Deus Ex: Mankind Divided

The Good
+ Fully supports stealth and combat play styles

• New augmentations are fun to use

• Excellent world design

• Engaging sidequests

• Nice graphics and soundtrack

• Improved gameplay over Human Revolution
  
  The Bad
  - Only a small part of a larger story

• Breach mode and microtransactions feel unnecessary
  
  The Bottom Line
  It’s hard to believe that it’s only been 5 years since Deus Ex: Human Revolution was released. That was a game that had quite the odds stacked against it. Human Revolution not only had to wash the bad taste that Invisible War left in so many players’ mouths, it also had to live up to the legacy of one of the most beloved games of all time. It was also developed by a new, unproven developer, Eidos Montreal, as their debut title. Fortunately for both developer and players, Human Revolution was a very strong game that didn’t necessarily surpass the classic original, but did improve and refine many of its ideas while also taking the series in an intriguing new direction. Even though I only finished the game recently, it was one of my favorite AAA games from the last generation of consoles, even with its faults. Human Revolution received lots of criticism, the biggest ones being the balance towards stealth and hacking and the boss fights that such players might have been ill-equipped for. The main takeaway from this sequel, Mankind Divided, is that Eidos Montreal seems to have listened to those criticisms, and have created a better, more refined version of their last game. This might not impress players who are looking for every sequel to be truly revolutionary, but if you’re in the mood for more of that unique mix of stealth, shooter, and RPG that only Deus Ex delivers, Mankind Divided is sure to hit the spot.

Mankind Divided begins two years after Human Revolution’s ending. The Incident which occurred at the end of Human Revolution, which caused many augmented humans to temporarily go crazy and murder non-augmented humans, has greatly divided the world’s population. The “naturals” fear those who have augs, while construction of a city exclusively for augmented people is under way. Adam Jensen, who seemingly didn’t die at the end of that game, travels to Prague to work with an agency called Task Force 29 while also joining up with a rogue hacker group known as the Juggernaut Collective, who believe that Task Force 29 isn’t an entirely trustworthy organization. While in Prague, he finds himself at the center of a terrorist bombing at a subway station, just one of several that has taken place over the last few months. With most of his augmentations damaged, Adam Jensen must begin unravelling the threads of another conspiracy to find out who’s really pulling the strings.

The conspiracy-thriller plot is as compelling as it has always been, however, Mankind Divided’s attempts to parallel augmented discrimination to racism are a bit ham-fisted at times. Augmented people are given derogatory names such as “hanzers” and “clanks”, and are forced to stand in segregated lines. At one point, Adam Jensen rides in a subway car “for naturals only” and gets pulled over by a cop. It’s hard to really feel the weight of discrimination that the game says is there, as most of the time Jensen is simply allowed to just waltz on through segregated areas due to his status as a spy. I think the attempts to address discrimination would have been more provocative if we were playing as a new character who did not have such privileges, rather than Jensen. At least the game seems to be aware of this, as there was one conversation that I heard between two cops which suggested that augmentation wasn’t necessarily equal to race.

I love how Mankind Divided opens as its very reminiscent of the first Deus Ex game. You get a short cutscene dealing the first mission, and choose a lethal or non-lethal weapon. Then you’re dropped into your first mission in Dubai, which is quite long and doesn’t really feel like a tutorial (even though it is). There’s no lengthy “opening sequence” to play through before you get to the first mission. Jensen also has a lot of his augmentations active during this mission, allowing you to see what exactly he can do. Later on, you re-spec Jensen from scratch after completing the first main mission in Prague.

Most of the augmentations from Human Revolution make a return in Mankind Divided, though some of the more “useless” ones, such as hacking identify and timer cooldown have been removed or included as standards. Some augmentations increase Jensen’s health, biocell capacity, and inventory size.  Other augmentations are active or context-sensitive, and allow Jensen to turn invisible, silence his footsteps, fall from great heights, and punch through walls, among several other abilities. New to Mankind Divided are several “experimental” augmentations, which were installed onto Jensen without his knowing between games. These augmentations include the ‘Tesla Gun’, which stuns multiple targets, the ‘Icarus Dash’, which is a dash move similar to Dishonored’s Blink ability, and even an ability which slows down time. The catch for these experimental augmentations is that Jensen needs to keep a stable system core, meaning that if you activate one of the experimental augmentations, you must deactivate one of the regular augmentations in its place. I should point out however, that there is a way to fix this much later in the game that involves finishing a couple of side missions, so you shouldn’t feel too punished by trying out some of these new augmentations.

Deus Ex is a series that’s primarily about exploring dense, intricately-designed, and complex spaces, and Prague carries on that tradition in grand style. The city just begs to be explored, with lots of cool little side areas and secret rooms which reward exploration with items and story elements. Sometimes, you might even stumble across one of the many side missions in the game. There are plenty of back-alleys, balconies, bridges, rooftops, and side streets, plus a number of visually cool landmarks. There are a lot of windows to climb into, shops and buildings to enter, and a very extensive sewer system that’s far bigger than anything seen in Human Revolution. In general, the levels in Mankind Divided are much more vertical than in the previous game. The standout in this regard has to be Golem City, which is a slum for augmented people just outside of Prague that Jensen explores in the middle of the game. My only complaint is that there are occasionally invisible walls or ceilings when traveling on rooftops, which limits the sense of freedom. The new mini-map is a valuable tool for navigating these twisting streets.

The cover and combat system is very similar to Human Revolution’s, though you now have a new feature which allows you to press a button when in cover to move to different spots. I remember seeing this feature in another recent AAA game, The Division, and I’m not sure exactly why it needs to be there. It makes using the cover system a bit more complicated than Human Revolution’s, which was one of the most elegant of its type. I also didn’t enjoy the lack of blind-firing. You only peek out over cover when either the aim or shoot button is pressed.

Probably the biggest change to Mankind Divided is the weapon customization system. For starters, you can change various aspects of your weapon on-the-fly by holding down the reload button, including changing the ammo type and firing mode. There are several different types of ammo including standard, armor-piercing, and EMP, which disable electronic devices. Previously you would have to find and buy specific upgrades for each of your weapons and install them. these would increase things like damage, reload time, and rate of fire. In Mankind Divided, you acquire generic “crafting parts” instead, which allow you to craft the customizations of your choosing. You can also use the parts to craft multitools, biocells, and mine templates, though these are quite expensive. I really like this change as it gives players who like to use weapons a bit more freedom to customize how they want. And yes, you can play the entire game without killing anyone.

Hacking has also been revamped. The hacking minigame is very similar to Human Revolution’s, but features new obstacles including darkness (which prevents you from seeing the full system of nodes) and firewalls, which are invisible traps that stop you for a bit. It also looks and feels much nicer, with a neat isometric viewpoint and better controls when playing with a controller. If you play without hacking, there are XP rewards for finding the code for most doors, safes, and terminals, unlike Human Revolution.

In terms of aesthetics, Mankind Divided utilizes a new proprietary graphics engine called “Dawn”, which is based off of the engine powering the latest Hitman game. The Dawn engine allows for much bigger areas than in Human Revolution. Many buildings can be dynamically entered in and out of, and unlike Human Revolution, there is no loading screen when doing so. This creates a more “seamless” feeling game world. The downside to this is some really mean loading times. It’s probably my computer and how I installed the game, and your mileage my vary, but some of the load times in this game can take up to a minute. That might be fine if the entire Prague map were loaded in all at once, but it is split into two hub areas. This makes switching hubs really annoying, especially when a mission takes you to both areas. I tended to do as much as I could within one area before traveling to the next. The art design of the game in general has gotten away from the gold-tinted scheme of Human Revolution in favor of a less-stylized look. I wasn’t the biggest fan of how “gold” everything was in the last game, though I appreciated it as a bold stylistic choice. In some ways, Mankind Divided feels like the midway point between Human Revolution and the original Deus Ex.

Mankind Divided’s biggest downfall is its story. It’s not bad, as it is gripping for much of the time. It also makes a greater attempt to bridge the gap between Eidos Montreal’s new games and the original Ion Storm classic. There are a lot of neat characters and locations, and the side missions are some of the most interesting in the entire series. You really should try to savor as much of those side missions as possible as the main story is actually rather short in comparison to Human Revolution’s. On top of that, it’s only the first part of a story. While the main conflict is resolved, it ultimately serves as setup for what comes in the next game. Even some of the side stories which develop over the course of the game are simply not wrapped up or at least not satisfactorily moved along by the time Mankind Divided ends. It feels like watching “Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows - Part 1” except you don’t know when or if the next part of the story is going to be released.

Mankind Divided has also fallen victim to corporate greed. I’m not sure who is to fault: Eidos Montreal, or Square, but something is definitely funky here regardless. There are a lot of micro transactions in the game, ranging from Praxis points to weapons and grenades. None of these items that you pay for can’t be gotten from normal play of the game, making their existence completely pointless. I actually had excess Praxis points by the end of the campaign, and I didn’t even hack a lot of things. The microtransactions are also one-time, one-save use only, which has also irked a lot of people online.

Even worse is the inclusion of “Breach” mode. Rather than focusing on making a longer, even more satisfying campaign, someone decided to include a mode based around time trials and arcade-style gameplay. This mode is initially intriguing, but its bland, repetitious levels and nearly impossible objectives make it something you probably won’t play for very long. Breach mode incorporates elements from popular “free-to-play” mobile games, including microtransactions and booster packs. I’m not sure if it was Eidos Montreal’s or Square Enix’s call, but either way it stings, especially since the campaign ends just as it really seems to get going. The mode might have made for a fun mobile-esque game if you can live with the freemium elements, but it’s hard not to feel like resources were wasted on it, especially since all of the prior Deus Ex games had nothing of this sort included. This mode simply was not needed, in my opinion.

Nevertheless, despite its flaws with both the script and the business model, Mankind Divided is still one of the best games I’ve played this year, and the best AAA game to release in recent memory. Eidos Montreal really listened to a lot of the criticisms from their first outing and polished things up this time around. This is just about everything that I wanted out of a sequel to Human Revolution.