Review: Deus Ex: Human Revolution

With summer comes the annual gaming drought. Developers typically hold off until the holiday season before releasing their big titles to ensure they don’t miss the Christmas sales blitz. But as summer draws to an end, we’re starting to see the light at the end of the tunnel. The games are slowly starting to arrive.

Eidos Montreal, a fledgling studio, has just released its first project to the gaming world. Deus Ex: Human Revolution is a prequel in the fan favourite Deus Ex series. The franchise has a devote following; after all the series brought about many firsts. Deus Ex was one of the first titles to mix the first person shooter genre with RPG elements, allow players to explore multiple paths and introduce the idea of choice equals consequence.

Fans are ravenous for a look at what has happened to their beloved franchise since the last installment hit stores some eight years ago. Eidos Montreal certainly has some high expectations to meet. So does it deliver with Deus Ex: Human Revolution? Oh boy does it ever!

The year is 2027. The world is a much darker place than we know it today. Corporations seem to have just as much, if not more power than the government and the idea of engineered humans has become a reality.

Imagine replacing a limb with a vastly superior mechanical one; a limb which gives you super-human strength, and faster reflexes. If you have the money you can do it. But be prepared for the consequences. “Augmentations” as they are known as have become a controversial subject in the world. Those who have them are shunned. A vast majority of the world’s population see them as unpure.

You play as Adam Jensen, a security specialist who has become augmented…but not by choice. While protecting researchers on the eve of a historical government hearing on Augmentations and bio-technology, you are attacked. One of the head researchers, who happens to be a former love interest, is killed. You are also mortally wounded. The only way to bring you back from the brink of death is to outfit you with augmentations. Now it’s up to you to unravel a global conspiracy centered around augmentation technology.

Deus Ex: Human Revolution plays out very much like a first person shooter, but it’s more than that. Yes, gunplay certainly plays a major role in this title, but it doesn’t have to. You are often challenged with the question “do you have to kill in order to get through the mission at hand?” You can use stealth to get through missions by sneaking around enemies, or you can blow them away with the weapons at your disposal. The choice is yours.

If you choose to use force you will have a variety of weapons at your disposal. Pistols, shotguns, and machine guns can be found scattered around the maps, many dropped by enemies. If you tire of their mediocre firepower you can purchase upgrades such as laser sights to vastly improve their performance. But you can upgrade more than just your weapons. You can also upgrade your body.

Your arms, legs, lungs, heart, skull and eye have all been replaced with augmented parts. Simply put you can enable some amazing skills if you choose to do so. As you kill enemies and unravel the story you earn experience points. These points help you earn Praxis points which can be used to upgrade your body. Augmentations will help you see through walls, drop down from buildings without getting hurt, or lift heavy objects. You choose what you want to upgrade and when.

As you make your way through the world you will encounter many individuals. Some will help you in your quest while others will stand in your way. How you talk to people will impact how the story unfolds. Dialogue trees will give you the opportunity to use wit and charm to get what you want. Sometimes violence can be avoided by simply telling people what they want to hear. The conversations are believable and will almost always have you second guessing what would have happened if you would have responded differently.

If you can’t get the information you need from characters you can always use your hacking skills to dig up intel. Hacking mini-games will have you racing against the clock, to hack into the network before the firewall detects you. The game is a bit hard to grasp at first, but once you figure out the mechanics you will gain access to memos, security codes to doors and passwords to other computers which hold valuable information. You don’t really need to hack much in the game, but doing so will certainly add to the enjoyment as it fleshes out the story.

Besides the main story (which will take you anywhere from 20 to 30 hours to complete) there are also many side missions to tackle. These missions are well fleshed-out quests which could very well be part of the main storyline. In fact you are never given a simple fetch quest which is refreshing for a game of this length. If you choose to take on the side missions you can easily spend up to 50 hours playing Deus Ex: Human Revolution.

While the game is an overall enjoyable experience, a couple of flaws prevent it from getting the almighty perfect score. In my play through, I found some of the enemy AI to be questionable. I was often able to hide from enemies behind crates and even though they knew I was there only one enemy at a time would venture around the corner to fire at me. They would always take turns. Other times I would run through a door and the enemies would refuse to follow. I could sit on the other side of the doorways and pick off the guards as they yell at me. That being said the game can be quite difficult. I played on the normal or “give me a challenge” mode which lives up to its name. I almost found the glitchy enemy AI to be welcome at some points as it helped me progress through she difficult levels a bit faster.

Another issue was long load times. Ugh! Every time I died (and I died quite a bit) I would have to wait 30 to 60 seconds for the game to load again. It becomes quite noticeable during marathon gaming sessions.

Fans of the Deus Ex series will not be disappointed with this prequel. It’s a perfect blend of action, stealth with a few RGP elements thrown in for good measure. The voice acting is top notch and the soundtrack phenomenal. The opening music alone screams motion picture soundtrack. The long load times and questionable enemy AI can’t take way from the fun you’ll have playing through this lengthy masterpiece. If you’ve been waiting anxiously for the onslaught of triple A titles this fall, good news. Your wait is now over. Even if you’re not familiar with the franchise Deus Ex: Human Revolution is worth picking up.

The Good

Entertaining story
Precise controls
Great voice acting
Amazing soundtrack

The Bad

Lengthy load times
Questionable AI