Deus Ex : Mankind Divided

Only four hours in so far but the game feels like a mess compared to the last one. Hard to use map, menus are difficult to understand, not enough flow and the beginning is rather dull. Performance is okay, and the game can look decent in some areas but it still needs improvements. Got some bad stutters once and a CTD but otherwise it worked okay. It can use some optimization. Animations are horrible for characters though. It looks even worse than Human Revolution, which wasn't exactly stunning either. They're enough to standout. Assets are rather low in detail to.

With luck the mess of a game will become a bit more straight forward as time goes on, and the story picks up. So far it seems like a lot of walking back and fourth and I fear it has fallen to the cliche "open ended" game design.
Yup. The constant back and forth to the same areas is a valid complaint. The poor map design makes it even more frustrating until you visit certain areas enough. The game could have used more polish.

So far I've clocked over 82 hours and that includes the current DLC. Waiting for the next DLC to drop.
 
I have a few more hours, but not very far in the game, a couple of hours after resetting my augs. I'm playing slow and enjoying the scenery. I'll say that if you liked Human Revolution, you should like this. It's not the same and there are some silly issues, but it's an even better detailed world than the last game.
 
If you're big on random exploration it's pretty easy to accidentally purge large plot points before you're ready. None actually seem to break anything (at least not in a major way) but there were several quests where I ended up sauntering from one goal to the next because the area was already cleared out or hacked/unlocked.
Rather than limiting access to those areas (I wouldn't want that), I don't think that would be as big of an issue if they game world was a bit larger.
The theories about the game being split in half for the sake of sales deadlines lend themselves to this. I can't imagine they really wanted you to go in those same sewer areas over and over, but they probably had no choice.
 
I can see that- I found a cult that I don't want to mess with because it reeks of 'later plot' (plus I don't have the augs to stealth it). Splitting the difference between on rails and open world has got to be difficult when your players are curious and tend to break everything by poking everywhere but the plot listed goals...
 
I tried this again last night and just couldn't get into it. I wish I'd never spent the $60 on it.
I loved the first Deus Ex but this one just never hooked me.
 
I will give it a try again today. Last night I played a few more hours, now Steam is reading 7 hours. Aside from the intro mission I only got into combat once so far. Although I could have entered combat if I had wanted. The pacing just feels a bit off. I thought the last game had an excellent balance of open/restricted gameplay. The hub areas were not that big and side missions only accounted for about 1/3 of your play time. Yet there was some freedom to accomplish things. I will see how it ends up.

Some things that annoy me is the hacking interface in this game. It is harder to viewed the nodes, more steps to lock it down or hack it, and the interface is just more clumsy. Also, oddly, when control is taken away from you mouse panning is exceptionally slow. Makes it hard to follow an NPC during a conversation.

The other is that mission objectives make zero sense. You have no idea what you're supposed to do. Kill someone, hack a computer, find something. It could be any of that or more, but the developers simply didn't bother to tell you what your objective is which can get infuriating. It makes the missions obscenely long; you may spend 2-3 hours because the game does not tell you what it wants you to do. Coupled with the broken hacking interface (which is half of the game so far) you'll be looking at loading screens a lot.

Overall it is playable as of now, but I think it still needs a few patches.
 
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I finally got around to starting last night. I had to drop controller/mouse sensitivity to basically zero to make it playable with the Steam controller (stock setup) but it feels pretty decent now although aim precision is not quite there.

Only made it past the intro mission which I was able to stealth until the end. Fun so far but not blown away. I was a huge HR fan so we will see how this goes.
 
I finally got around to starting last night. I had to drop controller/mouse sensitivity to basically zero to make it playable with the Steam controller (stock setup) but it feels pretty decent now although aim precision is not quite there.

Only made it past the intro mission which I was able to stealth until the end. Fun so far but not blown away. I was a huge HR fan so we will see how this goes.

Heh, I did exactly that. It didn't fully pull me in right away, so I let myself get distracted. Still haven't gone back to it yet, but plan to after I'm done with Dishonored 2. I also was a huge fan of HR. Even if I don't like this one as much though, I can't see not enjoying it.
 
Some things that annoy me is the hacking interface in this game. It is harder to viewed the nodes, more steps to lock it down or hack it, and the interface is just more clumsy. Also, oddly, when control is taken away from you mouse panning is exceptionally slow. Makes it hard to follow an NPC during a conversation.

The other is that mission objectives make zero sense. You have no idea what you're supposed to do. Kill someone, hack a computer, find something. It could be any of that or more, but the developers simply didn't bother to tell you what your objective is which can get infuriating. It makes the missions obscenely long; you may spend 2-3 hours because the game does not tell you what it wants you to do. Coupled with the broken hacking interface (which is half of the game so far) you'll be looking at loading screens a lot.

Overall it is playable as of now, but I think it still needs a few patches.
Agreed on the hacking, but I'll say that I think they give you the info you need for the mission in the cutscenes and dialog, the pointer is just to give a heads up. And if you check the 'tab' menu one of the icons will show you a decent reminder of what you are supposed to do... And finally, I REALLY agree on the patches needing work, this last one introduced a 100% crash in Prague for me, in a particular spot (but the tree next to the cops arresting a guy). Annoying as hell.
 
The other is that mission objectives make zero sense. You have no idea what you're supposed to do. Kill someone, hack a computer, find something. It could be any of that or more, but the developers simply didn't bother to tell you what your objective is which can get infuriating. It makes the missions obscenely long; you may spend 2-3 hours because the game does not tell you what it wants you to do. Coupled with the broken hacking interface (which is half of the game so far) you'll be looking at loading screens a lot.

Overall it is playable as of now, but I think it still needs a few patches.

Yeah, would have to say you need to not waste your time and stop playing now. Hacking is good for stocking up on programs, you'll be doing it a lot, unless you find a bunch of multitools. As far as navigating the map and quests, this will never change, so be prepared for another 13-15 hours of that.
 
I found the hacking to be a major weakpoint for the game. There really isn't anything to it. It's just a matter of moving your cursor from one node to the next and hoping it happens before the timer runs out. Most of the power-ups for it don't do much, other than the one that stops the timer. There's no real finesse to it and it isn't even something you can get "better" at. Plus, it's incredibly clumsy. For something you end up doing for so much of the game, it feels like they phoned the whole concept in.
 
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I hated the Hacking from the first DX, but found it to be manageable as you progressed.

However, I agree with the observations that it is much more difficult this time around, and one of the main sore points of the new game for me.
 
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I will give it a try again today. Last night I played a few more hours, now Steam is reading 7 hours. Aside from the intro mission I only got into combat once so far. Although I could have entered combat if I had wanted. The pacing just feels a bit off. I thought the last game had an excellent balance of open/restricted gameplay. The hub areas were not that big and side missions only accounted for about 1/3 of your play time. Yet there was some freedom to accomplish things. I will see how it ends up.

Some things that annoy me is the hacking interface in this game. It is harder to viewed the nodes, more steps to lock it down or hack it, and the interface is just more clumsy. Also, oddly, when control is taken away from you mouse panning is exceptionally slow. Makes it hard to follow an NPC during a conversation.

The other is that mission objectives make zero sense. You have no idea what you're supposed to do. Kill someone, hack a computer, find something. It could be any of that or more, but the developers simply didn't bother to tell you what your objective is which can get infuriating. It makes the missions obscenely long; you may spend 2-3 hours because the game does not tell you what it wants you to do. Coupled with the broken hacking interface (which is half of the game so far) you'll be looking at loading screens a lot.

Overall it is playable as of now, but I think it still needs a few patches.

Hacking is extremely easy even on the hardest game difficulty. Actually there is a strategy to follow. But most hacking problems are solvable without much thinking. But the basics are to check the nodes for chance of being discovered if you capture it. If the chance is low, you try to capture it and if you're not discovered you move to the next node. If there is a very high chance to be discovered. Then you start capturing everything in sight, and fortifying alll the nodes immediately, to slow down the eventual trace. And if you know that you don't have enough time to finish hacking then you sacrifice programs, either by nuking the most difficult node in the hack, or by stopping the timer long enough to finish the hack. I don't understand the bit about clumsy controls. You point at the node and press the key you want depending on what you want to do with it, capture, fortify or nuke. There was nothing clumsy about it, you can do everything in a flash.

It's the point of the game to not have to use combat if you don't want to that's what partly makes it good. It's up to you what you want to do. Hub areas in plural? There is only one hub area: Prague, where you can use the metro to travel faster from one side to the other, but it's still just one area.

It's actually a great thing that we finally have a game where the player has to do some thinking for themselves, and not being micromanaged and told all the way exactly what to do. And if you pay attention to conversations and context and all the information the game gives you then you have a pretty good idea what to do all the time. If you want the game to hold your hand and tell you exactly letter by letter what you have to do to win, then perhaps this is not a game for you.
 
Hacking is extremely easy even on the hardest game difficulty.

It is not so much an issue of the actual difficultly, but the capture/nuke/ect. options often overlay the Exit/Disconnect option. And the panning in the hack, conversation and map modes are oddly slow. Although I did accidentally walk into some side quests. A little odd as the conversations are referencing previous meetings that I did not participate in which makes it a bit confusing. I like to explore a lot, but it would have been nice if they locked some rooms and the like to prevent that until you did the previous part. But the game does pick up a bit better mission wise. It just takes a while.

Not too sure I understand how the experiential augs work though. I have two activated so I am at 200% and get minor gliches. Without spoilers, can this be fixed later in the game? I would like to try some of the new augs but I am not sure if they are worth it if the gliches become worse over 200%.
 
It is not so much an issue of the actual difficultly, but the capture/nuke/ect. options often overlay the Exit/Disconnect option. And the panning in the hack, conversation and map modes are oddly slow. Although I did accidentally walk into some side quests. A little odd as the conversations are referencing previous meetings that I did not participate in which makes it a bit confusing. I like to explore a lot, but it would have been nice if they locked some rooms and the like to prevent that until you did the previous part. But the game does pick up a bit better mission wise. It just takes a while.

Not too sure I understand how the experiential augs work though. I have two activated so I am at 200% and get minor gliches. Without spoilers, can this be fixed later in the game? I would like to try some of the new augs but I am not sure if they are worth it if the gliches become worse over 200%.

Are you deactivating augs to bring your total back down to 100 or so?

When you first go see Koller to get your augs in order, he does explain a calibrator... and where to go about finding it.
 
Almost hit 70 hours playing the game twice & the 2 DLC once. I'm hoping they bring out more story DLC & maybe eventually integrate it into the main game later on.
 
Are you deactivating augs to bring your total back down to 100 or so?

When you first go see Koller to get your augs in order, he does explain a calibrator... and where to go about finding it.

I did that side quest. I can deactivate augs but I don't want to. :p

I'm going very slow with this game. I'm about half way through and well over 20 hours already.
 
This game can has some of the worst directions ever. Spend 40+ minutes looking for a "Janus Package" in SM12. The directions are simply "find scanner or computer on 3rd floor" or some such. After hacking and looking at every PC in the damn bank I still can't get a "Janus Package" but the objective still points to this biometric encryptor or something. Maybe tell us a rough location, what exactly we have to do and the like would be helpful. Because clearly, the directions don't match the actual floor layout.

Edit: I found it, but there was a bug when trying to use it. Just exit to main menu and back to fix it.
 
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It is not so much an issue of the actual difficultly, but the capture/nuke/ect. options often overlay the Exit/Disconnect option. And the panning in the hack, conversation and map modes are oddly slow. Although I did accidentally walk into some side quests. A little odd as the conversations are referencing previous meetings that I did not participate in which makes it a bit confusing. I like to explore a lot, but it would have been nice if they locked some rooms and the like to prevent that until you did the previous part. But the game does pick up a bit better mission wise. It just takes a while.
I don't know what are you referring to by overlaying? Might be a bug that I didn't encounter. I could always use the proper function when I wanted, they all have hotkeys that I usually went for, F for Fortify, N for nuke, I used those all the time. Panning was fine for me, at least I didn't remember it as being inconvenient or sluggish, but with most hacks there wasn't event a need to pan, since almost the entire layout fit on one screen. But I did have to drastically change the actual mouse speed in the game to get proper aiming.

Not too sure I understand how the experiential augs work though. I have two activated so I am at 200% and get minor gliches. Without spoilers, can this be fixed later in the game? I would like to try some of the new augs but I am not sure if they are worth it if the gliches become worse over 200%.
When you go to the aug specialist he explains. But it wasn't clear to me either at first. You have to turn off other experimental augs to get the load down to 100%. You can try new ones, but you have to disable others in turn if you wish to activate new ones. And you can't disable standard augs, only the experimental ones count for the overload. Just be mindful that if you disable an aug, you'll need praxis points again to re-activate them later.

But I wouldn't be too concerned with augs. Most are unnecessary or give only minor benefits but rape energy. I didn't even spend the praxis points in the game, only when I specifically needed an aug to get something done easily. About the only thing worth spending on is basic energy recharge rate so you can iniitiate takedowns much more often without using biocells.

And yes later about halfway trough the game you'll get the overload issue fixed so you can have all augs at the same time but you do need to do the mission where you collect the necessary equipment for it. I don't remember if that was a skippable side mission or an actual story mission. But I think it was part of the main story.
 
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Yeah, as you're about done in the 2nd visit to Prague you can use any aug without problem. Thought most of the experimental are rather useless. The missions do get better as the game goes on. I experienced some bad graphical issues but reloading a save fixes it. They are not too common and not enough to hurt the game, IMO. I was a bit disappointed in the primary villain encountered as I felt he was too shallow and too henchmen like. Overall the game needed some more story missions; the ratio of side to primary missions is not proportional. Not too sure how I felt about the ending and story overall. It lacked some of the suspense HR had and brought the Illuminati to the forefront and made them seem too forefront. I never played the first game, but I liked how in HR they were hardly referred to. But I think MD is a good enough game.

It needs some patches though. Playable? Certainly. But some objective way points are off, menu can become "sticky", sometimes I could not combine mine templates with grenades and the like. Smaller issues and they were infrequent. The game and the Desperate Measures DLC mission took me 47 hours. I explored a lot, took my time and probably hacked almost every PC, door and vault I could find. I took alternate routes even after I got to my location via another method. Seems like it lasted much longer than the average person for me though I won't complain. May redo a mission or two going in guns blazing this time. :)
 
GMG is running Black Friday sales already and this is up at bat for 30 percent off.
 
It was already posted over in Hot Deals but Gamestop has the deluxe edition for $22.49 or the season pass for $7.49 right now, both are digital versions(Steam keys).
 
Question about one of the trailers.

One of the earlier trailers for this game showed Jensen trying and failing to stop a suicide bomber, with him sinking in the water at the end. Was this scene purely made for marketing? I don't recall seeing it in the game. I did skip the in game recap video half way through and I chose to go to the bank rather than save the bomb maker in Prague. Not sure if that means I missed it.
 
We have just released another PC patch for Deus Ex: Mankind Divided, v1.12 build 667.0_P12. This patch focuses on fixing a couple of critical and minor issues raised by the community.

This patch will be applied by Steam automatically when you next start the game. If your game does not update, please restart the Steam client.

The following changes are in this patch:
  • Fixes an issue where the weapon inventory bar would not be saved online.
  • Fixes some crash issues occurring with specific save files from users.
  • Quit Game option is now aligned with the other menu options.
As always, make sure that your drivers are up to date:
- AMD driver: http://support.amd.com/en-us/download
- NVIDIA driver: http://www.nvidia.com/Download/index.aspx?lang=en-us

While we expect this patch to be an improvement for everyone, if you do have trouble with this patch and prefer to stay on older versions, we have made a Beta for build v1.11_build616.0 available on Steam that can be used to switch back to the previous version.

We will keep monitoring for feedback and will release further patches as it seems required. We always welcome your feedback!
 
DE: Mankind Divided is on sale on steam for $20 right now, just picked it up! Couldn't believe a game this recent was on sale so cheap.
 
Worth playing? I heard the story kinda sucks and ends abruptly... Like the game is only half finished.

Makes sense considering the rumblings from Jim Sterling that Square Enix tried to pull the same episodic bullshit that it did with Hitman. With that and the microtransactions, I am happy to wait for the GOTYE to hit the $10 bargain bin.
 
Makes sense considering the rumblings from Jim Sterling that Square Enix tried to pull the same episodic bullshit that it did with Hitman. With that and the microtransactions, I am happy to wait for the GOTYE to hit the $10 bargain bin.

It's still a damned good game.


Much to my own shock: It's worked on Hitman, the way they did it, even though I would still prefer they hadn't done that particular concept.

I'm not sure what exactly they did on Mankind Divided but yes the game is absolutely worth playing and frankly for more than this shocking $20 Midweek Madness sale I'm seeing right now.

The microtransactions are complete non factor and non entities. I don't like this sort of thing but if it stays like that I can basically ignore it and forget it which is what I did here. It's a complete non-issue.



Worth playing? I heard the story kinda sucks and ends abruptly... Like the game is only half finished.

Just more exaggerated Internet hate from a loud, small minority.

You can't finish a story in one game with a clean, pretty little bow on it considering how expansive and ambitious the entire concept is.

$20 is a dizzying steal for this game, all told.


I would agree that Human Revolution is still a better game, overall, but that didn't have much of an ending, either.
 
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The thing with things like microtransactions and multiplayer, imo, is that it's dev time that could have or should have been spent on the campaign. It just shows that the people in charge have lost their way.. or at least lost touch with what made Deus Ex great and are now more focused on milking a franchise than creating a masterpiece.
 
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I'm only halfway through the game at this point so I can't comment on the ending but so far the story isn't nearly as good as HR but the atmosphere and characters are better, some of the interesting characters remind more of the first game. So far there's a lot less globe trotting going on so you lose some of the variety that HR and even the first game have.

I picked up the deluxe edition for a little over $20 during the black friday sales and I feel that the game was well worth it and I'm pretty picky but I also like the DE series.
 
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Ebernaut's post above this one is a fairly short and sweet summary of the pros and cons of this game. That's pretty fair.



The thing with things like microtransactions and multiplayer, imo, is that it's dev time that could have or should have been spent on the campaign. It just shows that the people in charge have lost their way.. or at least lost touch with what made Deus Ex great and are now more focused on milking a franchise than creating a masterpiece.

I see the concerns but the jury, for now, is still out, for me.


The microtransactions are so superfluous and silly I have a hard time imagining it took anyone much effort to slap that nonsense on there. Again, not defending it... so far it's nonsense and we all dread a potential day when someone tries to cross the lines on those to something more. I hope it doesn't happen. I'm sorry every time I see the likes of it.


MP.... yeah, I won't argue with you on that. Breach is interesting but... yeah, I definitely would have preferred any and all focus to go to the campaign just like HR. No argument there.



They did great on HR... I agree that's the all around better game so far between the two... but they also have the unenviable task of trying to take this "soft reboot" and tie into in the rich mythos established by the old games and if I understand things correctly, perhaps some day move the time line forward up to JC Denton and that whole bit. No way that's going to happen in a handful of games if they really want to do it right.

I don't know how much more DLC is planned for this game and this game definitely has more of a "installment/serial" feel to it vs HR which works as both a serial and strong stand alone.

I hope they put out at least one more slam bang DLC for this game. It needs it. It needs something that moves things forward and sets up potential for the inevitable next game.

One more powerhouse DLC/expansion to put this over the top would be great.

If they are done with this game already I will feel like they cut bait way too soon on it.
 
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Well said Q-BZ. And my comment was certainly a generalization trailing on Blade-Runner's comments. I haven't played this game, mainly because my rig is old :cry:, but I'd probably still wait for GOTYE on principle.

I also had the annoying experience of purchasing the HR on launch day and playing it in the same house as my flatmate who'd pirated it... he got all the pre-order bonuses and DLC right out of the gate, and while stealing, still left a sour taste in my mouth because of, again, greedy business practices.
 
It's still a damned good game.

Much to my own shock: It's worked on Hitman, the way they did it, even though I would still prefer they hadn't done that particular concept.

I'm not sure what exactly they did on Mankind Divided but yes the game is absolutely worth playing and frankly for more than this shocking $20 Midweek Madness sale I'm seeing right now.

The microtransactions are complete non factor and non entities. I don't like this sort of thing but if it stays like that I can basically ignore it and forget it which is what I did here. It's a complete non-issue.

Whether or not its an issue is a matter of perspective, as far as I am concerned any publisher that partakes in these sorts of shenanigans can pound sand. I am not in any way depriving myself given that I will eventually play it, and when I have a shitload of other games to work through in the mean time there is no way I am going give another game priority over the existing backlog unless its pretty damn special and the devs have gone out of their way to please the community. I am also fully expecting, given how much of a stingy fuck Square Enix is, some sort of reworked Director's Cut that existing owners are expected to pay for, so I am willing further bide my time to see whether that comes to pass.
 
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