A new diary series brought to you by Joe Martin – games editor for Custom PC magazine and running bit-gamer.net. Without being a walkthrough, this series will take us through Human Revolution – chunk by chunk – and discuss what Joe finds and thinks. Obviously, then, this will unapologetically contain spoilers, but we’ll let you know where up to and how severe. Like this:
Minor spoilers up until the first big mission
Deus Ex: Human Revolution has taken me through more emotions than most entire series’ are capable of doing and I’m currently only four or five hours in. I have felt anger, I have wielded cunning, I have crumbled in panic. It’s the panic that stays with me; crippling and desperate, enough to make me break my own rules for how to play.
My first rule of play is simple: the first time you play a game, it is OK to make mistakes. Failure is what makes a great story and regret is what elevates a tale over more than just a list of successes. I don’t reload or start from scratch if I flub a romance or miss a shot at a +2 Sword, I plough on and will revisit these errors in a later playthrough.
Or, that’s what I’d do normally.
The situation is familiar in framework, even if the details are new. I am Adam Jensen, a rebuilt man with chrome limbs and a gravel-filled voicebox, returning to work to find a hostage crisis in full swing. David Sarif, the eponymous billionaire behind Sarif Industries wants me to sort it out – I’m to meet him at the helipad. Get a move on, he says.
My second rule of play is even simpler: see everything you can. David may want me straight away, but I know this is just a game and I’m determined to take a chance to explore Sarif’s offices and line my empty pockets. There’s lots to see just in the lobby and I currently don’t know if I’ll ever come back here or if it’ll be the same.
David nags, because, you know, it’s a game and that’s his character. ‘Meet me at the helipad, meet me at the helipad, wah-wah-wah.’ I mime his words back to me while pitting my cyber-brain against Sarif’s paltry security systems and rummaging through air vents.
Out of nowhere, the tone suddenly changes. David swears at me and I stop dead in my tracks, one hand in someone else’s desk drawer. The boss not-so-politely informs me that the situation has changed while I’ve been dicking around and I need to get to the helipad right fucking now because people are fucking dying.
The news hits my brain like a bucket of ice-water and I go through a spread of emotions at blitzkrieg speed – this is a pain in the ass/was it worth it for 50 credits?
Running with this failure – so big, so devastating to this company that genuinely does seem like a family – doesn’t seem like an option. I hit ALT-F4, start a new game and take a breath to recover from the rollercoaster-like jolt.
My next attempt at Deus Ex: Human Revolution is predictably cautious; I sprint through the offices and reach the helipad before David finishes his spiel. I employ stealth and cunning in the factory; there are zero casualties and I talk the terrorists down with disarming calm. I salvage every screed of information in the building, doing it fast and without error. It’s effortless, like Adam’s augmentations were meant to be controlled by proxy, by me.
Adam Jensen and I start to become one man and that man does not make mistakes.
Hah – I did exactly this on my first playthrough. Being held to account for treating a game as a game is one of my absolute favourite things.
Incidentally, I appreciate the naming structure of this series. Nested subtitles with varying punctuation makes me feel safe.
I loved it in thr very first office. “Hey, stop reading my emails! Come on, we’re going to be late.”
Since then I’ve been playing in character and not treating it as a game. As a consequence I don’t feel the need to see everything on my first run through, which is liberating.
I really wish I could play like that, but I’m all about exploration in games. It’s why I love the original Deus Ex so much – I can just keep playing and finding new things. Hidden phone calls, the safe behind the Manderley’s bookcase, etc…
That’s what the second run through is for. I’m planning on completing it, then going through again and seeing how far I can push the systems and what I can get away with.
I had a similar thing with the first ‘do this without being seen’ mission. It’s optional, but dammit, I made a point of doing it anyway because Adam Jensen should be good enough to do it!
I’ve reinforced myself for mistakes like that now – Jensen should be good enough to do it…but everyone makes mistakes.
I’m sticking to my guns on my current playthrough – no-one survived in mine. On the plus side, I got even with Eye-Patch later on…
Great read, this will be an interesting diary. :D
Very nicely done, looking forward to more.
I always have trouble sticking to my failures in games – I’m torn between a sense of loyalty to the story I’ve created, and striving to achieve the story I want to tell. I did reload once or twice in Human Revolution, I will admit, but mostly so I could try a stealthier approach.
When I played Mass Effect 2, I gave myself a rule of no non-combat reloads. I ended up totally messing up Zaeed’s loyalty mission, letting his target escape, but I managed to convince him it was for the best. I wouldn’t want to erase a nice character moment like that for the sake of doing things ‘properly’.
I didn’t reload, but I may have allowed myself to die before I realised that playing non-lethally was the reason I wasn’t enjoying myself. Plot point number 4 (I think, might be 6) I refused to accept though. And dammit, I was proud that I didn’t let it happen.
Hi everyone from /r/truegaming – part 2 is here if you’re interested http://www.gamingdaily.co.uk/2011/diary-ex-%E2%80%93-a-human-revolution-journal-episode-2-mirrors/
Personally, I don’t see why playing through ‘failures’ is a good thing. If the point is having choice, then you should choose the best outcome for yourself. If you like to play the game and experience all the pitfalls it offers that’s fine, but I don’t see anything wrong with wanting to succeed in whatever it is you attempt in the game.
Having said that, I didn’t actually reload the first mission. I wasn’t all that invested yet and in the long run it didn’t matter.
That’s the thing about these games, really. Failures have no meaning, much like the rest of your actions. They can get you XP or create/remove an enemy or friend down the line but nothing really substantial. Since they don’t matter to the narrative, I don’t see why failing them matters other than to feel slightly bummed for a few moments before carrying on. Or, of course, just to do it out of principal.
I think a big part of enjoying games like this is the process of having a plan but then adapting to circumstance. Failure, I think, is a circumstance that sometimes happens out of plain bad luck and it’s just a case of dealing with it.
Whether the scope is trying to ghost a room to sweeping decisions in the main plot, I think it’s best to roll with the punches and see where a narrative will take you, rather than rigidly reloading to take the optimum path – because it’s just not as much fun nor as interesting.
That’s the idea, and I agree with it entirely. I’m only saying that I don’t think it’s the only way to enjoy these games, or indeed even the best way. I’m not saying the alternative is better, either, just that both ways are legitimate in my eyes.
It all depends on one’s idea of fun.
Oh, totally. Chris, for example, plays each Bioware game 3 times so he can dictate exactly what happens in the third playthrough to have as canon. YOU INSANE PEOPLE.
Sounds like fun!