Deus EX Mankind Divided is set two years after the ending of Human Revolution. Adam Jensen is the the protagonist and he now joins Interpol to hunt down Augmented Terrorist who have spread fear in Normal Humans who now hate “Augs” . This has divided mankind into two fraternity, “Normals” and “Augs”.
Huge Darrow, the main villain of Human Revolution caused “The Incident” at the end of Human Revolution which resulted in uncontrolled killing spree by Humans enhanced with cyborg augmentation. There was massive loss of life before Adam Jensen could stop “The Incident”. After ” The Incident” humanity is divided over augmentation issue, which has resulted in augmented human being segregated and heavily policed. Adam Jensen’s old boss is out of business and so he works for Task Force 29, an anti terrorist organisation. Adam is more interested in finding the people who are part of Illuminati. Illuminati were the driving force behind “The Incident”.
The opening mission in Mankind Divided acts more like a tutorial. The mission is very tame compared to smash-bang opening to Human Revolution.Most of the cast and characters of Mankind Divided are not that interesting especially compared to the memorable cast of Human Revolution. There are some interesting side stories but they don’t last very long as they are not connected to any significant character. The ending is not satisfactory and points towards a sequel(Mankind Divided is second game of the trilogy with Human Revolution being the first).
The Gameplay of Mankind Divided and Human Revolution is very similar and that is not a bad thing. Gameplay mechanics are exactly the same with different controls. Various control schemes are available which are controller friendly including a variation of Human Revolution control Scheme. Button Combos make access to weapons and inventory easier. UI is very controller friendly and you can always access everything with couple of button presses. The Game systems have also been simplified, there are fewer weapons but they are more customisable. The powers which previously were considered as weapons are now treated as augs.
The level design is a big improvement compared to Human Revolution. There are multiple paths to accomplish a single objective. Stealth or offense, both work for a single mission, you can even use combination of both. Hacking is there but has been nerfed significantly, you even get XP for using codes.
The number of paths available to reach a certain area significant, finding the best one can make whole mission easier. One of the early mission has a hidden gas-filled tunnel using which you can skip most of the area. Accessing a vent in another mission gives similar result. Mankind Divided is not a difficult stealth game, certain missions are quite easy and you can skip most of the area using alternate path. If you want to challenge yourself in the game, you can start playing on a higher difficulty, avoid certain paths and not use certain augmentation. Cloak augmentation can be maxxed out fairly quickly and most boss battles can be ended just by defeating the boss.
There is lot of freedom in Mankind Divided as compared to Human Revolution and that is the breaking point of the game. If you enjoy freedom in game then you will like Mankind divided but that freedom makes the whole game very easy. Even Adam Jensen starts at a higher level as compared to Adam Jensen from Human Revolution , so even if you want to go full Rambo, that is also possible.
Mankind Divided does feel a game which has been rushed to release. Main hub Prague is fun to explore and the early missions develop somewhat but soon fall flat. As you progress through the game, missions start getting simpler and easier, Prague starts getting less crowded and hence less interesting.
The Breach is the content padding the game very much needed.In breach you guide Adam Jensen through various obstacles and foes. Different system of level ups and game mechanics are used for The Breach. The Breach offers more challenging gameplay than the main story line as the resources are limited and you need to score high to climb up in the leader-board. But achieving anything in The Breach has zero impact on rest of the game, which is an opportunity lost but it is still fun to play.
Mankind Divided is like smoother and more polished version of Human Revolution. Gamers hoping for an engrossing plot might be disappointed but exploring new areas and finding new paths sure is fun.
Graphically Mankind Divided is top notch , everything has received so much attention to detail with great environmental touches which make the game fun to explore. The voice acting is all over the place though. Voice acting ranges from good, bad and downright awful in some cases but Adam still retains his trademark voice with some brilliant dialogues.
