Deus Ex: Human Revolution

The other prime way the third-person makes its hovering viewpoint known is through the stealth takedowns you can inflict on unwary guards. These can be non-lethal, but those with a more bloodthirsty outlook can enact some stunningly violent moves: a guard minding his own business watching security cameras can suddenly find himself gutted with your huge arm blades, or two guards with their backs turned can have their spines skewered in an Ezio-style pounce.

If you've got the right augs, meanwhile, you could perhaps turn on your X-ray vision and see a guard casually leaning against the inside of a building - then break through the wall behind him and snap his stupid guard neck.

The stealth in Human Revolution may not have the traditional 'follow guard and bonk them on head' pattern, but it still looks an inordinate amount of fun - giving you reasons to feel both powerful and slinky at the same time. Besides, these guards have developed the worrying ability to look backwards at the same time as walking forwards. It seems that AI routines just went 21st century.

The ways in which you can bring the pain in a more upfront fashion, meanwhile, appear expansive. You can still peck someone with a tranquiliser and watch them collapse metres away from an alarm, but if you're less picky about themes of mortality guards can also be pinned to walls with crossbows, peppered with bullets and exploded with rockets.

The most visually stunning move that's present within the E3 demo has Jensen stood atop a warehouse skylight, looking down on a huddle of guards who are urgently discussing the likelihood of their imminent demise. Using a bungee-type augmentation, if you so choose, from that point you can smash down through the glass and slam into the concrete below - and then trigger the claymore aug implanted in your back that fires an ever-growing circle of ball-bearings into 360 degrees-worth of surprised henchmen.

The whole manoeuvre is simply stunning to witness, and hopefully even better to play, and in all honesty the rocket-launcher vs. stomping mech gameplay that happens after it in the demo is something of an anti-climax by comparison.

In this era of re-energising the brands that once made PC gaming great (Fallout, XCOM, Deus Ex), there is a level of cynicism that simply has to be expected. These games are simultaneously being made to cater for those who know and love the old games, and to a wider (console) audience of youngling innocents.

There will always be people caught in the crossfire, and they will always set comment threads aflame with vocal disappointment and irritation. When a community has already been singed with a lacklustre sequel then it's a phenomenon that's doubly understandable.