Deus Ex vs. Half-Life

Message

kosamae · Post by **kosamae** » Sun Aug 17, 2003 3:55 am

So, I've been playing through Deus Ex, for the first time (well, the third time, the first time I made it past Hong Kong), and I started thinking, with all the sequels coming out this year. What do you all think is a better game, Deus Ex or Half-Life (I'm talking about the originals)?

I personally have to go with Deus Ex, it just has so much more gameplay, more interesting stuff to do, you know? I stopped playing Half-Life, because I felt like it was just getting old, and that boss fight with the giant green things coming out of the ground really pissed me off. I felt like Half-Life was only considered so great because it was a first- it was the first game to be a decent shooter, and a have a high quality story. I just didn't like the shooter.

As for sequels, I think Half-Life 2 is going to be a Daikatana. Massive hype and high expectations which won't be lived up to. Deus Ex 2 on the other hand, is starting to make me want to wet my pants with excitement. I'm so glad I bought an X-Box

. Flame away, I've got my enviromental augmentation maxed out...

lghman · Post by **lghman** » Sun Aug 17, 2003 4:18 am

Got to say, Dues Ex is a great game. Thats funny , my friend and I were just talking about that game earlier tonight.

--sonik

cylgalad · Post by **cylgalad** » Sun Aug 17, 2003 8:59 am

I don't like Deus Ex at all, ugly. HL is a bit old but was quite ok, I prefer games like Serious Sam 2. But I'm waiting for HL2 & Doom3 like everybody.
You should add a 3rd option "none of them"

Malek · Post by **Malek** » Sun Aug 17, 2003 10:05 am

Half Life, no doubt. You only scratched the surface of it as I noticed you mention absolutely no modifications.

The mod community surrounding Half Life is one of the best out there. If you're tired of half life, go download a modification...

I reccomend the following:

www.counter-strike.net - Counter Strike, everyone has heard of it by now.
www.dayofdefeatmod.com - Day of Defeat (maybe the wrong URL) a WW2 game, usually Team DM, or Capture / Hold the Point.
www.natural-selection.org - This may or may not work with linux but this is a good mod. It has serious strategic elements and a good learning curve and is very team oriented.
www.specialistsmod.net - Think Max Payne multiplayer with more action and jumping around / effects. An excellent action oriented Modification (mostly death match). Better then "The Opera" or "Action Half Life"
www.svencoop.com - I work for this modification a bit in my spare time as a moderator of their forums. Tired of playing HL alone? Play Cooperatively. SvenCoop version 3.0 due out soon... very soon.

It wasn't Half Life that made the game, it was the community.

Xiol · Post by **Xiol** » Sun Aug 17, 2003 11:40 am

I really, really liked Deus Ex, but Half Life did have some really good points. (Not to mention the mods).

I'm not gonna vote, because they're both good games in there own rights.

Also, I doubt Half-Life 2 will be the next Daikatana, if it is the people at Valve will be getting a personal visit from me and my shotgun... I'll show them how games influence violence.

I'm more worried about Deus Ex 2. Some of the stuff I've been hearing about it doesn't sound to good. They've removed the experience point system and just gone with biomods to make the game more 'accessable' to a wider audience. (Read: We Want Money.)

So, we'll just have to wait and see.

jufoa · Post by **jufoa** » Sun Aug 17, 2003 12:26 pm

if we are talking pure half-life without mods and deus ex. i would have to say that deus ex is a lot better. but half-life with counter-strike mod rulez.

i have heard that deus ex 2 is coming out this or next year. cant wait =)

Malek · Post by **Malek** » Sun Aug 17, 2003 12:36 pm

jufoa wrote:if we are talking pure half-life without mods and deus ex. i would have to say that deus ex is a lot better. but half-life with counter-strike mod rulez.

i have heard that deus ex 2 is coming out this or next year. cant wait =)

I agree 100% with this statement...

R0B_IX · Post by **R0B_IX** » Sun Aug 17, 2003 8:20 pm

The way I read the question was that the the vote was strictly about the game, not the engine, and for that reason, I voted for Deus Ex. I mean, WOW, that was a great game. However, if you want to throw in the flexibility of the engine w/ the mods out there, then for me it would be a toss up. I never played counter strike that much, and personly prefer a good game of worms 2 or jk2 (the 2 means better

), but from a programmers stand point, you have to love all of the extra attention that went in to making the game extreamly customizable with mods, and extreamly easy to mod in the first place (not saying it's easy to make a killer mod, but that the people making the mods didn't have to hack the engine a lot)

Lovechild · Post by **Lovechild** » Sun Aug 17, 2003 8:31 pm

I own both games and I must say I enjoyed playing Half Life the most - I never completed Deus Ex though, but it was a damn nice game.

Both games are exellent, and I was sad to see the Deus Ex port to Linux die before shipping - I would have loved to play it on Linux.

I'm looking forward to both sequels, I think both should be good fun.

I would still take Ground Control over both those games anyday though.

DuF · Post by **DuF** » Sun Aug 17, 2003 9:32 pm

If they was natively support under linux maybe I choose of of them, but it's not the case, so I choose any of them !

kosamae · Post by **kosamae** » Sun Aug 17, 2003 11:42 pm

I was referring to the original single player game, and not mods or anything like that. I would say, that Half-Life would have an unfair advantage from the modding standpoint, because it was based on a massively modified Quake 2 engine (I've heard original Quake engine in a forum somewhere, but I had read it was Quake 2 engine somewhere, so correct me if I'm wrong), whereas Deus Ex was based on a not so heavily modified Unreal Tournament engine. So most modders would head to UT for modding, because they're getting almost as much out of the engine, whereas the Half-Life engine was so altered, it was more apt to be modded, but I would have to agree, that if you're talking about online play and mods, Half-Life wins hands down. I've got dialup at home though, so I'm not playing very much online...

And about Deus Ex 2 scrapping the experience points, I think that's good. It's fustrating to me to be so skilled with mouse aiming from playing so many mainstream shooters, but be unable to hit the broodside of a barn when my crosshair was so clearly aiming at it, in Deus Ex. Of course, I DID like the experience for hacking and electronics and that kind of stuff, but I can live without it.

Moled · Post by **Moled** » Mon Aug 18, 2003 12:04 am

deux x was FAR more fun to play thru

no contest

seaweed · Post by **seaweed** » Mon Aug 18, 2003 12:12 am

I would have to say Half-Life is the best single player game I have played. I don't really like the tomb raider like jumping parts. But the way the story unfolds and the story itself.

Anyhow +1 for HL

t1deman · Post by **t1deman** » Mon Aug 18, 2003 7:31 am

There is now doubt that deus-ex is one of the most solid games I have ever played

charlieg · Post by **charlieg** » Mon Aug 18, 2003 9:58 am

A bit of an unfair comparison since HL was out much earlier than Deus Ex, iirc.

Lovechild · Post by **Lovechild** » Mon Aug 18, 2003 1:49 pm

Why don't they make first person shooters with as strong a storyline as Half Life and Deus Ex anymore - I think it's sad that the FPS genre has evoled into a situation where it's basically pretty graphics that push your machine to it's limits - and the storyline is sorta strapped on where it can be fitted in.

fx. I enjoyed playing Return to Castle Wolfenstein as a gamer by I found the storyline to completely suck - I would MUCH rather play a good game than a pretty game - I'm starting to feel like an outsider on that one sadly.

I value innovation. gameplay and story much more than just graphics that make me drool, maybe it's because I gave up on the whole graphic race long ago - I buy cheap good technology, like my graphics card is a GeForce4 TI-4280 - nothing special but it's a good card, so I might not be able to play the latest games on my box - but I'm still entertained.

Am I just getting old?

dermot · Post by **dermot** » Mon Aug 18, 2003 2:27 pm

The FPS genre hasn't evolved or devolved to that state - it was always there. Games like DeusEx and HalfLife have long been exceptions rather than the rule. Although with that said, it's worth pointing out that HalfLife's story isn't that much deeper than Doom's. It was the way that the events in the game were presented that marked it out as an innovator.

Comparing DeusEx and HalfLife is almost exactly like comparing apples and oranges. Despite sharing a perspective, both games offered starkly different gameplay; DeusEx oozed with strategy and self-conciously deep concepts. Half Life was, in many respects, a straight-forward shooter.

And if you still insist on comparing them on an engine level, it's worth pointing out the DeusEx used the Unreal Tournament and was therefore as extendable as UT. The lack of mods for DeusEx can be put down to two things: poor sales generally and the fact that most modders probably just modded for Unreal Tournament instead of DeusEx.

kosamae · Post by **kosamae** » Mon Aug 18, 2003 2:55 pm

dermot wrote:Comparing DeusEx and HalfLife is almost exactly like comparing apples and oranges. Despite sharing a perspective, both games offered starkly different gameplay; DeusEx oozed with strategy and self-conciously deep concepts. Half Life was, in many respects, a straight-forward shooter.

Okay, maybe the poll question should have said, "Which game did you find to be more enjoyable?"

dermot wrote:And if you still insist on comparing them on an engine level, it's worth pointing out the DeusEx used the Unreal Tournament and was therefore as extendable as UT. The lack of mods for DeusEx can be put down to two things: poor sales generally and the fact that most modders probably just modded for Unreal Tournament instead of DeusEx.

Point already made...

kosamae wrote:I would say, that Half-Life would have an unfair advantage from the modding standpoint ...Deus Ex was based on a not so heavily modified Unreal Tournament engine. So most modders would head to UT for modding...

DefconAlpha · Post by **DefconAlpha** » Mon Aug 18, 2003 5:48 pm

Deus Ex?

LOL

Just look at the avatar. And i'll prove anyone else different with my AK. :)

Lovechild · Post by **Lovechild** » Mon Aug 18, 2003 8:12 pm

I found unreal to have both good graphics and a strong storyline - I really enjoyed it, no game had as strong a storyline as Deus Ex though.

I really think people prefer HL over DX because DX was a bit hard to master where as most people could learn to play HL well in a short time.

dermot · Post by **dermot** » Tue Aug 19, 2003 1:03 pm

kosamae:

ah. i didn't notice that earlier. well, in that case i've just backed up what you said. or maybe i read it, forgot, and then thought that i thought of it? who knows?

Celtis · Post by **Celtis** » Tue Aug 19, 2003 1:13 pm

kosamae wrote: As for sequels, I think Half-Life 2 is going to be a Daikatana. Massive hype and high expectations which won't be lived up to.

Have you seen the videos? The object based world (which means that you can interact with everything!) looks fantastic, and don't get me started on the lifting gun....

MorphiusFaydal · Post by **MorphiusFaydal** » Thu Aug 21, 2003 12:08 am

Deus Ex, All the way.

I love both series, adn the Unreal series, and have all the games and expansions for both.. (OK, so I have the mod version of CS)..

But, I love Deus Ex far more than Half-Life...

It's just the way it immerses you in the story, you have a choise of how to do it.. you don't just have to go in a certain direction, kill the alien, and hit the button, you have half-a-dozen different ways of getting in, killing the guard, and pressing various buttons.

HL2 is gonna be sweet, yeah, but I personally believe that DX2 will rock the gaming world...

oh yeah..

chris

SQLBoy · Post by **SQLBoy** » Thu Aug 21, 2003 2:39 am

I really liked the stealth aspect of Deus Ex, where like your crawling through drainage pipes and stuff and using the silenced sniper rifle. The single player was very deep compared to HL but HL had had a better AI I think and some revolutionary gameplay. I think both of them are top notch games. I've just started playing Deus Ex via WineX in preparation of Deus Ex2. Might have to reboot to my Xbox partition for Deus Ex 2 though.

ieatchicken · Post by **ieatchicken** » Thu Aug 21, 2003 3:12 pm

My vote went for Deus Ex. An amazing degree of flexibility, a great plot, and interesting settings all combined to make this an unbeatable game.

I'm thinking of running bach through the game and killing as few people as possible. I read an interview with warren spector where he said there were about three people that absolutely had to be kill to beat the game.

I loved Half-Life. The initial presentations and scripted sequences were amazing. It gave you a well defined almost cinematic feel. Although, by the time I got to the alien levels, I was getting annoyed and forcing myself to beat it. They definitely let me down with that ending.

SQLBoy wrote:Might have to reboot to my Xbox partition for Deus Ex 2 though.

Haha, good one.

DefconAlpha wrote:Just look at the avatar. And i'll prove anyone else different with my AK.

Well this poll is about Half-Life, not Counter-Strike. =] A multiplayer team deathmatch game and an immersive single player game aren't meant to be compared. (Although I'll say Deus Ex is better ;P)

Deus Ex vs. Half-Life

Which is a better game, Deus Ex or Half-Life?

Deus Ex vs. Half-Life

Half-Life

What??

Re: Deus Ex vs. Half-Life