Deus Ex: Game of the Year Edition

One of the best games of all time (obviously), works fantastic on the steam deck. The Lay D Denton project is an amazing fan mod that completely changes the main game too!

accidentally walked into the women's bathroom and got chastised for it 10/10 am embarassed

Deus Ex was a game far ahead of its time upon release. Fully voiced cast of characters, multiple avenues to complete objectives, and they created a world where there is value in exploration. Whether it be obtaining useful weapons and powerups or maybe your exploration leads you to a datapad with a door/safe code for some sweet loot. The game can be played multiple times, each time you find something new or do something different which triggers a new element within the story or gameplay that may even alter the ending of the game.
No fluff, no bs, this game ticks all the boxes on what makes a good RPG. Graphics are outdated but that doesnt take away from the games excellent story and engaging gameplay.
10/10 first installment, and by far my favorite amongst the series.

Speak about "not aging well".
A great game in its' time but, feels more like a walking simulator nowadays.

Bought the game after watching the hbomb video on Human Revolution. I'm not an fps person at all but this game is still incredibly fun. It's a great combo of action and strategy. It's a bit overwhelming to get used to the controls but once you get it down, it's amazing.

My only gripe is that I wish I didn't have to download a separate mod to make the game playable. Without Kentie's mod, the game is unbelievably dark and near impossible to play. However, that's a small bump to an otherwise incredibly enjoyable and immersive game.

I've been playing this since it came out in 2000. I know it says I only played 13 minutes here on Steam, but I usually play it straight vanilla from my original GOTY CD-ROM that I bought new at release, so the play time on here really doesn't do it justice. Its one of the few games that just simply never gets old. You tend to get bored by a lot of modern titles these days. You know, play it once or twice, then never play it again. Deus Ex is not one of those. It's got the modding factor, the development kit where you can create your own games for it, new skins, weapons, levels, convos, ect. I've even been active in the modding community for it as well. I was lead tester and a voice actor for 7 characters for Terminus Machina from Silver Spook Games which is one of the full conversions for this game, as well as one of the beta testers for Bjork who developed Deus Ex: Revision back in 2013. So its given me opportunities in that regard also. Its got the nostalgia factor as well. You can play it over and over again and it just brings a smile to your face. You can constantly upscale and redo the graphics, port them to newer versions of Unreal. It even runs flawlessly on Linux like I mainly use now. Or you can run it on OG Windows 98 like I also do, or any other version of Windows and it never gives any errors. Its absolutely Timeless...

A classic you can't go wrong with. Still an amazing game.
Great to see, that this is easy playable with steam.

"The year is 2052 and the world is a dangerous and chaotic place. Terrorists operate openly - killing thousands; drugs, disease and pollution kill even more. The world's economies are close to collapse and the gap between the insanely wealthy and the desperately poor grows ever wider."

We are well on track then.

Very dated, but also very innovative and VERY cheap on sale. Story is prescient but also poorly written, it's fun though in a campy way. If the world seems interesting to you and you can tolerate old PC FPS games and RPGs, would recommend

The game tricks you into making you think that it's actually a working non buggy and functional game, but to experience that you actually need to figure out how the hell the Controlls work. What 99% of buttons even do or mean and how the hell to remap every single one of the buttons on your Keyboard to then test em out over hours to try to getting the game even remotely to work. It's a timeless masterpiece.

Unbelievable good .. especially for a game that was released 25 years ago ...

I'm thoroughly enjoying my play-through of this game. It's my first time playing any Deus Ex game, after being recommended it by my brother. It has such a nice charm to it, and a fun story. Plenty of great dialogue and Easter eggs. For a 25 year old game, it has held up very well. I recommend downloading the community mod that allows you to play with a modern resolution. My only knock would be that every environment is incredibly dark (even with max brightness), which can be hard for my eyes.

I got the game on spring sale for 89 cents, and it was worth every penny. At that price, you don't have much to lose trying it out. Would recommend to anyone looking for a retro, fun, story-driven experience.

You've got ten seconds to download it before I add you to the list of NSF casualties

Absolutely phenomenal game!

Other than an OK gun combat I have little to no complaints. The handcrafted levels are definitely the best part about the game, there is so much to explore, loot, interact with and discover. The variety of ways you can deal with the mission objectives combined with level design and exploration really feels like you are forging your own path.

The melee, non lethal and explosives combat is really good and fun to play with. I didn't bother with guns most of the time because melee always get the job done easily and only later in the game when you have put points and gotten the upgrades are the guns kinda good.

The story itself is nothing groundbreaking but the way it's presented through good voice acting, dialogues, atmosphere, sound design, world building, art style and the genuine sense of adventure and mystery makes it really captivating and fun experience.

Overall really impressed by this game. The game respects and rewards the time and attention that you give. Its not perfect and some aspects are definitely dated (like the enemy ai, gun combat and stereotypical voice acting for non american characters lmao) but its still a remarkable game overall even today (coming from a new player). The game can feel sprawling and intimidating at times but its that much more fun when you finally explore and conquer the level.

9.0/10
best level: Hong Kong

absolutely peak for it's time. the gameplay is definitely dated and it's very easy to get lost and confused, but it makes up for it with the amazing story and atmosphere. the voice acting is really good too, but some of the accents are borderline racist, generally just a problem with side NPC's though, everyone else is great, especially my boy JC. i personally never used a guide and was able to finish it with minimal issues and had most of my tools/ammo capped out (i mainly used the energy sword, one tapped gunther lmao)

btw, get the GEP gun at the start of the game, trust me, it's too good

Easily one of, if not, the best immersive sim I've ever played.
100% worth the effort to get it running.

By the way, Denton, stay out of the ladies restroom. That kind of activity embarasses the Agency more than it does you.

You can get yelled at for going in the ladies' room this is the best game ever

I can see why this is considered a gaming classic. A bit arcane at times (had to download the game to a flash drive to make saves) but worth pushing through to play.

Relavent topics and gameplay that has aged well.

I'm a guy who was born after 2000, so this game is older than I am, I've been going out of my way to play older games, partly out of curiosity and partly out of respect for the art. Deus Ex so far has been one of the easiest to acclimate too.

So for starters, the Gameplay and Graphics are older, (though for a quarter century old game actually still very good) but the level design itself is incredible, The maps were large and interesting but well designed enough that I rarely got lost. The combat was something that didn't quite gel with me, but I think that's on me not the game. I played on medium and it wasn't particularly hard, but both you and the enemies were just a few shots away from death until late game when you get upgraded Augs. This made me feel like a badass spy who cleared a room with one magazine of my pistol, or a jackass who was mowed down while trying to reload a gun I wasn't trained in behind cover. I think the only part of combat I actually disliked was how every boss in the game was laid out in just a few seconds (Shout out Gunther who I killed in two hits with a nanomachine lightsaber without him hitting me once.) Also movement was a bit of a pain but thats just Unreal 1 for you.


The characters were interesting even if the voice acting was inadvertently actually fucking hillarious, and the plot was super interesting to see as we are now almost closer to the in game date than the it's release. The Cyberpunk worries of the late 90's are a lot different than ours, the idea of the UN being a world controlling super power is absurd today but a real conspiracy back then. The Soundtrack is phenomenal, each city you go to, each sewer you crawl through having a rich distinct atmosphere that captures the genre near perfectly.

Game also ran exceptionally well with little problems with crashes, glitches, and issues with tabbing in and out. (I'm running Windows 10 so no promises for anything more advanced.)

I recommend it. As if you are someone reading this review their is a good chance you are around my age and are curious about one of the most famous games of all time. The jank was easy to push past and the story was interesting and fun, and i'll probably play the game again in 3-4 years.

Tldr?
Final rating is a 7.5/10. Gameplay holds up fairly well, gunplay being the only true detractor. While the story does most of the heavy lifting, following JC's never ending night is well worth doing if you have interest in the classic.

P.s pro tip lock picks are for chumps, take the GEP gun from Paul.

Took me a couple tries to get in to, but I strongly recommend giving it a try, it lives up to the hype

I played Deus Ex for the first time in 2025. No nostalgia googles, no fond childhood memories, and I had to install 3rd party software (Kentie's Mod ftw) just so I could see without using my robot eye-ball flashlights and draining my robo-juice. And yet. This is the first game where I finished the game and started a new game right after.

Goddamn this is a good game.

Play with kentie's launcher along with an updated renderer of your choice. The only 2 things you need for a modern vanilla experience. Try not to limit fps through the launcher, either use nvidia control panel or download RTSS (I guess this counts as 3 things) like I did and limit FPS at 120-200 depending on the refresh rate of your monitor.


One of the best games of all time, full stop. Its 1 dollar please buy it.

Classic story-based RPG. Better depth than the modern Deus Ex games.

Thanks, but no, First of all, I ended up installing a separate mod - kenties mod, so the game could work in full screen 2K mod. Thats fine. But the game itself is poorly preserved till nowadays; most of the time it was "where the hell should I go".
Map is A PICTURE FROM SATELLITE (seriously?). Alright, I took my chances and decided to go through it completely. HOWEVER, got stuck in Hong Kong pretty badly with Versalife, Dragon Tooth and overall instructions via goals that are vague as well. Console commands (thanks to GOD mode and LEGEND commands) made no interest for me to continue on with this game.

Those types of games are definitely a historical piece of exploration; back in 2000 I completely realized why it was so successful, but they require REMAKE. But please, do not waste your time on this and just move on.

Still feels very, very good to play. Fantastic level design, intricate and plausible levels, not just a random geometry. Game makes you use all of your tools and augmentations until the very end, which is great. Resources are pretty scarce so you always have to choose what to use and what to keep. Great soundtrack, good story. Overall, it is a game that just compels you to play, Warren Spector and Co knew their stuff very well, it is a classic for a reason.

Like I always do for these sorts of games, my first playthrough is 'non-lethal stealth'... and I had A LOT of fun doing it.

Of course, at the end it got a little tedious avoiding a certain endgame enemy, but I succeeded.

My next playthrough won't make Paul happy, but it promises to be just as fun.

Defintely recommend for FPS fans. Game has nice large maps to explore and I enjoy playing it.

Some games were a smash hit at the time of release, but are very clunky and thus not very playable today. Some games age well and become timeless classic. But this game is very clunky and yet it STILL manages to be one of the best games to date just because of how incredibly good it is.

There is so much stuff to do that you could make an updated graphics version and pass it as a next-gen title in 2025.

Deus Ex HR and MD were essentially dialed-down versions of this game's ideas and they still stand out among their contemporaries.

Such a great game. I would they would remaster it for today's gamer.

its like magic every thing is doable in this game i like it when i freestyle my action to reach my goals

It is a very good game, but oh my lord, the amount of issues and bugs are crazy

2025; the game is meaningful, since we live in a modern society living under rule of deceitful powers that ought not be. For a game made in 2000 it sure predicts alot of whats going on 25 years later.
One of the greatest ever made.

A very fun, thought provoking and prescient role-playing game that really does outshine games coming out today.
Combat can be approached and taken however way you want it to go. Nothing survives a rocket to the face, tranquilizer darts can knockout the shmucks that you first face but the G-men later on can be turned into paste with an energy sword. Doors can be opened, torn down with a crowbar, said energy sword or outright blown off their hinges with a rocket or grenade. You can throw objects at those foolish enough to be anywhere near you at terminal velocity, turning them into a shower of blood. Or if you have a conscience you may knock out guards by sneaking up behind them and give them the Thief blackjack treatment. You may also adopt a more traditional methodology and use the pistol, shotgun, assault rifle or sniper, all assorted with different ammunition types and attachments.

The skill system encourages both exploration to get as many points as possible per level, as well as multiple playthroughs to give each weapon type and its associated tactics a chance to shine.

As you progress the world reacts to the actions that you may or may not have taken. For a 25 year old game the NPCs got under my skin when they were peeved out that I didn’t do exactly as they had asked with their reprimands. Making me want to give the level another go to see what would be different.

There are many secret areas, and parts of the world that are completely unrelated to the main story, this is in spite of the limitations of the game, having to load individual maps. The developers crammed every corner and cranny chock full of things for the player to do, NPCs to interact with, basketballs to shoot into hoops, and so on and so forth.

I am a large fan of the graphics and principal design of the game. The character models have had an extraordinary amount of care put into them, no matter if it’s JC or a one off NPC. Enemies become more and more futuristic as the stakes are raised and the darkness of the future bares its teeth. Hong Kong’s vibrant neon alleys, Paris’ desolate and oppressed apartment blocks, Ellis Island, Hell’s Kitchen and LaGuardia airport resound a world oppressed by the technology that promised its freedom. This is all accompanied by a mellifluous soundtrack, which I will refrain from describing as to let you look forward to it.

The only shortcoming of the game is that there isn’t more of it. The sequel could not live up to the exalted status of the original, nor has any game within the same vein yet to have come close to it. Art is subjective but the art that is praised the most is the best. This is the video game equivalent of the Mona Lisa.
Play it now before the rest of this game’s predictions become true.

Un juego excelente tanto en jugabilidad como en narrativa, todo está perfectamente logrado. Lo único negativo es su sistema de apuntado arcaico, pero se le perdona por ser un título del año 2000.

although it is not open world, the world you can explore is huge. There is a big influence of your decisions in the development of the story and in the outcome. Try to wander about, explore, see all things there are to interact with. It is definitely worth playing from beginning to end.

Great, it's an exercise in avoiding combat. Stealth isn't straightforward, it actually requires that you learn patterns & explore, no vents every other room. Those that exist don't stick out & aren't linear like in Human Revolution. Quite the opposite, they use darkness & mazes to make the player work for big wins. You can throw objects or fire tranq darts to distract guards, everything's a tool.

88/100

An all-time classic that lives up to the hype

• An engaging narrative with very good pacing
  
• Great voice-acting
  
• A stealth focused shooting mechanic that will force you to take the tactical approach more often than not
  

• It is easy to avoid detection by enemy AI and the difficulty settings only determine how much damage you will take.
  I recommend playing on Realistic difficulty
  
[*]Some tinkering will be required for this game to work properly on modern hardware
I recommend the Kentie launcher https://kentie.net/article/dxguide/

Finally got to play this game for the first time and my god, such a good game. I love the immersive sim genre and always felt bad I had never played this before when I was exploring this genre. I did have to get the Kentie launcher and Dx10 fix to get it running smoothly and in full screen but that was super simple.

If the age of the game is holding you back from playing this. Trust! If you enjoy this genre, you will probably end up liking this game. I went through all 3 of the endings and think my playthrough was around 18 hours so not a super long game at all and I did explore the maps somewhat. I do wish you could level up your skills higher but just like Vampire Bloodlies, you have to pick what you really want to specialize in or me somewhat okay in most things. Can't wait to dive into the rest of this franchise!

100 Backlog Games of 2025 Challenge: 13/100

the game is about how the free market will worsen the lives of everyone who isn't rich, the main antagonist is a billionaire, the people who help/enlighten JC are rather apart of a left wing militia (NSF) or are racial minorities (i.e. Jaime Reyes, Leo Gold, Tracer Tong, etc.).

No idea why chuds think this game agrees with their ideology.

No need to read reviews, just go ahead and play it. Deus Ex isn’t just a game, it’s a labyrinth of choice, deception, and control, where every decision shapes a dystopian future close to our own. It’s a blend of AI, politics, and philosophy.

Should've called it Deus Ex: Game of the Millennium Edition

I really liked the shooting mechanic in this game. You have to stand still for the crosshair to shrink, and it's very satisfying to pop some headshots like that. it also becomes impossible to run and gun, because enemies can shoot much more accurately. I find it strange that no other (stealth) game seems to have copied this mechanic.

As many have said, there's lots of freedom in how you approach each situation. hack camera's and turn turrets against your enemies, turn off alarms and sneak past, use mines, snipe from a distance, crouch from behind and knife them, or just shoot a rocket to their face if you see no other way, or simply to blow up enemies for fun.

There's also loot everywhere, ammo, health, hacking tools, etc. that rewards exploration. The only negative is that the environment feels kinda empty. In that first mission with the statue of liberty, it's just a dark, flat green patch with some boxes and enemies here and there.

I was super excited that there was a mission in Hong Kong. But then a little disappointed, because nobody speaks Cantonese, except for those couple of guys in the hideout saying um goi jie guo, which is both misspelled and mispronounced. Some of the Chinese text on signboards is mirrored. What can you expect though, it was 2000 when this game came out.

Every time I start the game I always stick around to listen to the main theme. It really is that good. Fundamentally it's an epic futuristic song, but there's also some musical comedy in it. I mean, I only noticed after I listened to some covers, but the main melody seems to have a hole in it after the 5th note due to how soft it plays the next one, and a lot of phrases end in a very loud and high note like it's making fun of itself. It suits the character of the game very well. While the game deals with controversial real world issues, it also has some funny, maybe satirical moments in it.

This game really deserves a remake. Its scathing social critique is just as relevant today as it was back then.

cool old fashioned game. I think i needed a mod to get it to run better on windows 11 but I cannot recall.
Kind of like an RPG where your character gets better as the numbers go up so it feels like every playthrough could be quite different. Pretty tough though.

One of the greatest games of all time and my personal favorite. It's clunky and dated but you absolutely should play it. Just don't start with Revision for a first playthrough, it's well made but swathes of the game are virtually unrecognizable.

Deus Ex (2000) Review (8.5/10)
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Arguably being one of the most influential games of all time, Deus Ex manages to blend multiple genres seamlessly into one amazing package that's a must-play for fans of the immersive-sim genre.

[WARNING]

THIS GAME REQUIRES THE FOLLOWING PATCHES TO WORK ON MODERN MACHINES!!!

Kenties Launcher: https://kentie.net/article/dxguide/ (drag and drop into the system folder)
Direct3D10 Renderer: https://kentie.net/article/d3d10drv/ (drag and drop into the system folder)

(OPTIONAL)
Deus Ex Map Patch: https://www.dxm.be/navigator.php5?lang=en&content=202 (overwrite the maps folder in the root folder)

I'll be honest, it took me four tries to actually get far enough to enjoy this game. Lots of great reviews means nothing next to actually playing it. It's an older game that doesn't hold your hand, and I loved it! It took a while to get used to the controls, the inventory system, and the character progression, but once you get that down, it's a fun ride to go on.

Played this game as someone who has never played any of the games in the series. It is old and does show it's age in some places, but even playing it 25 years later completely new to it, it is still really fun.

As many others have said by now, you can approach each level in multiple different ways. If your skills aren't up to par in one area, you can beat the level another way with your build. I have heard people say the shooting isn't great, but I think it should be approached as an RPG first: if you have no levels in guns, you aren't going to shoot well with them. Saying that, the gunplay in this is unique to it and is not janky or aged out in my opinion.

The voice acting isn't great much of the time, but that doesn't detract from the game. The story is fun and the fact you can trivialize entire boss fights by being clever or getting information from other characters in the world makes the game feel like it reacts to you. There are characters I didn't save that I didn't know you could and ones I did save that many people didn't.

The overall feeling/atmosphere of the game is phenomenal. The soundtrack kicks ass and may be one of the strongest parts of the game. Other reviewers have mentioned it feels very Y2K and I think that's a positive here.

The only thing that really does detract from it is I had to run it with compatibility mods, but there's a zip of them you can get and it was very easy to install. Also, make sure you bind quicksave/quickload, I don't believe it saves after each level (and they tend to be longer anyway). For about 20-30 hours of gameplay in a playthrough, seven bucks (one on sale) is pretty cheap.

a piece of thousands of childhoods. every real gamer needs to play through this game. the graphics and controls are a bit outdated, but it doesn't matter at all. one of the greatest stories ever told. you should play it for the soundtrack alone.

Masterpiece of a first person RPG, one of the best games ever made. Lots of freedom in how you can approach pretty much any situation. You can go through missions however you want with all the different tools, skills, augmentations, and environmental setpieces available, and it just works. Absolutely incredible visuals and music that create an unforgettable atmosphere. Story is fantastic too with how detailed it is and how it explores various things like freedom, the consolidation and corruption of power, and trust. It's a one-of-a-kind experience.