fortuni on 25/6/2014 at 21:59

---

The first Thief fms came out in 1999 and I suspect that the first few years of Thief 1 and the soon to be followed Thief 2 may well have been the most exciting years at TTLG, just reading the threads and posts from that time gives me a sense of a incredibly close knit community enjoying a hugely exciting time.

Going by the statistics of fm's released, the first 10 years of TTLG up until 2010 were the busiest period in TTLGs history.(http://www.fuod.org/tmissions/) http://www.fuod.org/tmissions/ , so my question below is open to anyone who was a member or casual fm player of this wonderful community during those years, but my particular interest is in the early years, the time I would like to think of as the original Golden Era

So to those of you lucky Taffers out there who were there, would you mind sharing your reminiscences of that 'Golden Era' with us relative newbies. Which year did you consider to be the hay-day of that time, the year by excitement and energy not necessarily because of which fms came out that year, what events were the most revolutionary in the evolution of Thief and TTLG, which mods, patches or fm loaders took the community to greater levels of success. Memorable landmarks are particularly welcome, good or bad it doesn't matter so long as its a good story.....and finally what do you miss most about your Golden Era ?

Thank you in advance to all those who take the time and patience to answer this thread

Raven on 28/6/2014 at 08:27

---

:) there was even a forum before this one!

I am not sure I count as your target contributors though, as I may hold claim to being the original lurker!

Back in the early days I had fun appointing myself as a self proclaimed keep of canon, basically on a whim deciding if fan theories held up to scrutiny. The excitement of learning dromed was brilliant and we all still owe a huge debt to the creative pioneers that kept pushing the boundaries of the tool and generously wrote tomes of guides to get everyone started.

Renault on 28/6/2014 at 19:13

---

Of course back in the early to mid 2000s, it was a great time to be a Thief fan in general, because there were so many FMs released. But I really loved Komag's contests - he really knew how to run one and how to maximize the number of entrants with just the right amount of rules and restrictions. And then the missions would get released, and wham, you suddenly had 10-20 new missions to plow through. It was great. Plus, smaller contest missions gave authors a lot of license to try new and unique things, and it was always fun to see what they would come up with. FMs like Deceptive Perception, The Haunting, and Into The Maelstrom come to mind (but there were so many others too).

And there was also a lot of talk about doing full fledged campaigns, ones that would be as long as one of the retail games. It was exciting, there was so much interest, and everyone wanted to get on board. T2X was the main one, and COSAS too, and there was also a splinter of that group that wanted to make a fan-created T3 (before the real one came out, or probably was even announced). Individual authors had their own campaigns too, which were really cool - stuff like 7th Crystal, Calendra's Legacy, Keeper of the Prophecies, and Curse of the Falcon. It was just awesome back then to see authors come up with such involved stories and diverse missions.

And the camvator - a staple now, but it was such a unique concept back then. Another tool to tell a great story.

I guess 2002 was the year where T2 FMs really took off - people had learned the editor over the previous two years and were finally able to punch out missions that were better than the original OMs.

Goldmoon Dawn on 28/6/2014 at 23:38

---

Being a long time lurker myself, I would say that there were three most notable things about the early days for me. The two clans, the foofs and the haulers, were one of my favorite things to read, being into rpgs and such.

GingerbreadMan. Yes, the Force Of Nature himself. He was The Man. For his time and place. He fit right in there. If I had to narrow it down, he was the sole reason I continued to follow the 'ol TTLG. He handled things, and made us all laugh really hard in the process. I miss his brand of leadership the most I think.

And of course, last but certainly not least, Grundbegriff. Yep, 'ol Cutpurse In Chief himself. Whatever you think your stupid little problem is here at TTLG, Grundbegriff did it first. On top of this, he somehow managed to be a vast trove of knowledge about our beloved game Thief: The Dark Project, always witty as well as having an equally endearing sense of humor when called for.

The rest of us were all rabid devotees to the cause.

That is all. :)


My favorite quote is the sewer people with the high pitched voice... "shut the fuck up", and of course the amazing fart fx.

Gingerbread Man. :ebil:

SlyFoxx on 29/6/2014 at 04:44

---

Have I really been here that long? This place is where I learned how to www. I hardly knew how to work a computer before Thief.

Aww, who am I foolin'....I'm still mostly computer illiterate! :o