This Old Neon Forum

Welcome to the #BGE2020 Elimination Round of 256!

Each game is seeded based on its performance in the two opening rounds of pools. Every game in the Upper Bracket has defeated multiple other games in 1-on-1 polls to get to this point. These are still the best of the best.

Polls are updated weekly, typically on Sunday or Monday. Check back throughout the week to make sure you don't miss a vote!

HOW TO VOTE

This is easy. You only get one vote per poll. The game with the most votes wins. In the event of a tie, the higher seed advances, so don't get complacent!

This is another great match-up. Although I love Hollow Knight (a lot) and basically consider it the pinnacle of the action-exploration genre (it has a HUGE amazing atmospheric world AND fantastic, fast, responsive combat), Deus Ex is a more important and influential game.

Deus Ex's demo was better than many games of its time, and it was just the first mission.

Deus Ex is one of the few FPS games I really like. It gives rewards for exploration like the best open-world games, has a great skill system as well as a perk system, and gives you incentives early on for nonlethal play*. It starts falling apart towards the end, but the opening up through the escape sequence around midway are fantastic.

*I feel like nonlethal play was supposed to be important longer than the ~3 hours it actually is - if I remember right, you get warm fuzzies from dialogue and one extra multitool from all the sneaking, smoke grenades, stun rodding, and tranquilizing it takes.

Unfortunately the sequels feel like much narrower games, a little too polished. Although I've only played Human Revolution so far.