Deus Ex commentary compilation shows the 'net split on boss fights

@Acosta02
*spoiler*
ha, well, get to the end of the game and you'll see that you're not that far off

@Oldtaku

I dunno... they do an awful lot of explaining. They took the time and care to put case studies, journals, philosophical short stories, pamphlets, commercials, mission statements, product advertisements, believable real-world problems associated with cybernetics, etc etc. It is positively absurd how much detail and time was taken to explain things, especially when nearly all gamers will overlook it or aren't interested. Sure it is still head-in-clouds sci-fi but they spent a LOT of time trying to justify it, and the whole package is just well I don't have a word - captivating maybe.

I love this game. I couldn't even be bothered to read the article because I just feel compelled to tell all of my fellow gamers how incredible the game is. The world is so detailed, so many things on the micro other games don't bother addressing. Reminds me of the wonder I found in Duke Nukem 3D when I could do random things like play a game inside a game, look in the mirror, interact with unrelated objects etc.

I especially appreciate the throw-back FPS platforming. Sure it isn't meant to be anything new or exciting, but I love approaching each conflict with a problem solving mindset. Each step carefully considered with escape routes determined ahead of time. I still haven't fired one bullet or less-lethal dart yet. It has been a challenge but certainly rewarding.

Anyway I'm rambling, sorry to spam your inbox haha. Off to cyber-punk land I go! Huzzah!

@Anticrawl

Hey, no, I agree with you on how great the game otherwise is. I obsessively hack all the terminals and read all the newspads. I am already planning my augmentation for my next playthrough.

That's also why the formula bossfights are a letdown.

@Oldtaku

First of all, the game is great for me because of stylized sci-fi atmosphere the game is oozing (something rarely seen these days), but the control layout is beyond bad (if there is a way to change it I haven't found it), the cover system is bananas and the AI pretty awful. I've been spotted while in cover sometimes I'll walk right in there line of sight without being detected. It's pretty random sometimes, especially if you're not pressed up against a chest-high-wall. Is it me or are the black NPCs. . . . uhh it's pretty disrespectful at times.

I know that all sounds bad, but so far I really like being able to play a game that resembles Bladerunner, so in this case I have to take the good with the bad.

@Kimchi Kommando

. . . anyway my point was, there are other glaring flaws, but the atmosphere almost makes up for it. I have to agree with some of 8's it has been getting. It sucks because you can see the game almost coming together perfectly, but when the game screws up, it screws up bad.

@Kimchi Kommando if you're talking about Letitia, then yeah...disrespectful.

@Kimchi Kommando
I'm having some problems with it as well. I'm in the police station trying to get to the morgue and I keep on getting spotted through walls. They'll be in another room and I'm even sitting in cover and they spot me and charge into the room. Its a great game but it has its frustrating moments thats for sure. And when you alert the guards I think its funny that they'll all sit around staring at each other for 5 minutes before the alarm goes away.

@Anticrawl Where was that 'game inside a game' in Duke Nukem 3D again? I seem to have missed that on my 20 times through it.

@Anticrawl

+1
I wholeheartedly agree!

@Anticrawl I tried going through without killing any mobs and gave up on taking them out via only melee takedowns. That said, I still take out all the mobs, either with darts or my fists. Are you skipping some dudes?

@Kimchi Kommando

The most laughable situation I've seen so far was already in the first mission. I'm terrible at sneaking games, this time I blew my cover and ALL the enemies were firing on my location as I was barely covered by a box adjacent to an elevator. They clearly knew I was there cowering there and trapped....

And yet, after 30 seconds of sustained gunfire, they just assumed I somehow magically teleported out of the corner and the alert subsided. -_- lol.

At least they're a little bit less vindictive than MGS AI, that would've been an automatic re-start from last save for that game.

@Tradio

What does the Witcher 2 have to do with Deus Ex? That's like comparing Night and Day.

@Tradio Alright Kanye, you can sit down now lol

@DokiDokiBawanga oh i'm playing as battle hacker. i go in, kill everybody and hack all their computers and safes.

@DokiDokiBawanga There was a post on a dev twitter feed about a week ago about that very issue actually. It was quite interesting. He stated that almost all the test players complained that the initial amount of ammo in the game made it far to easy. They lowered the ratio and replayed it and hence the unusual ammo drop quantities now.

@tk421242 well that's not good thing to do on easy difficulty. if i were on their place i connected number of ammo drop with level of difficulty. so if player wanted easy experience you would give him enough ammo to go gun blazing around and restrict it on higher difficulties . well all that said it's very good game.

@DokiDokiBawanga That is a relevant point. I am on my first play through on normal level so not sure if they change ammo drops with difficulty. One thing I noticed is that on normal setting just in the initial factory stage I can drop all enemies with one head shot or two body shots. Nothing frustrates me more than some games, such as the original Deus Ex, when it takes sometimes up to 5 shots to drop an enemy.

Ironically I am sort of running thru the game in the same format as what you described... I sneak in and gun down enemies throughout then go collect everything. I actually prefer the pistol just to take one well placed shot and move on.

@arkweld
So when bosses and characters in video games begin to run on A.I., will they still be "unrealistic" because people came up with a strategy on how to defeat them?

@pluupy

To date, I've never had a problem fighting major bosses with a stealth build.

@pluupy Strategy and repetitive pattern are not synonymous.

@pluupy

if a game has pretense to be adult and realistic then boss fights don't belong unless it fits the scenario. Being thrown into a room with magically locked doors or invisible walls and then forced to run around repeating the same tactic of hitting the glowy thing (or finding the one place where you can just sit and spam) is not realistic. In any real life scenario you don't find people being forced to fight super powerful machines or bad guys one on one. Armies fight armies, and fistfights take place between regular dudes in regular environments - not artificially locked arenas.

@HaVoK308 Not at all, it was the same problem with Alpha Protocol, and actually Mass Effect.

If your game is centered on choice, taking it away for something as cliched as a BIg Boss battle is lame.

Especially since the first one already had that as an option.

I guess I don't see WHY anyone would defend the boss battles. It's a game of choice. If there are OTHER options it doesn't mean you have to take them it just provides alternatives. If you want to blow up some Big Bad with some gun fu that's your prerogative, I just don't see why having an alternative somehow infringes on your option.

@The Deuce That's a fair point, OTOH, sometimes violence is the worst option. If we are going to have unavoidable conflict there should be conflicts that will 100% of the time lead to player death.

I'd like to think if you decide to be Rambo, ONCE in a while the badguys will pile up 20 deep and just rush you with rocket propelled high explosives from multiple angles.

@houser not saying it's right but there ARE games that do that

@notoriousEIC

+2