[CP5670]

I think his points are correct. You do become good at basically everything by the end. Even though you can't get all the augmentations, you can certainly get all the ones that are actually useful. I had gotten everything I truly wanted by the second Detroit level, and by the end I had 3 or 4 unused Praxis points that I never figured out what to do with. DX1 did have these issues too to some extent though.

Still, I know a couple of people who played it closer to a more conventional FPS on their first go, but they weren't DX veterans

I play the DX games with a mixture of stealth and combat, planning out attacks carefully but still killing (or occasionally tranquilizing) everyone in some way. I like to explore all the areas very thoroughly and find everything there is to pick up, but all that stuff would be useless if I was just sneaking past everyone without fighting. I still finished DX3 with full loads of ammo and equipment, just like I do with DX1.

[Achillion]

I think his points are correct. You do become good at basically everything by the end. Even though you can't get all the augmentations, you can certainly get all the ones that are actually useful. I had gotten everything I truly wanted by the second Detroit level, and by the end I had 3 or 4 unused Praxis points that I never figured out what to do with. DX1 did have these issues too to some extent though.

DX1 had one very important difference though: you had to pick one augmentation per slot, which meant there were always augs you weren't going to get. That feature alone gives the game some sense of uniqueness in each player's custom aug setup. Also, there weren't enough skill points in the game to get everything you wanted. I don't think you can say that DX1 had the same issues, since the issue here is that by the end you're always the same "custom" character.

Still, I know a couple of people who played it closer to a more conventional FPS on their first go, but they weren't DX veterans

I play the DX games with a mixture of stealth and combat, planning out attacks carefully but still killing (or occasionally tranquilizing) everyone in some way. I like to explore all the areas very thoroughly and find everything there is to pick up, but all that stuff would be useless if I was just sneaking past everyone without fighting. I still finished DX3 with full loads of ammo and equipment, just like I do with DX1.

Same here. As soon as I realised that there were places that were only accessible with the Icarus landing system, I spent my next 2 points getting it. No rock left unturned

[Grizzly]

DX1 had one very important difference though: you had to pick one augmentation per slot, which meant there were always augs you weren't going to get. That feature alone gives the game some sense of uniqueness in each player's custom aug setup. Also, there weren't enough skill points in the game to get everything you wanted. I don't think you can say that DX1 had the same issues, since the issue here is that by the end you're always the same "custom" character.

Most of those other augs were rather useless though... And many skills could be replaced with augs (Health Regen ftw!) Or were simply not needed in order to get good results...

[CP5670]

DX1 had one very important difference though: you had to pick one augmentation per slot, which meant there were always augs you weren't going to get. That feature alone gives the game some sense of uniqueness in each player's custom aug setup. Also, there weren't enough skill points in the game to get everything you wanted. I don't think you can say that DX1 had the same issues, since the issue here is that by the end you're always the same "custom" character.

I was referring to the fact that you get maxed out on the most useful stuff long before the end. In DX1, I tend to have basically all the augmentations I really want by the time I get to Paris, and after that it becomes a matter of looking for things to upgrade just because I keep finding the upgrade canisters. DX1 does force you to specialize more with the augmentations, but I still find that certain ones are obvious choices, and the rest are very situational and don't make a big difference to the gameplay either way.

[Achillion]

Yeah I see your point, you're right (both of ya)

[Scourge of Ages]

Bump!

I just finished the game, and really enjoyed it. The multiple endings didn't seem quite as deep and involved as in the first game.
Anyway, I had a question I'd like to get some opinions on: A few times, Jensen is referred to as a "Hanzer" by civilians; what do you think it stands for?

[Achillion]

I'm currently running through my murderous second playthrough. It's nice to see the subtle differences in dialogue when you're playing differently. I remember I got called "Ghandi" by Pritchard the first time around and this time he called me "Genghis Khan".

Playing it like a straight, run and gun, FPS game on the hardest difficulty isn't as challenging as I was expecting it to be though and the low-ammo problem disappears if you have decent aim.

As for the "hanzer" name, I have no idea Scourge.

[The E]

Hanzer comes from "Enhancer", ie someone who went under the knife to get some upgrades.

[MP-Ryan]

I picked this up about 2 weeks ago, I'm now half-way through and 45 hours in (according to Steam), and I'm loving it.  The first Deus Ex remains solidly in my top 5 best games, and this really wouldn't be all that far behind if I didn't still have the first on that list (and the only thing keeping the first game there over this is the much wider RPG elements and game complexity).

Two main gripes:  had to reload an hour of playtime back because the game decided not to give me the Ghost bonus despite not altering anyone in one mission, and the bug that causes some enemies to die quite some time after being successfully knocked out has me worried for my Pacifist achievement.  Lesser gripe would be that the aug trees aren't mutually-exclusive choices like the original, but rather a progressive path where you really can get everything if you have sufficient XP.

Also...boss fights are hilarious.  I've been maximizing XP and therefore using takedowns over tranq headshots and stun gun, so I have a ton of ammo for both... and so far both bosses have been susceptible to the stun gun.  As in, were killed by the stun gun.  On the hardest difficulty.  With no aug usage.  In fact, so far the only thing my fully-upgraded pistol (the only lethal weapon I carry) has been used for is shooting open the odd wall that I'm too lazy to punch through.

Bots that turn hostile at EMP grenades tossed steathily behind them are also irritating, but don't seem to affect the Ghost/Smooth Op bonuses, so I haven't worried about that as much.

These are all nitpicks though.  The game is frickin' fantastic.

[Achillion]

Two main gripes:  had to reload an hour of playtime back because the game decided not to give me the Ghost bonus despite not altering anyone in one mission, ...

I got a bit compulsive with the Ghost bonus at some point too and looked it up on the Deus Ex Wiki.
It says that if an unconscious or dead guard is seen, you still lose the Ghost bonus,  even though they haven't detected you. Basically, anything that makes a guard realise there's definitely someone else there is enough for Ghost to fail.

[Colonol Dekker]

Left it for a month+ due to women, work, army...AND MORE


Came back to it, to find myself stuck on the second facking.boss :/

[The E]

Use the Typhoon for all your boss-eliminating needs. Yes, it's cheap. Yes, it's a hack. Yes, it is a perfectly legitimate strategy to get past the worst parts of the game.

[Colonol Dekker]

I don't have it. Nor do I wish to replay from the point where it was a possibility to "arm" it. :/

[The E]

Read and be enlightened.

[MP-Ryan]

Read and be enlightened.

20-something stun gun rounds kills her without her getting a shot off at "Give me Deus Ex" difficulty (I know, because I did it).  Same trick with fewer rounds kills Barrett.  Namir isn't susceptible to stun-locking, so he took 5 or so Typhoon deployments.

Honestly, I didn't feel at all cheap using stunlocking or Typhoon to kill bosses - the boss fights are the worst part of the game.  The Missing Link did a boss fight properly, through.  Burke's boss fight was challenging, but engaging and fun.

[Fury]

I just beat all but the first boss using revolver with explosive rounds. Since I didn't have that in the first boss, I just kept headshotting him from the room corners and retreated promptly.

[newman]

I found that killing Namir was ridicoulously easy with a grenade launcher. The fight lasted for like 5 seconds flat. Can't say any of the boss fights were particularly challenging, though.

[Achillion]

Speaking of bosses, I finished a playthrough on the hardest difficulty on Saturday. The boss fights were no trouble at all because I was stacking up on guns and ammo. I was playing it no-stealth, shoot-everything-that-moves style. I distinctly remember the devs saying that the game is set up so that it would be relatively difficult to play it like a regular shooter and I think they kinda failed in that. Once you get certain upgrades on the 9mm and assault rifle, if you don't care about alarms and ghost bonuses you can breeze through most areas. Also, if you skip certain tactical and stealth augmentations, you can focus much sooner on stuff like damage reduction and inventory space for all your pretty weapons.

Well I did try to get some ghost bonuses (it felt wrong to really ignore the entire stealth element), but my priority was killing every enemy in each level and it wasn't as hard as I expected. Still fun though!

I found that killing Namir was ridicoulously easy with a grenade launcher. The fight lasted for like 5 seconds flat. Can't say any of the boss fights were particularly challenging, though.

Same here. I had the grenade launcher both times I fought Namir. The first time I even had the "faulty" chip. You can spam grenades on him and they just stun him. It takes one direct hit to just make him stop there and let you unload the rest on him.

[Mikes]

Honestly, I didn't feel at all cheap using stunlocking or Typhoon to kill bosses - the boss fights are the worst part of the game.

Bosses were kinda a nonissue for me. Nothing special, true, but nothing that hindered my enjoyment of the game either. Typhoon + upgraded shotgun made them pretty much trivial (i.e. done in a couple of seconds on Deus Ex difficulty). I can see how they would be frustrating if someone got stuck on them, however, I had pretty much the opposite experience: i.e. Boom dead, next!

The only boss that made me reload was the first one (didn't have Typhoon yet and tried to engage him from cover at first), but grenades/mines + shotty killed him just as easily.

They are very unintuitive I guess (especially considering the rest of the game)... but trivially easy with Typhoon and Shotty.

[CP5670]

The good thing about the bosses is that they are all easy to glitch or defeat in some cheap way (and such tricks are one of the best parts of any Deus Ex game ). I used the rocket launcher on Barrett, the heavy rifle on Federova (the only boss I fought "normally") and the last two with the laser rifle. There are plenty of other ways to kill them using the Typhoon, EMP mines, glitchy takedowns or carrying turrets around.

Honestly, I didn't feel at all cheap using stunlocking or Typhoon to kill bosses - the boss fights are the worst part of the game.  The Missing Link did a boss fight properly, through.  Burke's boss fight was challenging, but engaging and fun.

I especially didn't like how most of them were just random enemies that had hardly anything to do with the story, in contrast to the bosses in the first game. Apparently there is an HR novel that contains a lot more plot information on them, but that was all left out of the game itself.

Is that DLC good? I'm guessing it does not add much to the story given that it appears in the middle of the game, so I haven't gotten it yet.