HDTP Final?

[Jonas]

The biggest problem with DX2/IW is the amount of self-righteousness it apparently spawns in one particular person who likes to think he's better than everybody else because he realises what nobody else understands, that "both are great for different reasons". Armed with this startling piece of universal truth, this person will happily tell us all how utterly, shamefully wrong we are, and how he is the only person in the world whose opinion shouldn't be classified as "whining".

But what does he know. IW SUCKS!!!!!!!!

[chris the cynic]

It was pushing the same concepts of DX, albeit simplified, but then DX's were overcomplex and conflicted with eachother (you have the skills system, the useless augs, and items that do the same jobs as most of the augs).

So, if I am reading this correctly, you are saying that resource management was one of the mistakes Deus Ex made. Is that correct?

[DaveW]

It was pushing the same concepts of DX, albeit simplified, but then DX's were overcomplex and conflicted with eachother (you have the skills system, the useless augs, and items that do the same jobs as most of the augs).

So, if I am reading this correctly, you are saying that resource management was one of the mistakes Deus Ex made. Is that correct?

No, I'm saying that resource management was one of the things DX got right, but to a degree. While IW's was over-simplified, I think DX's was over complex - a middle ground would be the 'ideal'.

Jonas, I'm not saying I'm highly enlightened, I'm saying that people repeating boring rubbish that has been heard hundreds of times before should just keep it to themselves if they don't want to rationally debate it. But I guess shrugging it off as arrogance rather than an attempt to promote some intelligent debate is easier for you.

[Hashi]

lol nubs I enjoyed IW. Had some cool music, my only gripe was that it didnt run properly lol..the technical side was utter crap. But when I got a new pc and was able to play everything on max settings with only the slightest amount of lag, it was quite a fun game. It has more action and the guns look cool when they fire, but that's not really a bad thing.

Meh its best not to compare it to the original, especially if your a fanboy who says "omg its the besssstttttt etc" Which is what I do, so I don't bother comparing IW to the original and just have fun playing the game

[encinodude]

Compared to the original, IW is suckage. On its own, it's an average -- hell, even decent -- game. It's hard to view it on its own merits, though, because it was developed as a sequel and has direct ties to DX which is a far, far superior product. The bottom line is that it failed utterly at being a better game, which is what any kind of sequel should be.

[Jonas]

Jonas, I'm not saying I'm highly enlightened, I'm saying that people repeating boring rubbish that has been heard hundreds of times before should just keep it to themselves if they don't want to rationally debate it. But I guess shrugging it off as arrogance rather than an attempt to promote some intelligent debate is easier for you.

If you want to promote intelligent debate, you may want to not start your argument out with proclaiming that everybody else is whining.

Just saying.

Meanwhile, my opinion is that judged on its own merits, IW is a fun and entertaining game with a fair amount of depth, and a good example of a game where a limited input can result in a huge variety of output. If compared to Deus Ex, however, it lacks long-term choice and consequence, it trivialises your actions, its levels are too cramped and suffer from a huge lack atmosphere, its resource management has been simplified to the point that I hesitate to pronounce the RPG part of FPSRPG, its tactical options have been crippled by the introduction of universal ammo (yes, that dead old horse is not getting any deader, but it hasn't gone away either), and its story is far less engaging because the pacing is more than a little broken.

Some of these criticisms are subjective, some are founded in analysis, but they are the same criticisms I always bring up. Nothing has made me change my mind significantly since the first time I presented them, so I can either repeat them or stay out of the discussion (which I do often, but "change your mind or shut up" doesn't seem conducive to a debate, eh?)

[DaveW]

Well for a start I didn't say everybody was whining, I just suggested most were. And that die-hard fans of the original tend to be too stuck in their mind about comparing it directly to the original (which is seen as perfect) and rarely seeing the merits of both.

I ended up arguing this to endless length at TTLG and found that most people had the mostly oddly formed opinion of IW. Most criticised it for things DX did plenty of times, I remember one person saying that they thought it sucked because, quite honestly, some people that spoke to you switched from infolink to a hololink message. Like DX does a number of times (although hololinks are far less plentiful in the original). They couldn't really rationalise that once I pointed it out.

That said, to your criticisms - while I agree with most to a degree I would say Deus Ex has very little choice and consequence, while IW at least had plenty of choice. The issue, of course, is that the choices you made could be reversed later by helping out a faction later on, but I can't think of anything like that in the original. There were small choices you could make I suppose, but the majority were made for you (you have to help Paul and help the NSF, for instance, even if you've been loyal to UNATCO all along). Also, while cramped, I thought the game had much, much more atmosphere thanks to the lighting system, physics, and more 'atmospheric' music.

And if you thought I was suggesting "change your mind or shut up", you need to re-read my post. I was criticising throw-away statements that have very little logic backing them up, which is about 90% of comments made on IW.

[Jaedar]

There were small choices you could make I suppose, but the majority were made for you (you have to help Paul and help the NSF, for instance, even if you've been loyal to UNATCO all along)

You get to choose why you gelp Paul though, is it because he is your brother or because you have actual doubts about the way UNATCO handles things. How you act in lebadevs jet decides this to a certain extent. What you did almost never changed, why you did it? Could change a lot depending on your choices.

[Jonas]

That said, to your criticisms - while I agree with most to a degree I would say Deus Ex has very little choice and consequence, while IW at least had plenty of choice. The issue, of course, is that the choices you made could be reversed later by helping out a faction later on, but I can't think of anything like that in the original. There were small choices you could make I suppose, but the majority were made for you (you have to help Paul and help the NSF, for instance, even if you've been loyal to UNATCO all along).

The major thing is that your play style changed people's attitude towards you, which was a fairly big deal to me back then, and it's still something you don't see a lot of. Invisible War kinda did away with that IIRC in favour of more macro-level choices like which mission to do or which faction to support, but as you said, those choices were reversible or even made irrelevant by the game's own plot (twice they did this - twice. First with the revelation that the WTO and the Order were both fronts for the Illuminati, and later they repeated the trick with the coffee shop side missions).

That said, I appreciated the plentiful opportunities in IW to affect the plot slightly by killing important people, and the much more complicated faction relations at the end. I no longer remember if it was actually possible to close certain endings for yourself by killing the key characters before Liberty Island, but I seem to recall something like that, and I believe it was the inspiration for the way we handled TNM's endings.

IW just strikes me as a much more whimsical game. It doesn't matter who you side with, the other guys will still keep offering you missions, and you'll still be able to get their endings in the end. Even the goddamn templars who you've been fighting all along. Plenty of choice, zero consequence. It's almost the opposite of Deus Ex, which has less choice but plenty of consequence, even consequence to actions that aren't explicit choices

Also, while cramped, I thought the game had much, much more atmosphere thanks to the lighting system, physics, and more 'atmospheric' music.

Okay well we'll have to agree to disagree on that. I couldn't really believe in Invisible War's levels as spaces where people lived, worked, or just existed. It failed to immerse me because its world was too game-like, too obviously designed.

[Xesum]

Did IW even have music?

[Jaedar]

And lets not forget Iw's greatat Sin: not allowing you to level a level while someone is gabbing on and on over the infolink. And asking whether you want to leave the level or not.(No I just clicked the "Travel to small space #21" because I thought it would give me candy, thanks for asking though.)

[bobby 55]

The lighting, melee to emp aug, and a things like bot domination I liked. However I could not get wrapped up in it as I did DX. I couldn't feel my choices were were of much consequence. I've never said I didn't like it compared to DX. But IW for me just didn't have the replay factor.

[Footkerchief]

Does Maggie Chow still look like this?

[Xesum]

I think so.

[DaveW]

You get to choose why you gelp Paul though, is it because he is your brother or because you have actual doubts about the way UNATCO handles things. How you act in lebadevs jet decides this to a certain extent..

Honestly, in my first playthrough I helped him because it was the only way I knew of to advance the plot. And you can also break the game by going to the NSF base and then coming back, then you're forced to help him.

The major thing is that your play style changed people's attitude towards you, which was a fairly big deal to me back then, and it's still something you don't see a lot of. Invisible War kinda did away with that IIRC in favour of more macro-level choices like which mission to do or which faction to support, but as you said, those choices were reversible or even made irrelevant by the game's own plot (twice they did this - twice. First with the revelation that the WTO and the Order were both fronts for the Illuminati, and later they repeated the trick with the coffee shop side missions).

I still think this happens to some degree in IW, probably a bit less emphasis on it but people do act differently towards you. The most obvious example is if you shoot up the WTO HQ in Trier, Dumier gets pissed off at you. This is what I mean by both have flaws in different respects, though - in Deus Ex you were forced along a linear path on who to follow, and IW gave you a false illusion of who you work with. That said there are missions you can choose against different factions which I thought was quite cool (if you're with the WTO when you arrive in Cairo, you get the Nassif greenhouse mission objective for instance).

I certainly think that, if it was as long as the original, it would be more replayable because of this. Not that I don't enjoy replaying Deus Ex, but only being able to take the same path each time is a bit limiting (maybe you go about that path a bit differently, but it is the same path).

That said, I appreciated the plentiful opportunities in IW to affect the plot slightly by killing important people, and the much more complicated faction relations at the end. I no longer remember if it was actually possible to close certain endings for yourself by killing the key characters before Liberty Island, but I seem to recall something like that, and I believe it was the inspiration for the way we handled TNM's endings.

IW just strikes me as a much more whimsical game. It doesn't matter who you side with, the other guys will still keep offering you missions, and you'll still be able to get their endings in the end. Even the goddamn templars who you've been fighting all along. Plenty of choice, zero consequence. It's almost the opposite of Deus Ex, which has less choice but plenty of consequence, even consequence to actions that aren't explicit choices

Unfortunately, like in Deus Ex there's a point at the end where you have a last chance to swap sides completely. You can piss off the Templars by killing everyone in Cairo and freeing Paul, but if you transmit the signal to them they side with you. How you act in Cairo does affect who is after you on Liberty Island though.

Although I do get your point about being more whimsical - the general attitude of the game is more cosy than the world of the original, but I wouldn't say Deus Ex had plenty of consequence while IW had none. I'd say both have very little, really.

Okay well we'll have to agree to disagree on that. I couldn't really believe in Invisible War's levels as spaces where people lived, worked, or just existed. It failed to immerse me because its world was too game-like, too obviously designed.

Outside areas definitely suffered at the hands of the XBox, but I loved the inside levels with the lighting system.