Deus Ex

by Aspyr

Product Details

• Shipping: This item is also available for shipping to select countries outside the U.S.
• ASIN: B00004TEY9
• Product Dimensions: 9.8 x 8.2 x 1.8 inches ; 9.9 ounces
• Media: CD-ROM
• Release Date: July 27, 2000
• Average Customer Review: 4.6 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (29 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #27,827 in Video Games (See Top 100 in Video Games)
  • #81 in Video Games > Mac Games > Adventure
• Discontinued by manufacturer: Yes

Product Description

Platform: Mac | Edition: Standard

Amazon.com Review

Deus Ex combines so many of the elements found in other action-adventure titles that it's almost like getting several games for the price of one. You slip into the trench coat of J.C. Denton, an operative with the top-secret UNATCO antiterrorist organization. Denton's body and mind have been augmented with nanotech implants that help him fight, think, and sneak his way through a completely interactive world filled with intrigue, conspiracies, and encounters with other characters. The plot is ripped straight out of a bad X-Files episode, but the decent cutscenes and complex mission environments kept us coming back for more.

Deus Ex's real achievement is that players are free to complete missions as they see fit. As the game progresses you can upgrade your character with a variety of bioenhancements that dramatically impact gameplay. Focus on your combat skills and you'll be the Terminator by the end of the game. Upgrade your computer know-how and you'll be the equivalent of Data from Star Trek: TNG, busting into computer and security networks with ease. We were expecting a game that let us role-play a little, opting for a brute-force approach or one that required a little more stealth, but we had no idea the designers would do such a fine job of pulling it off. The experiences of both methods are unusual enough that we found ourselves revisiting levels to try different tactics.

The individual components of Deus Ex--like the targeting system, inventory controls, and enemy viewing radiuses--are a little clunky when viewed individually, but they converge into an overall game that is much greater than the sum of its parts. It's easy to compare the game to titles that obviously influenced it (Thief, System Shock, and Rainbow Six immediately come to mind), but Deus Ex really stands on its own as a unique title that should appeal equally to action games, adventure lovers, and role-playing fanatics. --T. Byrl Baker

Pros:

• Several ways to complete each mission, and all are equally fun
• Game world is highly interactive, and exploration is rewarded
• Ability to tailor a character to match your gameplay style is a huge plus

Cons:

• Most of the voice acting is bad
• Enemies aren't very smart

Product Description

Deus Ex (Mac) [CD-ROM] [Mac]

See all Product Description

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

15 of 15 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars FPS for SF fans!, August 11, 2000

By 

neurotome "neurotome" (San Luis Obispo, CA) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)   

This review is from: Deus Ex (Mac) (CD-ROM)

A friend, who clearly knows me pretty well, sent me a copy of this game. I've already returned the favor for a great friend of mine - it's the game we've been waiting for.

The plot is futuristic and 'cyber' - you're a near-future supersoldier, a first-generation nano-bio-augmented replacement for the U.N.'s squad of mechanically augmented black op "robocops." Think Robocop meets Gibson meets X-files, with shades of Heinlein and Delany (there's a reference to 'Ashton Clark') thrown in in the beautifully crafted world that is your context.

The complicated plot unfolds in real time as you progess through the game, and there is a bit of role-playing - choices you make affect how your game is going to go, to some extent at least. You can certainly affect how your character develops - is he going to be a LAW-toting grenade throwing gun thug a la Duke Nukem, or a slip-through-the-shadows backdoor hardware hacker? Choose your own adventure.

Gameplay is based on the Unreal engine, as noted. It's fair to mention that you need a bit of hardware to make this puppy run well. For the scenic parts (i.e. briefings at HQ), I use high detail on textures and objects, but for combat I have to turn the detail down to medium, or else aiming is jerky and the baddies blast me in between frames. I'm running a B&W G3 with the stock Rage 128 card and 128MB of RAM - the game requires disk VM turned on so that its partition can be 160 MB. I run it with most extensions off (it needs RAVE) and it's only hard-crashed me once, although it tends to leak memory at about the 8-hour mark, requiring a civilized reboot.

What else to say? Music is great and the game experience is totally immersive and great fun. The authors have the feel of the genre down perfectly. And having been on the NYC subway system too much lately, I had a bit of a thrill when (in-game) some young punk drug dealer mouthed off, then drew a pistol on me in the Battery Park station.

BLAM.

5 stars. Buy it now. Then set aside a little free time and break up with your significant other. You can always buy him/her a bunch of flowers, after you've solved it.

11 of 11 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Might be my game of the year, July 31, 2000

By 

C. J. Silverio (Menlo Park, CA USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Deus Ex (Mac) (CD-ROM)

Deus Ex might be my game of the year. It's an adventure RPG that actually allows you to role-play to some extent. It looks great and plays great. Its closest predecessors are System Shock 2 and Thief, two games the Macintosh community missed.

The missions are open-ended and large. You can explore huge detailed maps, finding the approach to your goals that suits your playing style. Want to sneak and use your silent crossbow loaded with tranq darts? Want to snipe from the rooftops? Or want to go in with assault rifle blazing? You can do all that and more. You can pick locks or blow doors off their hinges with bombs. Your choices affect how the NPCs react to you later in the game. Really!

I liked the NPCs in this game very much. There are a lot of them, moving around, and they often have a lot to say to you. Or you can listen in on their conversations with each other. Some aren't so relevant to the game's plot, but are fun anyway. Listen for two homeless men talking about sculpture...

How good is the Macintosh port? It's good. And what's more, the Macintosh version lagged the PC version by less than a month. Deus Ex is based on the Unreal Tournament engine, which helped make the port fast. Performance is great on my G4 with its Voodoo3 card, and should be acceptable on the ATI Rage cards that come standard in recent Macs. Anything with a G3 processor or better should be able to handle it.

Make sure you check Inside Mac Games or Aspyr's web site for game updates. There's one update already at the time I write this review.

10 of 10 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Excellent.. but.., October 18, 2000

By 

Aaron Hee-Stacpoole (claremont, ca) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Deus Ex (Mac) (CD-ROM)

This game is fantastic, don't get me wrong. I rushed out to CompUSA and bought myself a copy as soon as i heard it was released. However-- (i won't get into praising it because that would just be repeating what is known..) the AI is .. moderate.. voice acting is horrid... stereotypes of hong kong are ... racist.. technical issues with equipment (payload, damage, etc) are almost silly.. being that an assault rifle does 1/5th of a pistol per cartridge, map sizes make memory requirements rediculous, and make the game lag when viewing a city street..

but on the upshot, it's a freakin' great game.. very fun. just make sure you have 256MB of real RAM, a decent video card (voodoo2 at the least) and a G3 processor.

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