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[The Greek Freak]

It struck me as odd that people complained so loudly and so often that HR felt too similar to the predecessor when there had been a 5 year gap and no other major games of the same style between the two. Compared to like, Assassin's Creed or Call of Duty which for years alternated between similar or identical settings one year to the next but people didn't seem to get burned out on it. Paradoxically it feels like had these games come out 2-2.5 years after the originals but been otherwise identical, they probably would have done much better. Striking while the iron is hot is probably a lot more important than being radically different from the predecessor.

Human Revolution was my first DE game so take this with a massive bag of salt.

I liked Human Rev in spite of many aspects I might call clunky (that long time fans might like).

Since they took 5 years between games I expected massive changes and improvements.

After watching some gameplay it looked more like an annualized sequel in terms of changes so I never bothered even putting it in my gamefly queue let alone actually buy it.

 

[Mcleon6494]

Excite? Dishonored and Deus Ex have no peers. If you're a fan of the genre, what the hell are you playing that makes those two games unappealing?

Personally, Prey

 

[Mr. Tibbs]

All immersive sims are selling better right now than they did back in 00's. They just aren't (and likely never will) selling enough to top the charts and become "a sensation". SE's expecting something different is the main reason why the franchise is "dead" again, not it's sales.

Modern immersive-sims also cost considerably more and take way longer to make by far larger teams than Ion Storm and Looking Glass Studios titles, so Dishonored and Mankind Divided selling slightly more than Thief and System Shock (single sku games) isn't particularly noteworthy.

 

[sirap]

They already took Tron 3 from me. Please don't cancel Adam's journey, my heart can't take it

 

[whalleywhat]

The game pretty heavily implied that there was a

Spoiler

clone angle

with some of the earlier conversations. A lot of things just don't add up without it, and it really should have been the focus of Mankind Divided rather than some ultimately inconsequential b-story about Adam stopping the bad guys of the week.

Uh, you could call Mankind Divided's story a lot of things, but inconsequential isn't one of them.

 

[Nessus]

What makes me sad is that, if Jim Sterling's sources are correct, they were halfway done making the second game.

But all that work will likely be thrown out because by the time Eidos Montreal is done making Marvel games the assets, engine, etc. will be completely outdated. So it's not even like they can come back to it later.

On the plus side I got the DLC during the Steam Summer Sale, so I've got at least another 10 hours of this series to go.

 

[joe_zazen]

This is true as well. I don't know what kind of place these immersive sims have in the industry. They're mostly single player affairs that take awhile to get into. Most of the popular games people play are all about instant gratification and have gameplay hooks that someone can understand within minutes. Games like Dishonored and Deus Ex are the opposite where you're building up a character and experimenting with possibilities. It's more longform gratification if anything.

To get anything good out of them, it seems you have to spent a lot of time on design and that can take years of development and refinement and you have to make sure it meets the expectations of the audience in the production values. That's a lot of money to spend on what's ultimately a kinda niche genre.

Idk. Part of me thinks these series don't have a future in the AAA space which is sad because that space is desperately lacking in diversity.

On the other hand, Zelda and Zero Dawn managed to create some hype, but it is obvious 3rd party pubs are moving away from these types of games.

The guy who ran Arkane for 18 years left, or was asked to leave last week.

 

[Ristifer]

I was reading about this theory today, but read that it was basically debunked in Black Light. I haven't read it, so I don't know if that's true or not.

 

[dr_rus]

Human Revolution and Dishonored 1 both sold far better than their sequels. They're never going to pull in CoD numbers sure, but there's no implicit reason they had to slide backwards in sales.

Did they actually sell far better though? I can see this being true for HR being a franchise resurrection and a great game all in all but I thought that DH2 did in the same league as DH1, maybe slightly worse.

Modern immersive-sims also cost considerably more and take way longer to make by far larger teams than Ion Storm and Looking Glass Studios titles, so Dishonored and Mankind Divided selling slightly more than Thief and System Shock (single sku games) isn't particularly noteworthy.

A game cost as much as a developer/publisher want to spend on it.

 

[Alexander DeLarge]

What makes me sad is that, if Jim Sterling's sources are correct, they were halfway done making the second game.

But all that work will likely be thrown out because by the time Eidos Montreal is done making Marvel games the assets, engine, etc. will be completely outdated. So it's not even like they can come back to it later.

On the plus side I got the DLC during the Steam Summer Sale, so I've got at least another 10 hours of this series to go.

This is what I'm wondering because they'd be throwing away years worth of assets and work. I wonder how much Mankind Divided's "bloated" budget that everyone talks about actually went towards the sequel and the engine. That's the thing, they have a bunch of assets that could be repurposed plus a bunch of content we haven't seen, they have the engine and I'd imagine they have a sizable portion of the sequel built by the "b-team" and I'd assume they also have the story written since it was pitched and approved and planned from the very beginning..... Does it make sense to throw all that away just because Mankind Divided flopped for a variety of reasons (augment your pre-order, microtransactions, the fact that the game felt incomplete and like a prologue)?

 

[CertifiedFP]

This is what I'm wondering because they'd be throwing away years worth of assets and work. I wonder how much Mankind Divided's "bloated" budget that everyone talks about actually went towards the sequel and the engine. That's the thing, they have a bunch of assets that could be repurposed plus a bunch of content we haven't seen, they have the engine and I'd imagine they have a sizable portion of the sequel built by the "b-team" and I'd assume they also have the story written since it was pitched and approved and planned from the very beginning..... Does it make sense to throw all that away?

When you're Square Enix and Opportunity Cost is the center of your universe... Yes, when you just got your hands on the Mahvel license.

 

[Shredderi]

I bought MD at release but never played more than 2h. I loved HR. The beginning to me in MD was just such a slog and then I'm in the main hub area and I'm totally overwhelmed. I never completed one sidequest. I spent that time just exploring the hub area but, and it's odd, I just felt too overwhelmed by how many paths etc. there were and it quickly exhausted me and there wasn't enough of a story pull at the beginning to drive me forward so I just quit it, decided to come back the next day. Nah, I'll come back the day after that. And the day after that. Then all my motivation just fizzled and from time to time I try to think about the game in hopes that I would go back to it. I kind of doubt I ever will. There was something that pulled me in with HR. This just feeled too samey and even the graphics, while improved, failed to make an impression. Just felt too much of the same.

I also loved Dishonored 1 but it too felt too samey to generate hype for me, but I knew I would enjoy it and kind of tried to force myself to buy it, but then the chatter about PC performance (stuttering) started and I can't stand that so I didn't buy it.

Both are quality games no doubt, but as someone who loved their predecessors, neither of them succeeded in generating excitement in me.

 

[Alexander DeLarge]

When you're Square Enix and Opportunity Cost is the center of your universe... Yes, when you just got your hands on the Mahvel license.

Oh yeah totally I would've made the same decision if I were in their shoes. That's a huge license with far more potential than Deus Ex unfortunately but if they were able to have a b-team simultaneously working on Deus Ex 5, I'd imagine they'd be able to manage doing the same during The Avengers project (assuming it wasn't just a skeleton crew doing pre-production work). Jim if you're out there, please get some further details.

 

[Paragon]

Where did the Immersive Sim audience vanish off to? Human Revolution and Dishonored were both mega-hits, and then suddenly Mankind Divided and Dishonored 2 bombed.

I think that Deus Ex: Human Revolution and the original Dishonored were unexpected hits which managed to attract more than just the crowd that knows what an immersive sim is and cares about those games.
The problem is that those people didn't stick around.

Either they wrote off the sequels as "more of the same" despite there being nothing else like them in the preceding five years, or they bought the first games and didn't want any more of what they were offering.
I know a lot of people that I would never have expected to play either of those pick up one or both of them, and a lot of them decided that type of game wasn't for them.

Combine that with it being reported that Deus Ex: MD had been cut in half, microtransactions being forced into Deus Ex by the publisher, both of them using Denuvo, both shipping with performance and control issues which made it look like PC was not their main priority with the games despite that being where the main immersive sim audience is, and they didn't start out in a strong position.
Lots of people decided it would be better to wait and see if the issues would be fixed or wait for a sale.

Prey obviously.
Oh wait, the "audience" for the genre and System Shock decided to sit out on that one too

Yeah, I'm not sure what happened there.
I've seen a lot of people that really liked Deus Ex: MD and Dishonored 2 who completely ignored Prey.
Which is a real shame, because it might be my favorite of the three.

LMAO. Yup, just as politics has entered the Misinformation Age, PC Gaming has entered the "Never my Rig's fault" age.
Dishonored 2 runs like butter on my PC... That said, I wish I could say the same for the RAM-devouring Mankind Divided and its legion of Memory Leaks.

I upgraded my video card for the game (GTX 960 > GTX 1070) then built a brand new PC (i5-2500K > R7-1700X) and then bought a G-Sync display, and it still doesn't run that well.

The most recent patch, which arrived seven and a half months after launch, is the first one that properly fixed some of the performance issues for me.
Before that patch, the game would always stutter badly. Didn't matter what the framerate was, the game would be stuttering.

Now at least if you can lock the framerate to 60 FPS, the frame presentation issues are gone.
They're still present if the game is running at anything other than 60 FPS though.
There are not many other games which run smoother at 60 FPS than 100 FPS.
I still have to turn down settings, enable dynamic resolution (which looks terrible), and limit the game to 60 for it to run acceptably.
It is now playable at least, but I haven't really gone back to it since these performance issues really killed my interest in the game.

 

[grumble]

In MD's case, the branding of the game looked like the exact same game that came out five years ago. Charlequin had a good post about it but I'm on mobile right now.

That is a great point. A lot of people weren't really aware that they were different games. Should have been marketed differently.

As for dishonoured, that game wasn't marketed at all.

 

[CertifiedFP]

That is a great point. A lot of people weren't really aware that they were different games. Should have been marketed differently.

As for dishonoured, that game wasn't marketed at all.

Hohohoho, Dishonored 2 was hardly "No Marketing".

Poor marketing that left a lot to be desired, yes, but there was marketing. I'd say E3 Press Conference Stage is pretty decent marketing to at least get the Hardcore on board.

You want to see what "No Marketing" is? Look at Valkyria Revolution. A PSBlog post announcing localization, and a second PSBlog post barely a month before launch saying it releases June 27th. No E3 presence, no trailers, release-day review embargo, and to top it off Sega and Deep Silver don't list it on any of their (English) sites to my knowledge (The Valkyria forum on Sega's site is still labeled "Valkyria Chronicles" and treats VC1 Steam/PS4 as the latest entry). That's LITERALLY No Marketing. Dishonored 2 had an Embargo, sure, but it at least had an E3 presence and multiple trailers.

 

[HorseFD]

I want a remake of the original game. More people need to play that incredible thing but they're put off by the dated graphics.

 

[aeolist]

LMAO. Yup, just as politics has entered the Misinformation Age, PC Gaming has entered the "Never my Rig's fault" age.

Dishonored 2 runs like butter on my PC... That said, I wish I could say the same for the RAM-devouring Mankind Divided and its legion of Memory Leaks.

i loved dishonored 1 and didn't buy the sequel because of the technical issues, which don't look like they'll ever be fixed at this point.

it doesn't matter whether it's the game or my pc, i won't buy a piece of software that runs like that. if someday i have a pc that can run it well consistently i will consider buying it.

 

[Un4]

What makes me sad is that, if Jim Sterling's sources are correct, they were halfway done making the second game.

But all that work will likely be thrown out because by the time Eidos Montreal is done making Marvel games the assets, engine, etc. will be completely outdated. So it's not even like they can come back to it later.

I wish i hadn't read this.

 

[Necron]

I feel we'll get a one more game to round off the Adam Jensen trilogy. They might as well re-release Deus Ex:MD in a Director's Cut edition to reignite interest (guess it helps). I too believe that it deserves to be rounded off and I'm sure there's a whole game's worth of unused assets. If they can still be used in some form in a few years is kind of doubtful to be honest.

If not, I think Square will bring Deus Ex back (in form of yet another reboot) but without Jensen (or perhaps an older Jensen?) and it won't be part of the prequel-saga. Perhaps it would even be best for the series at this point, would be to just remake the original Deus Ex.

 

[Ushojax]

Mankind Divided just took way too long to come out. 5 years of work with half a game to show for it, one that looks the same as the previous one, it wasn't enough. The game was good but it was obviously not the full experience that it should have been.

I know that SE chopped the game in half in a cash-grab but that was a stupid decision, the muted reception killed the series and now the third game will never see the light of day.

 

[Alpha Phoenix]

I have high hopes that a sequel is coming. You have to keep in mind that the sequel was already being worked on well before Mankind Divided even launched. The Marvel crap they're working on right now is unlikely to be their only focus, especially since we know Shadow of the Tomb Raider is also in development and will likely be out within a year's time.

 

[Laughing Banana]

I thought the prevailing theory was it's not that Mankind Divided's Jensen

Spoiler

is a clone

, but rather he may

Spoiler

have acted in ways he didn't even realize that he's being controlled by someone else.

 

[Lego Boss]

Currently on Mission 15 (London reception).

Gotta say, this is one of the finest games I have ever played. Everything about it screams a top quality production. I don't want it to end, but I know that it has to at some point, but just trying to spin it out so I don't have to go back to other less worthy games.

I can't believe that we're not likely to get a sequel. Sometimes it feels like the Deus Ex series is hexed somehow? Like it's the Blade Runner of videogames (in more ways than one).

 

[Infinite_Daremo]

My theory was

Spoiler

Jensen's DNA was they key to perfecting aug acceptance in the human body and the research eventually led to the 12 Denton clones.

I went in that room during the game and completely missed the OP's context and had my mind blown when I first saw it.

The game was pretty clear even from the start that something was off with Jensen though. The unaccountable time lapse, upgraded augs, different serials numbers, hints of clones, hints of memory transferrance.

I need to play this game again....

 

[hank_tree]

Mankind Divided has one of the worst stories in a video game I've ever played. The original Watch Dogs is the only one that comes to mind as worse.

The clone stuff makes the story worse, not better.

 

[Springfoot]

.

 

[Starbuck2907]

The marketing was bad. (Augment your preorder!)

It had a political plot line (Aug lives matter!) at a time when the news was very polically charged with "black lives matter". People wanted an escape from that sort of subject matter because it was in the news 24/7 and the marketing and story for this game did not sell escape as well as it could have. It basically mirrored the black lives matter movement in a loose, fictional manner, and I'm sure that really turned some people off, to have to deal with that stuff in reality and their gaming "escape" from reality.

Great game.

I think the distinctive loss of the "piss filter" hurt it too. I liked the stylistic choice... now, with MD, it just feels like any other game.

 

[GinoFelino]

I really don't see how or why knowing about this plot point would make anyone want a sequel

 

[Alpha Phoenix]

I really don't see how or why knowing about this plot point would make anyone want a sequel

I want a sequel because I like Deus Ex. There honestly doesn't need to be more reason to it than that.

It's actually probably my favorite franchise if I had to pick one, or at least among the top ones.

 

[Shredderi]

Mankind Divided just took way too long to come out. 5 years of work with half a game to show for it, one that looks the same as the previous one, it wasn't enough. The game was good but it was obviously not the full experience that it should have been.

I know that SE chopped the game in half in a cash-grab but that was a stupid decision, the muted reception killed the series and now the third game will never see the light of day.

And this too. It took forever to come out and it wasn't this dazzling new thing. If it came out after 3 years there wouldn't have been as much expectations.

 

[OmegaTreeFish]

Mankind Divided just took way too long to come out. 5 years of work with half a game to show for it, one that looks the same as the previous one, it wasn't enough. The game was good but it was obviously not the full experience that it should have been.

I know that SE chopped the game in half in a cash-grab but that was a stupid decision, the muted reception killed the series and now the third game will never see the light of day.

I really dont agree with people who claim its half a game. Didn't feel that way at all. It felt like game 2 of planned trilogy. That is that is has it main self contained story (the terrorist attack stuff) and its overriding story that gets told over the course of the whole series (the illuminati stuff).

The problem is that people were a lot more interested in that stuff and seem to associate that as the story of mankind divided. Hell the game is called mankind divided... the games story is exactly about that.

As for the reveal stuff I think its more likely

Spoiler

there are clones of Adam that are being tested on because of his strange acceptance of augs. He was clearly taken after the first game and experimented on. Then released again with memories missing and crazy new experimental augs. He is also being closely watched. To what evnd we dont know yet. Sadly prob never will.

 

[panthapanda]

Saw this thread and decided that I would finally go ahead and finished the game. I stopped for whatever reason. Turned out I was literally about to beat the game the entire time lol.

Now I can read this thread.

 

[Majukun]

Where did the Immersive Sim audience vanish off to? Human Revolution and Dishonored were both mega-hits, and then suddenly Mankind Divided and Dishonored 2 bombed.

i bought human revolution day one but waited off mankind divided because it looked a bit too much more of the same,with most of the new enhancements being variation of the same "anti personnel" stuff,and after i bought and played the game,i was kind of right...

but more importantly because the game has microtransaction and i NEVER spend retail money for games with microtransactions...if they wanna be treated like mobile games,then i'll buy them at a mobile game price.

still a really good game ans a slight improvement over the original...story was handled very badly though,both for what they decided to focus on, and some decisions in how it's structured (like the choice you have to make late in the game both lacking any sense of involvement, since you make a decision about things and people you barely know, and sense, since there were different solutions following the game logic that could have been sued to solve both "problems" at the same time.

also the beginning of the story is very jarring,

Spoiler

with jensen being already a double agent for a cause we know nothing about serving a private company we don't know anything either..so you kind of go around doing what people telling you to do without knowing why and what isde you should be on.

in fact i found this decision so lackluster that i used a trick to basically make both decision at the same time...and in the end it wasn't really worth it anyway.

didn't notice the whole

Spoiler

clone subplot

during the game, and since we are nowhere near to see the continuation of it,i'm kind of glad i did.

 

[hank_tree]

The marketing was bad. (Augment your preorder!)

It had a political plot line (Aug lives matter!) at a time when the news was very polically charged with "black lives matter". People wanted an escape from that sort of subject matter because it was in the news 24/7 and the marketing and story for this game did not sell escape as well as it could have. It basically mirrored the black lives matter movement in a loose, fictional manner, and I'm sure that really turned some people off, to have to deal with that stuff in reality and their gaming "escape" from reality.

I really don't think the problem was that it touched on those issues. The problem was that it had nothing interesting to say.