Deus Ex Diaries Part Thirty (Invisible War)

This is my ongoing exploration of the Deus Ex Universe, in release order. Whether you’re a newcomer or an old-goer, I hope to make this something you can read along with and enjoy. I finish Deus Ex: Invisible War.

Having arrived in Cairo and cleared the Arcology of Templars, I was finally heading up to the flight deck to rescue - or kill - Paul Denton…

Leaving the elevator, I met the elite trooper whom I had met before entering the Arcology. He accompanied me down the ramp, but I was interrupted by Luminon Saman on a holocomm. He taunted me with the fact that I had a decision to make, and reminded me that I had tried to join the Templars at the booth back in Part 24. I had the option to say that I was joking and took it, saying how I laughed as I walked away. Saman wasn’t happy, but I walked on to where the trooper was stood. Clearly, he wanted me to actually do everything, which was about par for the course at this point.

Opening fire on the Templars, the trooper did lend a hand whenever anyone came closer to him, but was generally useless. Saman had said that the Templars wouldn’t fire on me, I would be free to go and kill Paul Denton, all they wanted from me was a drop of blood. I was giving them blood, it just wasn’t mine.

There were multiple Templars in suits of armour, and a few without. It was a relatively simple task to kill them all, mainly because of my mod which detonates rockets before they hit me. I went into flight bay 23 and spoke to Leila Nassif, who was holed up with some guards and awaiting evacuation. Sadly for them, the pilot beacon had been removed, and they needed “someone” to find it, and activate it.

In the room furthest from the action was NG Resonance, just as her interactive AI counterpart had said. Well, the AI actually said she was currently in concert, but nevermind that. NG complained that I wasn’t there to get her out, and said that she would wait there to avoid being shot. Oh, and in her luggage I found a little NG Resonance doll.

With that loose end tied up, I headed for flight bay 24. Opening the door, I shot the man just inside who wanted my blood, then killed the other Templars. Finally, I shot the millbot that was stomping around, with my EMP secondary fire on the Mag Rail. Making my decision, I revived Paul Denton in his cryo-pod. He spoke to me about how I would be instrumental in JC’s plan, and then told me to get to Liberty Island where he would meet me.

As I turned to leave, JC also told me to get to Liberty Island, and said that he would make arrangements for Paul to get there. Quite how, when I was being taken by JC’s pilot Ava, was unclear. Unfortunately, Chad Dumier was aware of what I had done, and sent more elite troopers. I eventually managed to get up to the pilot beacon by taking out only two troopers, and Ava took me to Liberty Island to be merged with the Helios AI…

Arriving in New York, JC contacted me via comm and told me that Paul was with him inside the statue. From my vantage point, it appeared that the statue was merely a hologram, so I assumed that they were in the base of the statue. JC needed me to get inside the UNATCO building and grab the Aquinas Protocol specification from a computer in the lower level.

In front of me was an armoured trooper, so I headed east - and had to blast a small millbot with my EMP shot. Tracer Tong contacted me via the comm and told me to come and see him on the north dock, as I headed through a door to the east side of the island.

Wanting to take a look around, I headed left to avoid a big millbot, and came under fire from an elite trooper. Running for it, I happened across Tracer Tong, who killed the trooper for me. He needed my help to activate some small bots, as he had come here without multitools. Apparently, due to JC drastically lowering the temperature around the island with nanites, the housing unit CPUs had cracked. Luckily, I had six multitools, which was exactly the right amount to activate all three housing units.

Tracer also mentioned that the reason it needed to be so cold around the island was because JC was reconstructing the Statue of Liberty, and the way he was doing it required cold. With the bots active, Tracer asked me where he should send them - as I had seen more of the island. Having not seen any of the island, and managed to come straight here, I decided to tell him to send them to shore up the defenses at the statue, where the Dentons were.

Annoyingly, as I left I found the big millbot had followed me. It’s back was turned towards me, so I hacked it with one of my mods. Unfortunately, it was unable to go up the stairs it had come down, so I just had to deactivate it, and leave it behind.

Heading to the left, I tried my best to avoid getting into fights. Since both the Templars and the Illuminati were at each other’s throats, it did help me out, though it was far from easy going. Back on the west side of the island, I was hidden from a couple of Templars in armour. A short distance from them were some elite Illuminati troopers, so I shot one of them with my boltcaster, then legged it to the right while the two factions fought.

At the base of the statue, I found Tracer Tong who had managed to get here first. He had fought off a couple of Templars, but seemed to have lost the robots in the melee. He was there with two Grays, and seemed able to hold the fort. Turning back, I headed for where the elite troopers had come from, and found one survivor, and three more further down. I’d say that I didn’t kill them, but since they self-destructed when my Boltcaster’s neurotoxin knocked them out, yeah I did. It was a pain, because when they exploded, they did so in a cloud of toxic gas that I had to wait to disperse before I could grab their ammo clips…

Going through a door, I came across the Illuminati encampment. Two elite troopers and one mini millbot guarded it, and as I’d gotten a bit turned around I assumed that this was where I was supposed to go. After killing the troopers, and EMP grenading the bot, I went inside to find Chad Dumier and Nicolette DuClare stood with another elite trooper. Chad reiterated what he had told me over the comm on my way in - if I transmitted the Aquinas Protocol to him instead, all was forgiven.

I left them alone and returned the way I had come from. The UNATCO sign that I had followed was actually leading me to the left, and I had misunderstood, so I went that way. Leo Jankowski called my comm and told me that he was waiting in the comm van beside the UNATCO ruins, so after taking out the Templar soldier, I went to meet him.

To say it was a “van” of any sort would be a lie, as it was just a bunker. I was actually quite impressed that this area looked just like it did in the previous game. Leo was there, still in his Omar outfit. His opinion was that we should kill all of the leaders, as it was the only way for the world to be free. I told him to hang tight, as the only other option available was to kill the Dentons, and I went back to the main bunker.

After deactivating a mini millbot with an EMP grenade or two, I headed inside. Things definitely looked familiar as I made my way down, encountering some homeless people who lived here, and a couple of Templars. I also came across Billie Adams, who must have teleported out of JC’s place in Antarctica, and not been killed as I assumed. We fought in a stairwell, and when an armoured templar appeared I knew that was how to kill her. I threw a grenade down, then concentrated fire on the armour until it exploded.

After throwing Billie’s corpse into a trashcan fire, I continued on my way to find Aquinas. There were a couple more armoured Templars to be found, before I reached the right room. Everything inside was in disarray, but the Aquinas Hub was still functional. I transmitted the information to JC Denton, and he told me to meet him in the statue.

Blocking my way were two Illuminati elite troopers, both of whom I killed before I was allowed to leave. Back outside, three armoured Templars awaited me. I managed to get past thanks to my rocket-exploding mod, and the fact that all three had rocket launchers. I was incredibly low on ammo, and would not have killed them all - especially since the sword was useless against enemies that exploded upon death.

Back at the statue, I went inside and found that the entire room didn’t need Tracer and the Grays. There were four turrets and two Dentons armed with weapons, more than enough to protect them. I went inside and spoke to Paul, who reassured me that his brother knew what he was doing, and to do what he said. JC then explained that I just had to step into the Helios infusion chamber, and it would replicate my nanites into everyone on the planet. With a deep breath, I stepped in and activated the machine.

The Statue of Liberty hologram lit up, with beams of light hitting all of the civilians who were now there, 125 years in the future. Helios spoke, telling of the consensus that humanity had reached to prolong our long history of peace, and that the only frontier that has ever existed is the self…

"It really is of importance, not only what men do, but also what manner of men they are that do it. Among the works of man... the first importance surely is man himself."
— John Stuart Mill, On Liberty

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Despite Deus Ex: Invisible War having been out for almost 20 years, I’m very surprised that I didn’t have prior knowledge of most of the game going into it. Maybe because it hasn’t worked properly on modern systems for almost half of that time? Maybe because it wasn’t well received? In either case, I’m quite glad about going in blind.

It took about eight and a half hours to reach the end, and I tried to do every quest given to me. I missed out on helping rescue Klara Sparks in the Arcology, unfortunately, but I think I got most of the others.

I enjoyed every plot twist, from being watched through secret windows at the start, through Billie turning on me right to the end where I could have pulled a plot twist myself. After all, you get the opportunity to change which outcome you want until very close to the finish of the game. No ending is locked in, until you transmit the Aquinas Protocol, and as you’ve just read it’s then only two paragraphs until the ending cutscene.

There are four endings, plus a secret fifth ending that’s just a bit of fun. Having looked at the other three main endings, I’ve got to admit that I think I went for the best of the options. Well, apart from that secret wrap party…

I have to admit, this game is nowhere near as good as Deus Ex was. The RPG element is pretty much removed entirely, as you're only able to “level up” things if you have biomod canisters. The levels are much smaller, and every weapon pulling from the same ammo supply is super limiting. For the majority of the game, as you will have read, I used the Mag Rail and the Boltcaster. I had seven weapons on me at all times, just in case I decided to use them, but I never did.

It may have taken a lot longer than I had originally planned, but there you have it, Deus Ex: Invisible War. Thanks for reading along, and keep an eye out for Deus Ex Diaries Part Thirty-One (Human Revolution) coming soon!