Deus Ex: Invisible
War (2004/Xbox)
Deus Ex: Invisible War is the sequel to the Deus Ex which was released back in 2000, that game won so many awards; Invisible war has a lot to live up to and hopefully it will succeed.
Just a warning to reader, I’ve never played the original title so don’t expect too many comparisons.
Graphics 9/10
Invisible War’s graphic are one of the game biggest selling points. They included beautifully created characters, highly detailed location’s, lighting effects that rival Splinter Cell’s and items that have lots of pain staking detail put into them.
The main character in this game is either a male or female
character depending on what you choose at the beginning of the game, but either
way your name is
Alex D. Though accept for the ability to change your characters skin colour the
character creation is a little limited, luckily the bio-mods in the game do
help to some degree. The NPC’s in this game all have a unique appearance; you
will never see the same NPC twice. Unfortunately in later levels you do start
to see the same characters over again with small variations, usually they’re
wearing sun glasses or have a different voice. This is especially true with the
SSC security forces (police) or the WTO guards (army), which you encounter a
lot of through out the game. One of the greatest things about the characters in
this game is the rag doll physics that is applied to all of them. This allow
for some great moments when your either hitting with a grenade or throwing them
about, all of it is just great fun.
The locations in this game are filled with examples of the amazing graphically power that show what the Xbox is capable of. Every wall, floor and ceiling has great bump mapping effects and realistic textures. There are plenty of objects to interact with, from barrels to model aeroplanes. Also in every level will find multiple light sources, so really anything you can think of as a light source is light source. This ranges from simple street lights to the flicking of a used flash grenade. Along with the locations and the lighting there is the wealth of items that are available to you. In most games when you past an item on the floor you will walk straight through it, but on this game you will actually step on, which shows the astonishing amount of detail which went into Invisible War. The only downside of this level of interaction is the when trying reach a small object like an ammo clip and it’s surround by lots of other objects which will get in your way.
I usually hate to end a section on a bad point, but I must
mention the fact Deus Ex suffers from a poor frame rate, no were near as smooth
as games like Splinter Cell or Halo. Luckily this doesn’t happen to
often and the frame rate usually speeds up quick enough away.
Sound 8/10
The sound of this game really adds to the experience, with it high level of realism. Every object that has a shadow has a sound, which once again shows the depth of work gone in to this game. Yet occasionally I have thrown an object and when they land they fail to make a noise. Luckily this has only happened once or twice.
The major problem with the sound in this game is the main characters voices. They fail to show any major emotion, which really brings down the story. Since the characters lack major feeling in there voices you could miss a major plot event because they sound so dull and even if you were listening to them, they seem to have very little effect on you. Though having said that about this game, I do appreciate the fact that your main character can actually talk and you do not have to read lines of text for their reply. Since in a lot of RPG’s your character doesn’t have a voice, this is a nice change to the norm.
Game play 8/10
This is the part of the game which I will wonder the most about, should I class this game as a RPG or FPS. Yes the game is played from a first person perspective and you can do a lot of shooting, but on the other hand there is a lot of talking and upgrading to do. So really on paper they should be equally balanced. Though this changes when you start to playing it, you will probably find that though there maybe a first person view, this game is very heavy on the RPG action.
The control system is about what you would expect, simple but different. It will take you about half an hour to learn the controls fully and start using them naturally. Though there are quite a lot of options in this game, the controller coverer everything pretty well, from switching weapon’s to activating a bio-mods. My only major gripe is the fact have to use the D pad to select a bio-mods and in combat that can prove difficult.
The games well programmed A.I doesn’t make it any easier. You’ll find a lot the time the combat NPC’s surround you and take it in turns to fire at you. Also they won’t just chase you blindly useless you really piss them of; they will stay and guard their area, waiting for your return. The only problem with there intelligent is the fact that you can hide in the strangest places. I once hide behind a glass door; the enemy didn’t even find me after I shoot at him with a weapon known as the Mag Rail, but it just the fact that he didn’t see me. And on a side note for combat NPC’s, it nice side women as well as men in the fighting, giving them an equally chance to killed or saved by your hand or thumb as the case may be.
The rest of the NPC’s in this game seem to be smart enough to run away but not smart to known when it’s safe. It’s annoying trying to talk to some when they run around saying stuff like “too dangerous”.
The weapons in this game have a good an amount of variation. It similar to Halo in the sense that you don’t have to change your weapons when you reach later levels. Though there are upgrades available to give your weapons special abilities like the ability break a window with no noise, or no setting of any alarms, or the ability to decrease the amount of ammo required for each shot. On the subject of ammo, who ever came up with the idea of having a universally clip system was mad. You decide to use any weapon with a lot of power and you can kiss your ammo good bye.
My last point of this gameplay section is the length of the
Deus Ex, most likely the most talked about part. I personally took 9 ½ to
complete the game first time through and 7 ½ the second time through. What
really adds on to your own personally play clock is the loading screens, from
what I’ve heard there shorter than in Morrowind,
but longer than Splinter Cell’s. The
length does bring down the game a small bit, but not enough to ruin it.
Story 8/10
The story of this game is quite amazing and is the first story I’ve enjoyed in quite awhile. It’s filled with lies, mystery and betrayal. Compared with some of the games I’ve review recently Deus Ex is quite refreshing, in the way that it seem the story didn’t take second place to the rest of the game.
The story starts of with, Alex D waking up in
Replay 7/10
Like most FPS games the replay lies in the difficulty modes, easy or normal to start moving up a higher level when you play through again. This holds true with Deus Ex, but I found after playing through the game a few times, Realistic difficulty is the only enjoyable one. Though a note to all that play that level, pick the regeneration bio-mod, you’ll need it.
Another thing that adds to this games replay is the multi route, as I said before you can do the story differently at certain points. The endings of Deus Ex also add a lot to it, there are four main endings. Each can only be accessed if you do certain thing at certain points in the story, so choose careful.
The only problem is and major problem at that is when you look at your finished time after you’ve played a second time; you’ll probably see a massive decrease. This unfortunately shows how short this game is compared to some others. Though this only applies if you skip the dialogue, which I do when I play through a second time.
Overall 8/10
This game combines the genres of first person shooter and role-playing game really well. It contains all the necessary elements for a great game, but avoided a perfect score only because of its minor flaws here and there. I recommend you buy this game and prepare your self for some sleepless nights.