Thunder82
06-12-2003, 13:45
La rece di isonews:
Introduction
Supposedly a sequel to DX1, this game was broadsided during development with having to co-develop for xbox as well, and this clearly killed the game.
Everything about this game screams console in a BAD way. The menu system is annoying and unintuitive, if there is a quicksave key I can't find it or get it to work (at least it lets you save anywhere), the graphics are beyond shit and ALSO run like shit even on an elite gaming rig. The controls, combat, and inventory system are all dumbed down to work right for xbox, but as much as I hate consoles, I have to admit: This sucks even for them. A game shouldn't suck this hard no matter what console it is on.
Graphics (5/10)
Main test system: Athlon XP 2100+/1gb DDR pc2700/Radeon 9700 series clocked @ 380/310 (far above 9700 pro core speed, identical memory speed)
As stated above, the graphics are beyond awful. The reason there are no screenshots in this FL is because DX2 decides to block you from taking them. (Small wonder why: The engine is horrible and looks like something right out of 1998) I tried PRNTSCRN and then pasting to mspaint like I often do to get a clean screencap, but DX2 blocks this. I tried FRAPS which at least lets you measure the FPS you are getting (in the case of this game, NOT getting) but Fraps screenshot key was unresponsive within DX2 so I changed it a few times with no result. Oh well. You aren't missing much.
There are few graphic options within the game to adjust, but it is possible to extensively tweak the game's settings within the .ini files, but the amount of work needed to get the game to a remotely playable level even on good hardware is just beyond ridiculous. The average gamer is not going to be able to modify config files just to get more than 20fps looking at a wall.
Once I adjusted the shadows to lowest detail @ 800x600 and turned off the game's built in "Bloom" feature (which adds artificial blur and brightness to the objects, I guess to cover up the xbox framerate problems... yes you heard right, even the xbox version has framerate issues) the game finally ran at a fairly steady 40-50fps with rare drops below 30. I also tweaked a few config settings to sharpen some textures (trilinear filtering is disabled by default with no in-game option to enable it... aniso does not seem to work in Deus Ex 2) and reduced the mouse lag which renders the game almost COMPLETELY unplayable.
Once I did all this (which took around 2 hours of msg board reading and IRC chatting) the game was finally in a state of being playable with only minor hiccups.
This did NOT change the fact it looks like diseased donkey ass. Everything in the game is a blurry, pixelated mess, and its very difficult to tell what an object is sometimes. (Its almost like playing on a TV with scanlines enabled) There are a few cool shadow effects, and the dynamic lighting seems to work ok but nothing looks good.
Believe it or not, Deus Ex 2 looks MUCH worse overall than Deus Ex 1 did, even with the graphics options maxed out (including AA) and a high res, the game STILL looks like ass. It is simply unbelievable how Ion Storm managed to take years of development and end up with a game that looks like it time warped from 1998.
Audio (7/10)
What I managed to hear seemed pretty good. Voice acting was passable and the sound effects were good. Guns did NOT sound realistic, and often background noises would cover up voice acting or other things you needed to hear. Overall the sounds are a muddy mess, and difficult to pick out. I used Turtle Beach Santa Cruz and a Monsoon Planarmedia 9 system for testing.
Gameplay (4/10)
This is the usual do or die area, and this is the area where Deus Ex 2 picks up the soap in the prison shower. We are talking a "Daikatana-like" level of failure here. The hype was enormous, the screenshots looked fine, promises of great gameplay were soaked up.... and NONE of it delivers. This has got to be the worst sequel to a great game in the history of computer entertainment. Everything about Invisible War, and I mean literally EVERYTHING feels like it was made simply to irritate, annoy, and otherwise piss off the PC Gaming crowd. Objects all have physics but none of them move realistically; a basketball screams out in a non-arcing angle at about 50 mph when you throw it for example. The interface is clearly console centered, very few options to take advantage of the PC platform (i'm surprised they let you remap the controls at all), the graphics are ass even with maxed out settings, the lip syncing is BEYOND FUCKING LAUGHABLE... in fact, I think the lip syncing itself deserves the award as the worst in any game, ever. Its even worse than X2, I think. You have a conversation with someone and maybe speak 2 sentences and you're characters lips move maybe 3 times total, and there is only 2 mouth animations. Open, and closed. Thats it.
Moving on we run into shit like enemies take dozens of hits to take down, RPG elements are basically non existent, character creation is absolutely minimalist, etc etc etc I really don't fucking care anymore. Ion Storm ruined the name of what was one of the best PC games to ever come along.
Concluding Thoughts (6/20)
Ladies and gentlemen, this is what happens when you try to create a sequel for a great PC game, that featured tons of innovative new features, as an xbox title with a PC version as an afterthought. It would be impossible for me to cram every possible thing i hate about this game into this small review, so I'm going to simply conclude with this:
My hatred of consoles is well known, but this is beyond that: This is just an inherently bad game that should never have seen the light of day. No patch will fix this game, its just THAT bad.
Total score: 22/50
Direi che è piuttosto eloquente...
Introduction
Supposedly a sequel to DX1, this game was broadsided during development with having to co-develop for xbox as well, and this clearly killed the game.
Everything about this game screams console in a BAD way. The menu system is annoying and unintuitive, if there is a quicksave key I can't find it or get it to work (at least it lets you save anywhere), the graphics are beyond shit and ALSO run like shit even on an elite gaming rig. The controls, combat, and inventory system are all dumbed down to work right for xbox, but as much as I hate consoles, I have to admit: This sucks even for them. A game shouldn't suck this hard no matter what console it is on.
Graphics (5/10)
Main test system: Athlon XP 2100+/1gb DDR pc2700/Radeon 9700 series clocked @ 380/310 (far above 9700 pro core speed, identical memory speed)
As stated above, the graphics are beyond awful. The reason there are no screenshots in this FL is because DX2 decides to block you from taking them. (Small wonder why: The engine is horrible and looks like something right out of 1998) I tried PRNTSCRN and then pasting to mspaint like I often do to get a clean screencap, but DX2 blocks this. I tried FRAPS which at least lets you measure the FPS you are getting (in the case of this game, NOT getting) but Fraps screenshot key was unresponsive within DX2 so I changed it a few times with no result. Oh well. You aren't missing much.
There are few graphic options within the game to adjust, but it is possible to extensively tweak the game's settings within the .ini files, but the amount of work needed to get the game to a remotely playable level even on good hardware is just beyond ridiculous. The average gamer is not going to be able to modify config files just to get more than 20fps looking at a wall.
Once I adjusted the shadows to lowest detail @ 800x600 and turned off the game's built in "Bloom" feature (which adds artificial blur and brightness to the objects, I guess to cover up the xbox framerate problems... yes you heard right, even the xbox version has framerate issues) the game finally ran at a fairly steady 40-50fps with rare drops below 30. I also tweaked a few config settings to sharpen some textures (trilinear filtering is disabled by default with no in-game option to enable it... aniso does not seem to work in Deus Ex 2) and reduced the mouse lag which renders the game almost COMPLETELY unplayable.
Once I did all this (which took around 2 hours of msg board reading and IRC chatting) the game was finally in a state of being playable with only minor hiccups.
This did NOT change the fact it looks like diseased donkey ass. Everything in the game is a blurry, pixelated mess, and its very difficult to tell what an object is sometimes. (Its almost like playing on a TV with scanlines enabled) There are a few cool shadow effects, and the dynamic lighting seems to work ok but nothing looks good.
Believe it or not, Deus Ex 2 looks MUCH worse overall than Deus Ex 1 did, even with the graphics options maxed out (including AA) and a high res, the game STILL looks like ass. It is simply unbelievable how Ion Storm managed to take years of development and end up with a game that looks like it time warped from 1998.
Audio (7/10)
What I managed to hear seemed pretty good. Voice acting was passable and the sound effects were good. Guns did NOT sound realistic, and often background noises would cover up voice acting or other things you needed to hear. Overall the sounds are a muddy mess, and difficult to pick out. I used Turtle Beach Santa Cruz and a Monsoon Planarmedia 9 system for testing.
Gameplay (4/10)
This is the usual do or die area, and this is the area where Deus Ex 2 picks up the soap in the prison shower. We are talking a "Daikatana-like" level of failure here. The hype was enormous, the screenshots looked fine, promises of great gameplay were soaked up.... and NONE of it delivers. This has got to be the worst sequel to a great game in the history of computer entertainment. Everything about Invisible War, and I mean literally EVERYTHING feels like it was made simply to irritate, annoy, and otherwise piss off the PC Gaming crowd. Objects all have physics but none of them move realistically; a basketball screams out in a non-arcing angle at about 50 mph when you throw it for example. The interface is clearly console centered, very few options to take advantage of the PC platform (i'm surprised they let you remap the controls at all), the graphics are ass even with maxed out settings, the lip syncing is BEYOND FUCKING LAUGHABLE... in fact, I think the lip syncing itself deserves the award as the worst in any game, ever. Its even worse than X2, I think. You have a conversation with someone and maybe speak 2 sentences and you're characters lips move maybe 3 times total, and there is only 2 mouth animations. Open, and closed. Thats it.
Moving on we run into shit like enemies take dozens of hits to take down, RPG elements are basically non existent, character creation is absolutely minimalist, etc etc etc I really don't fucking care anymore. Ion Storm ruined the name of what was one of the best PC games to ever come along.
Concluding Thoughts (6/20)
Ladies and gentlemen, this is what happens when you try to create a sequel for a great PC game, that featured tons of innovative new features, as an xbox title with a PC version as an afterthought. It would be impossible for me to cram every possible thing i hate about this game into this small review, so I'm going to simply conclude with this:
My hatred of consoles is well known, but this is beyond that: This is just an inherently bad game that should never have seen the light of day. No patch will fix this game, its just THAT bad.
Total score: 22/50
Direi che è piuttosto eloquente...