[clarry]

>> I don't think this can happen today and I also believe this is the reason we don't see anything close to the original Deus Ex.

> The solution to that is to look outside of the traditional gaming paradigm.

I don't think indie & VR gimmicks are the solution to lack of games that are close to the original Deus Ex. It's not revered for original superb mechanics; most of everything it does was done before. It's that it put them all together and did so many things right to create a polished, immersive experience with a compelling story (rather footed in reality as opposed to all out scifi/fantasy), strong plot focus (as opposed to disconnected mass-produced side quests), rich level design, lots of choice and player freedom, great music, replay value..

Hardly anyone is doing that. But, evidently, a lot of gamers want that.

> If you're only looking at games like Deus Ex then it could be easy to miss all the other stuff going on.

I just don't see anything that really compels me. Stuff is going on, and it's mostly not worth my time (or does a terrible job marketing itself).

[dageshi]

> Hardly anyone is doing that. But, evidently, a lot of gamers want that.

Not enough really, we've had the Deus Ex reboot (Human revolution), Dishonored, Prey and their respective sequels, they're all great games but they didn't do amazingly, they mostly did "ok", they're all now on hiatus with their studios working on other franchises.

I think these games (immersive sims) are actually pretty difficult to make and the reward just isn't there vs other genres out there right now.

[clarry]

I haven't played Dishonored or Prey but if HR is any indication, then they aren't all that great. No comparison to Deus Ex.

[MaxBarraclough]

Human Revolution was a prequel, not a reboot.

[laumars]

> I don't think indie & VR gimmicks are the solution to lack of games that are close to the original Deus Ex.

I don't think flatly calling all indie and VR games as "gimmicks" does justice to some of the more innovative creators out there.

> * It's not revered for original superb mechanics; most of everything it does was done before. It's that it put them all together and did so many things right to create a polished, immersive experience with a compelling story (rather footed in reality as opposed to all out scifi/fantasy), strong plot focus (as opposed to disconnected mass-produced side quests), rich level design, lots of choice and player freedom, great music, replay value..*

I was gaming back then as well. It was mostly the mechanics people seemed to talk about at the time (and the graphics too).

In any case, story driven games have existed long before Deus Ex and still exist now.

> I just don't see anything that really compels me. Stuff is going on, and it's mostly not worth my time (or does a terrible job marketing itself).

I see these kinds of comments all the time and frankly a lot of it is rose tinted glasses. You will naturally favour the games you grew up with. As it was, I grew up with text adventure games and crappy 8-bit conversions of arcade games so as much as I enjoy modern games I'm often still going back to Pac-Man and it's ilk because 3D is too "modern" for me. Like with how people harp on about how cartoons aren't as good as when they were kids, people make the same arguments for computer games too.... but that doesn't mean it is true.

[clarry]

> It was mostly the mechanics people seemed to talk about at the time (and the graphics too).

Huh. Nobody praised the graphics back then. They were dated on the day Deus Ex came out; it uses the original Unreal engine (with some tweaks) and looks just as dated. Rendering technology moved fast back then and a game as large as Deus Ex had no hope of staying ahead of the curve. Plus they had to make some compromises to fit such a large scale game on disk & in RAM (there were other UE1 games that looked arguably better). I recall reviews considering Deus Ex's graphics "boxy" (literally!) and it has plenty of super small textures..

The thing that most people praised was the freedom. That's part mechanics, but what I was trying to say is that very few of the mechanics in Deus Ex were innovative; mostly they just did a great job incorporating mechanics that already existed in prior games. That's the ticket. You don't need to innovate and make some superb new mechanics to make a new Deus Ex quality game.

> In any case, story driven games have existed long before Deus Ex and still exist now.

Yes, but few games pull all the elements I mentioned above together. Deus Ex has "all the parts", and for most part it's done well, therefore it's more than the sum of its parts. Yes, story driven games exist, but few of them incorporate all the other elements that made Deus Ex what it is.

> I see these kinds of comments all the time and frankly a lot of it is rose tinted glasses.

I see people always dismiss this as nostalgia. I call bullshit, if only because I played very few games "back in the day" (and I don't like most of the games I had back then; I played them only because I really didn't have anything else to play).

Most of the old games I discuss today are games I've only played sometime during the last decade for the first time. And I keep finding old games that I really like, and then I don't like their sequels, and I have a hard time finding new games that I like as much.