Main Campaign - Spoiler Discussion

[James]

Darrow Ending: Pointless, Illuminati will easily spin his broadcast using Picus. Achieves nothing.

Self Destruct: Pointless, Illuminati will easily spin the disaster using Picus. Achieves nothing other than the destruction of Hyron and the deaths of thousands of people.

Sarif Ending: Pointless, mechanical augmentations are heavily regulated anyway by the events of Deus Ex. The next step in augmentation is developed by Bob Page/MJ12, and would be developed regardless of regulation by the government.

Taggart Ending: Pointless, but prevents most people from getting inferior mechanical augmentations before the events of Deus Ex. Achieves nothing in the end (because the Illuminati quickly loses power when MJ12 takes control) but provides the best damage control.

[MrBlackDX]

Heres another thought

If Sarif exists in the endings, say Sarif ending and Taggart ending, why would Megan Reed not rejoin him?

Jensen is still alive, Sarif is still alive, she has friends and research to go back to...?

Another reason why I think if they made any ending canon it would be self-destruct...

[James]

A lot of things come into factor but she prefers the science she was working on with Darrow than the restraints at Sarif.

With Page's resources she can continue.

[MrBlackDX]

How was she restrained at Sarif?

Except for morally

[James]

She said it herself when you meet up with her later on.

[James]

I'm still against the idea of Jensen killing thousands to hide the truth. That is just wrong on so many levels.

[MrBlackDX]

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yUpbOliTHJY[/youtube]

[James]

What video is it?, can't see in work.

[MrBlackDX]

Hot Fuzz - The Greater Good

[James]

I convinced Eliza to just broadcast archived youtube videos of cats doing funny things to the whole world. After a while of that, everyone just kinda forgot about the whole aug-zombie ordeal.

[James]

Bremen posted:
ENDING SPOILERS!
So, here's a question for everyone. DX and Invisible War both had philosophical quotations for every ending, and I really felt the absence in HR. Are there any quotes you would have assigned to each ending?

My thoughts:
Darrows Ending/The Truth: Science has made us gods even before we are worthy of being men. ~Jean Rostand

Sarif Ending/The Singularity: Will robots inherit the earth? Yes, but they will be our children. ~Marvin Minsky

Taggert Ending/The Illuminati: The only way to predict the future is to have power to shape the future. ~Eric Hoffer

Eliza Ending/Choice: Freedom is not worth having if it does not connote freedom to err. ~Mohandas Gandhi

Also pretty cool pic:
http://fc01.deviantart.net/fs71/f/2011/ ... 4bsoiv.png

[Tantalus]

Thanks spy boy.

[James]

Watching her getting dragged out of the vtol and shot in the face if you head straight to the lift.

[lfcjake]

I loved every single second of this game, yes even the boss battles. Can't wait to play it through again to soak up more of the story. Alot to take in on first go for me. I forgot to talk to Sarif towards the end, doh!

[James]

The more I think, despite endingtron 3000 button edition, the endings are so damn good. Look at all these communities arguing over what is right or wrong to do. The endings succeeded.

[James]

Want to talk about something that DXHR did really brilliantly on its own legs? The idea of being and what makes a human.

[James]

Want to talk about something that DXHR did really brilliantly on its own legs? The idea of being and what makes a human.

DavidAnfossi David Anfossi
Received this mail today: Your game was so beautiful that it made me cry--literally--and kept me off heroin for a month. you are heroes!

So do you want to talk about it?

[Aidan]

Is that second quote for real?

[Hanover Fist]

For a month ''0'_='

The game was so good he lost the itch while playing. DX JUNKIE

[James]

Yes. @ both

[Aidan]

Wow, that's insane.


...all the reason to make the next oneeee

[James]

http://eidosmontreal.tumblr.com/

Q: So this is a bit spoilery, but do we ever meet any of the real Illuminati in the game? Zhao came across as a underling who wanted into the inner circle. Darrow was a separate agent working with (then against) the Illuminati. I didn't get the impression that Taggert was part of the Illuminati elites, just another agent. So who are the Illuminati? Or is that exactly what you wanted me to wonder?

A: Lead narrative designer Mary DeMarle said: “Zhao, Darrow, and Taggart are all part of the Illuminati, but you’re right: they aren’t part of its highest circle. Those people would be the ones who make up the “Council of Five” (i.e., five individuals who hold the most power and basically make all the really important decisions, while delegating “less important projects” to members of lower circles of power to carry them out. In HR, the Council has delegated the problem of widespread mechanical augmentations to the man we see at the beginning of the game. He, in turn, is using Zhao, Taggart, and Darrow to make it happen.”

Q: Why was Jaron Namir linked to Belltower when in the book Ben Saxon was working for Belltower when Jarons ship shot them down . They never mention the Tyrants and Gunther Hermann is never mentioned either.

A: Lead narrative designer Mary DeMarle said: “Namir is linked to Belltower in both the game and the book. The elite black operations unit that he commands (codenamed ‘The Tyrants”) is part of Belltower’s Special Operations division. Belltower has several departments that cater to a variety of security needs. For example, it has a “Disaster Response Unit” and a cyber-specialist division known as “Hackwall Data Protection Services.” It also has an array of M.O.S. Divisions that handle a variety of warmongering clients. The Special Operations division is one of these divisions, and most of its operations are classified. As a member of Belltower’s regular divisions, Saxon would have known there was a special operations division, but he never would have heard the name of any of its units, operations, or soldiers. (So he would never have recognized the name “Tyrants”.)

Now, I know it might seem a bit odd to learn that a Belltower spec ops division would shoot down another unit of its company, but The Icarus Effect novel explains why this happens. As for why we never mentioned the name “Tyrants” in the game, it was because there really wasn’t an appropriate location or way to do so that made sense. (Being that the name is so classified, no one would have mentioned it directly in any communication.) ”

[Psychotic]

Old topic is old but I'd like to reinforce the fact that Megan is, indeed, a whore.

The endings were annoying for me, but only because the only ones that I felt made any type of sense (canon-wise) were the Illuminati and the "Self-Sacrifice" ones. I didn't particularly like either. I felt that the latter was something Jensen might do but probably actually wouldn't, and the Illuminati one just doesn't seem to relate to the character at all.

Then again, there is that whole "I didn't ask for this" cynic/depressive feeling that you get from him all the bloody time, but I still feel that if you really wanted to side with Taggart/Illuminati then you probably wouldn't join a company like Sarif Industries. Seems a little counter-productive.

My main disappointment in the game stems from the fact that you don't really get much backstory leading up to the first game. It's not so much that you don't get to see anyone on the Council of Five (most of the leadership probably wouldn't have changed drastically from 2027 to 2052, except that Lucius DeBeers would've still been active) as opposed to the fact that the cameos you hear about are very, very minor.

The most interesting pieces in the entire game for me was the whole Killswitch unveiling, Megan using nano-bots, the post-credit cutscene (concerning the Grey Death/D Project) and the White Helix project (unrelated to the main plot but something I wish I could've found out more on).

I expect sequels, but this is mostly because I don't see Eidos (or Square Enix, now) wasting so much money on making a 3rd game, only to stop there. Hell, Square Enix apparently wants 10 more sequels (I love Deus Ex, but that's just stupid silly).

[e] Oh, and the obvious SHODAN references were pretty freakin' epic. I never did catch on to the final boss being a massive reference to SS2, though. It has been a while since I've played the game (and I don't have a copy anymore )

[James]

https://store.
cmpgame
.com/product/6271/Game-Developer-January-2012-Issue
---Digital-Edition

Delete breaks, someone please buy this and post scans.

Also, I'm kind of hesitant to just post scans of this, but Game Developer Magazine had a fantastic postmortem of this game in the January 2012 issue (it's 4 bucks online) by Jean-Francois Dugas (game director), Martin Dubeau (project manager), David Anfossi (producer) and Mary DeMarle (lead writer), so here's an overview of it:

STUFF THAT WORKED:
Work started in early 2007 with a very small group of people. The core team was Anfossi, Dugas, JJB and Francois Lapikas. It mentions how they played the other games in the series to get a feel for them and see what worked and what didn't and also read a ton of books, watched movies and played other games while taking notes. They had very organic brainstorming sessions, with a presentation of the ideas to the other team members and taking their input every week. That way it felt like a true group effort. The concept phase itself took five months. It talks about putting the rough ideas and game systems on sheets of paper and (whenever an idea felt like it worked) plastering them on walls. That was basically the "design document", and it talks how it was an amazing experience since it was a very friendly environment, using a freeform approach and everyone was on board. Selling the game to Eidos basically meant bringing some suits into the room and showing them the important parts of the room until they said "Deus Ex is back!" The concept phase had a stimulating environment that allowed their creative ideas to bloom without them feeling the pressure of being formal.

Pre-production also contained something called a "blueprint". The production ended up being turbulent at times for various reasons, but since they blueprinted the overall game in advance they were able to avoid some risks of not knowing where you're going. It was basically putting the game on paper before actually producing anything else for it. That way, it says, they were able to merge gameplay and story together, then balance them when gameplay had to trump story, or vice versa. Initially they had to build six or seven major plot points, then Mary DeMarle's team could flesh out the story. For three months, they had meetings from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. every day, and those involved the writers, level designers, level artists, game designers, art director and game director. They broke down enemy lists, enviros, dialogue, cutscenes, etc... This helped them solve a lot of problems down the road during production.

Then it goes into what they kept in mind during each meeting: blueprinting is a creative and organic process, has a true sense of ownership for everyone. It let them have a clear vision of what they had to build and WHY it's needed. They were able to predict building 80% of the content (maps, scripted events, cutscenes, dialogues, etc...). It made it much easier to determine what to cut without damage the game's cohesiveness (ahem, Panchaea , ahem. -Tec). Thanks to blueprinting, they were also able to plan out the teams that would work on various parts of the game. It's not magic tho, and for it to work you need a committed team and it's a hard process.

They also talk about how cutting early and often meant the final product would be able to be healthier in the end. This is how the Bangalore city hub got cut when they actually started to build Detroit as a demo and realized just how much work is needed for each of them. Surprisingly, it only mentions Detroit, Hengsha and the cut hub here, no mention of Montreal. Anyways, just by looking at the blueprint, they were able to determine which hub getting cut made the most sense without disrupting the whole concept too much, and they were able to rework things so that its story and gameplay bits could be folded into the Hengsha map. Later, they had to cut the upper Hengsha part, along with some compounds (one in Hengsha and one in Utah) which also had some of its content shifted into lower Hengsha and the second visit to Detroit. It took them three weeks for the rework.

The average team member's experience level was around 10 years, but this doesn't necessarily make a recipe for success. They still had problems such as ambitious scope vs. unexpected departures. Every time they had a crisis, they took the time to sit down and really examine the state of things, and this happened several times. They had the directors and leads go off-site and examining/brainstorm solutions. This meant they had strong contingency plans that helped them overcome obstacles. Their experience meant they could make hard choices and defend the project when people had doubts. They also praise their project leaders since they had the balls to be able to go to a publisher, actually tell them when things weren't going smoothly, didn't hide poo poo from them... Apparently, Square Enix was incredibly chill and understanding about this and also respected their dedication and passion, which meant the relationship between studio and publisher was an awesome one.

One of the major things that helped was an internal playtest department (their Playtesting Lab). They didn't have this when they started, so initial playtests had to be done off-site and were expensive (U.S. West Coast and Europe). It was hard to conduct them on a regular basis due to this, but it did give them some info on high-level intentions and basic gameplay mechanics. Once they built the lab, tho, things changed. In the last year of development they were able to schedule several playtests (over 15). They had objectives in advance for each, and it wasn't for stuff like "I want more guns", but just observing players and determining where they got stuck or didn't understand something. The devs could actually observe the players while they were playing, and this helped a lot in understanding on what to fix. They even had a playtest in the end of May 2011, a few days before locking the game down for their Gold Master candidate. The lab allowed them to line-tune a lot of things, but in the end it didn't help them realize one of the biggest problems: boss fights.

WHAT WENT WRONG:
They knew they wanted bossfights (to spice up the rhythm of the game) and they had very high ambitions for them, but didn't actually plan them out much. They initially planned to build a team that would handle the bossfights, but those people kept moving around to help build other resources instead. Not having a huge team overall meant they had a lot of headaches like this for the first two years, just building the core gameplay mechanics and underlying systems. So, for a while, the fights just didn't advance. They knew who they were, their philosophy behind each encounter, but nothing else.

By the time they realized just how problematic this was, they shuffled people around and named someone to lead that. Unfortunately, it was an inexperienced level designer without giving him the management, programming and animation support he needed. The problem just kept growing for a few months, and it was a result of several factors. Later, they removed the person in charge, but didn't assign anyone else to take over. Working on other stuff just meant that they didn't have anyone to spare for the boss fights, and they only had the basics for one of the four fights actually designed. And it just kept getting worse as production continued to the point where they considered dropping them altogether. That, however, would have impacted other aspects of the story, basically creating another problem elsewhere.

That's when they found a company in Montreal that specialized in AI and was willing to do the boss fights. But since it was so late in the production, the schedule was very aggressive, the fights got completely re-scoped, and the company would produce two of the bossfights, while they'd do two in-house. However, internally, they had a new AI team, which redesigned several fundamental systems, which made the boss fights literally mostly incompatible with the game. So they had to re-scale them back AGAIN. Towards the end of development, they finally found some time to work on the bosses and make them "still fun" according to their testers - they didn't know just how bad the feedback would be at the time. They did know, however, that they were inconsistent design-wise. They didn't address the boss issue early enough, and when they tried to fix things, they were pulled in so many other directions that they couldn't see the full impact of their decisions.

Early on, they knew they'd have to rely on cutscenes to present their story (about an hour of them was planned), however in the blueprint they wanted them to be build in-engine, not pre-rendered, so they'd fit into the game seamlessly. It turned out they lacked the experience to realize that the number of people they planned to take care of cutscenes was insufficient. Their tools weren't efficient enough to build them with 'em, and they didn't have the resources to actually build those efficient tools. The truth finally sunked in when they made the 2010 E3 demo. They had 3 cutscenes planned for the demo, and those three scenes were about 1/10th of what they needed to produce for the entire game. It took everyone working towards this 4 months just to produce those 3 scenes. So, they COULD produce high-quality in-game cutscenes, but only had less than a year to actually do the rest. It was just impossible. That's when they had to go to Goldtooth studio, build a small internal team to evaluate stuff that would be going to Goldtooth so they could produce the cutscenes. This was kind of a defeat for the team, but it had to be done.

One of the major problems was actually going for shared technology with Crystal Dynamics. The original mandate was to revive Deus Ex within 24 months, which was just plain old impossible. However, the initial technology decisions were still based on this, so Eidos's philosophy was to support shared tech, aka Crystal making improvements on the engine that would fit the needs for this game. When they build the first tech demo, things were still going smoothly. Later on, tho, due to their ambitious vision, specific needs quickly started to pule up, and CD was already busy with their own project. The needs of both companies just started to veer off in different directions, EM was almost two years into DX:HR and they were losing too much time due to the tools and shared tech pipeline. Luckily, Eidos backed their decision to branch off rom Crystal and let them make their own version of the engine. This also allowed them to improve upon a lot of the tools. So: shared tech sounds good on paper and it's done with good intentions, but when it's built upon projects that are too different in nature, it's a bad idea.

EM also struggled sometimes to find the right key people, due to their high ambitions and expectations from their potential new employees. This happened mostly with animation and UI. It talks about their plans with hubs, populated with "living people" and the social bossfight conversations. Their first lead animator did not shared the same vision and both sides agreed to peacefully part ways. Due to the high recruitment requirements, it took a while until they found a replacement. With less than two years to go on the project, they found someone, and as much as he tried to save everything (they specifically point to the takedowns, the social bossfights and the AI patrol cycles), he couldn't salvage it all.

They also had problems with finding the right UI designer. They really wanted to push things with their augmented reality through the HUD ideas and the game would need to have a ton of menus. They eventually found a very talented guy who blew them away, but who had no experience actually LEADING a UI team. Since it was hard to find candidates at all, they chose him anyways. This lead to him being intimidated by the people (a "strong-headed team of old-timers") under him, plus he didn't get enough support from the others. He eventually left, and after two years they were still struggling with nailing the UI direction. The next guy whom they found actually had the experience needed to give a clear direction, and "what ended up in the final product is pretty good".

Outsourcing also turned out to be a much bigger problem than anticipated. Eidos could offload some of the workload to Eidos Shanghai, but that meant they wouldn't be able to use the same kind of structure they had used for in-house production. They had to outsource modelling and texturing of thousands of objects and characters, and later on, had to subcontract animations, boss fights, cutscenes and some code. They determined approval and communication workflows, organized internal reviews, etc... The problem was with setting up an internal team structure to oversee the outsourcing - a team that's dedicated to monitoring tasks, ensuring approvals, planning deadlines and carrying out constant communication with the outsource studio, plus sending internal teams off-site to train staff, maintain quality, and filter work that's sent back for approval. They had 30 external artists, 20 external animators and external programmers. They never gave the Shanghai team clear management because they lacked the required bandwidth, and had to do additional overtime to compensate for the work that didn't meet their expectations.

The production wasn't always a smooth ride - far from it. They hit walls, they learned and bounced back several times. It was their ability to adapt that was how they were able to see through the project to the end.

"Most importantly, three constants remained throughout development: our passion for this project, the love we put into it, and our commitment to make the best possible game. Despite the fact that [DX:HR] is not a perfect game by any means, we like to believe it has a soul."

[Siva]

Just completed it, time to sound off!

Megan's a fucking snake, I didn't buy a goddamn word she says. And if she's telling the truth she's an idiot

Sarif's a naive snake, fuck him too -- every time I figured something new out he'd have some bullshit way to spin it, honesty is always at a premium with this faggot

Darrow's a faggot because he spun a web of psuedophilosophy so deep that he couldn't get out of it only because his body resists augmentation

I picked the release the truth option. Sarif's ending is naive because it leaves the whole system still exploitable, the Illuminati ending wasn't even a fucking option to me and blowing everything up is completely retarded

So no, I didn't do it because I agree with Darrow's backward ideologies. I did it because I figured when you force feed people the truth when they inevitably fuck with augmentation next time they'll be more careful about it. It's not very canon but it works for me.

Didn't get the killswitch, as soon as I saw those glitches I knew motherfuckers were trying shit. Go into a LIMB clinic and sign your life away? Yeah nah I'll take a Praxis kit thanks. Laughed my ass off when Zhao hit the button.

Last level was kind of weird tbh, I didn't want to kill all these people. I punched as many as I could but I only have so many damn energy bars and running away just causes a train of faggots to be behind me when I'm trying to hack something. There's some artistic 2deep4u in it that I'm sure you all got though.

I didn't find the bossfights to be that bad tbh, the first one is fine because although you don't have much ammunition at that point, you can just throw shit and win. The second was kind of funny to me, figuring out her patterns and eventually beating her without being shot once. Last one was the worst tbh, no challenge at all. I do not consider the Hyron thing a boss fight.

The game as a whole was remarkable. The world felt very real to me. By the last level I'd stopped caring too much though, don't know why but I fell out of the immersion and started picking out flaws (this is not to say I didn't enjoy it thoroughly, I just stopped ignoring the errors)

Killing Zhao was not nearly satisfying enough. I wanted to slap Adam for being tricked BY A HOE but I wanted more to impale that woman several times for being such an idiot

When you meet whathisname (humanity front moron) I wanted to punch him in the face. Don't know why I didn't, but I talked to the other people and one woman said something ridiculous so I punched her in the face. That might have been one of the most satisfying moments in the entire game.

I have never seen so many vents in my entire life, are buildings actually built like this? It got to a point where I stopped bothering with stealthing through the front (which is much more satisfying) to move cardboard boxes around to find the inevitable vent. Not bad but borderline ridiculous.

Seeing Morgan Everett as the CEO of Picus made me smile. Seeing the hilarious Picus logo on the ground made me smile even more.

I don't know because I didn't try -- can you punch Megan and Sarif in the face? I feel they needed it.

But yeah, great game. Glad they didn't screw around with DX itself too much but added subtle nods in their direction now and then. They clearly cared about what they were doing.

[Aidan]

Just completed it, time to sound off!

Megan's a fucking snake, I didn't buy a goddamn word she says. And if she's telling the truth she's an idiot

Sarif's a naive snake, fuck him too -- every time I figured something new out he'd have some bullshit way to spin it, honesty is always at a premium with this faggot

Darrow's a faggot because he spun a web of psuedophilosophy so deep that he couldn't get out of it only because his body resists augmentation

I picked the release the truth option. Sarif's ending is naive because it leaves the whole system still exploitable, the Illuminati ending wasn't even a fucking option to me and blowing everything up is completely retarded

So no, I didn't do it because I agree with Darrow's backward ideologies. I did it because I figured when you force feed people the truth when they inevitably fuck with augmentation next time they'll be more careful about it. It's not very canon but it works for me.

Didn't get the killswitch, as soon as I saw those glitches I knew motherfuckers were trying shit. Go into a LIMB clinic and sign your life away? Yeah nah I'll take a Praxis kit thanks. Laughed my ass off when Zhao hit the button.

Last level was kind of weird tbh, I didn't want to kill all these people. I punched as many as I could but I only have so many damn energy bars and running away just causes a train of faggots to be behind me when I'm trying to hack something. There's some artistic 2deep4u in it that I'm sure you all got though.

I didn't find the bossfights to be that bad tbh, the first one is fine because although you don't have much ammunition at that point, you can just throw shit and win. The second was kind of funny to me, figuring out her patterns and eventually beating her without being shot once. Last one was the worst tbh, no challenge at all. I do not consider the Hyron thing a boss fight.

The game as a whole was remarkable. The world felt very real to me. By the last level I'd stopped caring too much though, don't know why but I fell out of the immersion and started picking out flaws (this is not to say I didn't enjoy it thoroughly, I just stopped ignoring the errors)

Killing Zhao was not nearly satisfying enough. I wanted to slap Adam for being tricked BY A HOE but I wanted more to impale that woman several times for being such an idiot

When you meet whathisname (humanity front moron) I wanted to punch him in the face. Don't know why I didn't, but I talked to the other people and one woman said something ridiculous so I punched her in the face. That might have been one of the most satisfying moments in the entire game.

I have never seen so many vents in my entire life, are buildings actually built like this? It got to a point where I stopped bothering with stealthing through the front (which is much more satisfying) to move cardboard boxes around to find the inevitable vent. Not bad but borderline ridiculous.

Seeing Morgan Everett as the CEO of Picus made me smile. Seeing the hilarious Picus logo on the ground made me smile even more.

I don't know because I didn't try -- can you punch Megan and Sarif in the face? I feel they needed it.

But yeah, great game. Glad they didn't screw around with DX itself too much but added subtle nods in their direction now and then. They clearly cared about what they were doing.

I took the same ending. Didn't fall for the killswitch, etc.

Perhaps why you were slipping out of immersion, were because the game had left the realistic flow of the city, and had moved to a (fictional) remote arctic base. Since you could not relate, you classify the environment as you would some other games. This is only my hunch :3

Man, after reading this... I feel like playing DXHR AGAIN.

[James]

Megan's a fucking snake, I didn't buy a goddamn word she says. And if she's telling the truth she's an idiot

Did you wait until after the credits?

[Psychotic]

Last level was kind of weird tbh, I didn't want to kill all these people. I punched as many as I could but I only have so many damn energy bars and running away just causes a train of faggots to be behind me when I'm trying to hack something. There's some artistic 2deep4u in it that I'm sure you all got though.

I agree with you on most points. As to the one I'm quoting? I may not have the achievement but I've beaten the game on the hardest difficulty, without alerting the guards and without killing anyone but the hardest level really tempts you to not do any of that, because it's the one level I found the hardest to not kill anyone.

Eventually I just ran away like a weak-willed motherfucker, waited for my energy to recharge, then beat the crap out of them zombies.

Did you wait until after the credits?

Also, this. As I've said before: Megan's a whore/bitch (can't remember my exact words).

[Siva]

Megan's a fucking snake, I didn't buy a goddamn word she says. And if she's telling the truth she's an idiot

Did you wait until after the credits?

BRB CHECKING WHAT UR TALKING ABOUT

Edit: Still a snake and a retard

DX Music was worth waiting through the mountain of credits

[James]

Hey I just seen the Lucky Money in the intro.

Did you know news articles reflect your actions on areas in game?