Amusing coincidental moment after starting to play Deus EX: HR

Greetings Watchers

Ahh, the summer holidays are almost here. I can start getting into my backlog in all earnesty! The first of these, is most definitely Deus Ex: Human Revolution.
I just thought I'd post an hilarious real-life coincidence after my first hour of playing with it.

I'd just completed the first Adam Jensen mission and was just starting to upgrade my hacking augmentations so that I could start going the hackity hack on all of those locked upper office doors. Anyway, I save my game and get up to make a coffee when the phone rings. I pick up and I get the following asian-middle eastern accented female who says:

"Excuse me, is this the residence of Mr B?"
Me: "Yes, speaking."
"This is Kiko calling from CyberHack Systems. We're calling about your computer sir, you do have a computer right, Mr B?"
Me: (knowingly) "Yes, would you like me to call the Australian Federal Police so that we can discuss the matter further?
*Klick* (hangs up)

Unfortunately, I couldn't think of anything JC Denton like to respond with. But after I hung up, I couldn't stop laughing at the irony.

These types of scam callers (i.e please download event viewer so we can steal your private information...) are becoming quite brazen and alarmingly more frequent near where I live. I know many people who have received phone calls from similar companies like them.

But as to the game, I'm quite enjoying it so far, even if it did take me awhile to warm to the graphical style. Just doing a few side-quests for the moment, before attempting to get into the police station for the second main quest. My approach is going to be traditionally humanist in nature: Attempt to get by utilising as few augmentations as possible. Should be interesting.

One more thing: Is it just me, or does Adam Jensen bear a slight resemblence to the MMA fighter (ex UFC) Jon Fitch? Ha, it seems I'm not the only one who thinks so: http://mmalinker.com/forum/jon-fitch-is-adam-jensen-t83557.html

You had luck. These calls come from a new scam system of foreign people (usually from India or from Asia in general) making you believe that they are from Microsoft (or another very well known company), "have found" that you have a virus within your PC, help you with everything - and then want a fee of 200 Dollars or so. Mostly before they "help" you.

I don't have a link describing this scam here right now, but I've already read about it in the local press.

Besides : Try to scribble down the number, if you can, so that you'll have proof.

That's bizarre! I have heard about and have seen many different kinds of scams but never about one where scammers try to scam you over the phone!

Yes, that's new.

I know them well, Alrik, so thankfully it was a bit more than luck.

I've had quite a few encounters with various scam callers over the past couple of years. They're all just so blatantly obvious though that it's frankly, ridiculous. It's just so brazen and stupidly criminal that in my incredulousness at having received such a call, I usually just hang up.
I do feel for the particular members of our society that are at risk however of falling for these gutless goofs.

Alrik Fassbauer said:

Yes, that's new.

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Actually, its pretty old. Predates computers even

It's new in this special way.

You just can't ask for "fees" for helping with someone's computer before computer technology - as we know it today - doesn't even exist.

Alrik is right, it's new. Scams always existed, but we've entered an era of scams and scamism. Scams are not happening rarely and sporadically any more. There is at least one scammer lurking near you every day.

This thread should be in politics section. I've already said there in another thread, forget feudalism, capitalism, socialism, etc. Scamism is now everywhere, in every single country, in every single neighborhood.

I've gotten a call like that here in the USA too. The caller took on an aura of authority and told me that my computer was registering unauthorized activity and they needed to work with me to fix it. I asked them who they worked for and they forcefully repeated that this was urgent. I asked them again and they hung up.

These scams are very common on landlines here. Most people have cells now, and the people who still have their landlines are often older and considered to be easier targets for scams. Because I've stubbornly kept my own landline, I get those types of calls reasonably often, and some are clearly specifically designed to target the elderly. It's quite sad.

I haven't got any calls regarding my "PC" but my parents certainly do get a lot of similar scam calls. They are so sick of it, as soon as they hear Asians or Indians talking in mock-American English they just say "Me no English" and hangs up

joxer said:

This thread should be in politics section.

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Uhh, no. This was a coincidence that happened to me whilst playing Deus Ex: HR. I'm not making a political point. I'll leave that to the esteemed voices such as yourself.

I've made some progress; have just finished the Montreal mission and are now back in Jensen's apartment. It's not a bad game, perhaps a little too linear and not quite open enough sometimes for my tastes, but the atmosphere is strong and I like the music's role in creating tension. The detective based side-quest for Malak in China, though easy to complete, was rather satisfying in seeing to completion.

The only augmentations I've gone for are hacking based ones (hacking is fun!) but I'm definitely racking up the praxis points. I had some trouble with the first boss, but lucked out after spinning around him and just timing constant stun gun shots.

Just a query to experienced players: How and when does Missing Link fit into all of this? When is the best time to start it? Currently, my assumption is after the end of the main game.

Role-playing wise and particularly dialogue wise, I probably prefer Alpha Protocol and Mass Effect at this moment, but the stealth game-play in Deus Ex:HR is reasonably varied and fun. The take downs could do with a little more jiu-jitsu or aikido and less funny looking strikes, but ahh you can't have everything.

zahratustra said:

That's bizarre! I have heard about and have seen many different kinds of scams but never about one where scammers try to scam you over the phone!

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It happened to me about a year and a half ago. Person calling me about my "Windows Computer", and who wanted me to install something. It was a surprisingly entertaining call (it did take him almost 15min before he realized that I was wasting his time).
I also got my first scam by regular mail just recently (basically a Nigeria mail).