Here's the most recently finished game: Deux Ex: Human Revolution.   I finished this game on November 4, 2023.  I'm trying a new tactic and writing about games now in a more recent order (i.e., writing about the ones I finished most recently) to see if I catch up on my blogging topic backlog - 😂

Anyway, I had started this game back in my Xbox 360 days about ten years ago.  I made the mistake of choosing the pacifist  route initially which made me a bit of a target.  The tranquilizer gun you get when you start off just doesn't work that well.  I kept getting beat, and frustrated, and put the game down for a bit....a long bit!

So...I started again back in October ...and,...you know what?  I made the same mistake again!  I picked the blessed tranquilizer gun and had similar issues.  This time, I stuck with it to see how far I could get.

Plot, from Wikipedia:

On the eve of unveiling a way to end Neuropozyne dependence, Sarif Industries is attacked by a group of augmented terrorists, the Tyrants, who slaughter the staff. Megan Reed and many other scientists are presumed dead in the attack, and Jensen, the head of security, is grievously wounded. Sarif saves Jensen by giving him advanced augmentations.

Six months later, Jensen is summoned to deal with another terrorist attack by a group of anti-augmentation radicals. Jensen finds an augmented terrorist trying to steal information, but he commits suicide before Jensen can capture him. Pritchard discovers that the terrorist was controlled remotely and tracks the hacking signal to an abandoned factory in Highland Park. Jensen discovers the Tyrants guarding a FEMA detention camp, but they are moving out after the Sarif raid failed. Jensen defeats one of the mercenaries, Barrett, who tells him to go to the Hengsha megacity in China before launching a failed suicide attack.

Jensen travels to Hengsha and tracks down the hacker, Arie van Bruggen, who is being hunted by private security company Belltower Associates and hidden by local triad leader Tong Si Hung. Van Bruggen directs Adam to Tai Yong Medical, the world's largest augmentation technology manufacturer and Sarif's main rival. Infiltrating Tai Yong, Jensen finds footage of a call between Namir and Zhao Yun Ru, which confirms that Megan and the other scientists are alive and that Eliza Cassan is involved. Confronting Zhao, he learns she is allied to an organization controlling global interests before she forces him to leave. Jensen tracks down Eliza, who is revealed to be an artificial intelligence construct designed to influence the media, who has begun to question her role and offers to help Jensen. He defeats Fedorova, another Tyrant, and Eliza directs him to Isaias Sandoval, an aide to William Taggart.

In Detroit, Sarif admits that the Illuminati are behind the attacks. Jensen infiltrates a Humanity Front rally and discovers Sandoval's location. Sandoval admits his involvement in the kidnapping and gives Jensen a lead to find the researchers. In Sarif HQ, Jensen meets Hugh Darrow, who is working to stave off global warming with the Panchaea Facility in the Arctic. Jensen and other augmented people start experiencing glitches, with authorities urging them to have a biochip replacement. Pritchard locates the tracking beacon of one of the kidnapped scientists, taking Jensen back to Hengsha, where Belltower ambushes him and Malik. The beacon leads Jensen to Tong Si Hung, who has been implanted with the now-deceased scientist's arm. With Tong's help, Jensen stows away in a stasis pod, waking up in a secret Singapore base days later. He finds the scientists and learns that the biochip malfunctions were staged to distribute a new biochip to control augmented humans. Jensen and the scientists stage a distraction, allowing him to infiltrate the facility's secret bunker. Here he defeats Namir and finds Megan. Megan tells him that she was kidnapped for her research into augmentation rejection and confesses that her research was based on Jensen's DNA.

Moments later, Darrow broadcasts a modified signal that throws any augmented person with the new biochip into a murderous frenzy. Jensen evacuates the scientists and commandeers an orbital flight module to reach Panchaea. He confronts Darrow, who reveals that he wants humanity to abandon augmentation technology, believing it will destroy human identity. Jensen sets out to disable Panchaea's Hyron Project supercomputer and end the broadcast; on the way, he encounters Taggart and Sarif, who each urge him to side with them and further their agendas. At the heart of Panchaea, Jensen confronts Zhao Yun Ru, who tries to hijack the signal, and then Eliza, who offers Jensen four choices. Jensen can either broadcast the truth and distance humanity from augmentations; rig the broadcast, so it blames Humanity Front and allows the development of augmentation technology; send out a report to benefit the Illuminati; or destroy Panchea, leaving no one to "spin the story". Jensen's final narration varies depending on his choice and use of lethal force throughout the game.

In a post-credits scene, Megan meets with Bob Page to discuss her employment in "the nanite virus chimera" and "D project": prior to this, Page instructs his cohort Morgan Everett to search the Hyron Project for salvageable technology for the 'Morpheus Initiative', setting up Deus Ex.

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Some observations: I tried to be a silent pacifist but that really failed early on. I really wanted to run this on a splinter cell/metal gear "work in the shadows" kind of thing, but  the anesthesia darts didn't seem as effective as bullets. Despite the violence, I did take a lot of enemies out by doing non-lethal CQC and stashing them away. However, once the alarms hit stuff seriously hit the fan.  Early on in the game, where you have to go into the police station in Detroit, I was detected, they pulled out their firearms, and it was a terminator-style bloodbath.  Sorry! 😅 I really didn't mean for it to get that bad 😵‍💫 At least some people were knocked out and not killed. I am sure their digital selves are going to have crazy survivor guilt 😵‍💫

The game had an interesting cyberpunk-y feeling. Your character (Jensen) can augment his body using an augmentation system that allows you to carry more stuff (useful for more medicine, food, and guns), you can breathe in toxic gases and be unphased, you can jump from heights and not be injured, and so on.  You get augmentation (praxis) points to upgrade Jensen as you get more XP in the game, and as you find some random praxis points throughout the word that you can spend.  I don't think you can fully deck out Jensen in a regular game unless you spend a lot of time grinding the hacking game.

The hacking mini-game seemed cool but I feel like it was a bit of a pain on a controller. This seemed like it would be better with mouse where you can use a right-click to capture and fortify areas of a virtual network.  Many times with the controller my options would simply not stick.

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20/50 achievements

Gamerscore: 320/1250

26% of the game done

Finished on Tell Me A Story (easy)

Not sure how long it took - wish the xbox would tell me ;-) I know that by the midpoint of the game I didn't care so much about the side mission lol

Final verdict? 8/10