As a sequel, it's nice how the previous Deus Ex storyline, and characters therein are tied into this game ('the collapse', JC, Tracer Tong, and others). For anyone who played the first installment, this provides insight as to what happened after you finished the first game (depending on how you actually finished it). Because of this, much of the mood of the first game can be felt in DE:IW.

As a stand alone, the game is unimpressive but casually entertaining; it's an FPS, which tries to add RPG elements. The black market biomods are cool and Alex D.'s character is fairly interesting. I guess graphics are okay, but I'm not an authority on those things.

Ironically, the tie-in storyline to the first DE and DE:IW that makes this newest sequel enjoyable, also overshadows the game also makes it a poor cousin to its predecessor. So now the bad:

The RPG improvement system is not present in this game. You start and finish the game with the same skillset, with the exception of biomods you choose. This is by far the most rewarding part of DE1, and therefore the most disappointing part of DE:IW. Moreover, your choices in the game do not affect the outcome except near the end, and sometimes the poor AI can screw that up for you (I was going to go with the illuminati near the end one time, but their sentry attacked me, and soon my prospective allies were choking in poison gas and died in front of me). Whereas killing versus stunning people in the first DE could affect character interaction and therefore how goals were to be completed, DE:IW has no such repercussions. BTW, concussion grenade concuss people to death. Although Alex D is somewhat well rounded, most of the other characters are one dimensional, including the JC and Paul Denton, which is sort of sad.

Inventory: I never have enough slots, and I'm always dropping items in lieu of another. Dropped enemy weapons do not yield ammo, as I found out at the start, when I suddenly had 5 pistols at my disposal, and hardly any ammunition.

Overall, weak storyline. Although it hearkens back to the first game, providing continuity, the story here has very little intrigue to offer, and no bombshells like the first game. As the end of the game approached, there was very little in the way of bringing everything full circle, and no real moral dilemma as to what choice to make.

I'm a crappy gamer, but I finished the game in just over 12 hours. Simply put: it's too easy. Whereas stealth could be the best option in the first game because of too many enemies to face, I would walk into a battle against 4 or 5 guys and mop the floor with them lickety-split. Although I began the game using stealth, I soon realized that walking in guns-a-blazing was just as effective at minimal risk, with higher inventory payouts.

Now, I didn't know this when I bought it, but when I started playing the game I thought to myself, "This feels like a console interface." I.e., oversimplified with small level design, and repeated levels. Looking to see if anybody else had this sense, I found out it was designed for the console. I think this is the root of the problem with this game. I bought it cheap, and this game is a reminder of why I wait a year and a half before I buy a release (plus the fact that patches for glitches are usually available by then).

It's a no-brainer game and better than some I have played. I recommend borrowing it, or waiting another year yet until it's even cheaper, however. If you played the first DE, then this is a must for curiousity's sake. If not, I highly recommend you pick it up instead.


What could go wrong? The answer is everything.   February 9, 2005
 24 out of 24 found this review helpful

Veteran hardcore FPS fans will have fond memories of the original Deus Ex - a game which has easily stood the test of time. It's successful combination of Role-playing and First-Person elements won many admirers, and its labryinthe anti-terrorism storyline is extremely relevant to modern events. So when a sequel to this classic PC game was to be produced by Warren Spector and the developers at Ion Storm, what could possibly go wrong?

Unfortunately, the answer is - almost everything. The biggest innovation in the original game were the modifications you could make to both your players skills and his physical abilities. This was implemented using a point system - the points were acrued as you successfully accomplished mission objectives. Another cool innovation was the use of biomods, which you could use to add deadly new abilities to your character. The second game has an inferior dumbed-down version of this system - the points system has been completely eliminated, which effectively destroys the role-playing element which made Deus Ex such a huge success. Unlike the original game, the sequel doesn't allow the player to adopt different gameplaying styles to accomplish the same goal. In general, it seems that sneaking and sniping enemies is more rewarding than outright combat. This essentially limits the number of useful biomods that a player should use during the game - hacking and bot domination being compulsory.

Music is also another big letdown - it'd be hard for any player to forget the wonderfully thunderous bombastic theme that played over the menu of the original game. It seemed that every single map and situation in the original Deus Ex had a piece of music composed for it. It's fair to say that music in the sequel is either non-existent or played so softly it virtually becomes background noise. The only time it's allowed to come to the fore is during the NG Resonance sequences.

Apart from the lack of a points and sophisticated biomod system, the biggest fault is the level design. The opening map of the original Deus Ex was absolutely huge - it comprised the Statue of Liberty, the interior of the Statue, the Harbour, and the entire surrounding environs of Staten Island. And that was just for starters. In the sequel, we're expected to believe that the entire German city of Trier consists of only four blocks of streets - which is patently ridiculous. The sequel's storyline demands big levels - especially during the latter half of the game. I suspect this design decision was possibly due to the perception that the XBox would not have the required processing power. Anyone who has seen the massive levels in Knights of the Old Republic or Halo will realise this is simply not the case.

The biggest mistake Ion Storm made was to simplify the game for the X-Box. As both Bioware and Bungie have proven so successfully with both Knights of the Old Republic and Halo, it isn't necessary to remove or simplify gameplay elements, simply because it's being ported to a gaming console. The result is an insult to the old fans of Deus Ex, who expected the same sophisticated user interface and role-playing elements. It's also an insult to the X-Box crowd as well, who have been lumped with a diluted gameplay experience.


Worth a look, but a bit patronising.   January 11, 2005
 3 out of 3 found this review helpful

I loved Deus Ex so I'm trying to not be biased. This game is worth playing: parts of it are great. The Bot mind control, the in flight controllable missles, and the way you pick up optional tasks on the way through the game.

I didn't mind the universal ammo or the lack of skill advancement. The graphics/design/music was average. The storyline was a bit hacky, but fine.

What I didn't like about this game was the difficulty setting. The first level was fun, but by the end of it I had all of the mods and practically all of the weapons. Difficulty had peaked. After that it was just a case of keep finding ammo. With most games you end up hoarding equipment and ammo, saving up grenades for big baddies. In DX2 you've got so much of everything, you don't need to bother. Nothing is really hidden from you, and you don't have to search much.

It plays like the designers don't want you to ever feel in difficulty, they have made all of the interfaces dead simple. they don't want to burden you with character development or having to tell between different types of ammo (or even having to reload between clips), they've made sure you'll never run out of anything or get stuck with out a key (there's always a grating to go through two steps to your left).

I find this very odd as the best thing about the first Deus ex was the unguided open-ness of it. It was a challenge and you had to make some difficult choices about who you were and who you were going to tackle the challenges ahead.

My girlfreind played it through first and warned me how easy it was, so I played it on the hardest setting. But even with that it wasn't any kind of challenge. For more serious gamers may I suggest seeing if you can play the whole game through without installing a single bio mod.

It's still got more to it than your typical storyless First person shooter, so it's still worth a play.


A sequal thats far from equal   December 8, 2004
 3 out of 3 found this review helpful

The first Deus Ex was an extremely fun game to play. I had high hopes for the sequal but while some of the new physics (ragdoll effects) were a nice change, the interface changes were a turn for the worse. It felt like a console game and for me thats a big negative. I don't really care to see the inventory screen on top of everything and I don't see why they had to dumb down the handling of ammunition and lockpicks. It was obviously designed with a minimum of controls in mind but is that neccessarily an improvement. I don't think so. What happened to the days when a game was redesigned to be ported to console?
Even all the conspiracies in the plot seemed somewhat less interesting in this game. Overall though it was entertaining and while maybe not worth the full price at its release, if you can find it cheap it's a worthwhile buy. If you have to choose though and you don't own the original, buy that one instead.


Not as bad as some people say it is...   November 20, 2004
 6 out of 7 found this review helpful

I found this to be an interesting and entertaining game. Sure, a lot of fans of the original game did not get what they were looking for, but for gamers new to Deus Ex there is a lot to like.

For one, the story is much better than in most other games. Here, you can team up with any side you like and apply your view of the world to the game. It will probably take to the very end (and a few surprising turns) before you really know which way you want to go. No other game before has presented so many meaningful choices to me.

Of course, compared to Deus Ex 1, there are a number of simplifications. Unified ammo is something a lot of people do not like. It didn't bother me too much, although it is a bit odd that rocket launchers and pistols use the same ammo. The bio-mods I am not to crazy about. There are too many options to upgrade your mods and not enough meaningful choices there. But there are other aspects in the game that make up for it.

Of course at this point, the graphics engine can not quite keep up with Doom 3 or Half Life 2, but it gets the job done.