donderosa on 10/3/2010 at 19:13
after getting a new pc, i was finally able to try this widely rejected black sheep of the thief series ..and now i'm fairly surprised about how much fun i have playing it. i even fell in love with the 3rd person view, using first person in narrow passages only (the only thing i completely dislike about garretts looks is his uncharismatic thug-like face btw.).
other things i like:
- neat, "clean" graphics (i got over those ugly-as-hell 2d bushes rather quickly)
- the dark, still thief-esque atmosphere - a very important factor in stealth games overall and thief in particular because its predecessors have already laid a very well developed foundation, making the gaming experience somewhat unique (i felt quite immersed into the thief world once again, so as far as i'm concerned this game still upholds this high standard)
- the story is good - not mindblowing but really good, with more or less unexpected twists, consistent storytelling, interesting readables and with the good old cynicism of a lonesome, tough lawbreaker (i havent experienced the end though, but this is my impression so far)
i guess i'm not a good game critic, but i can't overlook the fact, that thief 3 makes a lot of fun to play while drawing me into the well known thief world once again. yeah, there are some shortcommings, like odd AI behaviour now and then, not much variety when running through the city after progressing the main storyline and some crazy animations, when blackjacking those (literally) spineless enemies for example. but the most important things (the ones i've mentioned above) still make this game very worthwhile to me.
so why is the number of thief 3 fm's that low? is the overall opinion about the quality of this game really that bad? or is it because of a difficult to use editor, making it much harder to create levels and such? i wonder what reasons everyone else might have for preferring thief 2.
edit: i guess it's quite apparent that english is not my mother tongue. hopefully the points i try to make in my post are at least understandable to everyone who reads it.
Yandros on 10/3/2010 at 20:05
Your English is perfectly fine.
Many people were put off by the absence of rope arrows and swimmable water, and rooftop traversal. Other criticisms were the large HUD, the monotone bluish tint to the general look and feel, the loot glint, unbalanced amount of gear due to shops and fences... the list goes on. Some of those were addressed by mods like the Minimalist mod, but I think at a fundamental level, just the fact that it was done on a different engine, and "felt" like a different game, made it too disconnected from the first two games for many players, which really is unfortunate.
Personally, I enjoyed TDS quite a lot, mostly because of the story and how it was obviously the end of the trilogy originally conceived by LGS, and the story ends were generally wrapped up nicely. The visual and gameplay differences from T1/T2 didn't bother me as much as most others probably, but I do definitely prefer T1/T2 in those areas.
GhostStealth on 10/3/2010 at 20:07
It's not a perfect sequel, Looking GLass Studios were unreplaceable and the game engine itself everyone fell in love with, gone away, I just think the engine was a bad choice for a third installment, reasoning the low rate and dislike about it.
ZylonBane on 10/3/2010 at 20:55
Quote Posted by Yandros
Some of those were addressed by mods like the Minimalist mod, but I think at a fundamental level, just the fact that it was done on a different engine, and "felt" like a different game, made it too disconnected from the first two games for many players, which really is unfortunate.
Don't undersell the things that had nothing to do with the "different engine" angle, like the overall "gaminess" of TDS (special loot! get X% of the gold! blackjacks cure blindness!) all the things that were just flat-out badly done (first-person control, first-person animation, NPC animation, etc), and of course the loading zones.
Beleg Cúthalion on 10/3/2010 at 21:32
Making ramped-up guards blackjackable with a single flashbomb is just as gamy. Or strange. :weird:
^ and that is why almost every TDS discussion turns into a more or less intense battle, just have a look around. Although, I think Yandros did quite a good job in summing it up.
ZylonBane on 10/3/2010 at 21:35
Quote Posted by Beleg Cúthalion
Making ramped-up guards blackjackable with a single flashbomb is just as gamy.
No, it isn't. If you're blinded, you are going to be much, much worse at defending yourself from attacks. It makes perfect sense.
Avalon on 10/3/2010 at 23:50
I liked Thief 3 in its own respect. It was pretty entertaining.
As a Thief game, though, it lacked the versatility of previous games. Nearly everything felt "scripted," and the ways to finish each map felt more in the hands of the developers than in your own. Sure, there were several choices for how to go about each thing, but it was very far away from the original Thief games' variety.
In the original games, missions were more like playgrounds where you came up with your own solutions to problems. Occasionally you'd be bottlenecked - hit a point where you have to choose from designer paths to progress, like grabbing an eye from a window, or open a bank vault from one of two points - but for the most part, you were given an item to loot, a place to loot it from, and your obstacles were the 3924723 guards and the terrain in the way.
In Thief 3, however, missions typically had linear paths, albeit sometimes many of them. I had a lot of fun, but in only one or two missions did I ever feel like a free thief rather than a driver of a cart on rails.
Queue on 10/3/2010 at 23:57
Yes, but if T3 had been the first (or only) game in the series one had played, then it would have been viewed as an utterly brilliant game. And honestly, you need not to have played any of the previous games to play T3 as it, more-or-less, stands alone.
Personally, I love T3 and thought it was brilliant, and only sought out 1 and 2 because it was so good.
Xorak on 11/3/2010 at 02:40
The game designers must have absolutely hated putting in the large purple portals. They had to know before hand that those would compltely kill the immersion and atmosphere of the game. To me that's the whole crux of the game and the studio that made it -- they released something that they knew had blatant flaws. Then they wonder why the game doesn't sell well. :erg:
ZylonBane on 11/3/2010 at 03:02
Quote Posted by Xorak
The game designers must have absolutely hated putting in the large purple portals. They had to know before hand that those would compltely kill the immersion and atmosphere of the game.
Judging by the graphical design of the rest of the game, I disagree.
