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Deus Ex 3 Announced
Gamasutra has the news that Eidos is already hard at work on a Deus Ex 3 . The company announced this project along with a brand-new studio in Montreal, which will be developing the title. "According to [General Manager Stéphane D'Astous], Eidos Montreal currently has two groups -- a Q&A group that is responsible for testing all of the developer's games from anywhere in the world, and an in-house development team that D'Astous says has just passed proof of concept for Deus Ex 3. 'This game was very highly rated at its release in 2000, and we have this great huge mandate to do the third one, and everybody is very excited,' added D'Astous"
I have a few words for the developers.
See that 3 in the title? That's just a number. Ignore it. Look only to Deus Ex for inspiration. There never was a Deus Ex 2 - that was all just a figment of the darkest parts of your imagination.
(fwiw, for those who haven't played, Deus Ex 2 wasn't a horrible game, so much as it didn't nearly live up to the first game of the series. It suffered from a massive case of being dumbed down for simultaneous console/PC release, from the original's PC-only origin.)
Like most of the people who will comment here, I really enjoyed the original Deus Ex. Yet I was also very disappointed with DX2. Whenever the discussion of great single-player games comes up, there's usually someone cheering for Deus Ex, closely followed by another comment warning potential players to stay away from the sequel.
The most often cited reasons for the sequels 'suck factor' seem to be the (relative) brevity of the game, small areas with constant loading, as well as the simplification of the interface, inventory management, ammunition/weapon system, and character development. Many of these issues can be seen as the problems inherent with developing for the console market. The original Deus Ex was PC/Mac only, whereas DX2 had to get by without a mouse and keyboard. Those issues are the ones that everyone seems to cite when talking about 'what went wrong', and why DX2 is widely seen as inferior to the original. I believe that this is the case, but it's not the big problem.
The big issue I see is that people know what they are getting in to. The original Deus Ex was long and involved, with a plot that was interesting and unique. When I started the second Deus Ex game, I knew what I was in for. Not the specifics obviously, but the general outline of the game was pretty much known to me within the first hour. While there were some interesting changes made in structure between the first and second games, they were not enough. This is still the story of an augmented special agent, unraveling massive conspiracies, lies, and backstabbing, and ultimately deciding the fate of the world.
Long post short, what I thought was great about Deus Ex was the plot and how it was revealed to the player over the course of some fairly long gameplay, combined with very ambitious (for the day) interactivity. The second game had much the same overarching plot, but the surprise was gone and it didn't pull it off as well. Repetitive plots are the bread and butter of gaming, but the direct comparison between the two makes DX2 suffer.
I could be a great artist, and if I paint a nice half portrait of a young woman seated, dressed in dark colors, and appearing to look back at the viewer, it could be very good on it's own merits. Hang it next to The Mona Lisa, and tell people that there is some connection between the two, and it will garner nothing but scorn.
How to fix these issues for DX3? Good luck.