thiefobsessedgirl on 6/8/2008 at 16:10

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I was 10 or 11.

I'm now 16 and still love Dark Project!

RavynousHunter on 7/8/2008 at 05:58

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Wow, you people make me feel old, lol. Young buggers ain't ya? Makes me feel good that at least some of the younger generation can respect a game such as Thief. My hope for your generation, and, by extension, my own, has risen somewhat. :thumb:

jtr7 on 7/8/2008 at 19:43

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I've told the story a few times now, but I'll probably give my testimony again and again.

It was 2001--I can't remember the month--so I was 30 or 31. A friend of mine was purchasing a new computer and he wanted to be able to use the same software as myself, which for us meant compatible hardware, even though our systems were six years apart. I was doing a lot of MIDI compositions, using custom sounds, and the only cheap way for his computer to play the compositions using the custom sounds was for him to get a Soundblaster. Well, because of the EAX technology, a stack of games came with the soundcard to show it off, including Thief: The Metal Age (minus DromEd, which I didn't know existed, yet), and a demo of Deus Ex.

A year or so before, I had been visiting another friend out of town, and when I showed up at his house, he was playing what I now know was Thief: THe Dark Project, and he showed me the first part of Assassins!, up to reaching Ramirez' estate. Watching him move carefully, stealthily, and not shooting/running/exploding all over the place, I was interested. When I saw him use a moss arrow, I had never seen anything like it, and it was still about being quiet and non-confrontational. He had the volume low, so I wasn't immersed in Eric Brosius' soundscape, but it looked like a place I wanted to experience. But what really locked the game into my mind was when my aggressive, competitive, macho, hunter, jock, Quake-lovin', Doom-lovin', banned from Battlenet, explosion lovin', womanizin', metal crunchin' friend said "I LOVE Thief." What was it about this quiet game that he loved? If you knew him, you'd be shocked, too.

Having had a taste of Thief, the TMA disc was the first one I popped into my other friend's new drive. After playing it through the first time, happened to hear Karras speak of Garrett's metal eye. That was it, I had to get the first game to learn more about Garrett's story. I searched online and found TTLG, and The Circle, while looking for TDP.

It wasn't long before I began compiling lists of Names. My friend and I were already conceiving epic fanon stories. He was into AD&D and Warhammer and tapped Thief for ideas for when he would DM/GM a game. Since I didn't own Thief, or a computer that could play it, I made copies of the media, printed out the maps, and formed the most basic idea that still drives me to make the ETU today: If I can't play Thief, I can still make a resource that tells me everything about that world that can be known, and it won't require a computer, or need to be plugged in at all.

And it was years before I finally got a computer that could run the games, so I continued to search online for missing information, especially when TDS was being made, and after it came out. I had since broken off my friendship with the guy who had the computer I lost my taffin' virginity on, so I couldn't walk the streets of The City again until late 2006.

jtr7 on 11/8/2008 at 03:18

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HAHA! No worries, we generally think that's cool. Thief is enjoyed by people of all ages! The oldest age I remember hearing for a TTLG taffer, years ago, was 84.:sly:

Fraser on 11/8/2008 at 05:55

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I believe I was 41 years old when I played my first game of Thief.