It's funny, but I loved DX:HR at the time and played it right through to completion which is more than I can say for many (well, most) games. It was easily my game of the year. Yet, by the time we'd reached the end of the year, I found that I didn't remember too much about it. That's not unusual with my terrible memory, if I'm honest, but I was surprised at just how quickly it had faded.
I know Skyrim is more recent, but it has certainly made more of a lasting impression thus far. A glance at my Steam profile is also revealing. I played through DX:HR in about 42 hours. I didn't rush it. I also didn't feel compelled to replay it and try things differently. By contrast, I've spent ~150 hours in Skyrim. In Skyrim, I have started and levelled to the mid-twenties maybe four characters with very different experiences. I'm still far from done with it.
Even Skyrim is eclipsed by the time spent in Football Manager this year, though. I'm slightly frightened by it, if I'm honest, and, oh Christ...if you add up the total time spent with each iteration of the game since it's been on Steam...it's just terrifying. I calculate that I've spent the equivalent of a tenth of the time it would take to get a degree just playing the last three Football Managers. I console myself with the thought that it's the sort of game you can go AFK from for long periods. Yeah. That.
Time isn't everything, though. Somehow, Portal 2, which I only spent 14 hours with, has left a more lasting impression in my mind than DX:HR. Portal 2 had real character, I think. The characters in it loom large. Ironic given the absence of actual people in it, eh? Also, it's the first game I've ever played that has attempted humour that has actually worked, too. I literally laughed out loud and that has never happened before when playing a game.
Skyrim, of course, is simply breathtaking in its scope and in its geography. You could argue that its geography is its greatest character. Football Manager always wins on story, which sounds odd to someone that has maybe never played this sort of game before. It's a very personal experience: it's you at the helm and the real-world setting makes for a deeper engagement. Like the Sims, you make your own stories and that can often lead to a richer experience than heading on someone else's carefully plotted rails. When I play this game, I can actually like football again; which is in stark contrast to my growing contempt for the sport as a whole in real life.
For all that it was a worthy successor to the Deus Ex crown, I can't help but feel that maybe DX:HR was a little flat. Maybe it was a bit lacking in its story. Maybe the ending was a bit lazy and uninspired. Maybe the characters were less than striking.
What do people think now?
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Topic: Deus Ex: Human Revolution (Read 16668 times)