2901

You can, but you have to look closely at times, which means you can’t see one from the other side of a hangar and plan for it as a stealth target without highlighting.

2902

You can! The texture has some cracking visible. I got the upgrade fairly early though so I’m not too sure you can spot all the destructible walls later in the game without it.

Approx ten rounds from the 10mm will destroy them.

2903

You can see them yes - They have cracks in them. As for blowing them up, no idea, sorry

2904

Ahh ok, so even highlighting enabled is useless without the aug. I suppose the cracks are pretty subtle since I never noticed them, but I guess I wasn’t looking for them that hard either.

Thanks.

2905

You have to pretty much be looking right at them to notice them, sans the aug highlighting.

2906

In the sewers you will also notice that the electricity conduits conveniently go up and over any spot where there is a breakable wall.

2907

I didn’t find any areas that I could reach with Icarus Landing that I couldn’t reach some other way. It’s possible I missed one or two, but seems unlikely unless they didn’t appear on the map.

An Icarus Example

In Chinese research facility, there’s a long drop down an airshaft, which you reach from the maintenance catwalk. However, there’s a vent at the bottom of the shaft, and you can enter the airshaft from the vent. It’s easier with Icarus Landing, but possible to reach without it.

2908

Did I just hear some Detroit hobo whistle the theme from the original Deus Ex?

2909

Yes. You also may hear the UNATCO theme on the radio, among other things.

2910

The hobos in China whistle it, too.

2911

I finished it, clocking in at like 29 hours by Steam’s count. I started stealthy and half way through went half and half. I never went full-on Rambo, but I was no pacifist.

It’s a really good game. For me, it doesn’t have the same level of appeal as Deus Ex, nor does it deliver the same level of satisfaction, but that’s as much a product of the novelty of the original game, perhaps, and its era, as it is of any differences in relative quality. Certainly the action and much of the aesthetic in HR is superior to the original, IMO.

But…I don’t have an overwhelming urge to replay it. I had pretty much all the augs by the end of the game, and the ones I didn’t have I didn’t want. The only real way to make another play through different might be to try for the full non-violent/stealth approach, but that often frustrates me more than intrigues me. I probably will play through once as a pure mean-spirited pissed-off death machine though. Augment me, will you?

2912

perhaps if you look real close you can see the cracks? i reckon explosives should do the job for ye.

2913

I got this game for free with my newest graphics card and didn’t even realize it. Fantastic!

2914

So, better late than never. I’m enjoying the game, but it’s still not really Deus Ex. I posted a few more extensive thoughts on my site.

Also, the more I play, the more I enjoy it, but ultimately, it’s a double-edged sword, since the whole game has so much fanservice at this point, I’m starting to wonder if they had any original thoughts at all.

The jump aug is pretty fun though.

2915

Link?

2916

I think you are selling the game a bit short Charles. Yes, DEHR does not have the bigger choices DE had, but it does have a lot of things that differentiate the player experience, at least up to a point. Look at the discussions of how to handle the first boss fight, for example. What weapons and augs a player has at that point really do determine what strategies can be pursued effectively. Granted, that goes away as the game progresses because the augmentations are not exclusive and so by the end of the game all the Adam Jensen’s are relatively similar.

Click on his name and then choose homepage on the left of the post.

2917

The gist of it is: DE1 was a game made by nerds, for nerds. Hand raised as a member of the target audience, thank you very much.

DE:HR, while a worthy effort and definitely NOT something I regret playing at all, is a mainstream sneaky-shooter with the requisite nods toward DX1 nerddom.

2918

Enemies are bound to their areas in order to prevent them from being lured in to traps. Perhaps this kind of thing will materialize later in the game, but from what I’ve seen so far, I doubt it will.
It bugged me that they didn’t exist across cache zones. One time I tried luring enemies below a manhole cover so I could stun them with the Icarus power. When I got to the top and looked down, all I saw were little splashes in the water as the enemies moved around. They didn’t stay fully spawned.

Now I’ve forgotten what happened next – either the power didn’t work or they didn’t pop in until I hit the ground. But the point is it seems like the software architecture and area encapsulation – things that allow the game to load with small console memory limits or make it easier to debug – hold back emergent gameplay.

You can work around this at a technical level, but my guess is you have to want to do it. Harvey Smith talked about hashing it out with the programming team in a recent RPS interview. He wanted to make sure the game remembered state to make the world believable, and I bet it’ll allow for more emergence.

2919

After playing about 18 or so hours, I agree mostly with scharmers and Charles. I like DE:HR a lot, but story-and-feel wise it’s not really Deus Ex.

I look at it like this. There’s Dawn Of The Dead, Romero version. And there’s Dawn Of The Dead, Zack Synder version. Zack Snyder’s is really, really pretty. It’s clever in it’s own way, and has flashes of absolute brilliance. It’s a great movie. But Romero’s Dawn Of The Dead is motherfucking Dawn Of The Dead, you know? It’s rough and weird and hilarious and horrifying, and there’s nothing else really like it.

That’s how I feel about DE vs. DE:HR. Like I say, I’m glad I’m playing DE:HR, and I’ll probably give it a solid FAQ-laden replay maybe during the downtime next year, but I doubt I’ll obsess over it the way I did DE.

2920

How am I selling it short when I admit to liking it? I really am enjoying it. I’m just saying that the things it lacks in comparison to Deus Ex are things which make it a lesser game in my eyes. That doesn’t mean the levels aren’t fantastically designed, or the hacking minigame isn’t spectacular.