By Jim Rossignol on May 29th, 2008 at 2:52 pm.
Gametap, that surging faucet of digital delivery, has announced that it’ll be featuring candidate for best game ever, Deus Ex, on its free games roster as of next week. The Big Ex joins Psychonauts and Thief: Deadly Shadows on its free game thinger. You will again be able to celebrate some of the greatest moments in gaming.
I have to say, actually, that it’s about time we had some more Deus Ex 3 news for Kieron to dissect at terrifying length. Come on, Eidos, leak some more info already.
OMG this is awesome news my Deus Ex Disc is worryingly scratched i wake up in cold sweats at night wondering if the next time i install it will be the last, before going to the shops and getting a new one I mean, or downloading it, or running the copy i keep on 2 different hard drives one plugged in one not, actually maybe this isn’t relevant to me, but an excuse to talk about how amazing Deus ex is should never be passed up!
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Indeed, any Deus Ex is good Deus Ex! 8-)
However, must we dwell on the upcoming DX3? The more discussion there is the more hopes will be built only to be mercilessly dashed on the rocks of “shitty 360 port” come Q3 ’09…
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DX was one of the first games I played on Gametap after I started paying for it. Being that it was around a year ago, I’m surprised how much I enjoyed the game’s aesthetics. I’d argue that it’s still a great looking game, especially if you haven’t been playing the latest graphical fps games.
I do feel like the new game selection in Gametap for paying members is getting worse though. There’s nothing really exciting coming out. The latest one I played was Alien Shooter: Vengeance, which was great. Maybe when they finish their deal with Take 2, we’ll see more quality titles.
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@runningwthszzors: I appreciate the review. I saw GameTap come up in another RPS thread earlier and I’ve been curious to see what other RPS members think of the service.
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It has been great to see the positive response on other, less PC focused, sites to this news. In an industry dominated by Halo sequels, rather than decent successors to DX, it’s been easy to assume that the game has settled into being little more than a cosy memory for an opinionated group of aging PC gamers.
But both this and the DX3 news have generated such an outpouring of affection for the game in unlikely places that it leaves me wondering just how large the underground DX appreciation movement really is.
I’m feeling all warm and fuzzy about it. Now nobody has a good excuse not to play the best game ever made. ;)
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Too bad Gametap does not work on Vista 64. At least I still have my own copy of Deus Ex.
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too bad GameTap is American subscribers only…
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I notice Eidos have just released a twenty-game MEGAPACK for 50 quid on Steam which also includes Deus Ex. And DX:IW. And T:DS. And… Project: Snowblind! And.. 16 other games.
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if deus ex wasn’t hugely popular ion storm would’ve sank straight after it’s release instead of after the next gen stuff, it was massive
don’t forget daikatana was a stinker and anachronox was hugely under appreciated
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Hey. I played that game. It was pretty good.
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Just came in to say:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5DAPXMZk2iw
What a shame.
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I haven’t played this one in years, so I think I’m going to try it again. Curious how it holds up.
Does anyone know if there are any mods for worth installing?
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Strelok:
I’m Australian; I just put CA as my state and 90210 as my zip code and I’m fine.
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Did someone say mods worth installing?!?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k6coZ7pvPyE
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Will this be “america only” like Psychonauts? :/
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Love that Malkavian mod video. “Get PILLS against my orders. Get moving!”
DX is the only game for which I keep an installed, patched and fully modded copy on a backup HDD “just in case”.
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I think what you mean is:
Did someone say mods worth installing?!?
http://www.offtopicproductions.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=1042
Also I can’t help myself, I must mention this: http://www.thenamelessmod.com
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JJ: There isn’t much (well, depending what you mean by ‘mods’), but Shifter is a goer; it doesn’t modify the game as drastically as the blurb might suggest, but that’s a good thing, really — it’s mostly about repairing minor niggles, with a few added rewards like custom weapons put in there to encourage above-and-beyond effort.
Meanwhile, there’s the ‘HDTP Project’, where they’re doing their best to create new hi-def models and level textures (albeit not level geometry) that’ll work in the old Unreal engine; they’re not blessed with the embarrassment of HR riches that, say ‘Black Mesa’ are (they had a hell of a time looking for texturers for awhile there; makes ya wonder where the love for DX is!), but things are apparently coming along nicely. There’s also DX Reborn, an attempt to port DX from the original engine to UT2k4, I believe — not sure what that’ll accomplish in itself from gamers’ perspectives, but it’ll apparently make things a lot easier for modders.
Hey, ‘Thievery’ sounds good — the lack of shadow-usage in DX always kinda throws me when I come back to it from stints in Thief and Splinter Cell. Anyone know if it’s worth a shot?
(Also: The DX theme is great; ‘Superman theme’ great. Go Alex Brandon.)
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Tx, James T. I will check those out.
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James, DX:R will have much better lighting and karma physics instead of the original game’s extremely clunky physics simulation (if you can call it that). There’s also support for bigger textures (which is something DX: New Vision are working on) with all sorts of fancy shading.
But seriously, here is a full list of finished and WIP modifications for Deus Ex sorted by type:
http://www.offtopicproductions.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=1042
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Ah, yes, that’s a very cool list Jonas. Tx!
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Essential mods (after installing DX and patching) are:
1) Shifter v1.7.2
2) HDTP Release 1
3) Enhanced OpenGL Renderer, which you can find here:
http://cwdohnal.home.mindspring.com/utglr/
The OpenGL renderer completely replaces that shipped with the game (useless) with something that works even better than the game’s native 3DFX Glide mode. Nobody should ever play DX in Direct3D mode, it’s just dreadful. The new OpenGL renderer supports FSAA (when forced at the driver level), and other modernfangled graphical features.
4) OTP UI Fix, which sorts out the UI scaling for higher resolution settings:
http://deusex2.filefront.com/file/OTP_UI_Fix;84991
Use that little lot, and you get something surprisingly respectable for an 8yr old game.
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And even better, HDTP seem right on track to finish their final release before hell freezes over :)
It’ll be great to play around with those high-poly reanimated weapons. I’ve seen a couple of them and especially the new pistol is quite fantastic in-game.
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Thanks Jonas, sounds like DXR’ll bring it to the yard much more than I knew. Seeya on the boards. :P
edit: Argh, damn that lewd ‘tongue-in-front’ smiley…
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(Psst, someone mention and praise The Cassandra Project, or Kieron will end up weeping on the floor in a fetal position with self-hate)
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The OpenGL renderer instructions for Deus Ex are a little, um, terse. Are these steps correct?
1. Copy file OpenGLDrv.dll to F:\DeusEx\System, overwriting previous version.
2. Add the following lines to F:\DeuxEx\System\DeuxEx.ini after the line [OpenGLDrv.OpenGLRenderDevice]:
NewMeshPath=True
EnablePatch=True
UseVertexProgram=True
UseFragmentProgram=True
P.
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Yep that’s pretty adequate. Also in case you haven’t already found it, technically savvy people from the OTP boards recommend you use the following .ini settings:
http://offtopicproductions.com/forum/viewtopic.php?p=1730#1730
That’s what I use, and it works for me.
Also, The Cassandra Project was bloody ace, but sort of unfinished, to put it nicely. Having worked on the same mod project for 6 years, I feel completely entitled to shake my head at the TCP team for not sacrificing similar portions of their life for very little reward ;)
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Was there ever a fix for the wonky server timescale on multicore CPUs? Unreal 1 has one…
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CunningBeef: where do you set your location?
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Theory, you can find a couple of suggestions for fixing the multicore issue here:
http://offtopicproductions.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=1214 :)
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Bad news everyone!
Coming January 22nd, it’s no longer free. Aaaw :(
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This is why i don’t sub to these services they pull things away. Yes from free customers. But a disagreement with publishers means it gets pulled from paid accounts too.
Never mind, i already own the game but getting it on steam is an option if my disc breaks.
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