Alexander3 on 27/3/2013 at 10:33
Glad I'm not the only one concerned. I've seen the gameinformer article and it doesn't fill me with joy.
What made Thief what it is; is that it was unlike any other game out there. Deep story, unique gameplay, etc.
Thief 4 looks like a steampunk version of Assassin's creed. Thief is not steampunk(With perhaps the exception of the builder's children/metal faces from Thief 2).
They didn't bring back Garrett's sword either.
jtr7 on 27/3/2013 at 10:42
Thief has lots of steampunk, in the first game, too, just not presented in the classic way. It's not only steampunk, either, just as it's not only Medieval, or industrial, or sci-fi, or fantasy.
If Garrett has a blade at all, or can use one, I hope it's utilitarian like the first games, not just a defensive/offensive or backstabbing weapon.
bukary on 27/3/2013 at 15:10
Quote Posted by Alexander3
They didn't bring back Garrett's sword either.
As far as I remember, the sword in Thief was some kind of "leftover" from early developement of the game. It was suposed to be sword fighting game in the beginning. And, honestly, slashing banners was fun, but besides that the sword was almost completely useless in Thief. (On the other hand, I remember using it massively in Calendra's Legacy :ebil:)
Why would you, sneaky Garrett, need huge and heavy sword?
jtr7 on 28/3/2013 at 02:49
Chopping through forests, cutting off crushing vines, huge spider's webs, planks, ice, shattering glass (there are always overlapping uses between tools), destroying crates 'n' barrels (good for attracting AIs to the scene, like jumping on a loud surface, as well as opening optional pathways), bashing down unpickable doors, dropping undead, and holding off or slaying creatures and AIs the player bumbles into, and lots of things that an anachronistic machete would be perfect for, but with people thinking it's a Medieval fantasy title, a machete is odd, and a sword as a chopping tool is odd.
But, if you play as a Ghoster, forced use of the sword still occurs, doesn't it?
Other players want the dagger back for slicing paintings out of their frames, but if they have that, they had better not turn it into an automated animation, maneuvering Garrett in front of the painting to align the animation of the blade hand, and they had better not have the player go through the cutting motions, either.
With electricity, will we ever be able to slice wires? Can we shoot out or shatter certain electric lights?
And as for the "huge and heavy" aspect of the sword, that argument falls flat on its face in light of the bow and quiver and multitude of arrows. It makes no sense to single out the sword in light of the other 30-60 kilos of stuff he carries, with or without the contents of his magic Bag of Holding.
bukary on 28/3/2013 at 08:09
Quote Posted by jtr7
Chopping through forests
I do not remember "chopping through forests" in Thief. :erg:
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cutting off crushing vines, huge spider's webs, [...] ice, shattering glass
Wouldn't the dagger be more handy in this case?
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destroying crates 'n' barrels (good for attracting AIs to the scene, like jumping on a loud surface, as well as opening optional pathways)
I've never destroyed crates or barrels with the sword in Thief. (And mind that I created FM in which you destroy tons of barrels ;) ) But I guess in this case the sword could be useful. But wouldn't it be easier and safer (more silent) for a thief to just pick up and move the crate (or even destroy it slowly with a dagger)?
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bashing down unpickable doors
Yes, you could do that in Thief. But it always seemed rather ridiculous to me. I am almost certain that this "feature" is there, because the developers tried to find more uses for "leftover" sword. I guess using one's arm or leg to open closed doors is more reasonable.
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dropping undead, and holding off or slaying creatures and AIs the player bumbles into
I've never done anything like this in Thief. It reminds me more of The Walking Dead. ;)
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But, if you play as a Ghoster, forced use of the sword still occurs, doesn't it?
I am not sure why it makes sword a useful tool for a thief.
I simply believe that for Garrett-like thief the dagger (and bow) is much, much better than the sword.
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And as for the "huge and heavy" aspect of the sword, that argument falls flat on its face in light of the bow and quiver and multitude of arrows. It makes no sense to single out the sword in light of the other 30-60 kilos of stuff he carries, with or without the contents of his magic Bag of Holding.
I makes a lot of sense. The bow is more useful for Garrett (or thief), therefore if you can't carry too much weight (the bow and the sword at the same time), it's better to get rid of the sword than to dispose of the bow. :p
jtr7 on 28/3/2013 at 08:39
If you Ghost, and do not go for full loot, and don't care to explore thoroughly, the sword is "useless" 99% of the time, never 100%, in the OMs. For others, it's a blast, a relief, and for combatants or moments of combative abandon, testing limits of skill and game, it's a joy, and those players share their fun to this day, even if they decry kill restrictions. Few get the perfect game they want, but at least most of the fans have one or more missions that hit on all personal cylinders.
Some more info to add, if we're going to argue old Dark Project development history
against the sword in Thief. Look at the dates, and notice the general attitude about having the sword in the game
post-Dark Camelot (where they still had Merlin and Morgana, if anyone wants to discount magic and alchemy and forged alloys that Garrett's universe never got rid of!):
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March 28, 1997Our first motion capture shoot went off without a hitch this week. We got an even 100 short animation scenes shot in one hectic day. Jonathan, our model, is a sword and bow enthusiast himself and ad-libbed some lovely
sword kata at the shoot. Now comes the long process of sifting through and editing the animation data.
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January 9, 1998We're busily churning away towards an internal prototype next week, where we plan to have two reasonably playable (if still rough) missions. On the big checklist we've got:
[INDENT]* locks and keys (and basic lockpicking)
* working door-and-lever systems in the prison mission
* prescripted voice-over hints and color commentary by the player-character
* a bunch of new speech samples for NPC chatter
* basic swordfighting, with several attacks and a block
* better-polished weapon art for the PC's bow
* our first cut at inventory, with items you can pick up (since, after all, you're supposed to be stealing stuff) and use
* new mockups for interface art and the in-mission maps
and no doubt a bunch of stuff I'm forgetting.[/INDENT]
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January 23, 1998Well, technically it's January 23, since it's 1:00 am. We're pulling an all-nighter in preparation for a company demo tomorrow.
We had the first project-induced suicide this week. It was one of our AI's. He'd just got his shiny new physics model on his sword, and provoked by the appearance of the player-character, wound up and swung with mighty abandon. Following through less than adroitly, he managed to hit himself and promptly keeled over.
I love this phase of a project, because your bugs get so much more entertaining. -Tim
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February 20, 1998The last of a recent flurry of internal demos is due this weekend, and so the team, as you might expect, has been busily working to get it done. The number of improvements on all fronts is too large to adequately catalog, though the advances made in sword combat deserve special mention. There, I just mentioned them.
Tim has been on vacation this week, but he calls to us over e-mail from the great beyond, which I think is somewhere near St. Louis. -Dorian
For a leftover, they sure did wait to within the final year to begin implementing the sword and swordplay into TDP!
Nowhere is the forging of the Keeper Novice sword mentioned. We know not how it was created in that universe, but we do know that there are strange things that happen outside the Glyph magic, where the Hammerites accidentally find their forged tools blessed by the Builder, learn how to repeat it, even if they don't understand it, and bless other items from then on. We know they practice alchemy and discover new materials to work with. There's no precedent whatsoever for a magic-less world with no roots in the worlds of Tolkien and fantastical legends of King Arthur, as well as the future strangeness of Jack Vance and the strange fantasy of Leiber and Lovecraft, and the many RPGs and CRPGs rooted in the same.
Regarding something that only includes the sword, the LGS games were never meant to be any sort of reality simulator, never beholden to our real history while stealing from it liberally, and the strongest sense of realism I got from playing the games is the one thing many people who never noticed it in their own playstyles want removed.
And for combat in general, which is where I thought Thief went pretty far as it was:
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March 14, 1997The new combat system design has been firmed up and we're sending our maneuver list to the motion capture studio.
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June 6, 1997Jon's got the first cut at his AI speech system running. With all AI's currently using a tuneless whistling as their idling noise, and sounds not attenuating in volume according to distance, our levels sound a lot like some sort of twisted piece of concept performance art. Mahk has started work on bow combat, only to discover that our 3D arrow model is oriented pointing backwards. Which looks a little funny shooting away from you.
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June 20, 1997Warren's minions in our Austin office got basic spherical-object physics in, so objects can collide with each other. Mahk wasted no time setting up our first bow combat system. Doug revisited the outer space rendering code from System Shock and got in starry night skies. He also prototyped our footstep sounds, so you can now hear enemies coming (and vice versa). Briscoe got AI's hooked up to Jon's speech system, so they bark out appropriate guard-like phrases when they begin to detect you. He also implemented some new behaviors for non-combatants (sleeping, fleeing, general helplessness).
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December 12, 1997Chris, in his guise as physics guy is getting doors in this week, much to the joy of designers everywhere. Tom is in the final stages of getting our scripting language together, which will really unblock our upcoming (mid-January) gameplay prototype. Many correspondents have noted that our current "gameplay" movie is heavy on bow combat and light on thievery: the simple reason is that bow combat is just about the easiest part of our game to implement. The next month or two will be when we really get into the meat of the gameplay, with lockpicking and pickpocketing mechanics coming on line, plus hand-to-hand combat, and AI and scripting support for more interesting creature behaviors.
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March 6, 1998Chris is working on the player-character body physics, which is all wrapped up in implementing crouching, crawling, impact whiplashes in combat, maybe leaning, eventually climbing ... basically all movement and maneuver modes where the PC doesn't move like a tank. A side effect of this is that it's really easy to loosen the player-character's neck until his head bobbles around and you get seasick. Can't argue with fun like that. -Tim
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April 3, 1998Doug, who's basically in charge of the combat code and much of the combat design, has lit a fire under the rest of us to finally deal with guards' speech in combat (instead of just when they suspect you're around and such, which we've already ironed out pretty well). This led to much deliberation by all involved and yet another thankless writing task for Laura, who gets to write a bunch of stuff which (except for the blustery, verbose Hammer Priests) is 80% variations on "Ha!" "Uh!" and "Oh!" There's more to making any sense out of a job like that than you'd think, so feel free to send her treats. -Tim
bukary on 28/3/2013 at 08:47
Quote Posted by jtr7
Few get the perfect game they want, but at least most of the fans have one or more missions that hit on all personal cylinders.
I agree with you, jtr7. It's just that if we can't have both tools - the sword and the dagger - I'd rather have the latter.
jtr7 on 28/3/2013 at 08:48
I can understand that, I will miss the greater interaction, though. If he's not ever dealing with something like Hand Mages or wood nymphs and thistleaids, if he's not facing down flora and fauna in general as obstacles or threats, wooden barriers (lids and planks), slashing ropes holding things, and has no handy tool for them, it'll be something to bring back in T5 with all the foundational assets already built at that point. That is, if the situation with SE doesn't screw future titles out of T4 assets, sold off to another company, like what screwed us out of more System Shock and hindered source code releases.
Also, more than one Robin Hood story were inspirations for Garrett, too, but the undetection principles are in direct conflict with that of the flashy highwayman robbing a coach of rich nobles of their gold and goods, and being a master swordsman when confronting the Sheriff of Truartham.
Alexander3 on 28/3/2013 at 12:59
Thief was great due to the various gameplay options it left the player. The sword was a favorite of mine, next to the smooth action of the bow. Thief was one of the few FPS games to implement a sword and do it well. It may not be a "true" thief experience, but it was always nice to have.
It would have been cool if you had the option to leave it behind when choosing equipment or substitute it for the dagger. If you abhorred using it against other humans there were always the monsters and other baddies. Having to pick at an enemy with the dagger in Thief 3 is something I really didn't like. It looked stupid.
Will they even have the blackjack in Thief 4? Or will they implement some kind of stupid choking or knock out maneuver like in splinter cell?
thiefessa on 28/3/2013 at 13:32
Quote Posted by Alexander3
Will they even have the blackjack in Thief 4?
The blackjack is confirmed, yes.
If you choose to take the fighting/combat approach you'll be challenged by both the guards and the environment/level design - people are certainly going to react to your behavior!
Fans will be happy to hear that old school style melee combat is still there like the classic Thief games, and it's just as challenging.
