Unfortunately, immersive sims are defined primarily by their atmosphere and their gameplay systems. It stands in stark contrast to the game’s typical gold palette and may be interpreted in many ways, but it immediately reminded me of Frank Jackson’s “ Mary in the black and white room” thought experiment. A late-game area that serves as a prison for a scientist is rendered entirely in black and white, for example. They include subtle, easily missed touches, like a set of decorative spheres in Sarif’s office, which can later be seen, fuzzy and distorted, in the glass panes of a rival company.Īnd they use color and lighting to underscore fascinating narrative themes.

The environments pack everything from the baroque furniture and Blade Runner-esque clutter in Jensen’s apartment to the sleek modernism of Tai Yong Medical. Here Human Revolution unequivocally surpasses the original. Deus Ex: Mankind Divided did a good job of expanding its predecessor’s systems and level design, but it also relied on a convoluted, unevenly paced story with an abrupt ending, dialed up the melodrama, and introduced a multiplayer, DLC, and micro-transaction plan that eventually put the franchise back on hiatus. No doubt some of the blame rests with Eidos Montréal’s follow-up. Meanwhile, other immersive sims from the era ( Dishonored, BioShock) are still frequently discussed and top various lists and replay recommendations. Developed by Eidos Montréal, a studio that hadn’t shipped a single game and didn’t have Ion Storm’s Looking Glass Studios heritage, it nonetheless released to widespread community and critical acclaim, aggregating the same Metacritic score as the original.Īnd yet a decade later, while Human Revolution often features in digital sales and tracks well in recent Steam reviews, it rarely comes up in critics’ recommendations, features, or best-of lists. As if to prove the point, several Deus Ex projects were canceled, Ion Storm Austin folded, and the game’s leads moved on.įast forward to 2011 and Deus Ex: Human Revolution defied expectations. It may have been because both games were developed by Ion Storm Austin, or because Invisible War was still passable when judged purely on its own merits, but the fan base became convinced that a worthy sequel to Deus Ex was impossible. Its 2003 successor, Invisible War, was just as quickly reviled as one of the worst sequels ever made (though it was critically well received). For me, this is one of those rare gaming moments that transcend the medium.The original Deus Ex, released in 2000, quickly cemented a lasting reputation for its level design, plot, and complex systems that encouraged player choice. Whether or not the result was inevitable, I really felt that my dialogue choices made a huge difference in the outcome of that situation, and that those choices were based on analyzing the NPC properly. Even when I let him go he tried to take a hostage, so I had to talk the guy down and convince him to release his prisoner through multiple, touchy responses. For example, at once point in the game, there’s a hostage situation and you can choose to let the kidnapper go or to fight him. In most games, it’s simply a matter of choice: do you want to follow path A or B? But in Deus Ex: Human Revolution, you are not only faced with a choice, you often have to convince an NPC to make your choice a reality. As I said, I’m a jaded veteran video game player, and I can see a plot branch a mile away. Where the developers really nailed it is with regard to NPC interaction and the dialogue choices.

Deus ex human revolution rating