Yesterday afternoon found me at my desk with the vague expression of a lobotomy patient or a recreational user of thorazine. If a passerby had said “whatcha thinking about?” I’d have said, “Nothin’,” which was better than the truth. I was really thinking about narwhals, and Kate Beckinsale. I rarely think of narwhals, since they don’t usually impinge on my day. Kate Beckinsale is a more frequent mental guest, though not one I typically associate with narwhals – or, indeed, with any marine life. Then, because I hate myself, this reverie was interrupted by The Other Voice: “No wonder that Thief article is four days late, you’re so busy there.” God damned Inner Guilt.
Being a couple days late on a game nobody expects much from isn’t a big deal, but yesterday had been a bad day – and I’ve been late on stuff a lot recently, and kinda kicking myself for not having as much time to write like I did, and the usual. Something about the day made an otherwise innocuous deadline push feel like a double helping of Ennui Cake topped by the Scrotum-Pulverizingly Judgmental Cherry of Self-Loathing. Fortunately, my mood was about to improve dramatically.
Didn’t seem that way at first. I sat in a ball of grroawrr, thinking that death was probably the answer, until Outlook plorked and handed me a message from one “Amy Louise.”
It was a query to run an unsolicited article. I hate query letters.
We get them often.
“Will TaprRepedatly piublsh kids atroiocles? Im ate and i lijke mylittle pony. Her is my artcle on me favrotizotest ponsy int he poiny patch. Thasnk yuou!”
Okay, they’re not all that bad, but only a few have met our editorial standards. This Amy Louise character didn’t have history on her side. In fact, I was so ready for the punctuational wasteland I usually get that her email didn’t register as English right away.
This isn’t in English, I thought. Why would the subject be in English and the messa-ohhhhh.
Look, under no circumstances will I guarantee to run unsolicited work, but if you’d like to try your luck, Amy Louise could teach a master’s course in how to maximize your chances. Gracious, structured, grammatically perfect queries are a good start. Everyone loves compliments, and being able to demonstrate familiarity with our site going back to Four Fat Chicks days, as she did, well… it can’t hurt. She also revolutionized the concept of article writing by actually writing the article she wanted us to publish (no. You’d be amazed how many don’t).
An article which, to my Inner Guilt’s scream of rage, happened to be a sharp, fizzy word-cocktail of a debut, equal parts attitude, knowledge, and thermonuclear passion for the Thief universe argued with lawyerly precision and offering plenty of chances for great discussion below.
Thief disciple, Morrowind fan, Dishonored appreciator, good writer, and likes our site? Forget the unsolicited article, at this point I’m wondering about her position on unsolicited marriage proposals.
Very rarely, it becomes necessary for me to make an executive decision immediately, without any time to build some web of deceit by which Gregg appears responsible if the decision is wrong. When that happens I just have to do my best and hope I’ve made the right call.
So in the end, I have to sigh and accept that I can’t lead our Thief coverage under the byline of an unsolicited writer. It’s not quality, or opinions, it’s… politics, I guess. Such a big commercial game, with such a long history at this site; it would look bad to start off that way, no matter what the quality of the actual work. As a debut for Tap’s new staff writer, though, it fits quite nicely.
The fact that she wasn’t seeking and didn’t precisely even want that job… well. Details.
Please welcome the Thiefy stylings of Amy “Official Byline To Be Decided But For Now We’re Going With Amy Louise” Louise, a UK-born psychotherapist with a hell of keyboard, profound love of Rope Arrows, and a gaming timeline that goes back to the ZX Spectrum. She says stuff like “I’m not a professional writer,” but I’d take those protests salted. I’m miles behind in Thief anyway, and I know plenty of people who want to get talking about it now. (Meho! I got your Steam text, and I invoke thee, come forth!) Me, I’ve got more skulking to do, and I’m definitely looking forward to some contributions from our new team member. Everybody say hello… if possible, in slightly warmer tones than the remote “at times Tap will consider unsolicited work from industry professionals” that she got from me before I read her article. I was much friendlier later!
Amy Louise! Make with the thieving!
—Steerpike
Impressions: Thief 2014
By Amy Louise
I’m going to start by putting my cards on the table: I love the Thief franchise. I am in no way an unbiased reviewer. This series cast a huge shadow (pun, er, intended?) over my impressionable adolescent years, and Garrett holds the dubious honour of being my favourite ever video game character – perhaps even favourite character, full stop. The revival of the franchise represents a deep emotional investment for me, as it opens up the possibility of all those sacrosanct childhood memories being sullied by an inferior instalment. How melodramatic, you might exclaim! But honestly, for me – and I suspect many other hardcore fans – there was a lot riding on this one.
Despite that, I was determined to give Thief a fair shake, even with reports of headshot bonuses, quick-time events and interviews showcasing developers who expressed a desire to move Thief more towards (cringe) Assassins Creed territory. Thankfully, the general outcry in response was successful in altering that artistic trajectory, as Thief turned out to be far more faithful to its genre roots than I’d first feared.
A quick note on hardware and performance – I’m running a fairly old system (2007), and my Intel Core 2 Quad 9550 2.83Ghz with Radeon HD 4870 is starting to look a little elderly. If I crank the settings up to max I get significant lag. Turning off the shinier graphical treats and lowering the textures to medium ensures a more stable performance, although my framerate drops the more NPCs happen to be around. I assume most PC gamers will have a better system than mine, however, and no-one I know has experienced crashes or any other serious problems.
Anyhow, despite having opened on the positive note of the game’s fidelity to the stealth genre, the first entry on my checklist is the one I feel lets Thief down the most – its swing-and-miss interpretation of its protagonist. Garrett’s great draw has always been his personality, both in his obvious traits and the more surprising ones we catch only tantalising glimpses of. In Dark Project and Metal Age, this was achieved solely through Stephen Russell’s iconic voice acting. The fact that we were never given more than a shadowed hint of our protagonist’s face only fuelled the importance of his narration. Russell’s Garrett is cynical, jaded, selfish and shamelessly materialistic, but his sardonic wit and dark humour make him impossible to dislike. Throw in the occasional glimpse of compassion – his sincere comfort of a Pagan agent on the edge of death in MA11, or his reaction to the news Viktoria has launched a suicidal attack on Karras (“No!”) – and you have the foundation of an antihero who continues to make “greatest character of all time” shortlists sixteen years after he burst (slunk?) onto the scene.
While undoubtedly a talented stunt artist and actor, the problem with Nu Garrett’s VA Romano Orzari is that while he does a passable imitation of Russell’s tone, the warmth and humour of Classic Garrett is entirely missing, and without it he’s just a po-faced dullard wearing eyeliner and a corset. Honestly, I could forgive all the black nail polish in the world if the personality was right. I don’t really care what Garrett wears; I care how he sounds and feels, and Nu Garrett is all style and no substance. According to this interview on Eurogamer the reason for the change was that the same actor was needed for both mocap and audio in order to make the cutscenes more streamlined and natural. My response would be to point to Bioshock Infinite’s Elizabeth, who was nominated for both Hardcore Gamer’s best new character and Destructoid’s best character in 2013, despite having three separate actors – one for mocap, one for facial design, and Courtnee Draper as VA. In any case, as many of Nu Garrett’s lines are delivered in first person, the consistency argument seems moot. My main disappointment is that it could easily have been so much better – I was really surprised to hear such clichéd and lacklustre dialogue coming from Garrett’s mouth, particularly with the acclaimed Rhianna Pratchett on board the writing team. Maybe they thought biting observations on potential marks’ décor and literary collections didn’t fit with their character’s gothic redesign. Whatever the reason, it’s a real shame.
I’ll freely admit I’m making guesses here, but by watching various developer interviews and browsing through the official art book, I feel like the design team were more interested in creating their own character than sticking to a faithful recreation of Garrett. And that’s natural – when you’re in a creative job, you want to create, not be constrained by the boundaries of long-past titles. But if that was the case, this really should have been an original project and not a continuation of a franchise. Any fears of poor interest in such a project should have been allayed by the critical reception to Dishonored, a beautifully made standalone love-letter to the genre classics that suffers nothing from being an open homage. But with Thief, it feels like the main point of the franchise association was to cash in on its fanbase, and that’s a bitter pill to swallow.
This theory is further supported by the baffling removal of the City’s most recognisable factions – namely the Pagans, Hammerites and Keepers. I understand that the developers wanted to inject some new blood into the old worldspace, and I agree – social and political upheaval in the City was an unexplored theme in previous titles, as was the seldom-mentioned Baron – but the new can work alongside the old without replacing it entirely. The existing factions don’t have to be the centre of the plot – they’ve all had their day in the sun – but to leave them out completely just seems weird, like making a Star Wars movie without the Force. These are the things that lend uniqueness and character to the City. The Pagans, Hammerites and Keepers are brightly coloured threads in the tapestry of Thief’s mythology, and though they were only part of a greater whole, without them the resulting product feels that little bit more drab and generic.
That doesn’t mean lessons haven’t been learned, however. The previous titles aren’t immune to criticism, and one of the big complaints of Deadly Shadows was the absence of the steam/clockpunk-plus-magic element that made the City’s design so unique. Thief has scrapped Deadly Shadows’ pseudo-medieval veneer in favour of pseudo-Victorian, and in my opinion it’s a huge improvement. The frustratingly ineffectual climbing gloves have also been ditched, with a return to rope arrows that will surely draw a sigh of relief from long-time players. The huge increase in customisable gameplay elements also seems to be a direct result of the backlash against Deadly Shadows’ restrictions – Thief generously allows you to turn off the light gem, loot glint, map markers, guard hostility indicators and a whole host of other options that when coupled with the unforgiving Master difficulty make this game a truly challenging experience. Here, at least, the spirit of the franchise is carefully preserved – the biggest rewards in terms of achievements are skewed towards ghosting rather than violence. But while Altair impersonations aren’t exactly encouraged, the developers have successfully implemented bloodier pathways for those who prefer them without any cost to those who don’t. I generally choose to ghost, but even I can’t resist the occasional takedown. The aerial ones are my favourite; there’s something amazingly satisfying about drop-jacking a hapless guard from a roof beam like some kind of murderous Brandon Lee bird spider.
The PC controls are intuitive and easy to use, with full keymapping options for any who wish to make changes (I typically swap the jump/use buttons because years of Elder Scrolls games have given me an ingrained ‘spacebar = activate’ muscle memory). To my pleasant surprise, I noticed that my changes were reflected by the in-game alerts – Skyrim, learn from this! – so that when the game helpfully tells me to press ‘E’ to mantle, I’m not going to smash an empty bottle into my own face instead. The dodging function during fights is also a fun and genre-appropriate addition, and gives you a trick up your sleeve beyond ‘run awayyyyy’ during combat. The ease of control means that when you find yourself a good route, the exhilarating rush of haring pell-mell through alleyways and across rooftops feels like Mirror’s Edge took a lesson in steampunk.
Just when you think you might fall in love, however, the game bitchslaps you with an infuriatingly pointless lasso designed to keep you firmly railroaded to its preferred route. It’s like the Apple of open play. “Sure, you can try anything you like, but if it’s not the way we want, we’re going to make your life really f***ing hard.” Windows and doors occasionally shut behind you like coffin lids, leaving no way to return and explore the area beyond the loading zone you’ve just unwittingly crossed. Rope arrows, while initially delighting me with their welcome return, quickly proved to be usable only in carefully designated spots. Jumping/mantling is location-specific, leaving you ineffectually humping a waist-high barrier because there’s a super cool rooftop you really want to explore, but you’re not allowed to because that’s not the way we want you to go! The swooping mechanic, while delightful in its own right, should really have been a separate function instead of merging it with the jump key. It all adds up to a point when you realise this wonderful sweeping vista, with all the opportunity it promises, is actually a tight-laced laboratory maze and you are the mouse, expected to run the path that has been chosen for you. Once you’ve had that realisation, it’s hard to recapture your immersion.
Though I do have my laundry list of gripes as per above, there really are a whole host of things to love about Thief, and it’s a solidly enjoyable stealth game if you look at it as an original title. Considering it on those terms, I’d give it a good 7/10. But as an addition to the franchise…? I’m less decided. Metal Age’s plot was needlessly convoluted and Deadly Shadows was full of frustrating gameplay annoyances, but I could forgive them all because in the end, Garrett was such an infectious personality that I’d play anything if he was the protagonist. To me, that’s Thief 2014’s greatest failing, and one I simply can’t get past.
It’s nice to see such a well written and thoughtful article. I had briefly scratched the surface of the Thief franchise many moons ago, but time and the fact that my meathook hands lacked the dexterity to use intricate controls meant I soon became a console kid. Nevertheless, it’s wonderful to see so much passion from someone who has dedicated time to playing the new version. I suspect, from what Amy says, the type of gameplay and characterisation now is focussed toward the console generation, who are now used to, and feel comfortable with, something along the Assassins Creed/Arkham Batman games, combining stealth with action and placing a heavy emphasis on open world play. Interesting that a prescribed path seems to feature so highly when I thought Thief would be far more open. There is nothing more frustrating than having a huge world and so much of it roped off (see L.A. Noire). Overall, a fantastic article, and I’m willing to give Thief another go.
At the risk of sounding like a Fallout fan (eek!), it doesn’t sound like a “real” Thief game at all. But, given the helpful description above, it still sounds like something I can pick up cheap in the Steam sale and get reasonable enjoyment from. Useful information – thanks!
First, thanks so much again to Steerpike for his kind indulgence of suspiciously keen strangers throwing Word documents in his lap. As a long-time reader and admirer of Tap, I’m thrilled at the chance to be part of the team. Maybe I should be this pushy more often?
Bane – I actually feel this latest instalment has been far more inclusive and careful towards PC gamers than Deadly Shadows was; the sheer amount of customisation is testament to that, as is the (evidently thoroughly play-tested) interface and control system. I probably should have made it clearer that while I’ve expressed my opinions in a rather definitive manner, this is very definitely an Impressions piece and not a full review, as I’ve only completed the first four missions. I’m happy to be proven wrong as my playthrough progresses, and I suspect the perceived linearity is one of the things I was too hasty in condemning. I’m not actually opposed to the linearity in and of itself – the first games were by no means sandboxes – I think what actually annoyed me was the bloody-mindedness of its implementation. A crate on one side of an alley is mantleable, but an identical one thee yards away is not. Your appetite is whetted by the aerial dash in the intro, but when you’re out in the world only 5% of rooftops are reachable. I started to feel like every time my gaze wandered where the game didn’t want it to go, some immersion-breaking foghorn of an obstacle would grab my chin and force my head back in the ‘right’ direction. This seems to be more of a problem with the side quests between missions, as by their nature they are supposed to less linear than the main story-driven chapters.
Also, I need to reiterate that I’m exclusively discussing the PC version here. I did get a chance to play the PS4 version at a very fun lock-in event at my local GAME, and it was met with a lot of approval by the console veterans (while I severely embarrassed myself by holding the controller like it was the offspring of SHODAN and Faust, before begging fruitlessly for a mouse and keyboard). I’d be interested to hear any console players’ experiences.
Amy is a few missions ahead of me, but my so-far briefer experience is similar to hers. The first several hours of Thief were gratifying, to say the least, insofar as part of me feared that I’d hate the game from the beginning, that they’d have misfired so badly it’d be impossible to give the game a fair chance. That was not the case – quite the opposite.
The sense of stealth, the stealing mechanics, and much of the foundation is reasonably solid and loyal to the franchise, and I really appreciate the retention of the body awareness (ie, Garrett has feet), which adds to a sense of stealth and place. To me, the biggest irritant so far has been the City’s nonsensical layout and narrow byways, which make navigation an unnecessary chore and cause the City portions of the game (as they were in Deadly Shadows) to be a lot less rich and enjoyable than they could be. And maybe because I’m suspicious of the game in general, I’m unthrilled by the lack of context in the early hours, which makes it sort of disorienting.
Some of the canon issues are more serious, but their impact on the game is likely going to vary by player. We can all agree, having played, that Eidos Montreal’s reasons for recasting Stephen Russell are bullshit – Garrett is barely mocapped, and while this new guy does pretty well with tone and cadence, the writers clearly never understood Garrett, or Thief, or the City, or the game’s tone.
The fascination of Garrett was always that he’s a thief, a criminal, a killer, and a selfish guy, yet you’re on his side, and you like him, and you’d like it if he liked you. His personality made him memorable. The one-liners and humor were an inherent part of who he was and what made him charming, and it was front and center in The Dark Project, from the moment he muses, “I wonder if he reads them, or if it’s just for show…?” At the same time, he was also very sinister, a dangerous man, capable of great violence or cruelty – he just didn’t revel in that stuff or present that side to others often.
Here it’s different. The writers make serious dialogue mistakes. Garrett comes off as more of a dick – arrogant and sometimes mean. He used to make jokes to amuse himself; now they’re bad one-liners. He knew he was the best so he never had to say it; now he evidently does. And for some strange reason, the writing makes me much more conscious of the fact that Garrett’s a thief in this game, and I find myself less on his side. The Bank Heist job rubbed me the wrong way… rob a bank? Fine. Steal a necklace, fine. But Garrett wouldn’t laugh about stealing a from an old lady who recently lost her husband and all her possessions in a fire. Garrett wouldn’t filch a pocketwatch that only had value to the dead man who’d received it as a retirement present, and whose family had specifically asked be kept in the bank because the fellow had so loved his job there. Garrett’s written by people who don’t understand him.
Other canon choices I can take or leave… I guess we’re just assuming that the last half of Deadly Shadows never happened. Maybe that’s for the best. The City’s complete transformation is unwelcome. And the Rope Arrows. Don’t get me started.
Welcome! It’s really nice to hear about this game from someone who knows Thief. I had heard a lot of disappointed mutterings, but… I’ve never played a Thief game. So I didn’t want to touch it.
IF I’ve never played Thief, should I try this, or look for the original?
Certainly in your case, AJ (which is to say, you have the requisite tech knowledge and won’t freak if it’s dated), I’d say it’d be worth your time to try Thief: The Dark Project. Many common shooter and sneaker elements innovated there, it has fantastic writing and voice acting, great level design, and though it looks and feels somewhat old, the gameplay doesn’t age much.
You’ll face some issues out of the gate…
-The installer errors out on NT kernels, use the -lgntforce switch at Run
-You may want to mod the game to increase the maximum resolution
-It’s unplayably fast on today’s CPUs, so you might need throttling or some alternative
Still, TDP is worth the effort. Still my favorite, by far, of the series, and the most indispensible. I suspect people who aren’t tied up in the old Thief lore will have fewer complaints about Thief 2014, though.
Steerpike, your description of Garrett’s attitude during the bank heist makes me sad. I can certainly see him stealing someone’s last penny if there’s gain enough in it for himself, but to actively crow over it? Or swipe a financially worthless sentimental trinket simply out of vindictiveness? That leaves such a bad taste in my mouth.
AJ, thanks for the welcome! I’m going to live on the edge by rubbing the editor the wrong way and disagreeing with him in my first day on the site – I think you should give Thief 2014 a spin first. Being a first-timer, the removal of a lot of old Thief lore obviously won’t hold you back from jumping straight in, and when the game hits its high points it’s hugely enjoyable and immersive. Selfishly, I’m also curious to know how someone with no investment in the franchise views the game. Even more fascinating, when you’re familiar with Garrett’s new personality, you can go back to the older titles and compare them in reverse to his original characterisation – a perspective I imagine few people on this site will have experienced! I’d love to hear how you measure the two against each other.
As for running Dark Project and Metal Age, I recommend shelling out £5 for them on GOG.com. They come pre-packaged to work on modern systems with a ready-made installer. I’m sure you’re perfectly capable of setting them up without that, but it’s nice to have the option. (I’m lazy as sin, sorry to say.)
FIRED
They are on GOG? I couldn’t remember and share the lazy trait, so I didn’t check. Yes, GOG. Much easier.
If you go with Thief 2014 first, AJ, it’ll offer an interesting perspective. So far (I should stress that), so far, it’s a 7/10, like Amy said, and assuming we think of a 7 as what that number really means versus an IGN 7. It’s really pretty. It plays nicely. It’s lengthy and feature-rich. It has one of the best options menus in the history of time. I haven’t seen any obvious bugs. As a sneaker, it’s tense and sneak-y. By all accounts it’s solid, and if it were the first of a franchise, it’d be a great foundation. The history complicates things, so approaching it without the history would be interesting.
Because the Rope Arrows, I swear to god.
Welcome aboard, Amy!
I tried to make an old CD-ROM of The Dark Project work on my computer ages ago and couldn’t get it to run quite right and gave up. Me and the first-person stealth genre have never clicked for some reason, despite my affection for stealth games in general. Maybe the GOG version is worth a look, though, if I won’t have to guess at whether or not I’m playing it as intended. As I recall, the last time I played I got through the first level and then promptly never played again for reasons I can’t remember.
Bahaha. I knew it was too good to be true!
I honestly think that Rope Arrows will go down as the biggest gaming cockblock of the year. I was so indecently excited to see their reappearance, and my face when I realised the extent of their uselessness was unfortunately reminiscent of a punched kitten.
Amanda, it would make an interesting experiment to see what wins in old school gameplay vs new sensibilities. I don’t think you’d get very far before saying, ‘sod this’, and going off to something else. I think these days they’d seem pretty sloggy and boring.
Amy, welcome and well done.
Well, finally we get some writers in here, instead of all the “Oh Dark Souls this and Dark Souls that” whiners. I’m a kidder!!! 🙂 🙂 🙂
Thanks everyone! I think I’ll actually try the new one, since obviously “it’s not a proper Thief game” isn’t going to hold me back. I guess it isn’t like the old games are going anywhere.
Fantastic review. Thanks for this.
I have “Thief: Gold” and “Thief Deadly Shadows” sitting in my (massive) Steam queue. I’ve always loved the idea of these games. Being a good friend of Steerpike’s for over 20 years, I kind of feel like I’ve played Thief before.
I did play “Dishonored” and loved it. So, these games might be right up my alley.
welcome!
sounds like they should have made a new stand alone game like dishonored
think I will pass
I know some people who thought “thief” was actually called:”I will murder you all if you see me”
just saying
Judging solely by how popular My Little Pony is in my household, if you wanted to increase readership, accepting unsolicited articles featuring said ponies might be a good idea. Actually no.
OK, now that I’ve gotten all (almost) of the silliness out of my system: thanks for a great impressions piece Amy. I’m torn on this one. I embrace wholeheartedly the gameplay and interface innovations that creative developers have come up with over the years between The Dark Project and, say, Dishonored. Generally speaking, those old first-person 3D games: Quake, Half-Life, Thief, etc. were doing well just to perfect the mouselook/WASD system. I don’t really miss those days. I like my stealth take-downs and contextual actions and what-have-you. To my mind they, by abstraction, help to remove the awkwardness of using our various input devices to actually move a character around in a 3D world.
That said, I’m extremely sensitive to tone in entertainment media. I’m not claiming any skill at knowing what works and what doesn’t. I’m just saying that I know what I like or don’t like when I see it. Based on Amy’s description of Garrett’s character, I’m inclined to think I’ll fall on the “don’t like” side of things.
Still, I am willing to give it a go with lowered expectations I could just pretend it’s called something else, after a sale of course, and oh crap I simply must finish Dishonored first.
Holy Impressions! This reads more like a review and your point about the writers dropping the ball on Garret’s personality and wit is well-taken. I loved the Thief games and their mechanics, but Garret’s observations and wit fueled my desire to finish each mission and to bull through the occasional frustration.
I could probably forgive the dropping of canon–that is, sometimes, the point of a reboot. This is New Thief, I guess. What I can’t forgive is dropping Garret’s personality and of (at least what sounds like) different paths of problem solving.
I look forward to reading more, Amy, and thank you for writing this!
Welcome Amy
It is great to see we have another staff writer who lives up to the Tap level in terms of thoughtful reflections and good writing.
I am a big fan of all the Thief games (also Elder Scroll games, the Fallouts, Dishonoured) and was looking forward to this game. When I heard what many people were saying about it prerelease, I felt disheartened. But based on your initial Impressions and Steerpikes’s also, I have decided to play it. But I will play it with a slightly different mindset–not the next Thief gave but a different Thief game. I am looking forward to it. I will download it tonight.
Looking forward to more of your contributions.
Kay
Great article! I hope you stay on the team, Amy, because you’ve certainly got the requisite combo of writing chops and earnest geekery.
I have never played the Thief series, because as cool as I know it is, I’m exactly the player that would set your eyes rolling. Throughout Dishonored, I waded in gore. The city had become a crumbling wasteland filled with rats and plague by the time I was halfway through. Had I rope arrows, I would be firing them into people’s heads and then yanking them toward me, chortling and making bad puns (“Stick around!”).
I know. It’s a failing.
However, knowing how much the Thief series means to some (cou-Steerpike–gh), I’m delighted that they at least didn’t ruin it. Sometimes a partial victory is enough; maybe it will pave the way for a better follow-up.
Anyway, well done, and welcome aboard!
-Marquez
@Marquez: Well, I’m sold. I’m now thinking about what kind of pun could accompany a fire arrow to the face.
…I’m now thinking about what kind of pun could accompany a fire arrow to the face.
“That’s hot.”
“BOOM! Headshot.”
“Bears with claws? Never heard of that.”
The last one probably isn’t a good fire arrow pun, but still.
That last one isn’t even a PUN, Steerpike.
Don’t tell my wife but I fell in love with Amy Louise after her first sentence. Specifically this part: *I love the Thief franchise.*
Yeah I’m easy.
As for this game, even though it’s installed, I think first I’m going to return to the original Thief again so I can play that wonderful mission with the horn. And then maybe I’ll play the others again too.
Ernest, I love Down In The Bonehoard too – the sound design for that level is so beautiful!
@Steerpike: I’m sticking with “That’s hot”. So simple, and yet so moving.
I so clearly remember the first time I played Down in the Bonehoard. One of my favorite missions as well – I always found Burricks vaguely adorable, too. I can see why Mrs. Ramirez kept some as pets. The eerie haunted/monster levels resonated with me as much as the more purist house-robbing ones. The Haunted Cathedral still makes me shiver. Who can forget the sense of accomplishment upon finding the Serpentyle Torc (and the sense of bladder-voiding terror watching that skele-homeowner come down the stairs)?
In case anyone’s missed it, Rock Paper Shotgun’s got a Game & Chat with Greg LoPiccolo and Randy Smith up now. Listening to those guys talk about the process is fascinating if you’re at all interested in game design. It’s easy to forget that until about three months before Thief shipped, they had no game. Practically none of the stealth systems worked, sound propagation wasn’t working correctly, nothing. Looking back it is such a study in bold, confident game design, but as Randy told me once years ago, “we had no way of knowing whether any of this was going to be well received. We didn’t know if some of it would work at all.”
I haven’t had a chance to sit down and read this properly until now but:
“[…] the baffling removal of the City’s most recognisable factions – namely the Pagans, Hammerites and Keepers.”
Wait, what? I didn’t realise they were absent… Very disappoint. Much loss. Such sadness. Wow.
Great write up Amy and welcome aboard! I think we could maybe rename the site to Taff-Repeatedly, such is our collective appreciation of the franchise around here (at least the original two, I stumbled on Deadly Shadows and never returned).
Like Steerpike, I too am a lover of the more paranormal levels in The Dark Project (Down in the Bonehoard, the Lost City, the Haunted Cathedral), they provided great contrast that wasn’t so present in The Metal Age save for Trail of Blood and… was that it? I’m sure there were more.
“Had I rope arrows, I would be firing them into people’s heads and then yanking them toward me, chortling and making bad puns (“Stick around!”).”
This had me laughing out loud. For shame Marquez, but hilarious. One of these days I’ll do a psycho serial killer playthrough of Dishonored.
I was really surprised how good the new voice actor sounded as Garrett but having not played the game I couldn’t comment on him as a character. By the sounds of things it seems they’ve managed to soil this opportunity more than Arkane did with Silent Corvo.
Gregg, thank you! Steerpike, that interview really is fascinating – it’s been so long since I’ve heard any media from the original developers that this is a real treat. Oh, and I too found Burricks strangely adorable. I could never bring myself to hurt them; the sounds they made just broke my heart.
Thanks so much for the review. Get in line, as I will be gay marrying Amy Louise.
Okay, I finished the entire main plot of the game and moved on to the bank heist and side/client missions. We had a snow day on Wednesday (thanks Old Man Winter) which allowed me to finish all 20 or so Basso missions in one glorious romp.
However, I think my enjoyment of the game is coming from my replacing the Garrett they’ve given us with the Garrett of my memory and imagination combined. I found myself making jokes for him, making decisions about loot to take or leave based on my sense of his honor/morality from past games.
I also found myself taking the true Thief’s path (undetected, no civilian knockouts, etc.) in most instances (although I CANNOT RESIST the aerial takedowns), but once I reached the point where I could fully upgrade my Combat in Focus mode, and walked into an area where criminals had murdered everyone — random workers and all — I must admit I got my righteous indignation on and while I didn’t slaughter my way through (I considered it), I used poppies like a Pinkerton in an opium den to get the satisfaction of face-to-face beating those perps down.
Anyway, I agree with all the comments about the frustration of the rope arrows and certain mechanics.
I admit that when I first started the game and saw Erin, I outwardly rolled my eyes, thinking the worst was going to happen: that they had given Garrett a love interest, and I almost stopped playing (then I remembered Mona Sax and thought I’d give it a chance). Needless to say, I was happy to progress in a more true-to-character manner.
I thought the Moira Asylum level mimicked earlier paranormal levels really well, and I got jump-scared more than once, which was satisfying.
I felt on the whole, though, that the game didn’t feel /profound/ the way the first two did. I didn’t feel immersed in a story that included me and I wanted so much more story. I also hated that the side and client missions had nothing to do with the main plot. As I said, I waited until I’d completed Chapter 8 to do any of them, because when you’re in a hurry to save someone or right some wrong, taking a detour to steal a necklace feels petty and stupid, which I never wanted Garrett to be.
Also, I look forward to your comments on the ending, as I found it… meh.
I really miss the old maps and I wish every potential map change point told you where it was going before you accidentally went there (hello poet’s apartment right next to area transition, we meet again). I also really miss animated cutscenes rather than game-styled. The former brought a beautiful ancient flavor to the proceedings and now it’s just a cutscene I watch like I would in any other game.
Sorry to ramble so long, but I’m facing a decision whether I care to max out my collections now that I’ve finished every mission in the game.
@Irony – Ok, I think we should have written this review together as we clearly share one mutant taff-fuelled superbrain. It’s no longer necessary for me to write any followup thoughts, as I now have the option to simply direct people to your comment. (And you’re funnier than me. Damn it!)
“I think my enjoyment of the game is coming from my replacing the Garrett they’ve given us with the Garrett of my memory and imagination combined. I found myself making jokes for him, making decisions about loot to take or leave based on my sense of his honor/morality from past games.”
You know, I never realised until you articulated it, but I do this all the time! I’ve always found it easy to forgive even the most mediocre characterisation if there’s a tiny bit of potential for me to sink my psychological teeth into. I guess the reason I was more obviously disappointed with Thief was because I’d hyped it up so much, but now you mention it, I’ve already started to replace Garrett’s obnoxious one-liners with better stuff in my head, and I’m enjoying the game more because of it. Uh, delusions represent?
I had the same reaction as you when I first saw Erin, but I was determined to like her even if she turned out to be tired love-interest cliche, because I think female characters get a raw enough deal without me dismissing them for imaginary offenses. I really liked their dynamic in the intro scenes. Garrett treats her like a precocious younger sister, and I loved the telling-off he gave her when she killed a guard. (This is the only area of Garrett’s character that I – very slightly – disagree with Steerpike about; I don’t think Garrett is comfortable or remorseless about killing, even when it’s necessary.) I’m really looking forward to how her story progresses.
It sucks that they chose not to implement those wonderful cutscenes after Metal Age, but I guess I understand why they didn’t. The static images worked perfectly with the first two games’ more stylised design, but the move towards realism in the latter two doesn’t quite gel with that art direction. I’m disappointed they didn’t try, though, because I think the design decisions they would have had to make in order to fit them in would have changed DS and T2014 for the better. Hard to explain exactly how, but Thief just always had a quirky quality for me which disappeared when the cutscenes did. Like I said above, it’s yet another colourful thread pulled out of the Thief tapestry.
Thanks so much for your comment! (I found a veil and a couple of Disney rings at the back of my wardrobe. Let’s do this thing.)
Thank you, I’m glad you liked my response since I liked your impressions so much! My feeling on them having “normal” cutscenes makes me remember I’ve never bothered to finish the last Max Payne game; the second one will, I believe, live forever for me as a perfect blend of style and story and characterization and I couldn’t get a handle on Max’s character in the third game the way I could in the first two. That happened with the third Thief, but in the new one, there’s such a /lack/ of story depth that I really found it easier to fill in the blanks.
It’s like playing fan fiction for me now. I’m looking forward to replaying some of the earlier chapters (plus I need more LOOT) with new eyes now that I know the plot, and I’m sure in my head, the Erin/Garrett backstory dynamic (am I the only nerd who got a Chronicles of Riddick Jack/Riddick vibe from that relationship, sort of the idol worship?).
I understand them changing the cutscenes for the reasons you suggest, but I really miss the MAPS more. Their hand-drawn and sketchy nature always made me feel these were maps Garrett created from casing the joint (the idea that he, I don’t know, PLANNED his jobs always appealed to me).
What I would have loved to see to replace the /abysmal/ city map is something hand-drawn with only notable landmarks and well-traveled areas, which gets steadily more and more fleshed out as you progress through the jobs, especially the city ones. Having a “map HUD” (especially one so poorly designed) was worse for me than having no map at all.
A commenter on the Steam forums, responding to map criticisms for the city, basically said stop looking at the map and just pay attention and /learn/ the city. I felt a lot better once I tried that more (except for the aforementioned poet’s apartment; I feel like I should make it a new hideout). Plus I did explore the city a little more solely by getting lost (and discovered the saddest suicide vignette! took me totally off guard).
I really wish, too (and maybe a sequel or DLC will address it), they’d did something more with the Gloom. The idea that everyone is getting sick and a rebel leader is taking advantage of peoples’ desperation to rise to power is so ripe for story development that I felt they really didn’t explore it nearly enough.
I’m glad that, like you, I gave Erin another chance. I /totally/ agree with your assessment of Garrett’s moral code about killing. I tried, one time, just sawtooth arrow to the face-ing my way through the city, and after the second or third arrow to a guard’s eye, I felt like I was becoming a bad part of the city, rather than its unofficial guardian. Garrett’s no Robin Hood, but as a certain Steerpike always said from the first Thief: “It’s Thief, not assassin.” (Yes, SP, I still hear that in my head every time I kill someone in these games; you’re like my Obi Wan).
Thank you sincerely for the opportunity to fangush about this series.
I’ll have to buy a ton of eyeliner if we have a Thief-themed wedding.
Hey, I loved the gurgling sound guards would emit after taking an arrow to the neck in Dark Project. I don’t discriminate against a little violence. Sometimes those guards have it coming. In fact, I think “It’s Thief, not Assassin” should be in a certain McShane’s voice, which is really ironic considering it’s the same voice that still complains about not being able to finish Morrowind as a kitty boxer.
As to Garrett’s attitude, he’s what each person makes of him, but personally the sense I consistently got from Russell’s Garrett was that he avoided killing because it was amateurish, not because he placed any emotional value on human life. But maybe I just told myself those things because I liked shooting guards in the neck sometimes. A good neck-shooting is really cathartic.
So as promised I started playing Thiefgold again (it was just Thief when I first played it but). And Down in the Bonehoard is as good as I remember it. One of the best gaming levels ever! Right up there with the great reformatting scene in Tron 2.0.
People talk about Return to the Cathedral, but this level’s got it all. It’s ominous, comes with early warnings–and, best of all, you actually can hear the horn almost as soon as you jump in (it’s just hard to distinguish it from all the other sounds). Thief had great sound direction. Just a brilliant game. And I love this level!
Bonehoard is amazing (and nice deep cut on the Tron 2.0; I still imagine I’m the only person who loved most of that game). I really was happy to get some jump scares out of the Moira level in the new Thief, though, especially the highly entertaining pyromaniac one (which, if you haven’t played it yet, ENJOY B!TCHES).
Against my better should-be-asleep judgment, I am replaying Chapters now to get collectibles and some are definitely more replayable than others, and I’m definitely continuing to fill in way better in-my-head backstory than the game itself was nice enough to give me.
I agree with you, Steerpike, that Garrett is flexible enough for us to assign our own morality to him. As I replay chapters, I am ranking “Predator” on nearly all of them, but not for killing. As much as I enjoy stepping over a body with one of my arrows through its eye (and yeah I use sawtooth instead of broadhead because I CAN), I get a much better kick out of the combat blackjack takedown (second only to the joy of the aerial takedown), mostly because I agree that Garrett avoids killing because it’s unprofessional, but there’s something incredibly /professional/ feeling about blackjacking a guard uncouth enough to try to /stab/ me. All that vaunted dexterity, and I /should/ be able to dodge a clumsy sword and repay it with a “I could have killed you if I wanted but I didn’t bother getting my boots bloody”.
Y’know, you’re right about the voice being McShane’s, though. I should’ve remembered better. Now I’ll see it subtitled in all lowercase, though….
I just replayed Chapter 2 angling for a better pickpocket count, and I was treated to an eavesdropped discussion between two guards on the nature of cock rings. I don’t think I can reproduce the cacklesnort that came out of my face. I’m upgrading the game to 8/10.
Ha, I just heard that one on a replay, too (I’m replaying everything to get complete collections; some levels are DEFINITELY more replayable than others). I also saw more in the brothel than I remembered.
I miss moss arrows.
So just read the Dark Horse comic that ties in with the game, and it was entertaining. Tells Erin’s history with Garrett, although it mostly focuses on side characters (Basso, Madame Xiao-Xiao). They touch on the “kill/don’t kill” issue we’ve been discussing from the game, and I like that Garrett’s take mirrors Steerpike’s cry of un-professionalism (in the comic, he dubs it a “lack of imagination”). All told, the comic was an interesting read but doesn’t break a ton of new ground. I will probably keep reading it when new issues come out because I’m a sucker and a comic nerd.
I saw a few pages from the comic when I went to a pre-Thief event at my local Gamestation – I liked the art and thought it was a lovely addition to the game. I do agree about the professionalism thing, and that’s always been a major factor of Garrett’s no-kill stance (lack of imagination is a perfect way to put it). I suspect my conviction that he actually doesn’t LIKE killing is more wishful thinking than anything.
You’ve made me want to check out the rest of the comic now, though. The City is the perfect place to set a graphic novel… I wish it wasn’t just Reboot-based, though, because I’d love to see some Hammer/Mechanist/Pagan/Keeper stuff in that format.
“(and discovered the saddest suicide vignette! took me totally off guard).”
Dishonored had one of those, as subtle as it was!
Great article. I just discovered tap today for the first time, and I am as excited as I was when I found the CRPG addict. Going through the back catalog of articles now one by one and savoring them. And all because I was googling for reviews on Evil Genius (good review on that too btw).
Welcome to Tap, Daniel! Always glad to see a new face. : )
Thank you. 😉 I’ve read a couple of years worth of articles so far, and I’m really impressed by the consistently high quality of the writing and the intelligent analysis.
And Steerpike, thank you for sharing that quote in the review of Rome Total War II btw.
“He could only rule the world.”
Warning: If you read that Shadow of the Colossus review you might splurge and buy one of those fancy PlayStation 2 devices like I did.
Lol. No danger of that until I get a job. Twiddling my thumbs here in Tokyo. Thank goodness for super cheap steam and gog sales.