pick your own way of doing the mission. For example you need to access a building and interrogate someone, you can either:

A) Go in all guns blazing shooting everyone in sight (including hostages)
B) Sneak in through use of stealth by finding back entrances, secret tunnels
C) Find additional info from various people including pedestrians walking the streets on ways in
D) Get all the guards outside and blow them up by using a grenade, TNT box, LAM etc..
E) Gas grenade the entrance and sneak in under cover picking off the guards 1 by 1 with silent pistol, baton, crowbar or stun gun. Make sure to hide their bodies.

Etc.... As you see there is so many ways of tackiling a situation and depending on how you do it will depend on the amount of skill points you receive and the credit you recieve from many members within your orginisation.

Another pleasing aspect of the gameplay is the upgrades available. You can upgrade all your skills such as computing skills, weapon skills, swimming skills, electronic skills etc... as well as upgrading your augmentation skills allowing you to get stronger (lift heavier things) hold breath underwater longer, better vision enhancement, better combat strength etc.. The way you upgrade these skills is by obtaining skill points which are achieved by doing various tasks and sub tasks in the game. The more you have the better your upgrades so it really is worth playing through fully and finding every sub task possible.

Multiplayer is even available with this game and although not as good as Single Player its still well worth a go. There is much variety to be had on multiplayer and fun plus many of the aspects used in single player are used in multiplayer.

Graphics
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Graphics arent the strongest point in this game but to be honest when your playing it you dont care as you are so gripped in the immersive gameplay and depth within the missions that much emphasis is taken off the graphics. The indoor locations look quite decent as well as the outdoor ones but the main point with the graphics is lack of detail and everything can look rather bland. There is patches available to increase the asthetic look of the graphics if you are really fussy (which I doubt you will be) the graphics are solid and well constructed but just lack detail.

Sound
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Deus Ex has an amazing array of weird and wonderful sounds, from the basic reloading of a clip, to the upgrades of nano technology and the noises from the robots as they move. Sounds play a big part in this game and even the music that goes along with the on screen action is well thought out. Some of the guns sound poor when they are fired but its really not a big deal cause if you worry about that then you shouldnt even be reading this review.

My Personal Thoughts
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Its no wonder Deus Ex is winner of over 50 game of the year awards. The beauty and depth contained in this game is pure genius and once you play this game it will change your perception of video games forever as you will constantly be wanting the same aspects from this game to appear in every game. The ability to free roam the environment, explore, upgrade, collect, talk to people, make friends and plan out your missions etc... I personally love this game and I think you will as well if you are a fan of strategy based games or first person shooters, hell even both would be best. This game adds a whole new element to the PC gaming genre just like the way Half Life redifined the FPS genre forever.

Overall
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A game that is pure genius. Everything that a game needs is here and everything you want a game to contain is here. In short this is one of the best games available in this genre (along with half life) and its easy to see why. This game can be bought for around £1.99 these days from your high street gaming shops or better still from the internet. At that price its an absolute MUST and should be owned and cherished by every PC owner out there !

Summary: A pure piece of gaming art. Up there with half life in certain ways ! Genius