Deus Ex: Human Revolution

[Spatial]

I certainly get that but the end of the year is looking quite cluttered once again while the summer seems quite sparse.

[PeteJ]

Just confirmed that there will be a demo sometime before release...no date given.

[FreelancePolice]

They felt that the stealth mechanic was too strict; to play the game in this fashion you had to stay hidden in cover all the time, and the resultant constraints on your movement meant that you ended up missing side missings unless you went down the gun_totting route.

On the release date issue, I'd be very surprised if this wasn't Eidos realising that they were proposing to put their intelligent shooter up against Portal 2...

That may be the case (in terms of strictness). It does contradict RPS's findings

How?s this for a surprise: Deus Ex: Human Revolution has some of the finest stealth I?ve enjoyed in years. It?s a side effect of being an immersive sim. The world feels so weighty, dangerous and plausible that slipping past a man (or many mans) unseen is an incredible thrill. The minimap in the lower right corner of your hud is generous, but believable given the other cyberpunk tools at your disposal, and makes the stealth enjoyable rather than easy.

After several more rooms? worth of cinematic sneakery I?ve examined plenty of datapads, been impressed by the new hacking minigame, left a trail of heavily electrocuted bodies slumped and learned that I love the new one-button takedowns for much the same reason I love the new cover system, which I talked about with Alec here. I know takedowns are the cause of another great lagoon of doubt within the hardcore PC community, but like the cover system, you don?t have to use them, but if you do use them you?ll find you interact with the world in a way that makes that much more sense.

It maybe just a case of personal preference. Time will tell whether any strategy will mean you lose sight of other side missions but I would imagine that's part of the attraction. A stealthy approach will open yourself up to various rewards and information that wouldn't be available to an all guns blazing approach. To me that is exactly what Deus Ex is about, taking your own approach to a situation and being rewarded (both physically and through plot/conversation advances). Being admired or scolded (by different people) for tearing up battery park was a wonderful yet simple way of the game noticing how I'd gone about things.

Really can't wait for this.

[Sketcz]

The resultant constraints on your movement meant that you ended up missing side missings unless you went down the gun_totting route.

This, along with the strict real-time in-game time limits, is starting to worry me. The original Deus Ex gave you all the time in the world to explore and immerse yourself in the world - missions, side or otherwise, were frozen until you entered their sphere of activity. You could spend an infinity trying to stealthily break into someone's office, without any concern about leaving Manderly waiting. Likewise in-game, you could explore at leisure despite a terrorist/hostage situation.

It rewarded exploration, stealth and being meticulous.

A recent write-up on Siliconera revealed that taking time to explore severely penalised you. In the example give: spend too long exploring the opening's offices and all the hostages for mission 1 will be dead before you even arrive.

I don't care what anyone says, that kind of stringent time limit sucks and isn't in any way what Deus Ex is about. Now it's revealed that taking the stealth route also penalises you. FFS developers.

Looks like I'll be spamming my save/reload buttons A LOT.

[Neon Ignition]

It's probably just a living world concept where you're penalised for taking so long but by doing so gain info & items you'd otherwise miss. Done right it could be brilliant

[FreelancePolice]

It could even be just an isolated incident to raise tension for that level. I can't imagine theres a time limit for every level. We don't really know enough about it.

[EvilBoris]

They felt that the stealth mechanic was too strict; to play the game in this fashion you had to stay hidden in cover all the time, and the resultant constraints on your movement meant that you ended up missing side missings unless you went down the gun_totting route.

On the release date issue, I'd be very surprised if this wasn't Eidos realising that they were proposing to put their intelligent shooter up against Portal 2...

The latest edge preview doesn't say that, they just say that the controls and aiming are a bit stiff/slow and that makes any kind of attempt to play the game like Halo or COD virtually impossible, making it easier for you to take a more slow strategic/planned stealth approach

[Judge]

The latest edge preview doesn't say that, they just say that the controls and aiming are a bit stiff/slow

It's in the middle of the article where they talk about missing an area because the stealth demands such a low profile at all times. I'm not too worried about the time-critical hostage rescue, as the first mission is reportedly deliberately linear and fast-paced, with things opening out after that.

Assuming that the disks haven't been pressed yet, then the six month delay can't hurt the game. Like most people, however, I'm not too pleased with the industry becoming polarised into two release windows per year; late Aug-late Nov for blockbusters, and late Jan-late April for slightly more original but still mainstream efforts.

Still, for the time being, there's nothing to do but wait. Let's all go to a happy place, shall we?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vxi7JRJrod4

[FreelancePolice]

Oh my god JC, a bomb!

[abigsmurf]

mmm orange.

Looks pretty good though. The aiming seems a bit clunky there but I'm going to be playing this on PC anyway.

[Spatial]

If it keeps that sort of approach up all the way through then this really does sound like it could be the true successor to the first game.

[PeteJ]

Looks great.

Hope you can turn off the orange highlighting though, it's far too prominent.

[Spatial]

It is a bit silly on things like ladders - they do really need an option to turn that off.

[Finsbury Girl]

This is looking pretty awesome.

[mugetsu]

very very nice.