While at PAX Australia 2015 in Melbourne we were fortunate to get some question time with Mary DeMarle, the lead writer on Eidos Montreal’s upcoming game, Deus Ex: Mankind Divided. We discussed some of the story and new things we can look forward to early next year.

Grant: First up can you introduce yourself and explain to us what your involvement is with Deus Ex: Mankind Divided?

Mary DeMarle: I’m the Executive Narrative Director on the Deus Ex franchise. Basically that means I was the lead writer and the head of the narrative development for Deus Ex: Human Revolution. On Mankind Divided I’m doing the same thing.

Jude: Can you tell us a bit about the story in Deus Ex: Mankind Divided?

Mary DeMarle: The story takes place two years after Human Revolution ended and the world has changed in that time. (Spoiler Alert) The mechanically augmented people at the end of Human Revolution were forced into psychotic fits which led to alot of death and destruction. The world is reeling from the aftermath and have turned against the augmented. The divide has become huge and mechanically augmented people are very much feared. They are being shoved into augmented ghettos and separated from society as their rights are being stripped away.

This environment has bred a lot of chaos and with it many acts of terrorism. Adam Jensen comes back into the story having left Sarif Industries and has now joined with newly formed division of Interpol known as Task Force 29. Their job is to fight this rising tide of terrorism that is happening in the world.

Jensen is in there to stop the chaos and investigate the terrorism but he has a secret double agenda. At the end of Human Revolution he became aware that there were people operating in the shadows, manipulating society and they are the real source of a lot of the problems. Adam has decided they need to be stopped.

He has teamed up with a group of hacker activists known as the Juggernaut Collectives in order to get to the truth, find the illuminati and take the fight to them. He is working in the task force to both stop terrorism and discover the source of it all.

Grant: Can you tell us about some of the themes you are trying to explore in the game?

Mary DeMarle: The Deus Ex franchise is always looking at the idea of transhumanism, what happens when mankind has technology and biology combining and where it is going to take us. That leads to a deeper question of ‘what does it mean to be human?’ We are always looking at that kind of idea. With each story we are pegging it from a different direction. In Human Revolution it was ‘why do we do the things that we do?’ In Mankind Divided we are looking at how human beings react to these chaotic events. Are you ruled by reason or emotion?

Within the chaotic environment comes the rise of opportunists; ‘How do we take advantage of things?’ ‘Should we take advantage of things?’ It all basically comes down to, as human beings, what are we really ruled by reason, emotion or something else?

Jude: Can you tell us a bit about the choices in the game and what impact they have?

Mary DeMarle: The game has always been about choice and consequence. When we did it in Human Revolution a lot of the choices played out on a gameplay level but they didn’t really affect the story that much. This time round we really wanted to change that, we wanted to push the envelope as much as we could. Right from the get go, we asked ourselves; ‘If by presenting story choices can we change the narrative?’ ‘Can we have a different experience?’

How you deal with characters early on may shut down a path. You might be over and done with that character but depending on the choices you have made, the character might come back and have an actual effect on your critical path story later on.

Midway through the game we present you with choices that you can only do one or the other, you cannot do both. As a result, your story will change and when you get to the end of the game, there is no four button ending. How you get to that ending, what you have at your disposal and the choices you made all along are changing your experience

Side missions can also affect the story, they can be quite short if you want them to be but if you explore them you can discover a lot more. This means side missions can become a lot bigger and can come back and impact the main story.

Grant: What are some of the real world inspirations that have gone into creating the game?

Mary DeMarle: That is a hard question to answer as there is a lot, but we definitely try to hold up a mirror to the world with it and see where we go. With this one you could say that since we are dealing a lot with terrorism we are looking at things like the military-industrial complex, militarization of police and how people that are there to protect and serve, but they are so separate from us, they are not [serving and protecting].

We can look at things that are happening in the US, with Ferguson and all that, with a lot of the rioting against police. You can even look at things like the war in Syria and the refugees. There is a lot of different little things as we are building the story that we can touch upon. I wouldn’t say there is any one big thing for inspiration.

Grant: What are some of the big improvements gamers can expect to see in Deus Ex: Mankind Divided?

Mary DeMarle: We have put a lot of effort into making the combat a lot more visceral and fun to play. We have also introduced quite a few new augmentations that enable you to really feel powerful weather you are playing stealth or combat.

For instance we have new things such as the Titan Shield which is an augmentation that creates this dark black triangular body armour around Jensen that absorbs a lot of heavy damage so he can be a bit of a human tank. There is also a gun arm augmentation where one of his arms is serves a lot more as gun. One example would be the Nano blade he has always had which now can be shot like a crossbow. You can also charge it before you shoot to cause an explosion.

We are also trying to have a better balance with non-lethal augmentation, for instance the Typhoon is still there, it turns Jensen into a human grenade but there is another Typhoon version that is now non-lethal, so players can access a really cool but non-lethal augmentation and not kill people. The P.E.P.S. gun arm is another non-lethal one where you can hit people with a concussive blast.

We have also fine-tuned the gameplay a bit, for instance the take-downs are back, both lethal and non-lethal. These can now be performed from cover and won’t break your cover whereas in Human Revolution these would take you out of cover which made playing stealth very difficult.

So there are lot of improvements as mentioned a lot more that I’m not going to mention.

Jude: Finally, can you summarize Deus Ex: Mankind Divided in couple of sentences?

Mary DeMarle: It’s a near future story that is set in dystopic cyberpunk world and an action RPG that is based on five pillars of gameplay: combat, stealth, hacking, social and exploration. It really is our attempt to build a universe you can really lose yourself in. Everything in the universe is cohesive if we have done the job right.

Eidos’ Deus Ex: Mankind Divided is due for release on the 23rd of August 2016 for PlayStation 4 and Xbox One.

The post Deus Ex: Mankind Divided Developer Interview appeared first on Shane the Gamer.

I started my last day at E3 2015 with a remake that I have wanted for a very long time, Ratchet and Clank.

While I was aware that this was more of a reboot of the original, I still wasn’t sure how much they might change things up. Picking up game and having a play though really gave me better idea of what Insomniac are trying to do with this remake.

The game while having a familiar feel felt new and even reinvented with new weapons and some classic old ones. Newer game mechanics like strafe was available and the environments were all new while still capturing the essence of the old. The game was still recognisably the original Ratchet and Clank game but with a new feel and direction.

I was told they have remade everything from character models to cut scenes and they have modified this reboot to closer tie in with the up-coming Ratchet and Clank Movie due for release next year.

Suffice to say I was impressed with what was shown and I can’t wait to get my hands on the game when in releases on PS4 next year.

Running down to the Xbox booth I soon found myself having a personal non-playable demo of Crystal Dynamics’ Rise of the Tomb Raider. While the initial footage looked more like a few well shown set pieces, this showed greater gameplay and some of the mechanics.

Off the bat it looks amazing. I thoroughly enjoyed the first and this seems to capture the same magic the first one had me feeling. I will definitely be going through the demo in a bit more depth very soon.

I didn’t mean to play Assassin’s Creed: Syndicate but it was kind of there and so I figured what the hell.

It does look better than Assassin’s Creed: Unity but even in the short gameplay I had there were some issues. Maybe it’s just me but I managed to find a few bugs/break the scene on show. Climbing and traversing the city of London and especially assassinating felt more natural and fluent but this didn’t last too long as when parkouring around the place I soon found myself getting frustrated with some aspects.

There was a scene where I was supposed to jump on a horse and carriage and chase down a certain enemy. First time round I managed to get pulled off the cart by local law enforcement and was unable to finish as I was stuck in combat with a rather large unhappy lot of policemen. My second attempt had me accidently running ahead of the pursued enemy jumping on her cart before she got to it, only realising after, and then being unable to actually attack her while policemen attacked both me and her.

My last attempt had me making it closer to the destination but still getting pulled off, I was told just to run the last 100m, which I did and finally made it to the ending scene of the demo.

It may just be I have the unfortunate skill of accidently breaking these kind of things as I also managed to find all the bugs and issues in Assassin’s Creed: Unity when I played that one too. I do however actually have higher hopes for Assassin’s Creed: Syndicate and I hope they will have all the bugs and glitches ironed out come release day.

Uncharted 4 being one of the biggest Sony titles on show I managed to get a more personal run through of the gameplay demo. The game once again looks great with detailed textures and environments. The demo I sat through didn’t go too much further than what was in the Sony conference but it was very action packed with poor Nathan Drake copping all manner of brutality.

Can’t say personally I’m looking forward to this title but it does look good and may even get me back into the series since I haven’t touched once since the first game.

ID@Xbox had me sit down with the creator and developer of Beyond Eyes, Sherida Halatoe.

The game is based on a young girl, Rae, who lost her sight in an accident and has been afraid of the world ever since but one day Rae loses her best friend, a little cat called Nani. With this she takes courage to explore the world in order to find Nani. The game’s art style is that of a watercolour painting and is very beautiful with the soft water colour pallet setting off the environment perfectly.

Rae slowly visualises the world around her based on both her sense and memories of what things making a particular sound looks like. She might imagine a fountain on hearing running water but on closer inspection it is in fact a pipe drain. It is entirely up to if you wish to clarify all the objects in your surroundings.

This game looked beautiful and eloquent and had a sweet story to it as well. I really don’t think I’d mind forking out the few to finish this game to find out if Rae is finally reunited with her kitty.

Deus Ex: Mankind Divided was the last thing I got to see at E3 and while not a big fan of the series it did have fun and interesting gameplay to show. This instalment is set two years after Deus Ex: Human Revolution and during that time augmented (half human half robotic) have become feared and reviled.

The hero Adam Jenson is part of antiterrorist task force. Playing as him you apparently uncover all level of conspiracy. Doing so you have a decent arsenal of weapons and abilities to take on the enemy of numerous ways. The Levels are apparently large and allow numerous ways to traverse them along with many options in taking down the enemy from your super stealth to the gung hoe approach each allowing different use of the arsenal on hand.

I admit it did look interesting and the amount of unique abilities and items seemed to allow for a more unique experience from the FPS genre. This was just a showcase but I hope the whole game manages to stick to the ideals of the demo.

And finally, on my last day at E3 2015 I also managed to get very brief glimpse of Vicarious Visions Skylanders: SuperChargers.

This game is based on a growing collection of toys and using these toys and a portal of sorts, the toys come to life within the game. Each toy has is an individual character and element to the game. Things like gold and upgrades are saved to it.

This new chapter encompassed a somewhat new idea to the series. Vehicles play a much bigger role.

There is sky, land and sea vehicles all of which come as actual toys. These along with the character(s) need to be placed on the portal. Skylanders: SuperChargers plays similar to that of its predecessors and like them, all previous toys will be usable in the new game. While my time with the game was brief, I certainly have enjoyed previous instalments and am pretty sure I would enjoy this one just as much.

I have to say E3 this year was truly one for the record books. There was an astounding amount of great games and announcements with me not knowing which way to go as I simply wanted to play everything. I will say my highlight was definitely the personal experience with the HoloLens. It was truly spectacular.

From a game perspective it really is hard to pick a favourite. Being a huge Ratchet and Clank fan I can say I was quite impressed with what they had to show for the reboot so far but there was just so much I was genuinely impressed with.

Rise of the Tomb Raider and Horizon were two stand outs for me. They both looked amazing and like a lot of fun to play.

I hope you managed to get some insight into what the world of gaming has to offer us in the year to come and keep reading for a few more in-depth reviews of some of the games mentioned in my day one reviews.

The post E3 Day Three In Review appeared first on Shane the Gamer.

It will be releasing for the PlayStation 4, Xbox One and Windows PC.

“For 15 years, Deus Ex has been a point of conversation across the games industry and beyond, whether the topic is the franchise’s unique gameplay or topical narrative focused on advanced biotechnology and human augmentation,” said David Anfossi, Head of Studio, Eidos-Montréal. “What began with Deus Ex: Human Revolution goes to a whole new level in Deus Ex: Mankind Divided, diving even deeper into this discussion and, in turn, offering fans an all-encompassing experience, one which will challenge their skills as players and emphasize decision-making based on real world topics.”

Deus Ex: Mankind Divided takes place in 2029, two years after the events of Human Revolution and the infamous ‘Aug Incident’ in Panchaea that resulted in the death of millions at the hands of those who had installed augmentations.

This event has created a huge divide between those who have augmentations, and those who do not. Amongst this emotional turmoil are various factions looking to manipulate the public by twisting public opinion of augmentation to further their own agenda and hide the truth of what really happened.

As the social and political chaos reaches boiling point, super-augmented anti-terrorist agent Adam Jensen re-enters the fray.

Empowered by brand new augmentations that bolster his formidable, strategic arsenal, Jensen will visit multiple new locations to uncover the truths that are hidden by a cloak of new conspiracies.

With more choice at the player’s disposal than ever before, Deus Ex: Mankind Divided is the ultimate DEUS EXexperience.

The post Deus Ex: Mankind Divided Trailer – News appeared first on Shane the Gamer.