Deus Ex is a classic, a cult game considered by many to be one of the best ever

made, so its not surprising that even eleven years after it was released, there i
s still a strong fan base which awaited with interest another member of the seri
es. So enters the scene Human Revolution, announced in 2008 as the first title t
o be developed by Eidos Montreal, its a prequel that shows us the world as it was
25 years before the events in the original game
Tin Man

Now that the famous first paragraph is done, we can talk business. In the year 2
027, nanotechnological augmentation was just a pretty dream, with biomechanical
technology being the state of the art. These methods were crude, causing bad sid
e effects, the most important being the rejection syndrome, which required drugs
to be kept in control. Not to mention that the surgery needed for one of these
augmentations was also very expensive. At a time when new technology was disco
vered every day, companies specialized in human augmentation battle for supremac
y in a world where everything is privatized, including the army. Adam Jensen, ex
SWAT, is hired by one of these companies (Sarif Industries) as a security speci
alist and hes about to guard a conference where his ex-lover, also working for Sa
rif Industries, will unveil a new technology meant to make augmentation affordab
le for everyone by eliminating the rejection syndrome and so the dependence on d
rugs, in other words a groundbreaking discovery. Well, the conference in case ne
ver happens because, while in a meeting with David Sarif (his boss, and CEO of S
arif Industries), the company gets attacked and everything goes to hell. After a
rather short fight with one of the mercenary leaders responsible for the attack
, we witness what happens on an operating table and before you know it, Adam is
half robot. Yeah, the beginning isnt especially good, but things get better. Next
follows the exploration of Sarif Industries headquarters, where we can enter ea
ch and every workers office and listen to the gossip in the relaxation areas, jus
t about right to get a general idea of the surrounding environment, then were sen
d in the first mission. Dont be scared! Although the game progresses with each mi
ssion, its not entirely linear and we will get the chance to go out in the world
and explore.

I cant say what happens next because I would reveal too much, but after this firs
t mission we gain access to the city and the RPG side of Human Revolution become
s obvious. To this side we can also add the abilities (implants) that can be upg
raded and even have a logical explanation. It seems that after the surgery Adam
was weakened, so a good part of his augmentations have to be manually activated.
This activation is done using Praxis Points, which we get by accumulating experie
nce. You know the story, not all of the implants can be upgraded to the maximum
level, so the way you decide to invest praxis points will influence the way the
game is played. For example, neglecting the hacking augmentation will severely l
imit the number of ways you can complete a mission. We will get to travel quite
often throughout the story, starting with Detroit, a city fallen from grace afte
r the collapse of its automotive industry, infested by constant gang confrontati
ons and the conflict between the supporters of augmentation and the ones that th
ink it somehow destroys the essence of the human race. On the other side of the
world, in China, we visit Hengsha, an island where overpopulation has led to the
construction of a second street level, with roofs being heavily circulated. Her
e the nightlife represents the main attraction, with clubs for the rich and even
a brothel. These two locations (cities) are the biggest from an exploration poi
nt of view, and here is where we find side quests or shops from where to buy or
sell weapons and equipment.

These cities are also a good place to observe the main selling point of the game
: freedom. More precise, the freedom to take care of every mission in the way we
see fit, because the locations arent especially big and theres even artificial ba
rriers that stop us from going to certain areas. A good example of how the alter
native routes to an objective are implemented is the point in story when we have
to infiltrate a police station. Here the game gives you at least three choices:
the main entrance, where you have to convince the receptionist (an old colleagu
e of Adam) to give you access inside the station, or we have the back entrance a
nd the roof access (there may be another entry point from the sewers). For the l
ast two choices you will inevitably have to hack the security on a few doors and
to avoid any cameras. Then we have the different situations for each access poi
nt, maybe convincing the receptionist didnt go so well, so another path has to be
used, but then maybe the security level of one of the doors is too high, so ano
ther solution is needed and this keeps on going until you reach the objective. F
or those of you that played Deus Ex, this is nothing new. Of course, you can als
o use force, assaulting the police station, but for obvious reasons this is not
a good idea.

Sneaky half cyborg killing machine

The stealthy way of playing is by far the recommended one. Like this you can rea
lly feel in character, and hiding behind a desk so that a patrolling enemy holdi
ng a cannon doesnt see you, provides an amazing sensation. The cover mode really
helps playing the game like this, jumping from cover to cover being very easy. A
ctually, you can easily move throughout a level using only the cover mode, its ve
ry simple and the intuitive controls coupled with abilities like temporary invis
ibility gives birth to spectacular moves, like rolling in front of enemies in or
der to get to a place where you cannot be observed. Still, its a little weird tha
t many augmentations used in this kind of playing style are basically useless. I
understand and agree that playing stealthy should depend on how much informatio
n you have, but its absurd to invest points in abilities that allow you to mark a
target so it can be easily followed, if you can see it clear on the mini map in
the first place, and with a lower cost you can get your vision augmented to see
through walls.
On the other hand, playing in full force turns the game into a repetitive FPS wh
ere you stay in cover waiting for the enemy soldiers to reload their weapons. Th
e limited AI will do exactly the same thing, even though they have numerical sup
eriority and could just assault your position. Like this, the game becomes borin
g relatively fast, despite spectacular abilities like shooting projectiles at a
360 degree angle, which proves that the ex-SWAT is now playing with the big boys
. This is also where I had my first disappointment, although the game can clearl
y be played like a shooter or using stealth, in some ways similar with a first p
erson Splinter Cell, the developers decided to divide the playing styles in leth
al and non-lethal. The really annoying part is that the first means mass destruc
tion, while the last is silence incorporated. But what about a silent killer? No
cant do, because its clear from the takedowns: if you decide to kill the poor, un
suspecting, sociopath, hes going to scream his life out, but if you just throw a
couple of punches in his direction, then he falls down quietly. Of course, the w
ay Adam kills his opponents is not the most subtle one Ive seen, stabbing with tw
o huge blades does tend to be messy and make noise but its only normal that he sh
ould be able to cut a throat, decapitate, cover the enemys mouth etc. Im not an ex
pert on silent killing methods, but I would think a cyborg from the future would
be able to handle something like this. You could mount a silencer on the 10mm p
istol, which would allow taking out somebody quietly, but it doesnt prove a relia
ble replacement for a takedown because shooting a bullet between the eyes of a h
eavily armored enemy will not have the desired effect.

By the way, using a takedown (lethal or not) consumes an energy cell (represente
d by a battery). An interesting aspect of the game is the economy of these energ
y cells, because at any given time only the partial depleted ones regenerate. On
ce a cell is gone, it cannot be recovered unless you consume an energy bar, whic
h exist in limited supply. The last energy cell is the only exception, this one
always regenerates. The point is that like this the abuse of certain abilities i
s limited in a very elegant way. For example, the temporary invisibility (cloak)
only stays active seven seconds per energy cell available. I remember here Alph
a Protocol, where a similar skill wasnt limited and could turn into a downright c
heat. In a similar way, the ability to shoot projectiles at a 360 degree angle (
Typhoon Explosive System), uses one ammo pack per activation, and the ammo packs
are rather rare, so it cant be used abusively.

There is a large enough variety of weapons to choose from, with technologies tha
t you would expect from the future. The weapons also feel real, at least until y
ou invest praxis points in augmentations like aim stabilizer or recoil reduction
. Every weapon has a series of compatible upgrades. Take the 10mm pistol as an e
xample; you can mount a silencer and upgrades that increase the damage output or
the size of the clip. The more powerful a weapon is, the more room it takes in
the inventory, which is limited enough so that if youre carrying a rocket launche
r, there will only be room left for a couple grenades (it can be expanded if your
e willing to invest praxis points in the required augmentation). We have three k
inds of grenades at our disposal: fragmentation, toxic gas and an EMP grenade. B
ut you cant really find them that often, so theyre best to be kept for tough situa
tions. Like the boss fights, these big, ugly sores that plague Human Revolution.
Basically, it doesnt matter how you played until one of these fights, it doesnt m
atter that you dont want to carry a death store in your inventory, because here t
heres only one way to go: in full force. Common sense dictates that the freedom t
o choose how to resolve a situation should have applied here as well. But alas,
no!
Nightwalker

Just like in the original game, the action takes place only at night, to deepen
the player in this cyberpunk world and better make him realize the interior turm
oh, screw it, its for the sake of the feeling. The soundtrack is superb and it fits
perfectly in this kind of universe, walking on a narrow street of Detroit, with
the police sirens that can be heard in the background and all kinds of trash fl
ying with each breeze; its hard to explain in words how nice this is. Too bad it
doesnt last, the distance between objectives is very short and entire areas of th
e cities are blocked by artificial barriers (hmm DLC). Then theres the unconvincin
g NPCs, having either incredibly dumb conversations or highly philosophical debat
es, and this from a bunch of average Joes that should have better things to do.
Graphic wise, you can see the darker tone of the game and although it occasional
ly blinds you with bloom, in the end the futurist design of the world serves its
purpose just right. There are also a couple of augmentations that have a big ro
le in exploration. Other than the omnipresent and oh so necessary hacking, we ca
n improve Adams arm strength in order to break through weakened walls (this also
works using explosives). We also have the Icarus Landing System, that allows us
to jump from any height without fear of injury and it can also be used to stun e
nemies while landing.

So, gameplay wise, Human Revolution doesnt bring shame to the original game, but
neither does it represent a much more evolved version. First of all because of t
he AI, which is disappointing for a game launched in 2011, especially after weve
seen in Splinter Cell: Chaos Theory how enemies should react when they see your
shadow or when their colleagues are disappearing. Here, everything is very basic
, if you do something and enemies hear you, they will always go through the same
two steps. First, they come to see if someone is indeed there, and if youre noti
ced they start shooting in your direction, and thats about it. They could have wa
ited to catch you by surprise but no, they waste their ammo shooting at you, des
pite the fact that between them and your position theres a cover object that prot
ects you from bullets. Then the way they talk, if theyre in the first step of sus
picion, you can hear them saying stuff like If anyones hiding there, come out! Say
what? What is the purpose for a so called professional to give out his position,
making himself look dumb? But thats not all, even if a building alarm goes off a
fter a firefight in a room, the guys from the next zone will act like nothing ha
ppened. Another weird thing is that if you pick up and throw an object, the nois
e made will be heard by NPCs, but if you stumble upon something and make the same
amount of noise, nobody seems to care.
Deus ex machina

For me, the story usually represents the spine of a game, and Human Revolution i
s crippled. Predictable, predictable, predictable; and what of it isnt, fits in t
he game about as good as salt with sugar. I dont want to ruin your so called surp
rise, but the entire motivation behind the actions of the man that has the highe
st influence in the ending, is just not convincing enough. Then theres the moment
s when dialogues between NPCs or the different reading materials (eBooks, emails
etc.) give you very useful information about the situation youre in, but somehow
Adam seems to ignore them, then later hes very surprised of how things turned out
. Human Revolution is a game that would just not let me see it as the sum of its
parts, but rather force me to pass judgment on each separate component. No doub
t its fun, immersive, overall a good game, but there are other recently released
games that this cyberpunk FPS-RPG hybrid cant fight on equal terms, not when you
strip it down to parts. If you want to talk about high variety gameplay and a tr
ue hybrid between the two genres, then E.Y.E: Divine Cybermancy, with all of his
bugs, still stands a few leagues higher. The dialogues are also not very convin
cing in this last Deus Ex, most of them being childish and stereotypical, and th
is is especially bad when you have to convince a character to do something your
way. Everything to do in order to manipulate him its being delivered to you on a
plate and the words that come of Adams mouth are cheesy, like the ones from bad,
overly dramatic movies. This guiding that the game offers you is also present in
missions. Just off the top of my head, theres a moment when you sneak into a hig
hly guarded facility and you have to get to the most secure room. Well what do y
ou know, two random NPCs were talking exactly about that room and how the tempera
ture dropped because of an open ventilation shaft Or two of the bodyguards of a p
ro human rights activist were talking about the only UNGUARDED point of entry at
a press conference that was the ideal spot for an assassin to strike. Its useles
s to have many different paths to an objective if the game holds your hand every
time.

There is also a good side; these shortcomings dont really apply to side quest. Al
beit there are few of them, theyre way more interesting than what the main plot h
as to offer, the ones where Adams past comes to light (and his symbolic name real
ly starts to make sense) are especially well done. Honestly, I would have prefer
red that the part of the game involving a great conspiracy and the people that m
ove in the shadows, pulling the strings of world governments, was developed more
, instead of an unsatisfactory twist that in the end means nothing. I could also
talk about the long loading times that you have to go through very often, or th
e sudden drops in the number of frames per second, but the first patch already t
ook care of these.

Although I was maybe a bit harsher than it deserved, Deus Ex: Human Revolution i
s far from being a bad game, its just that the satisfaction that youre supposed to
get from doing things your way, gets disrupted by gameplay inconsistencies and
a stereotypical storyline, thats disappointing especially in the second half of t
he game. Other than this, its worth its money (and time), even more so if youre th
e kind of gamer that likes to explore and try everything. A nice, captivating ex
perience, just not memorable.
TG