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Was wracking my brains trying to figure out the location here. There's not too many in DX:MD - Prague, Dubai, Switzerland and London - but I didn't recall encou

by smcl 3y ago

Was wracking my brains trying to figure out the location here. There's not too many in DX:MD - Prague, Dubai, Switzerland and London - but I didn't recall encountering a scene like this in the only one that fit the terrain (Dubai). Turns out this is actually from an expansion called "A Criminal Past" set in Arizona that I wasn't aware of - https://deusex.fandom.com/wiki/Penley_T._Housefather_Correctional_Facility https://deusex.fandom.com/wiki/Penley_T._Housefather_Correct... I enjoyed the game, interesting depiction of future Prague too. There's some slightly iffy voice acting and interesting pronunciations (pronouncing Václav as "Vaklav" instead of "Vatslav"), which is interesting since there's clearly some Czechs involved (see "Picus") :D edit: I should explain the "picus" thing for non-DX and/or non-Czechs. There is a media company in the latter two Deus Ex games called "Picus". This is close to a rude word in Czech: https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/p%C3%AD%C4%8Dus https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/p%C3%AD%C4%8Dus. Also fun fact, I was told "čus, píčus!" (pron choos, peechoos, first word is a loanword from German "tschus") meaning roughly "hey, ya fucker!" was how you say "cheers" when I first arrived here. It can be how you say cheers, but only to good friends who you know enjoy talking like that :)

hallux 3y ago
There are also a few moments where Alex's voice actor pronounces the a in Prague like the a in brag. A Criminal Past is a decent expansion by the way! I recently re-installed the game just to play through the expansion again.
- smcl 3y ago
  Hm both the 'a' in "Prague" and "brag" are the same for me, might be an accent thing. I'll give it a whirl, I promised myself no new games until I finish Elden Ring but maybe I can bend the rules a bit, after all it's a DLC not a "game" ;)
sho_hn 3y ago
I played DX:MD just before Cyberpunk, and it made Cyberpunk feel so dead and barren in comparison. The levels of interactivity and exploration in MD's Prague were crazy off the charts in direct comparison. Discovering an entire underground little civilization in the sewers and tunnels I could have equally just easily missed etc. really made me feel like I was discovering things just for me. Cyberpunk instead felt like clinically crossing off items on the map/quest tracker todo list; aside from the fantastic visuals, just looking around on your own offered basically no rewards at all in the game. Similar feelings around NPC interaction and AI. Add the fact that Cyberpunk's "hand-holding you through the environment" approach feels more and more lacklustre and grindy as the game develops, as they clearly ran out of resources to do all of the custom animations and setups they have in the first couple of hours to at least make it feel big and cinematic. The emergent/more sim-heavy/sandboxy approach of the DX games is more even there, and things tend to feel deeper rather than shallower over time, I think.
- smcl 3y ago
  I played them the other way round (well Cyberpunk, then Human Revolution and then Mankind) and had the same feeling. Cyberpunk is enormous but relatively hollow in comparison to both in my opinion.
  - 9dev 3y ago
    On the other hand, DX has such intricate details precisely because it isn’t enormous, but rather constrained (still big, don’t get me wrong, but definitely way smaller). You can feel how someone poured attention to every nook and cranny, something just not possible on the scale of Cyberpunk. On the other hand, there’s Red Dead 2…
    - _cenw 3y ago
      RDR2 is the most confused game I've ever played. They have this great open world and a lot of systems and "immersion" that very clearly years of work have went into, yet very few of those systems interact with each other (or the main plot) in interesting ways and the story is still the typical tired half cutscenes + half linear, highly choreographed gameplay with little room for creativity (no deviating from the exact text on the bottom) that Rockstar has been using mostly unchanged since at least GTA IV.
      - ehnto 3y ago
        I must admit RDR2 stunned me in many ways, but I was still left a little bored. I think for the reason you explained. Occasionally something wild will happen, that fell organically out of the systemic gameplay elements and I will wish the whole game was like that.
- Semaphor 3y ago
  I’ll recommend the original here. It doesn’t come close in looks, looking like the 20-year-old game it is, even with the fan made HD patches, but the world design, story, and interaction are great. And FWIW, I spent very little time with Cyberpunk before shelving it.
simonschreibt 3y ago
Yes :) The extra levels are quite nice! But the original locations are very cool as well. Need to play it again! <3
- smcl 3y ago
  Nice to see you here! I really enjoyed the article :)
  - simonschreibt 3y ago
    thank you! <3 that's great to hear!
Barrin92 3y ago
>interesting depiction of future Prague one major success of the franchise is its depiction of a future that feels genuinely forward oriented. I think they dubbed their art direction 'cyber renaissance' (HR in the remaster comes with a great developer narration) and it genuinely manages to seem novel. There's also a lot of very smart world-building and writing in the ebooks scattered around the game. From tensions in Australia caused by wildfires and draughts to the antagonists backstory in MD featuring Ukrainian separatism in Belgorod it seemed eerily relevant at times having replayed it last summer.

by smcl 3y ago

hallux 3y ago

There are also a few moments where Alex's voice actor pronounces the a in Prague like the a in brag. A Criminal Past is a decent expansion by the way! I recently re-installed the game just to play through the expansion again.

smcl 3y ago
Hm both the 'a' in "Prague" and "brag" are the same for me, might be an accent thing. I'll give it a whirl, I promised myself no new games until I finish Elden Ring but maybe I can bend the rules a bit, after all it's a DLC not a "game" ;)

sho_hn 3y ago

I played DX:MD just before Cyberpunk, and it made Cyberpunk feel so dead and barren in comparison. The levels of interactivity and exploration in MD's Prague were crazy off the charts in direct comparison. Discovering an entire underground little civilization in the sewers and tunnels I could have equally just easily missed etc. really made me feel like I was discovering things just for me. Cyberpunk instead felt like clinically crossing off items on the map/quest tracker todo list; aside from the fantastic visuals, just looking around on your own offered basically no rewards at all in the game. Similar feelings around NPC interaction and AI. Add the fact that Cyberpunk's "hand-holding you through the environment" approach feels more and more lacklustre and grindy as the game develops, as they clearly ran out of resources to do all of the custom animations and setups they have in the first couple of hours to at least make it feel big and cinematic. The emergent/more sim-heavy/sandboxy approach of the DX games is more even there, and things tend to feel deeper rather than shallower over time, I think.

smcl 3y ago
I played them the other way round (well Cyberpunk, then Human Revolution and then Mankind) and had the same feeling. Cyberpunk is enormous but relatively hollow in comparison to both in my opinion.
- 9dev 3y ago
  On the other hand, DX has such intricate details precisely because it isn’t enormous, but rather constrained (still big, don’t get me wrong, but definitely way smaller). You can feel how someone poured attention to every nook and cranny, something just not possible on the scale of Cyberpunk. On the other hand, there’s Red Dead 2…
  - _cenw 3y ago
    RDR2 is the most confused game I've ever played. They have this great open world and a lot of systems and "immersion" that very clearly years of work have went into, yet very few of those systems interact with each other (or the main plot) in interesting ways and the story is still the typical tired half cutscenes + half linear, highly choreographed gameplay with little room for creativity (no deviating from the exact text on the bottom) that Rockstar has been using mostly unchanged since at least GTA IV.
    - ehnto 3y ago
      I must admit RDR2 stunned me in many ways, but I was still left a little bored. I think for the reason you explained. Occasionally something wild will happen, that fell organically out of the systemic gameplay elements and I will wish the whole game was like that.
Semaphor 3y ago
I’ll recommend the original here. It doesn’t come close in looks, looking like the 20-year-old game it is, even with the fan made HD patches, but the world design, story, and interaction are great. And FWIW, I spent very little time with Cyberpunk before shelving it.

simonschreibt 3y ago

Yes :) The extra levels are quite nice! But the original locations are very cool as well. Need to play it again! <3

smcl 3y ago
Nice to see you here! I really enjoyed the article :)
- simonschreibt 3y ago
  thank you! <3 that's great to hear!

Barrin92 3y ago

>interesting depiction of future Prague one major success of the franchise is its depiction of a future that feels genuinely forward oriented. I think they dubbed their art direction 'cyber renaissance' (HR in the remaster comes with a great developer narration) and it genuinely manages to seem novel. There's also a lot of very smart world-building and writing in the ebooks scattered around the game. From tensions in Australia caused by wildfires and draughts to the antagonists backstory in MD featuring Ukrainian separatism in Belgorod it seemed eerily relevant at times having replayed it last summer.