Grandmauden on 13/10/2021 at 22:58
Quote Posted by Estel Randir
The climbing gloves were a huge disappointment. There were very few areas in which they actually added content to the game. There were what 2 places that could only be accessed with them?
Let's see...
- A hidden attic in South Quarter between Garrett's place and Black Alley.
- A fisherman's apartment near the Keeper door in the Docks.
- A balcony with a rust mite on the roof of Fort Ironwood.
- A gargoyle with gems for eyes above the street outside Fort Ironwood.
- A loot cache above the north entrance of the Auldale Public Gardens.
- The pipe that triggers the "Killing Time" mission.
- The special loot in the pendulum room atop the clocktower in "Killing Time."
- Various air crystals scattered around the City hub.
And that's just off the top of my head, nor does that include the various shortcuts that the climbing gloves open up. While I agree that climbing glove-related secrets and shortcuts weren't as plentiful as rope/vine arrow-related secrets and shortcuts, I think that's more the fault of the smaller levels rather than the gloves themselves. And Ion Storm was careful to design the environments with the climbing gloves in mind, not allowing you to climb around sharp corners and using architectural barriers like beams and ledges to limit how far you can climb.
Just sayin'.
Estel Randir on 14/10/2021 at 04:30
Quote Posted by Grandmauden
Let's see...
- A hidden attic in South Quarter between Garrett's place and Black Alley.
- A fisherman's apartment near the Keeper door in the Docks.
- A balcony with a rust mite on the roof of Fort Ironwood.
- A gargoyle with gems for eyes above the street outside Fort Ironwood.
- A loot cache above the north entrance of the Auldale Public Gardens.
- The pipe that triggers the "Killing Time" mission.
- The special loot in the pendulum room atop the clocktower in "Killing Time."
- Various air crystals scattered around the City hub.
And that's just off the top of my head, nor does that include the various shortcuts that the climbing gloves open up. While I agree that climbing glove-related secrets and shortcuts weren't as plentiful as rope/vine arrow-related secrets and shortcuts, I think that's more the fault of the smaller levels rather than the gloves themselves. And Ion Storm was careful to design the environments with the climbing gloves in mind, not allowing you to climb around sharp corners and using architectural barriers like beams and ledges to limit how far you can climb.
Just sayin'.
Places like the hidden attic in South Quarter are good extra content. The rest are just "stuff" they added to justify the gloves (like the various air crystals, the rust mite). I wished they would have added a dozen or so unique locations like the hidden attic or plot progression points. That would have been much more interesting. Overall I am not a fan of the gloves at all they way they were implemented.
New Horizon on 14/10/2021 at 12:26
Quote Posted by ZylonBane
IIRC the developers have admitted that both rope arrows and swimming were removed because they couldn't get them working with Havok and/or third-person mode.
Yeah, both of those things contributed to the loss of rope arrows. Not sure why they couldn't switch the view to 1st person for rope climbing and disable havok on the rope while climbing. They were certainly able to switch to 3rd person view on the fly...such as when the player died.
hard thief kyd on 15/10/2021 at 17:59
Quote:
I dislike the depiction of the Pagans in this game. They sound like dunces. I prefer the Pagans as a terrifying cult in league with a literal demon, as they are depicted in The Dark Project
Well "the demon" is dead long ago, so it's rather a dumb cult of homeless loafers. It's funny how they're calling everybody "manfool" while the biggest manfools are Pagans themselves.
Jashin on 15/10/2021 at 19:05
Quote Posted by hard thief kyd
Well "the demon" is dead long ago, so it's rather a dumb cult of homeless loafers. It's funny how they're calling everybody "manfool" while the biggest manfools are Pagans themselves.
Funny how to me it's the opposite. The dumb hammers worship a god that is made up by their ruling elites and dare to call pagans, whose god is actually real, a demon.
Also there was never a definitive answer on whether he was killed, if it's even possible to "kill" trickster, or perhaps he was just banished for a time.
ZylonBane on 16/10/2021 at 02:41
Quote Posted by Jashin
The dumb hammers worship a god that is made up by their ruling elites
Citation needed. If the Trickster actually exists, there's no reason to assume the Master Builder doesn't also exist. Do note that holy water and holy magic seem to work quite well.
hard thief kyd on 16/10/2021 at 21:46
Quote Posted by Jashin
The dumb hammers worship a god that is made up by their ruling elites and dare to call pagans, whose god is actually real, a demon.
Also there was never a definitive answer on whether he was killed, if it's even possible to "kill" trickster, or perhaps he was just banished for a time.
What's this?! Ah, 'tis just a Pagans' heresy. I hath let myself jump at naught.
Mine brethren, set thy bricks with the bones of heathens, and mix thy mortar with their blood.
demagogue on 20/10/2021 at 05:34
My little confession, I picked up TDS from the game store the day it was released (way back when we actually bought games from brick & mortar shops), but I've never played it past the first level. Maybe it's hard to say why not. I don't have any prejudice against it per se. But I think not having much of an FM scene swayed me off of it, and after enough time I never got that motivated to come back to it. All that said, I do want to finish it someday.
To put things in perspective, I got Thief 4 for free directly from Square Enix North America for "helping out" with the ill-fated TDM/Thief 4 fan content contest, and I've yet to even install it and don't think I will any time soon.
<Username> on 20/10/2021 at 06:28
Quote Posted by demagogue
My little confession, I picked up TDS from the game store the day it was released (way back when we actually bought games from brick & mortar shops), but I've never played it past the first level. Maybe it's hard to say why not. I don't have any prejudice against it per se. But I think not having much of an FM scene swayed me off of it, and after enough time I never got that motivated to come back to it. All that said, I do want to finish it someday.
I had similar feelings during the past 15 years. I finally started playing TDS again because it was one of the last three boxed games on my shelf that I had never completed. :)
Thief Guild lists (
https://www.thiefguild.com/fanmissions/?&games=3&page=1) 49 fan missions for TDS. I originally planned to give away my copy, but after completing the main game, I liked it enough to set myself a new goal to complete all the fan missions first.
phobos2077 on 20/10/2021 at 20:16
Unpopular opinion: I used to love Deadly Shadows. Maybe because it was the first game in the series I completed. I tried to play The Dark Project way back, but I guess I was just too young to appreciate it at that point. DS has this very thick foggy atmopshere. Very satisfying to just explore, listen to AI. Voice acting and sound design were amazing. Much later I played through The Metal Age, and then finally The Dark Project (yes, in reverse order). I find charm in each game, but gameplay-wise TMA was more compelling (I just recently re-played it for the third or fourth time). TMA has it's own atmosphere but it's nowhere near as dense as DS. Locations are huge, lots of open areas, lots of running and jumping. Whereas in DS it's very close and personal. Good thing they added this wall bracing mechanic. Can't compare story much, as it never felt as a strong focus in any of the games for me.
I think gameplay-oriented people tend to like the first two games more. Also they enjoy the benefit of being "the first", so people who become fans back in the day, for them DS was a departure from what they expected. I can see the same trend from an opposite position with Fallout series. For me Fallout 3 was an abomination and I literally felt betrayed and insulted with the product they've made. But now most people will say that Fallout: NV is the best game in the series, despite it being basically an expansion for Fallout 3...
Nowadays I tend to get back to TMA and TDM more often simply because they enjoy the support and game engine improvements, unlike DS which got "stuck" with buggy and outdated engine.
My dream Thief game is basically Deadly Shadows with bigger levels, fully-realized semi-open-world and faction systems, minus all the quirkiness and bugs.
