The original Deus Ex (released a now staggering 12 years ago) took the gaming rule book, ripped it up, pimped it with some suitably ingenious and groundbreaking augmentations, and threw a revolutionised status quo back into the video game ring for others to follow.
It pioneered the whole ‘your choices shape your world’ angle, delivering a coherent and addictive narrative, awesome action and the world’s first proper, successful FPS/RPG mash-up – unsurprisingly it garnered a cupboard’s worth of awards (including PC Gamer’s Best Game of All Time title), and left a heap of critics and fans gagging for more.
While soon-after sequel Invincible War just about hit the spot, it didn’t grab the collective attention as easily as headlines, and so it’s been a long, but calculated eight year wait before Eidos decided to yet again attempt to reshape the mould.
Unlike Duke Nukem Forever, which managed to spectacularly abuse the gamer goodwill that had accumulated in its aeons-absence, Deus Ex: Human Revolution manages to live up to expectation with a confident and heady mix of knuckle-dusting action, narrative intelligence and breathtaking game design.
As a prequel to the original, you control Adam Jensen, a private security officer for Sarif Industries. While you’re kick-ass enough as it is, a mild defence snaffu leaves you near death and forced to undergo augmentation (state of the art man/machine upgrades) to survive. Cue a mind boggling array of upgrades to choose from as you unravel the conspiracy behind the attack, Sarif and the world as a whole.
Its chief success is an embellishment of the franchise’s original selling point – there really is no pre-defined one way to tackle each mission, and the game as a whole. Human Revolution never penalises you for taking the easy way or out, nor bludgeon home the big ol’ moral blame game should you choose a less cuddly form of offense/defense.
Equally, the sheer variety of methods open to you encourages you to actually use your brain – inevitably, the more intelligent the idea the more manageable the outcome.
Of course, it’s not perfect – the boss battles take away some of that ‘free choice’ (it’s shot or be shot), there’s the odd niggly control issue (primarily, but rarely, with the Gears of War style cover system) and, it’s a rare criticism, but it’s blatantly obvious that for those of a shorter attention span, you’re unlikely to find anything here – it’s a tough game, and one not scared of blasting you away with gritty abandon.
Stylistically, it’s as sci-fi-tastic as you’d expect. While there’s the odd bugbear or graphical banality, the sheer depth of design that permeates the entire universe is utterly immersive, with a Blade Runner futurism that works on every level – the score, artistry, level and character designs complement each other to perfection, to create one of the most coherently flawless games you’re ever likely to play.
In short, once its sucked you in, there’s no escape (for a good 40 hours or so on the first run) – and that alone, for a single player game in this day and age – seems a marketing Deus Ex Machina in itself.
[Rating:5/5]
Deus Ex: Human Revolution is on General Release now, and available on Xbox 360, PS3, and PC.
