First off let me start by saying I never played the first Deus Ex, but really didn’t need to thanks to the incredible 12 minute recap video they offer before you start the campaign. At first I was nervous to buy this game because I hate starting games mid-series, but that video was a welcomed surprise. I’ve heard great things about this game and was very excited to try out Deus Ex: Mankind Divided and I have to say after the recap, things were off to a great start.

The video allowed me to identify with the main character, Adam Jensen, right off the bat. Which helped during the first tutorial missions because they really do throw you right in the thick of the action. The game throws you a few options during the first cut scene, like which kind of weaponry and Augs to choose from, so I knew shit was about to go down, in terms of story and the action.  As someone who’s extremely up-to-date with the latest in the biological tech world (Huge tech nerd over here), I’ll admit the story had me hooked. The futuristic technologies in the game almost seemed achievable.

There are two basic ways you can make it through the story: stealth and cunning or destroy everything and everyone in your path and be a badass. I went with option number 2. Gigs chose the other path, and I was interested to see how our game play styles impacted the story. Only a few hours in, I noticed Gigs was finding the characters you encounter to be much more helpful. Not every NPC was pleased that I was racking up a body count with their goons, and were much more apt to disregard my calls for information. I heard in the first game people were a bit disappointed that their actions didn’t sway the direction of the storyline, but I was already seeing the impact around six hours into Mankind Divided.

As far as gameplay goes, the controls are a bit wonky. You can definitely tell this game was made with PC gamers in mind. Once you play through a few missions and walk casually away from enemies enough times (kept forgetting the sprint control.) you begin to catch on. I still find myself defaulting to standard FPS controls and instead of sprinting (Triangle on PS4), I’m trying to crouch away from enemies instead which can all get pretty annoying. Even though I blame the controls for more than one of Jenson’s deaths, I do have to say they are set up in the best interests of the game. By this I mean certain common FPS controls wouldn’t translate over well to all the different actions Jensen can take. After all, a Battlefield soldier doesn’t need to think about using his robot arms to take out a circle of bad guys.

Overall, I have to say I’m really enjoying this game. I’m about 13-15 hours in right now and the story completely grabbed me. If it wasn’t for me (a veteran world of warcraft player pre-BC) downloading WoW for the new expansion, I would have doubled the hours spent playing Deus Ex: Mankind Divided. The story matches up with today’s social issues (No spoilers but you’ll see what I mean, spoiler review coming soon), the action was on point, and you feel like a badass every step of the way. It’s extremely challenging too, which is a rarity in today’s games. Still, I never felt like any mission was absolutely impossible with my reckless game style. I was never forced to change the way I play, but I did have to look at certain situations more tactically. We here at Gigamax feel as though every video game is a piece of art.  It’s our policy not to slap a number on a game, because a nice round number isn’t enough to explain a unique piece of artistic expression. Instead we’ll be using adjectives because they seem to be able to describe the game much better than a number ever could.

Game Rating: Exciting, Exhilarating, Challenging, Frustrating, Thought-Provoking