Llama on 9/7/2013 at 02:54
Quote Posted by Flavia
but they certainly had some issues (plot holes bigger than Garrett's pockets, for one)
What plot holes?
Stillwater Giant on 9/7/2013 at 04:12
@operativex
Just thought I would say that I recently beat the first two Thief games for the first time and I would consider them to both be masterpieces.
Even to this day they have the best and most advanced stealth gameplay and the levels are huge and complex and very well designed.
In TDP there aren't that many bad or action focused missions i guess escape and strange bedfellows would qualify for action focused and are IMO the only bad levels in the game.
In Thief 2 IMO the only bad level is sabotage at soulforge and while I thought Casing the Joint was pretty good it was annoying to have to play the same level twice in a row.
I have to disagree with you about Thief 4 it is very obvious that they are dumbing it down what with focus mode,mini map,what they have done to the combat and the fact that the AI only attack you one at a time,cinematic take downs, the fact that you can only use the claw at certain times.
It's pretty likely that I'm forgetting some stuff as well and because they are obviously dumbing down the game this means it is very unlikely that the level deign will be as complex either and I wouls also be surprised if they don't add quest arrows.
As well as this I also don't like that fact that Garrett now looks like an emo and that the pagans,hammerites and keepers aren't in the game.
SeriousCallersOnly on 9/7/2013 at 04:23
A example of a new thiaf fan people!
Chade on 9/7/2013 at 04:50
Wow! Operativex must be some kind of genius if he foresaw thief 4 all the way back in 2004 when he registered his account here!
SeriousCallersOnly, you wouldn't happen to be able to tell me how he accomplished this superhuman feat, would you? Is this something I can do too?
operativex on 9/7/2013 at 05:53
Quote Posted by Specter
@operativex
I feel you either left out, or do not appreciate, the subtleties of Thief as made by Looking Glass. In that way, you look favorably on the new game for superficial reasons and call them similarities. Its like telling a Border Collie owner that your Chihuahua is the same: fur, tongue hanging out, it even barks!
Fair enough. I was focusing on the core elements of thief such as stealth infiltration and theft (which thief is the grand daddy of) which from what I saw of the E3 footage seems to be at the heart of this new game.
Darkness_Falls on 9/7/2013 at 06:53
I'm sad I read the OP. I thought for sure I was still finding loot and secrets after 10 years of playing those old games... seeing shadows that actually worked for cover... seeing realistic stealth gameplay (which no other game can do)... using rope arrows that could be shot into any wood surface... emergent gameplay galore... navigating water that was swimmable... exploring huge, non-linear levels ... but it turns out these things are not real... not done as well as I thought... not as good other games. My rose-tinted glasses have obscured the truth all these years; and for this I am sad. I've been living in a lie. The truth is somewhere out there. Games have evolved to have much better stealth, level design, intricacies and exploration. I will remove these glasses that make the world look so graciously beautiful and finally see the true gaming gems that I have been missing out on all these years; some of the newer great stealth masterpieces that leave T1 and T2 in antiquated dust! *Runs off to the store to buy a bunch of newer games that know how to do stealth and exploration right!*. And, thankfully, it's a given that Thief 4 will be spectacular -- I have nothing to worry about -- simply because it's 2013/2014, not 1998/2000. Time has a way of innately making things better.
Shinrazero on 9/7/2013 at 06:53
Welcome to the boards, operativex. As others have pointed out, you'll be hard pressed to find people that would share many of your views but varying opinions makes it interesting. I've heard the rose tinted glasses argument. EM presently employs the "nostalgia" line of reasoning in their design decisions, can't let nostalgia get in the way. This reasoning may work in other situations but I feel it doesn't quite fit Thief. The thing is, myself and others still play this game on a regular basis. If we are not playing, we are busy developing fantastic new content, rooting through the game files for information of the beaten path, and discussing the intricacies of the series with other taffers. Thief is the greatest game I have ever played and it perseveres! Every game I play, regardless of genre, I hope will capture the same feeling I get when playing Thief.
As far as nuthief goes, some are cautiously optimistic, others have varying levels of dislike. Me personally, I'm not pleased with anything they've shown. When Stephen Russell was not recast, that was the hardest blow for me. His absence is downplayed at times, but everyone has massive respect for him. Dan Thron too although he isn't brought up as much, he'll not be returning either :mad: I do not like the additions they're adding. The zombie hands are distracting, as are the shadowy edges. I think the effort into making the game accessible to broad audiences dilutes the experience. Sure they say you can toggle the training wheels but to what extent, we don't fully know, I think it doesn't really matter. Their efforts could be better spent advancing the stealth genre, they have the blue prints from the past three games! Yet, it seems they are playing it safe with the same features you see in just about every AAA game nowadays. It really makes me upset as a fan of this series.
At any rate, again, welcome to the boards!
auricgoldfinger on 9/7/2013 at 06:55
Quote Posted by operativex
I think many people here are looking back at those old games with rose-tinted glasses. They are not masterpieces by any means (though T2 comes close), but more like yesterday's neat experimental FPS ala Mirrors Edge (great concept, but has it's flaws).
Funny you should say that. I think both Mirror's Edge and Thief 1 are masterpieces, for similar reasons, including their 'experimental' nature.
The perception of Thief 1 as lacking stealth gameplay is just wrong. It's stealthy (and burling-ly) from start to finish, it just had a 'skin' of fighting zombies or wotnot that you can superficially take for it being not about thieving. I liked the weirdness and the twist of it not being all about robbing vanilla targets like Bafford's Manor or First City Bank. There isn't a game world like Thief and i loved spending time in it.
Thief 2 was less fun to me for the non-threatening robots that went around like wind-up toys, the really aggravating turrets, and the more vanilla burglary targets, the less well executed cutscenes, and the main villain who only got interesting in the very last level (which was Stephen Russell entirely), but before that was hard to take seriously.
Thief 3 I'm still progressing through.
I'm probably not a die-hard Thief player and very different to some other people on here, even though I love the first game, I've played through the campaign exactly 1 and a half times (the half is because I couldn't find the last piece of loot on the haunted cathedral level on expert mode, and refused to look it up). I like the gameplay but I'm not a huge sucker for it or able to find it interesting over and over again. If there isn't a story to distract me I'm done with it. Same with Mirror's Edge, a game that has zero replay value to me. Taking Thief gameplay to the next level seems to be about mastering the map more than mastering the mechanics, and i don't care to see the same scenery over and over. If there were a Thief game with randomly generated maps, perhaps it could get interesting for me enough want to keep replaying it.
Quote:
IMO people saying that this new game is "TOTALLY DIFFERENT" from the previous thief games are being overly dramatic. It's very much a thief game. I mean, all the classic Thief mechanics are there: hiding in the shadows, water arrows, rope arrows, clubbing people in the back of the head (albeit in a more cinematic way, but it's essentially the same thing), stealing loot, pick pocketing, lock picking, etc basically everything you could have done in the previous thief games but now more.
This, I agree with.
operativex on 9/7/2013 at 14:25
Quote Posted by Darkness_Falls
I'm sad I read the OP. I thought for sure I was still finding loot and secrets after 10 years of playing those old games... seeing shadows that actually worked for cover... seeing realistic stealth gameplay (which no other game can do)... using rope arrows that could be shot into any wood surface... emergent gameplay galore... navigating water that was swimmable... exploring huge, non-linear levels ... but it turns out these things are not real... not done as well as I thought... not as good other games. My rose-tinted glasses have obscured the truth all these years; and for this I am sad. I've been living in a lie. The truth is somewhere out there. Games have evolved to have much better stealth, level design, intricacies and exploration. I will remove these glasses that make the world look sograciously beautiful and finally see the true gaming gems that I have been missing out on all these years; some of the newer great stealth masterpieces that leave T1 and T2 in antiquated dust! *Runs off to the store to buy a bunch of newer games that know how to do stealth and exploration right!*. And, thankfully, it's a given that Thief 4 will be spectacular -- I have nothing to worry about -- simply because it's 2013/2014, not 1998/2000. Time has a way of innately making things better.
Sounds like you never played Skyrim before, best "Thief'" game ever made. 100x more places to infiltrate, more loot, fully explorable, etc.
Vivian on 9/7/2013 at 14:50
Or minecraft. Or stalker. or FO3. Or even Crysis. 'Freeform exploration' is one area of games that has very definitely surpassed the original Thief's by now, and I must admit I didn't even realise it was such a big part of them? The huge levels are lovely, but you are there for a purpose. You're not just wondering about for the hell of it, trying to survive etc.
