While most of 2011's game related hype will likely be focused on the Battlfield/Call of Duty competition, Skyrim and Batman: Arkham City to a certain extent, I thought that I would take time to talk about games that have peaked my interest. These titles are coming over the next few months, and each has interested me in different ways. First off, Deus Ex: Human Revolution.
The original Deus Ex came out on the PC in 2000, more than a decade ago. I've tried the game, and while in many ways it feels dated and hard to understand, it cannot be denied that the game was very much ahead of its time. Though it used a shooter engine, the game was one of the first that allowed alternative means to complete goals in a genre design (FPS games) that mainly consisted of 'shoot everybody' and now is mainly 'shoot everybody and hide every few seconds'. In Deus Ex, you could fight everyone, but charging in blindly almost always got you killed and there was no regenerating health bar, as this was one year before Halo was released. Players could mostly fight through the game, but had to be very careful and skilled to do so, making good use of every weapon. However, they could also choose to not fight at all, instead using stealth and hiding places to simply walk to their objective. Also included was the option to excel at hacking; normally computer hacking in nearly any game is a secondary skill, but in Deus Ex it was immensely useful. Not only could players turn off security cameras, they could also change robot targets to the players enemies, set off traps, be warned of upcoming enemies and even take money out of people's bank accounts for themselves. In fact, it was common for players short on cash to hack ATM machines or use people's bank account passwords to fund their adventures.
While neither Deus Ex's plot nor engine have aged well, the basic ideas of gamer choice have become incredibly important to the latest RPG and adventure titles. Because of this, I am very interested in the latest installment of the series, despite the last Deus Ex title, Invisible War, having been released in 2003. Previews have left me slightly apprehensive though. So let's discuss why I'm worried about the title, and why I am looking forward to it.
First my worries. In nearly all of the previews of the title, very little has been mentioned about how the game feels to play. Maybe I overlooked this when I was looking over these previews, but they mainly seemed to discuss what was in the game over how much fun previews editors and website correspondents were having with it. This is likely because only brief bits of the seemingly larger game have been shown to the press, but it still remains a worry. Second, the game seems to be trying a bit too hard to be a simple next-gen remake of the original game. While Human Revolution is thankfully a prequel, I'm hoping that the conspiracy laden plot of the original game is put to the side in favor of the 'nature vs. machine' debate that seems to be at the forefront of this prequel, as that would be a more interesting topic to explore. We've had enough of overblown conspiracy theories with Dan Brown thank you. Finally, this is yet another game that seems to have a depressing, dark color palalette, which is just hard to look at. It may indeed be possible that in other areas of the game there are brighter colors, but that does not seem to be the case.
I am still looking forward to the game for a variety of reasons however, chief among them being the gameplay. Normally, I dislike first person games as they are almost always mindless shooters, the possible exception being the Elder Scrolls series. Irrational's Bioshock however, proved that the shooter idea can be expanded and built upon to make something more interesting with the use of Plasmids, traps and the like. Though Human Revolution's basic gameplay has been around since 2000, the idea of giving players choice is still a great concept. It may very well be that the title feels like several distinct games, with one focusing on combat, another stealth, and one half of a game or more dedicated to both hacking and the new conversation option. Likewise, the various augmentations that character Adam Jensen is given add to the choice concept, and I imagine will reward creative players. The overall setting is cool, as it isn't often that designers choose cyberpunk as often as they used to for worlds in games, movies or books. Likewise, the story idea, set twenty five years before the first Deus Ex, is surprisingly contemporary and interesting, revolving around the various debates regarding science and technology.
So Deus Ex: Human Revolution sounds like an interesting game, but the jury is still out on it.It has potential and is one title players should keep their eyes on. Look for a review on Game Scholar Gray when the game comes out, the week of August 23rd.
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