3141

You could sneak around and hack all the alarm panels and turn them off. Except maybe that might be missing the point of the whole approach.

Oh, fun notes for chievo sluts:

  1. Don’t try to blow up robots, because grenades automatically make Box Guardians recognize that you exist, no matter where you throw them from. What’s more, they psychically communicate that knowledge to their compatriots. Maybe mines work, but I just gave up trying to kill the first Box Guardian I ran into and just avoided him, which is saying something, because I am compulsively playing this game like Batman, knocking everybody out for no good reason.

  2. Dudes in the beginning count for the no murder achievement. So don’t do that. Actually, the third time I did it, I got through it in maybe three minutes just sneaking around, rather than the half hour it took the first time, so maybe there’s something to be said for just running in like a moron.

  3. Small number of guns. If you’re rolling non-lethal, also plan on selling, like, all the weapon mods. You need one lethal option for bosses. I’m actually finding it a little bit of a hassle dealing with the three less-lethal options; I carry around all of them, but thus far I’ve never opened up the Pepsi even once (and I’m only carrying it because I went to so much trouble to get it), and I only have the stun gun as a fallback because I never find tranq darts in the environment. Generally, if I’m close enough to taze a guy in the butthole, I’m close enough to tickle fight him to sleep, so as an actual weapon, if you’re trying not to be seen and you’re carrying a fair number of energy sources, it hasn’t been much help yet.

  4. Hacking: Stealth is a more useful augmentation than anything past Capture 3. Before I maxed that out, I was extremely frustrated with the whole experience of hacking, as I was routinely tripping alarms so early that I basically had to rush to the end. Afterward, hacking got a lot more fun.

Finally, an observation, because I’m not sure about this, but I’m pretty sure that if you ever enter into one of the front-facing knockout animations for a takedown (by which I mean your character obviously approaches in a manner that would be noticeable to any person that can actually see), whether you’re detected or not before you trigger the takedown, I think maybe you still count as being seen. I ran into that a couple of times in the pods, running up on dudes from a side angle, and I’m pretty sure that’s why I didn’t get Ghost there.

3142

Even if you do go all Shooty McShooterson, stick around to hack the alarm panels and reap the XP.

3143

You can play it like a run and gun shooter, the trick is you don’t just need the armor, you want cloak. Don’t need to use it to be stealthy – just cloak up when you are taking damage and need to back out, or just cloak up and keep blasting.

3144

Finished this today. Now I can safely read the spoiler thread. ;-)

Bummed by the ending section, though. Dropped it at least a notch IMHO.

3145

This is not Space Marine. ;-) You don’t really need to be passive but full on Rambo, running and gunning out of cover, often requires reloading and rethinking strategies.

You can Rambo a little from cover with the right weapon and skills. Firing on the enemy from one position and then using a vent or cloak to flank them is another option. Then again, rushing a lone enemy and dispatching him with CQB, never gets old.

Edit: Strusser said it better up-thread.

3146

No wonder the boss fights felt so disconnected from the main game. They were built by GRIP rather than the internal team at Eidos.

3147

Subcontracting antagonists.

Why do I feel like they took one step forward in project management and four steps back in game design? It’s not just the fights themselves but also the missing buildup and connection to the characters.

3148

Just finished it… Missed quite a few sidequests it seems (I couldn’t finish one I had in China because my lack of Hack), and I gotta say, I really loved this game. Like, way more than I assumed I was going to.

Like, holy cow. I remember playing DX2 on Xbox, but that was utter shit compared to this. I can only imagine playing the first one was as awesome, if not more so, if this is a good spiritual successor.

I absolutely loved it. Hands down, so far, it might be my GOTY, though I honestly doubt it’ll survive against Skyrim.

Edit: Also loved the soundtrack. Suitably Tron-y.

3149

Good god. That is unbelievable.

3150

“Paul, what was your involvement in that project?”

“Uh, Shawn, we worked on the boss battles.”

What’s the point of having 100+ nodes in your decision tree if all your boss does is walk around and occasionally throw grenades?

I just got to the first boss. Not only does the fight suck, but apparently these bosses come straight out of Final Fantasy or MGS.

At least the rest of the game is great. I’ve not been using the third person cover system and it’s entirely feasible, at least so far, and I’ve been playing stealthily, although a lean key would be useful. I’ve also avoided using the takedowns, cause the taser and PEPS are much cooler.

3151

If you push in a direction you’ll lean out.

Not sure what else you’d want since you can see all around while in cover, which is usually the point of a lean function. If you want to see around a corner, go into cover at it and you can see around it. If you want to shoot a dude, press out of cover and you’ll lean out and aim.

Or maybe I’m just misunderstanding what you mean.

3152

Oh, I meant without using the third person cover system. As in a lean key in first person.

3153

Why would you want not to use the third person cover system ? It’s the heart of the game… It’s like you were playing a racer without using the brakes because you hate brakes…

3154

No, in FF and MGS, the bosses are frequently the best part of the game.

3155

Agreed on both counts. At least we have an explanation as to why the bosses feel so crummy compared to the rest of the game’s brilliance.

My dramatic second boss encounter

She hitched on the scenery and I facerolled the Typhoon key. Give Me Deus Ex indeed! To be fair, this is almost exactly how I avoided Walton Simons in the first game.

3156

I used it… maybe three times in all the game. It’s not really needed, so i am not that sure it’s in the heart of the game.

3157

Really? It’s pushing towards being a stealthgame. Stealth clearly works best when you are using the cover system - its also quite neccesary in some areas, unless you want to slug it out with the bad guys.

How is that not central to the game?

I know its cool to be opposite others opinions on a forum, but this just seems silly (There, I did it! Unleash the wrath ;-) )

3158

I didn’t use it that often for the shooting over the top functionality or the rolling/moving around - I did use it quite a bit statically to take advantage of third-person to see round corners easily.

I found the shooting from cover seemed to require one more button press than I was comfortable with: one to hold to keep you in cover, another to make you lean out, one more to make you aim with the gun’s sights and then a final one to actually fire. It could have used a bit of streamlining in there somewhere.

The crouch stealth worked perfectly fine in most situations without using the sticky cover and it was easier to start shooting tranq’s if the stealth went wrong when you weren’t stuck to a wall.

There were a couple of spots that seemed designed to be only solved as rolling puzzles where I did break out the cover rolls but I can only recall a handful of places where it seemed required. Elsewhere there were always other options.

3159

one to hold to keep you in cover

Switch the cover to “toggle” mode.

3160

It may not be “necessary” to see around corners and get cover as snug as possible while monitoring the enemy, but it’s exceedingly helpful and I suspect it was at the heart of the game for most players.

I didn’t fight from cover much, but if I had to take a breather in cover for a few seconds it was safer to do it while keeping an eye on enemies than by staring at the wall my face was pressed into.