King Ronald on 21/2/2003 at 19:02

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Wow! Wow! Wow!

This game just keeps getting better and better! Super-shiny graphics that no computer can run (ssh!) because they're so powerful! Amazing realistic physics that make lightbulbs swing -

hang on, how the hell do you make a lightbulb swing? I mean, if Alex shot it, then it would shatter, and if he it with a melee weapon it would break, so what did he do?
Can you blow air at stuff in Deus Ex 2? Is their a Trespasser-style ARM?

anyway, it lets you control bots! So I can jack into a PageBOT and fufil my long-held Dalek rampage desires! And there's a spinny, info-laden eye thing replacing the old twenty-too-many menus.

I didn't think the old interface was THAT bad. Don't be too hard on yourself Mr. Spector, there were a lot of menus, dealing with a lot of info. It would be improved massively if you could just press tab and cycle through to the next screen.

And the AI! Well, once again we hear claims of unbelievable Artificial ability. But wait - is that what we really want? I mean, if all these guards actually gain some sense, then strealth is right out! Let's be honest, the whole Thief-style system of stealth just wouldn't work in real life. People would see you, notice stuff had gone missing etc, and no amount of crouch-walking on a carpet or wearing a hoody would change that. In the original Deus Ex, I RELIED on the fact that you could walk up to the front desk of the enemy hideout, drop a gas grenade on the counter, unload a pistol clip into the security staff and dive into an air vent. Then, when more folks arrived, they'd look at the carnage and go "Must have been a rat...."

A rat? EH?

What, are the rats more tenacious than ever in the future or something? Why is it that all these stealth games have guards going "It was a rat that made that noise." I never saw a single rat in all the facilities I went to in Deus Ex (a couple in the Smugglers house, but that's it). What is it with those troopers? If you want to give realistic intelligence, then have the troopers patrolling in PAIRS, weapons drawn, with the lights of the building on, looking out for danger. If they find a body, have them radio for backup, not run away, letting me hide the body round a corner, and when they return (still on their own....why?) they forget the body was there at all.

Nah, with proper AI you'd be dead meat. The Ai would do things like barricade the building so you can't get out, turn on the alarms and get all the troops to do a floor by floor search.

But that would be too hard to code.....

Apparantly, one of the later areas will be Cairo. Should be a tough place for three reasons. One, I don't speak Egyptian (ancient or modern). Two, from what I've seen of the place on TV etc. its building layout looks like a right maze. Finally, they have a major terrorist problem there (and in the game) so you'll be kidnapped.

- Oh god, please don't be so corny as to have a "Secret Pyramid NSF base"; I can just imagine someone suggesting that "It'll be cool, just like James Bond!". Don't - it's just stupid.

Will the new graphics enghine let there be proper cities with 100-200 people milling about (a population more like the towns of Baulders Gate 2 than Diablo 2)? And will it always be night? And can there be a car chase in a Knight Rider style car, with cheesy music? And film references? And bullet time? And a monkey (anywhere you can)?

Will this Alex chap be able to use Dual Uzi's for that Matrix moment? And if you can provoke an NPC by staring, does that mean you can have a proper bar room fight, with headbutting and eye gouging and punching and kicking and breaking bottles over peoples heads?

And will enemies, when they see you, do that little crouch-standup movement, then run left and right far too quickly, and run right up to you, kneel down and THEN fire at you?

Hopefully not.

Will Alex actually eat in the new game? Or go to the toilet? Will beer give a different alcoholic sensation to drinking wine?

Can you buy a pet dog at a Hong Kong shop? And name him Ruffles the Super Pooch?

Will there be a love interest?

Will the voice acting of Alex be done by a Scotsman?

Why in Gods name did you make it so I need to shell out for a Geforce 3? Which means a new motherboard as well. You didn't think it through did you?

When will you learn that by putting the main villains of a game in an intro cutscene, you instantly spoil any buildup or tension, cos for the next few hours play I just sit back nodding quietly until Simons or Page show up, whereupon I go "Hey! The Evil ones!" and try and kill them?

Can you have silencers?

Why do you need glass cutters when you can just dive head first through a window, and zoom towards the stunned guards below in a hail of glass, cape flapping behind you?

Gah.................

rant. over.

juveli on 22/2/2003 at 10:41

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The only thing that's bugging me after reading the previews is the fact that we'll get a lot more biomods than there were augmentations in original DX, but we'll still have only 9 biomod slots! Oh well, at least there will be more replay value, too...

MHK on 24/2/2003 at 16:58

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Where did you find out about the character's name? I know that one of the clones in Area 51 was named Alex Denton, but what if you're playing as the female character? Is it short for Alexis? (That clone sure didn't look female.) I'm assuming DX2 doesn't follow the ending where JC blows the facility sky-high.

Udasai on 4/3/2003 at 05:10

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Alex Denton was one of the clones you see in the lab where JC was "incepted".

I'm disappointed that there will be greasels and karkians. Can't they make new critters?

MHK on 6/3/2003 at 00:48

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I know that not a lot of gamers would say this, but I'll take decent physics over eye candy any day. I can't remember how many times I'd be playing the Half-Life mission "On a Rail" and I'd jump while on the moving tram only to find myself being electrocuted on the tracks because the stupid Quake II engine can't add velocities. If a game as early as Jedi Knight could have decent physics then it shouldn't be that much trouble. I want environments where you can blow up objects and furniture, knock stuff over, break objects apart, and pick things up and whack enemies over the head with them. (I love those moments in DX where you can jump and land on an enemy's head to kill them.) I want to see bodies realistically fall and tumble down stairs or ramps. I want to be able to throw people and objects thru windows.