The simple things aren't always best

We can get this out of the way right now: Invisible War is not as deep nor as realistic as the original. The characters are not as intriguing. The locales aren't quite as varied. Head shots aren't quite what they used to be. The skill-points system that rewarded you for exploration and allowed for deeper specialization is gone. Body-specific damage/healing is gone. The number of nano-augmentation slots is down from nine to five.

So we've fallen into a trap of sorts. The sequel is not up to the previous standards in all these categories. Game over; bring on Snake Eater, right?

No. Anyone ready to dismiss this game because of the preceding points needs to stop, reload, and try again.

The omissions and relatively underwhelming features noted above are distracting - and the more recently you've played the original, the more disappointed you probably will be. Indeed, I was shaking my head in disappointment all through the introductory level. The game has been dumbed-down a bit, maybe because of its simultaneous release on PC and console. However, the main purpose of a review is to tell you if a game is worth playing and why or why not. And the fact is that sophomore-jinx complaints aside, Invisible War is one of the best Xbox games yet.

The story begins twenty years after the events of the first installment. It seems instead of choosing one of the three options presented at the end of Deus Ex, hero J.C. Denton chose all of them. Having destroyed megalomaniac Bob Page and the Aquinas Hub, Denton merged with the Helios intelligence and dropped out of plain sight. In the introductory movie, a lone fanatic turns Chicago into a pile of cinders - the first volley we see in a series of back-and-forth attacks between several warring factions in the DE universe.

You play as Alex D., male or female and one of three skin tones, depending on your choice. Alex is in training to be a nanotech-augmented corporate heavy and, like Denton, starts out with a built-in light and infolink. Alex has five assignable nanotech slots. Most abilities max at level three, though some, like hacking, have only one level. (It's true, you cannot hack information systems without taking up one nano slot - the same slot that Cloak uses. But you can still hide from cameras and bots using a different ability.)

The world is what you make it

Alex must ultimately choose between several courses of action leading to one of several endings. Usually you can juggle allegiances, helping one group here and another there, but sometimes you will have to commit, and the last stage of the game is designed to make you ask yourself what kind of world you really want.

The supporting cast that is supposed to help you reach your social-engineering conclusion is painted a little more broadly than I would have liked. Only one - very important - character inspired me to think long and hard (in video game terms) about whether I wanted to help him. With the rest, there are not that many layers beneath the surface. But again, if I had never played the first game, I'd probably be on here raving about how deep the characterizations are and how heady the choices can be. Two things that particularly impressed me were the use of a pop-star shrine as a means of societal control and the possibility of using a glorified vacuum cleaner to dispatch a dozen heavily armed foes in the course of ten seconds.

Besides the momentous moral decisions it asks you to make, this series is known for its more-than-one-way-to-skin-a-cat ethos. The developers gently nudge you toward the finale, all the while imparting a feeling of wondrous freedom. Invisible War allows you kill almost anyone you come across. Imagine if you could kill Solid Snake in Metal Gear Solid 2 or Tracer Tong in the first Deus Ex and have the story go on. The game has a handful of protected areas where weapons are deactivated by security personnel, but just adopt the patience of the schoolyard bully and those few people sheltered the first time you meet them will probably become easy prey if you meet them outside later on. No more invincible enemies shrugging off a barrage of explosives to the face. If you prick them, they will bleed; and if they bleed too long, they will die.

Objectives can be accomplished through strength, cunning, or force, and many if not most can be ignored outright. Most players will choose to stick close to one extreme style of gameplay and equip themselves accordingly. Nanotech augmentations this time around can be installed on the fly with no need to find a medbot or even a canister meant for a specific body part. A one-kind-fits-all approach detracts from the strategy and goes against the theme that all your actions have consequences, but some may like the more easygoing approach. (Heretics!)

Similarly, the game pays little or no attention to where you or your enemies take damage. In the first Deus Ex, taking too many bumps to the legs would result in J.C. crawling around on the floor, helpless to walk until his legs were healed. If you had particularly poor resource-management skills, you might have to decide between using a medkit to restore his ambulation or using it on his torso to provide a greater buffer against impending death. Here, below the neck a hit is pretty much a hit, and one-hit kills are harder to get without the sniper rifle. Simplifying the damage model is a definite step backwards.

The visible (and audible) war

Speaking of shooting people, the AI is not the brightest - but as compensation for all the easy targets, the developers have programmed endlessly entertaining rag-doll physics. Once your prey is dead or knocked out, the fun begins in earnest. You can launch the limp bodies of your foes dozens of feet into the air and catch them or let them fall. You can shoot them through over railings, toss them at open flames, or terrorize other non-playable characters with the limp form of Death. There is a certain gruesome humor in throwing the dead body of a plague victim at the feet of another victim who is asking for help (as long as you save the person after tormenting her). Or, as my brother discovered, it is great fun to take down enemies then throw them face down in Greasel dung to die a humiliating death. One wonders what the people who discover them will think ("What possessed all these guys try to eat this stuff?").

Playing as a jerk opens up a whole other world of possibilities, but overdo it and you can miss out on some storylines. Of course, you don't have to pick either laughs or subplots: playing through the game carefully takes about twenty hours and it can take a whole lot less. You will want to go through at least twice to see some of the different branches.

The enemies aren't the only things choking in Invisible War. The graphics are nice and all, but it is all too common to have the graphics stutter something nasty. I would much rather have had a slightly grainier game running smoothly than a slick-looking game hitting a wall every couple of hours. I wouldn't have minded the slowdown (more like "standstill") in most games, but here it is just another reminder that I am playing a game and not immersed in a world of life-and-death political intrigue. Even the sound is goofy, with head-on conversations much fainter than what's happening on the periphery. Unless you turn down the music, you might find yourself starting a conversation then turning to the side to better hear the response. I guess Alex has the capabilities of a machine and the hearing of a run-down octogenarian.

And maybe that is a good way to charecterize the game as a whole: some easily noticeable sticking points that belie lot of impressive machinery under the surface. I give you the same advice that was given to J.C. and Alex: Dig deeper.

· · · Nick Vlamakis