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Deus Ex: Invisible War Preview |
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Deus Ex: Invisible War
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Set 20 years after the original Deus Ex, Deus Ex: Invisible War puts you in the shoes of Alex Denton. The choice of which sex to play as is up to you, which wasn't possible in the original Deus Ex due to the thousands of lines of speach. Originally the development team were going to experiment with things such as giving males higher strength, but better conversation options for females, but this was discarded, and the sex of the player will factor into less than 10% of character conversations. Other cosmetic details, such as hair colour, style, skin tone, etc, will also be left to the player's choice.
Deus Ex: Invisible War will be up there with the most technically impressive games, such as Doom III, Halo 2 and Half Life 2. While the game runs on the latest itteration of the Unreal engine (heavily customised, I might add) Ion Storm have licensed Valve's Havok physics engine, by far the most advanced physics engine ever made. The game makes extensive use of pixel and vertex shaders, which is why it can only be done on the PC and Xbox. These are not only used for ultra advanced dynamic and real time lighting effects, on par with Splinter Cell, but also for normal mapping, a similar process to bump mapping. This can make 3000 - 3500 polygon characters look like they have 10,000 polygons or more, and add an insane amount of detail to uneven surfaces such as a stone wall. These, along with already high quality textures and models, make the game look as life like as anything we are likely to see for a while. Animations have also been greatly improved, and bones in the face allow very realistic lip synching. Rag doll physics, something that was missing from the original Deus Ex, have also been implemented. This will mean much more realistic death animations, with bodies falling down stairs and slumping realisticly. At the moment, the Xbox version is looking evey bit as good as the PC version.
The sound system is also hugely impressive. How it works, is that each object has a material classification, such as wood, metal, leather, etc. Then each material makes a different sound depending on what is happening - rolling, banging, toppling, sliding and so on. The weight of the object is the next factor in determining the basic sound to make, altering the pitch and volume slightly. The volume will obviously differ with difference. This will play an important part in creating the atmosphere.
One of the problems with the augmentation system with Deus Ex was that you had to set your augmentations and skills before actually playing the game, which made it a matter of luck as to whether you chose useful options or something useless. This has changed in Deus Ex 2. Instead of augmentations, Alex can acquire bio-mods, which come in three levels of varying power. For example, the level 1 eyesight bio-mod might simply highlight targets making them easier to see. The level 2 eyesight bio-mod could offer night vision, and the level 3 bio-mod might allow Alex to see through walls. There will only be around 20 opportunities to acquire bio-mods during the game, which will make it important to specialise in a few areas or become average in many areas. Some unusual mods will be available, from regenerating health from corpses, to "Bot Domination", which allows the player to control any robot or cyborg. The game will allow you to play a few levels before making any huge customisations to your character, so you can see how the game plays, and how useful various skills will be. Not only can you mod your character, weapons can be modded as well. It is not certain how extensive this will be, but at the absolute minimum it should include different types of bullets, scopes, silencers, laser sights and similar modifications.
Deus Ex: Invisible War can play almost any way you want it to. You can play by stealth, talk your way though the game, or run in guns blazing. As the lighting is dynamic, an area can be as dark or light as you want. This could allow for some Splinter Cell style shadow hiding. Deus Ex's AI was far ahead of it's time, and it can only get better for Deus Ex: Invisible War. It only takes a few seconds staring at a non playable character to provoke a response such as "What're you lookin' at?", and depending on the situation, could even lead to verbal abuse or violence. Like the previous game, expect your actions to have consequences. These range from getting told off for going into the bathroom of the opposite sex, to being attacked by police for trading with the black market or shooting innocent people. The emphasis in on non-linear gameplay, so there are very few fixed failiures, just differemt possible outcomes, some better than others. The main quest is said to offer 20-25 hours of gameplay, and side quests make up another 30-40 hours. Obviously, taking different routes through the game will cause the story to work out differently, so the replay value should be relatively high as well.
Deus Ex: Invisible War is looking every bit as interactive and ambitious as Fable, and has it's prequel behind it. Even with all this, it is due out in just a few months. With it's unique mix of elements from role playing , first person shooters, stealth and more, this should turn out great and have a great chance for game of the year.
Review By: Flid_Merchant
Game Info: Deus Ex: Invisible War
Buy Game: Buy Deus Ex: Invisible War Now!
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