I.s

[Fandango]

One quick statement. The makers of Deus Ex2 can burn in hell for all eternity, they betrayed us for their god forsaken Xbox owners. It wasnt the Xbox who supported the original was it. No I dont think so. And not supporting MX cards (or so it seems) is just another reason they can lie on the racks with Satan.

[E.T.]

I'll wait to pass full judgement for another week when Invisible War
full version is released.
I do have concerns about the interface being "streamlined", especially the unified weapon ammo & deletion of skill points.
The original DE Conspiracy warrants due process for its sequel, Invisible War. ;)
Im hoping for the best, an immersive invironment & absorbing storyline.
:D

[Suicides-by-Steve]

<div class=\"smallfont\">One quick statement. The makers of Deus Ex2 can burn in hell for all eternity, they betrayed us for their god forsaken Xbox owners. It wasnt the Xbox who supported the original was it. No I dont think so. And not supporting MX cards (or so it seems) is just another reason they can lie on the racks with Satan.</div>

LOL Expect the same response from me if they butcher Thief III. So far I don't like this trend of multiple releases on multiple systems (with the XBox seemingly bottlenecking us PC users).

[Aku]

<div class=\"smallfont\">[QUOTE=E.T.I do have concerns about the interface being "streamlined", especially the unified weapon ammo & deletion of skill points.
:D[/QUOTE]</div>


Forgive me, I haven't been following Deus Ex 2 at all. No skill points? Wasn't that one of the main selling points of the original? That's what made it fun for me. Is this just to be another shooter/puzzle solver then? This one isn't high on my list of purchases. I'll let the guinea pigs test it out first.

[Hieremias]

<div class=\"smallfont\"><div class=\"smallfont\"></div>

LOL Expect the same response from me if they butcher Thief III. So far I don't like this trend of multiple releases on multiple systems (with the XBox seemingly bottlenecking us PC users).</div>

"Developing concurrently" means "console port", nothing more. When they streamline the development process into one exercise they have to aim for the lowest common denominator, and between the PC and Xbox, it's the Xbox.

Now if they would make the game for the PC and then port it to the Xbox, we'd be far better off. I don't care if the Xbox gets the same game or a stripped-down version, makes no difference to me. I just hate having OUR games butchered!!

After playing the Deus Ex 2 demo I'm neither excited for it, nor for Thief 3. Thief 3 is going to be the same. Stalker is now definitely my most-wanted game.

[Richard Hobbes]

Fandango,

--- The makers of Deus Ex2 can burn in hell for all eternity,
--- they betrayed us for their god forsaken Xbox owners. It
--- wasn't the Xbox who supported the original was it. No I
--- don't think so. And not supporting MX cards (or so it
--- seems) is just another reason they can lie on the racks
--- with Satan.

Well, I've got to say, after the demo (which crashed and burned on my computer only because I've got a GeForce 4 MX card) my excitement for the game has been *somewhat* dulled. It's a tough call for game developers... do you constrain your game engine by conforming to older technology or do you subscribe to newer technology causing compatibility problems for your users. In the case of Deus Ex 2, it looks like Ion Storm has taken the later approach.

From what I can tell, Deus Ex 2 will not run on any video card that does not have full hardware pixel and vertex shader support. This means Deus Ex 2 will only run on computers with high-end video cards of the very last generation. That's a pretty limited audience. It may also be the case (as you point out) that Ion Storm sees the Xbox as their primary market. The Xbox has an nVidia graphics chip that is equivalent to something between a GeForce 3 TI and GeForce 4 TI (nVidia's highest ended cards) so this would seem to support the Xbox "argument". What a shame. As I said in an earlier post, I think a lot less people will be playing Deus Ex 2 than had originally thought they would (me being one of them).

(Yes, astute readers of VGR know that I've got an Xbox, but Ion Storm has pretty much pissed me off over the entire Deus Ex 2 fandango so I'll be waiting quite some time before buying the game if at all.)

RH.

[E.T.]

<div class=\"smallfont\"><div class=\"smallfont\">[QUOTE=E.T.I do have concerns about the interface being "streamlined", especially the unified weapon ammo & deletion of skill points.
:D</div>


Forgive me, I haven't been following Deus Ex 2 at all. No skill points? Wasn't that one of the main selling points of the original? That's what made it fun for me. Is this just to be another shooter/puzzle solver then? This one isn't high on my list of purchases. I'll let the guinea pigs test it out first.[/QUOTE]</div>

The full version of DE2 wont be released for a few more days, so all we have to go on for now is the demo.

What is known : the interface has been "streamlined" to accomodate being ported from Xbox.
As a result, skill points, are gone, and worse [to me] is implementation of "unified weapons ammo",....many PC gamers are in protest over some of the changes, but I suggest holding out till we get to play the full version........
Venture over to SW board & read RGs thread "Why PCers hate Xbox" for more contentious debate/screen comparisons etc
http://forums.videogamereview.com/showthread.php?threadid=1352

[Suicides-by-Steve]

<div class=\"smallfont\">One quick statement. The makers of Deus Ex2 can burn in hell for all eternity, they betrayed us for their god forsaken Xbox owners. It wasnt the Xbox who supported the original was it. No I dont think so. And not supporting MX cards (or so it seems) is just another reason they can lie on the racks with Satan.</div>

What's gonna be really funny is that all the X-Bots will be raving how great the game is... Man, we really are getting dumped on this season by the developers...

[Static_Fred]

<div class=\"smallfont\"><div class=\"smallfont\"></div>

What's gonna be really funny is that all the X-Bots will be raving how great the game is... Man, we really are getting dumped on this season by the developers...</div>

What you guys are saying couldn't be any more true. What Ion Storm did with DE2 seriuosly pisses me off... As Fandego points out, who supported the first DE to make it such a legendary game? So this is how Ion Storm repays their gratitude? By developing DE2 from the ground up on the XBOX? I say BS, don't support this crap!

[Suicides-by-Steve]

<div class=\"smallfont\"><div class=\"smallfont\"></div>

What you guys are saying couldn't be any more true. What Ion Storm did with DE2 seriuosly pisses me off... As Fandego points out, who supported the first DE to make it such a legendary game? So this is how Ion Storm repays their gratitude? By developing DE2 from the ground up on the XBOX? I say BS, don't support this crap!</div>

I've been thinking a bit about this, and I have come to one logical conclusion... maybe it's just the XBox that sucks... period. I mean the other ports I have got from the other systems have been prime. Grand Theft Auto 3 and Metal Gear: Substance that appeared on the PS2 are cool games... Everything that has appeared on the XBox that was due to be a PC game originally are bombs... (well sort of). KotOR and Morrowind appeared on the XBox, and are okay. I'd be interested to play the XBox version of Morrowind.

[Static_Fred]

<div class=\"smallfont\"><div class=\"smallfont\"></div>

I've been thinking a bit about this, and I have come to one logical conclusion... maybe it's just the XBox that sucks... period. I mean the other ports I have got from the other systems have been prime. Grand Theft Auto 3 and Metal Gear: Substance that appeared on the PS2 are cool games... Everything that has appeared on the XBox that was due to be a PC game originally are bombs... (well sort of). KotOR and Morrowind appeared on the XBox, and are okay. I'd be interested to play the XBox version of Morrowind.</div>

hey, i thought of something when i was reading your post. It's true about what you said, but GTA 3 was actually over hauled to take advantage of the PC graphic capabilities right? (i have no idea on MG:S)

Here is my question, could it be that the XBOX games are "almost" Windows compatible when they're released on the console, therefore the game developers can just port the XBOX copy almost straight to Windows? Maybe this is the reason many game Dev's don't bother over hauling the graphics and such? It's probably more "cost effective" from a corporate stand point...

[Suicides-by-Steve]

<div class=\"smallfont\"><div class=\"smallfont\"></div>

hey, i thought of something when i was reading your post. It's true about what you said, but GTA 3 was actually over hauled to take advantage of the PC graphic capabilities right? (i have no idea on MG:S)</div>

I think what is closer to the truth stems from the term "concurrently developed", like Jeremy said. GTA III was made after the PS2 release. However, Halo wasn't really "concurrently developed", unless what MS has been telling us is a huge load. This wouldn't surprise me though, since the technology to run the Halo game was out years ago... about the same time that Halo was released... Oh well, either way, I'm not happy with this current trend.

[Static_Fred]

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I think what is closer to the truth stems from the term "concurrently developed", like Jeremy said. GTA III was made after the PS2 release. However, Halo wasn't really "concurrently developed", unless what MS has been telling us is a huge load. This wouldn't surprise me though, since the technology to run the Halo game was out years ago... about the same time that Halo was released... Oh well, either way, I'm not happy with this current trend.</div>

Oh yeah, i totally forgot about Halo... I guess that blows my theory out of the water, lol.

[BortiiS, The]

I have GTA 3 on the PC, and it's great. Very impressive game engine and everything. Of course, I wish the controls were more customizable but it's not so bad really. I'd like to play this in a FPS-type mode, or be able to see the interior of my car as a I drive it in 1st-person mode (in the game, that view is more like having a camera at the nose of the car), but oh-well, can't have everything, and what you do have is pretty satisfying. I was very impressed by the fluidity of it all and how so well it all "works". No crazy bugs, crashes, or glitches, or anything, the game is very solid.

As for Deus Ex 2, gee, I guess I'll have to dump PC gaming and get a an Xbox, where you try to play strategy and FPS games with a freakin' gamepad---LOL!

I don't care if DE2 is the best game ever made, I'm not playing a FPS game with a gamepad, and I'm not plunking down $200 for an XBox, or any console, to do so.

Plenty of other games out there.
If they don't want to support my video cards (GF4mx) then I guess I won't be supporting their game.
That sounds reasonable to me.

[Hieremias]

Ummm, I don't consider GTA3 to be a great port. It's still a system hog. Compare the performance of GTA3 to Chrome and you'll see what I mean; the latter is less resource-demanding and looks infinitely better. I don't consider the Xbox any worse than the other consoles (it is the most powerful, after all). But the fundamental fact is that the Xbox is behind the PC in hardware capability, and more than that, it has a <i>different target audience</i>.

Deus Ex 2 demonstrates that <i>it's not just the graphics that suffer when a game is developed for both the PC and Xbox</i>. The average console gamer is around 17, while the average PC gamer is 26 (and that number has been rising as the gamers that were raised on the Atari and Commodore are getting older). They are a different audience, and console games invariably have gameplay that PCers would call "dumbed down"--they want simple gameplay, lots of fluid motion, fast-moving plots, and very little down time. That's why platformers and sports games are FAR more popular on the consoles than the PC. There are a couple of exceptions, like Morrowind, but they are few and far between.

Even if a longtime console gamer and a longtime PC gamer are the same age, they've been raised on different stuff. Remember back in the 286 and 386 days? PC gamers were playing realistic flight sims (the top-selling genre), submarine sims, strategy games (mostly turn-based back then), or the Ultima series of RPGs. Consolers? They were jumping on mushrooms with Mario.

Knights of the Old Republic is a good example of a "dumbed down" Bioware RPG. The environments are grossly simplistic, and that is the game's #1 failing. A huge spaceport or city consists of, if you're lucky, 2 stores, a cantina, and a big open space between them all. The environments are extremely linear. We know from the past that Bioware is able and willing to make a huge RPG with big, detailed environments and tons of sidequests (Baldur's Gate 2). Is it a coincidence that their RPG developed for the Xbox would be extremely simplified?

Forget Deus Ex 2's graphics. The original's graphics sucked, so I can live with it. It's the idiotic gameplay simplification that is indicative of the disturbing trend. The game has been dumbed down to appeal to a wider, younger audience with shorter attention spans and less patience for slow, strategic gameplay.

I read all the interviews with Warren Specter, and he has this weird fixation with making a game "accessible". He used some example of watching a guy at a gaming expo try to play System Shock 2, but end up getting backed into a corner and he couldn't get out. Well good grief. Deus Ex did not have a difficult interface, Warren. It was quite good. I remember it being praised for adhering to FPS standards and yet providing a wealth of information to the gamer via the datapad screens (in fact I think Gamespot's review says almost exactly that). Now, with the inclusion of the consoles, that info-rich interface is considered a liability?

Don't get your hopes up with Thief III.

[Suicides-by-Steve]

"Knights of the Old Republic is a good example of a "dumbed down" Bioware RPG. The environments are grossly simplistic, and that is the game's #1 failing. A huge spaceport or city consists of, if you're lucky, 2 stores, a cantina, and a big open space between them all. The environments are extremely linear. We know from the past that Bioware is able and willing to make a huge RPG with big, detailed environments and tons of sidequests (Baldur's Gate 2). Is it a coincidence that their RPG developed for the Xbox would be extremely simplified?"

Didn't I say this from the beginning? The city of Tarin felt too artifical. It doesn't get any better with you going to other planets. It's really too bad this wasn't developed with a NWN-like system in mind, or in fact mimicked NWN a little more... it could have been great. I'm still hoping for the underground mod that rips the textures from this game and total converts them into NWN.