[Dracko]

http://www.deusex.com/themissinglink

Totally not Metal Gear Solid 2.
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[Pat the Great]

Just finished the game.

I have never been motivated to do a no-kill run through either DX1 or DX3. I am interested in trying out a no-death run (think D2 hardcore) on max difficulty. I realized that the game's combat got a LOT easier once i learned the rules and got some of the better augs.
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-pat m.
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[Broco]

Good work doing a pacifist rescue Mr. Mech. The helicopter dies really quickly so I didn't find it a cakewalk even deploying deadly weapons (which didn't include a sniper rifle, unfortunately). I basically ran into the middle and typhooned the hell out of everybody on ground level, then sniped the upper ones with my pistol. I also had two hypo-stims which helped a lot (they restore your health all the way up to 150 even if you're already damaged, which I hadn't realized before).

[Pat the Great]

First attempt at a no-death DXHR run: Died halfway through the first not-tutorial mission. Oops.
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-pat m.
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[DJ]

[Dracko]

[Mr. Mechanical]

[Pat the Great]

the point is for ME to not die. i don't give a shit about THEM.
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-pat m.
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[parker]

This game made me go blind in my left eye for a few minutes. Zero out of four action button dot net stars.
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[parker]

I hard a hard time reading words too. Probably gave me a stroke or something.
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[Felix]

Hm, I actually had the same experience after waking up in bed at like 3am one morning after playing the game. Maybe it's like the seizure Pokemon episode?

[Iacus]

It's true that a lot of people are playing this consistently.

In the SB Group, The 25+ people playing DXHR managed to surpass the playtime of the two people playing Football manager, lol.


Oh, and I found that a very efficient way to rescue Malik, if you don't mind using lethal violence, is with just an EMP grenade and a revolver with exploding bullets (one of the best weapons you can get, really). You can take the heavily armored dudes with two shots (first explosion stuns them and makes them fall, then you can finish them off with a headshot). I don't think you even need a longer range weapon if you just jump into the fray as soon as possible.

There are some augmentations that are pretty useless. Anybody uses mark & track, or recoil reduction? But I think the hacking capture upgrades may be mandatory, unless I've managed to avoid all the shops where they sell auto unlockers (I've used them in the beta, but never in my un-DLC'd copy of the game)

At the final boss, the game never made it too clear that you can damage Zhao without actually shutting down the life support in the other pods. Having to hack 2 of the 3 security hubs forced me to upgrade my capture augment up to level 5 right at the final battle.
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Guayaba 2600

[DJ]

Actually I will say I thought the final boss battle, while cool conceptually, was pretty poorly executed. It's a vague throwback to (far as I can tell) the final boss fight from System Shock 2, but...It sucked back then, even. Nobody liked that boss fight and it was considered a piss-poor ending to an otherwise fantastic game. Why copy that? I mean you have the added Minority Report Asshole option to make it shorter, but besides that, it's the same thing. Run behind pillars, hack something, dodge respawning enemies, repeat until a shield drops then fire away.

The whole thing was muddled and bizarre in a bad way.

Oh well though.
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[Pat the Great]

After encountering a little frustration with the no-death run in the beginning, I've managed to successfully make it all the way past the DRB/antenna mission. The game gets a lot easier once you get a silencer and a laser sight (both of which I've parked on my 10mm).

Spent my first few points maxing damage resistance, then icarus, then 1 point in inventory.

Also accidentally performed a lethal silent takedown on Letitia. Oops.
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-pat m.
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[drobe]

I use recoil reduction. It's fantastic if you happen to use the assault rifle or heavy rifle. The mark and track is something that I use together with Smart Vision. You can spot people through walls, track them, and focus your assault rifle to auto target them (if you have the upgrade).
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http://i.imgur.com/9ATgokP.gif

[Toto]

I started playing this (i.e. I cracked). Quite liking it so far. Feels Deus Ex-ish. I like the sneaking and the cover too surprisingly. You don't have to work frustratingly hard for stealth in this game.
I'm playing a stealthy smooth operating hacker. I would love it if I could talk my way through every mission.

[drobe]

CHUTE FAILURE
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http://i.imgur.com/9ATgokP.gif

[Mr. Mechanical]

Just got past the third boss and holy hell I thought I had really screwed up for a moment there. I stupidly took the biochip upgrade earlier on without even thinking about it only later to wonder if I had made the wrong choice. Turns out, uh.. yeah that was totally the wrong decision because Zhao triggered the killswitch on me and fucked up my vision and took out my ability to use any of my augs. So with no ability to typhoon my way out of that fight I decided to do a little improvising after trying and failing the fight a few times using just my emp grenades and whatever weapons I could find in the area the fight took place in.

I had saved on the elevator right before stepping off to trigger the cutscene that starts the fight so I instead opted to take the elevator back up and explore the level a bit for hardware. I ended up taking a combat rifle with a damage upgrade and target tracking upgrade with about 93 bullets. I also made my way back near the beginning (using a shortcut via a breakable wall) and nabbed the turret (which I reprogrammed to fight with me) and carried it all the way back to the elevator. Once I was back down to the fight I saved again at the elevator and tried unsuccessfully a couple times to toss the turret out of the elevator and have it land in an opportune spot where it would see the boss. After I accomplished that the fight went pretty smoothly with me chasing the guy around the center area, having him get caught between the turret and me with my bullets that tracked him so I didn't have to worry about precision aiming with my hud all screwed up. He went down in less than a minute.

What a game! After the fight I made my way up to Megan, got my shit fixed up and played the gramophone in her room to hear it play the original Deus Ex theme. I can tell the game is probably going to end soon and I kind of don't want that to happen because I love seeing all the emails and stuff that tie it into the first game and I just don't want that sort of stuff to end but I also do want it to end soon so I can start it over again and see what all's different making different choices than that ones I made this time around.
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[drobe]

So, I finished. What, there wasn't an option to get all freaky with Eliza and rule the hearts and minds of people with a consistent, but compassionate hand?
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http://i.imgur.com/9ATgokP.gif

[Toups]

I just beat the second boss

HOW LONG IS THIS GAME

I am ell you vee'in' it pretty hard though!

I kinda wish they'd remake the first one in this engine and rebalanced, etc. that would probably be a huge production but it seems like they have to chops to make it work right and be excellent.
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[Dracko]

It doesn't need a remake. Certainly not from a mainstream developer.
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[Lasakon]

I want to see Akitoshi Kawazu's Deus Ex.
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[Dracko]

The player takes on the role of the Director General of the "Department of Agriculture and Fisheries", a non-existent Executive Agency that conceals a secret police which keeps the government popular by any means necessary. Answering only to the Prime Minister, the Director General has the power to use wiretapping, surveillance, smear tactics, disinformation, burglary, kidnapping, torture, and assassination to keep the government popular with the people.

In addition to the Director General's regular duties suppressing and removing those who threaten the status quo, there is also a subplot involving his membership in a secret society called "The Secret Masters of Thoth". These missions, which are received from a "Secret Master" wearing the vestments of an Egyptian pharaoh, involve more bizarre opposition than regular missions; these missions include protecting a fellow member from a Mafia assassination, foiling an attempt to subvert the nation by pod people in key positions, the protection of the Church of the SubGenius from a scandal, and restraining the growing power of the Illuminati, among others.
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[Felix]

[Sly Buccelli]

[CubaLibre]

As far as I can tell, the only required hacks are level 1. Anything else you can find a pocket secretary for, somewhere. (Often times on a random guard wandering around.) Hacking makes the game about 5000% easier, though. Or seems to, I haven't played without it.

I dunno what the deal is with you guys and multiple playthroughs. The game clearly encourages you to be as thorough as possible and I can think of only one occasion off the top of my head where I didn't have a mod required to explore some alternate path. I plan to exhaust everything and never play it again.
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Let's Play, starring me.

[Dracko]

Well, alright.
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[Pat the Great]

I'm doing a second playthrough because I have a lot of fun playing the game. The combat parts are like a puzzle that I solve with headshots.

Update on the no-death run: Died at the first boss. Going to get Typhoon right after Dermal next time.

Also: a friend and I both blogged about DXHR this weekend, and I thought I'd link the posts here.

friend: http://paletteswaps.wordpress.com/2011/09/12/how-deus-ex-brings-out-the-worst-in-me-and-why-i-love-it/

me: http://paletteswaps.wordpress.com/2011/09/12/im-stuck-on-deus-ex-human-revolution/

basically, he really likes playing through the game as a total perfectionist, and i abhor it. though i think, after having reflected on the two approaches for a minute, that we're just being perfectionists in different ways.
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-pat m.
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[Toups]

[remote]

There's already the New Vision mod, Toups.
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letterboxd | last.fm | steam

[Toups]

o rly
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[Mr. Mechanical]

Just finished this! Really enjoyable game all things considered. A tad on the easy side for the most part but that's probably more my own fault than the game's since I got almost all of the augs. Got the pacifist achievement but not the foxiest of the hounds one so I guess I tripped an alarm at some point. Oh well.
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[Toups]

I tripped tons of alarms (inevitable if you want to EMP a bot or gas anyone or disable a camera etc etc) and I only killed like one or two dudes.
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[CubaLibre]

Okay, I could see myself playing through this one more time, getting no hacking upgrades and slaughtering every single bad guy in a carnival of death. That's it though.
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Let's Play, starring me.

[Dracko]

i can quit whenever i want
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[death parade]

It's good.

I'll expand on this when I've finished it again but the only real area of weakness is their decision to tie it into the Deus Ex universe. It would be better as a spiritual not literal successor. The mech aug plotline is great but undermined by the need to factor in Bob Page et al.

[Dracko]

I agree entirely on that front. The slavish devotion to the original only gets worse, unfortunately. It leads to a lot of poor loose ends to boot.
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[Broco]

Yeah, it's weird to see Sarif talking about the Illuminati like it was a real thing, especially since its relationship to the plot is indirect at best. The writing seems aware of the incongruity too: whenever it's brought up a character usually mentions the idea sounds kooky -- which is better than playing it deadpan, but still feels off. The thing is that the writers of this game have a multidimensional and realistic enough vision of the world that the simpleminded idea of an Illuminati conspiracy no longer fits.

That said, I think it's a minor issue.

[Dracko]

Sure, if you ignore the entire endgame. Or the inclusion of a Dragon Lady.

I did like the small detail of Sarif acknowledging that the Illuminati is just a useful name the group were just as likely to use as any other as would be useful for the sake of evocative powers. Sadly, not much at all is done with that moment.
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[Toups]

[CubaLibre]