Deus Ex Go (iOS) Review

As many know already, the dystopian, technology-driven world of Deus Ex is rife with non-governmental paramilitary companies and secretive espionage. The adventures have always been swerving plots of betrayal and twists. This portable vision ditches much of the meat on the bones, positioning itself squarely as an attempted addictive 'free time' prison.

The limited plot does involve series protagonist Adam Jenson and is set before the events of Deus Ex: Mankind Divided; however, it is scaled back to a forgettable text-based narrative, following a conspiracy by the military research company Ironflank. In truth, although it is positive that there is something for fans to latch on to, for most users it stands as a forgettable distraction—one indeed that is not much more original than arcs from the previous titles in the series.

The majority of focus stands on the puzzle gameplay. Any observer of the previous titles using the Go moniker will understand the gameplay straightaway. Utilising a turn-based system, Jensen has to make his way through one of the 50 core stages, along the way avoiding or eliminating the various enemies set out on the grid.

It has to be said, many of the levels are quite challenging. The first few stages ease the player in, but before long, a lot of elements are introduced, such as additional hacking abilities or the differing enemy types or enemy placements such as turrets or mechanised bots.

With puzzle games like this, the payoff is always the sense of satisfaction of having mastered a particularly hard stage. This satisfaction is definitely apparent here, because having finally figured out a complicated 'chess-like' solution nearly always results in a real pleasing smugness at having bested the developers.

It is a pity that this smugness can be bought through solution packs. It boggles the mind that anyone would be willing to pay a monetary value to ruin the entire point of the exercise in playing. The addition of micro transactions is not a problem on its own, as most mobile titles have them. The real problem is that they are so blatantly illogical to the purpose of playing.

One additional criticism of the main gameplay would be that a few more initial tutorial sections would be helpful, especially when it comes to some of the hacking abilities, which are foisted on Jensen without an explanation of their full potential or use.

Where Deus Ex Go falls down particularly badly compared to even the past Go titles is in having a very bland and minimalist visual presentation. Of course, as discussed, this is a portable title, so it is never going to inspire the imagination. However, stages, even despite different locales, tend to all merge into one big grey field. The fact that there is so little sound beyond footsteps and occasional electronic effects does nothing to make it more engaging.

The stages are designed to be bite-sized, and so it is no surprise that for most people the entire adventure can be polished off in about three to four hours. However, Square Enix does get some props for doing the sensible thing and including a puzzle creator, as well as free additional stages released on a regular basis. It keeps the user playing, which is the main goal.