Deus Ex: Mankind Divided is free to play until Thursday

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It's on sale, too.

Deus Ex: Mankind Divided didn't really knock my socks off. It was decent, but I thought it fell well short of the standard set by Human Revolution, which I really liked—even with the crappy boss fights. And despite its pedigree and plentiful PR, it wasn't really a big seller, either: SteamSpy indicates that more than a year after its release, a little under 1.7 million people own it on Steam. 

On to Plan B, then: Mark it down (way down), and give everyone a chance to try it at no risk.   

The $15/£10/€12.50 sale price on Steam is only available until October 27, one day after the free play period ends, but it is a deep discount on a game that normally still goes for full price.   

We actually scored Mankind Divided quite well in our review, calling it "a great immersive sim with some of the best level design in the series, a wonderfully rich setting, and an enjoyably diverse range of augmentations." And it is a good game. But it had the misfortune of being the sequel to a ridiculously good game (something we've seen before), and to me it felt very much like the middle part of a trilogy, functioning more as a bridge between bookends than an experience unto itself. Whether we'll ever get to play that concluding chapter is, unfortunately, a wide-open question.

Andy Chalk
Andy Chalk
US News Lead

Andy has been gaming on PCs from the very beginning, starting as a youngster with text adventures and primitive action games on a cassette-based TRS80. From there he graduated to the glory days of Sierra Online adventures and Microprose sims, ran a local BBS, learned how to build PCs, and developed a longstanding love of RPGs, immersive sims, and shooters. He began writing videogame news in 2007 for The Escapist and somehow managed to avoid getting fired until 2014, when he joined the storied ranks of PC Gamer. He covers all aspects of the industry, from new game announcements and patch notes to legal disputes, Twitch beefs, esports, and Henry Cavill. Lots of Henry Cavill.