Brodo Swaggins on 14/2/2021 at 22:34
Hi all
Longtime lurker, first-time poster. I'm a journalist who covers live entertainment, but am angling to write more about gaming. It's been 21 years since TMA released - old enough for its first legal drink - and one story I’m pitching to PC Gamer, Polygon, RPS, etc is a retrospective on Thief FMs. A rundown of 21 missions that cover the last two decades, along with insight from the authors themselves, speaking to the rich and vibrant legacy of our favorite pilferer. As such, I wanted to drop the community a line, and ask a few questions.
I'm digging through many threads and combing the old CoSaS archives, not just for the "Best" missions, but the most important ones: the ones that were influential, groundbreaking, or otherwise noteworthy, even if they didn't fully cohere. Also of interest: the vital community members at various points, even if they weren't/aren't known for particular missions. Initial lists are below.
I’d be particularly grateful to hear people’s thoughts on the following questions, if you have any to share:
1) What am I missing? Any missions that have become community favorites/must-plays in recent years?
2) Who am I missing? Who are the people behind the magic? Who might be interested in chatting with a journo about Thief?
3) Anything feel out of place, like it shouldn't be on these lists? Some is culled from posts & reviews 20 years ago. Remember, I’m not just looking for “Best” I’m looking for Important, too.
4) Any overlooked ‘gems’? Missions that might not have gotten the fancy community coverage at the time but that I should check out alongside obvious hits?
Many thanks in advance. I’ve been playing Thief since I found the demo on a 1998 PC GAMER demo disk (remember those?), and am stoked to highlight some of the incredible work done by fans in the years since.
MISSION SHORTLIST
Lord Edmund Entertains!
Autumn in Lampfire Hills/ Calendra's Cistern/Calendra's Legacy
Bloodstone Prison
The Inverted Manse
Benny’s Dead
Keeper of the Prophecies
Equilibrium
Rose Cottage
CoSaS (Gathering at the Inn/Mission X)
The 7th Crystal
Ranstall Keep
A Thief’s Holiday
T2X
Ominous Bequest/Broken Triad
Rowena’s Curse/Seven Sisters
Rocksbourg series
Deceptive Perception(s)
L’Arsene
Drymian Codex
Dracula/Bathory
Death’s Cold Embrace
Godbreaker
Cracks in the Glass
Sound of a Burrick in a Room
Into the Odd
Endless Rain
FM Authors/community pillars thru the years:
Purah
Kung Fu Gecko
Loanstar
Saturnine
Digital Nightfall
Lady Rowena
Eshaktaar
Random_Taffer
Yandros
Komag
Skacky
john9818a on 14/2/2021 at 22:54
I'd like to say that every mission has contributed something to the TTLG community and to the gameplay experience, but one of my all time favorites is Transitions in Chaos pt 1: Conspiracies in the Dark by Ramirez Old Fat Burrick.
downwinder on 14/2/2021 at 23:00
lady rowena missions,seven sisters/etc
skacky on 14/2/2021 at 23:24
I would say Disorientation is a lot more influential/memorable than my two missions you cited, it almost single-handedly shaped the landscape for fan missions for the past decade after a decade dominated by mansions/single location missions. I would also mention Hidden Agenda and especially Heist Society by AsyluM as two expertly made missions. More recently, The Scarlet Cascabel also deserves an accolade.
trefoilknot on 14/2/2021 at 23:37
I would say Haplo should be included as someone who, more-or-less singlehandedly, defined the puzzle genre of Thief FMs. I'd also say nicked should be included on this list; he's been prolific over an extended period, and all of his recent missions (as in, within the last 10 years) have been exceptionally good. (not to mention, his tutorial which is bookmarked on almost every dromeder's browser.)
marbleman on 14/2/2021 at 23:46
Ha, a year or so ago I wanted to do something similar but never even started. It's amazing to see someone more determined tackling this. :D
Maybe you can use something from the notes I made back then. My idea of the FM retrospective was supposed to follow this plan:
- The Beginning: Gathering at the Bar, Dromed being made public, and the early FM scene
- Calendra's Legacy and other most influential FMs.
- The beginning of heavy custom resource use (After Vigil released his texture pack, those textures were probably used more than stock ones; also, Christine is the author who, I believe, made the most custom objects, which have since then appeared in numerous missions)
- Thief 2X and its 5 years of development
- Other megacampaigns: CoSaS, Hammerite Imperium, Death's Cold Embrace
- The Dark Mod
- NewDark and other support that OMs got: patchers, HD mods
- FM design trends (This can be a retrospective of its own! A few examples of what I was going to include here: as skacky already said, the mid-2000s were rich with Victorian mansion heists, but in the last decade, city missions became more popular; it was an acutal trend at one point to create key-hunt missions -- basically open-ended levels that required finding keys in a specific order to unlock previously locked areas; finally, an oddball topic this, but it was quite popular, for example, to use System Shock 2 resources or to set missions in space at one time)
- Contest mission retrospective
It's definitely worth talking about Gathering at the Bar as the very first FM that convinced Looking Glass to make DromEd public. The scene was going more or less steadily until Calendra's Legacy happened. That's what I would call the most influential single-release mission: it shook the FM scene to its core and raised the bar immensely. Thief 2X was the next biggest thing, and to this day, it remains one of the greatest accomplishments of Thief modders because it's a full-blown campaign with a massive production value. Around the same time, custom resources started appearing more and more. The Rocksbourg missions were some of first heavily customized FMs with a very distinct look. For the next 5-7 years, the FM scene had its "golden age" as it has seen the largest number of missions released per year, including some of the fan-favorites like Broken Triad, Seven Sisters, and Mission X. Alas, by the time NewDark came out, the number of missions started declining. Still, even though we don't get so many FMs today, modern FMs are some of the most high-quality ones. In fact, almost half of my all-time favorite FMs come from the two 20th Anniversary Contests.
fortuni on 15/2/2021 at 00:02
the last couple of years, especially 2020, has been an extraordinary period for FMs. Since the advent of Newdark author have not only been able to make bigger missions, they have been able to pack their missions with very much more detailed textures, build more complex cities, use almost unlimited custom objects and more, but recently authors seem to have taken that even further with a slew of superb missions that just weren't possible before Newdark I suspect.
Recent such missions include
Ascend the Dim valley
Catacomb of Knoss
Whistling of the Gears
Lost among the Forsaken
Scarlet Cascabel
Violent End of Duncan Malveine
Into the Odd
The Builder Paradise
Malazar's Inscrutable Tower
Patriot
Nosferatu 2
Loser
Cracks in the Glass
Other authors that I think were also influential include
Andrea Aleotti, the master of monster sized maps
Apache
Gaëtane
JIS
Belboz
Soul Tear
Renault on 15/2/2021 at 05:15
@Brodo - Thanks for showing an interest in the community here. Back in 2005ish, there was a petition started to convince Ion Storm to release an editor for Thief Deadly Shadows. The original site for the petition included a history of Dromed and FMs up to that point. I (sorta) tried to preserve it, hopefully there's some good info there for ya:
(
http://www.southquarter.com/thiefpetition/dromed.php)
I'll add that I think Komag was really influential in growing the community here, back in the early days. Not just as an author (he was that too), but in the contests he ran in the early 2000s that got people interested in making missions and learning the editor. Also, his Dromed tutorial was the gold standard for years for newcomers wanting to dabble in making FMs.
(
http://www.southquarter.com/komag/)
downwinder on 15/2/2021 at 08:11
cardia's mission melancholic in porto and FTM are some of the best realism mission series out there
and bbb makes some of the best traveling/journey missions i played = three crowns/mighty joe young,lord matt,short nights work,lady lisa harbor
and yes jis had some of the most unique missions = elevator series/etc
also haplo,apache,schwaa,basso71,beltzer,Christine,Dark Assassin,DarthsLair,Drysils Chosen,Balboa,Eternauta,Gaëtane,Grzegorz Lukawski,Spitter,Ottoj55,HipBreaker,John9818a,John-the-begger,DrK,Morrgan,Master of Dromed,DarkMax,AntiMatter_16,Naks,Nameless Voice,Niborius,Nicked,Nightshifter,P forth,eepcat,Robin Collier,Ramirez's old fat Burrick,Random_Taffer,Eshaktaar,RiCh,Robin G,Schattengilde,Shadowspawn=long live lord fishkill,GORT=one of the best,Silencium18,Sliptip,Soul Tear,Spoonman,intruder,Sterlino=horns of canzo series,Belboz,Sensut=legendary,Terra,Ricebug,The Dude,The Independent Thief,TheImmortalThief,Theker,Thorin Oakenshield,Gumdrop,Trefoilknot=Triptych on Infinity, Act I: Heist at Hilbert's Highrise Hotel,Turi Robert,Uncadonego,William the Taffer=Father Hirvakia's Portal series,Xorak=Zealot's Hollow,first small map with massive depth,Yandros =legend,Zappenduster,Zontik=legend,and many more
thehardyboyz on 15/2/2021 at 10:32
It's always difficult to sort out some FMs and authors, and your list seems totally revelant.
I'd personnaly add :
- The Scarlett Cascabel, which won the contest in which entered The Sound of a Burrick in a Room which you mentionned (another gem!) - Its V2 is to me the most immersive mission ever, along with Broken Triad which you mentionned as well
- Heist Society
- Hidden Agenda
- A Smuggler's Request & The Art of Thievery from RiCh which are old but still gold to me
- bbb's work is amazing too, with Three Crowns as his absolute best so far. His missions are true journeys !