The Phantom on 13/11/2012 at 18:53

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Having re-played "Bloodsport" recently it was time to re-experience it's sequel, Dyers' Eve, which takes place shortly after the events in Bloodsport. Here's a review I wrote.

After Garrett's first encounter with the Brotherhood of the Raven at their arena compound, he succesfully escaped and now finds himself in an unknown hamlet. Frustrated about his experiences, Garrett is determined to find out the truth behind this Brotherhood and settle the score. A local businessman gives him a proposition; he will tell him where to find more information about the brotherhood if Garrett retrieves an old nevagation glob from him, located in a ancient haunted temple nearby. Garrett agrees with these terms, buys some equipment and heads off towards this temple to satisfy his curiosity.

Dyers' Eve is a medium-sized horror and adventure FM, that takes places within in and around a temple, resembling a wrecked mansion. The undead roaming the place, some sort of magical wave of energy stretches out above the temple into the sky, and the desolate environment gives the level a mysterious and sinister feel. As with Bloodsport the three difficulty settings (Normal, Hard en Nuckin' Futs!) deliver a welcome difference in gameplay. The highest difficulty provides limitated equipment and less loot in the loadout screen, extra objectives and more foes, resulting in a more difficult and rewarding gameplay experience. Re-playing this with the 1.19 patch installed, I didn't encounter any new bugs other than undead clipping/getting stuck into walls on some occasions. Surprisingly, a tome texture glitch that was present in 1.18 is fixed in the update.

I really liked the various ways of entering the temple and the way the mission progresses; what initially seems like a pretty straightforward job turns a bit more complicated once the player reads a keeper scroll that turns into a search for talismans and leads the player towards the source of the undead infestation. There's a nice mix of objectives to complete that can aren't that easy to complete with all the undead walking around (head the warning that they aren't like any Garrett faced before :o) while the main objective itself also requires some thinking and usage of special objects you come across. To aid the player, usefull tips can be acquired through the scattered writings in the game (among them revealing an effective explosive way of getting rid of the undead :sly:). While helpful, the writings also provides more background by telling about the events that took place during the disaster that struck the place.

What makes this mission rather unique is the implementation of inventive custom design elements, making it stand above the average FM of it's time :thumb:. Bricks can be removed from a wall to create a entrance into the fortress, a couple of items providing some special purposes to aid you in your goals, and many creepy new voices by Wynne and YcatX are made for the haunts and zombies. Especially the female zombie has some excellent new comments ("I'll come for you" and "Will you give me a kissy?" :cheeky:) which, being creepy as well as hilarious deserve to be more widely used as a substitute. Furthermore, the fire arrows light up and cast sparks when drawing your bow, haunts fall apart in a pile of bones and weaponry once killed, and there are more of these destinctive aspects that make Dyers' Eve special. Great stuff!

In terms of atmosphere, the mission is more convinving than Bloodsport, partly due to of the haunted element, which is a lot more darker and present this time, but also because of the design of the temple. Furniture is trashed, walls and ceilings contain large holes, mushrooms grow in the wooden floors and the basement area is completely submerged. The view of neglect and disrepair is apparant and convincing. Meanwhile the sole use of stock textures ensure the original Thief mission is preserved while capturing the old and abandoned feel of the place very nicely. Nice job!

Dyers' Eve is a clear improvement over it's prequel. It contains better usage of textures, a more clear level to explore and less flaws/bugs to frustrate the game. Meanwhile it surprises once again with a strong selection of original design elements (like custom skins and voices) that really add to the gameplay and make this game stand above the average FM of it's time. In terms of atmosphere Metalhead's 2nd FM is a more darker and solid experience, thanks to the undead, the magical element and the design of the level as a whole. Unfortunately there's no briefing movie this time and little secrets are present (although the Bin Laden niche is quite a discovery). The ending is a bit contradicting (telling the player to return to the start while it isn't the way to end the mission) and the loot requirement can be a bit hard to acquire on expert, but overall Dyers' Eve is a strong and well-designed medium-sized horror FM with a nice mix of objectives to accomplish that takes Garrett further into the progressing story. Adventurous types who don't mind dancing with the dead will no doubt entertain themselves, just like I did :).
Dyers' Eve doesn't provide Garrett with the information he hoped to find, making the mission more of an interlude in this ongoing campaign, but my guess is more information (more than Garrett ever feared, according to the keeper) will be provided in the upcoming next part, whenever it'll be ready. Can't wait :thumb:.

Statistics
Difficulty: Nucking' Futs
Time: 2 hours
Loot: 1745 / 1805
Secrets: 2 out of 2

EDIT: the same review with added screenshots has been posted in the FM Review and Discussion Thread (http://www.ttlg.com/forums/showthread.php?t=124349&page=96&p=2153997&viewfull=1#post2153997) here.

PS: Metalhead, one of the in-game scrolls (plot1.str) reveals the portal was supposed to open to the Basilica in Chesley. I assume that's (http://www.ttlg.com/forums/showthread.php?t=140158&p=2146103&viewfull=1#post2146103) the basilica you're creating right now, and where the next part will take place? :) And what exactly went wrong when the Brotherhood performed the ritual that caused the undead infestation (if Garrett can do it why can't they)? I guess it's another dimension the undead spawned from?




Buglist & other suggestions:
- the objective "get back to where you started" should better be blocked (marked red) once the objective "Break the seal and open the portal" is triggered. Currently, the player might return to the starting point before realizing he's supposed to jump through the portal.
- Suggestion: create a new objective once you've broke the portals' seal, something like "Time to seek your destiny and find out where this portal leads to."
- When the player jumps through the portal without finising all his objectives first, he falls all the way through the teleportal and crashes, which is a bit silly (as if the portal wouldn't work when Garrett hasn't found all the loot :laff:).
Solution: it should be made impossible or discouraged to jump through the portal beforehand (maybe Garrett saying "Guess I should finish here first" once the player opened the portal).
- no 'objective complete' notification is visible once Garrett jumps through the portal.
- the drowned captain of the guard, wearing a key, has the skin of a regular guard. Why would he resemble a normal guard while the guards that got posessed have a green skin with a Brotherhood symbol. It's more realistic when this guard has a similar skin (the same or a modified one, as he was the captain after all).
- the water talisman leaves behind a trail of blue smoke once you've picked it up and carry it with you. Don't know if this is intended.
- a fire arrow is placed right near the cave entrance that has to be cleared, which is a bit obvious. Better to move that particular fire arrow elsewhere, like on top of one of the pedestrals next to Azrael's shrine.
- the scroll that explains how to open the portal (conrad2.str) can't be picked up. It would be useful to the player when he can take it with him to consult at the scene itself.
- the wooden platform at the front of the building, before the main entrance, isn't connected to the pillars that are supposed to support it.
- the door knob on the double doors to enter the temple isn't attached properly.
- for future reference, you might want to implement an objective in a future mission for the Navigation Globe to be handed to your contact in the village in a later mission, as right now Garrett takes it with him through the portal.
- the male zombies also say "thank youuu..." once they explode while this sound should only be used by the female zombies.
- the Thief Enhancement Pack by Nameless Voice contains a pretty good replacement texture for the blue wall light, among other textures and object replacements that might look good.

The Phantom on 19/11/2012 at 18:34

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You're welcome!



Sounds good, can't wait :thumb: Thanks for answering.

pwl on 11/10/2021 at 19:00

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I just replayed this awesome mission!! Man where did Metalhead go this author was way ahead of their time???:eek::confused:

Metalhead on 12/10/2021 at 05:58

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Heh... wow... just, wow...
I'm absolutely floored people are still playing what I cooked up and being entertained by it, twenty years after I did so.

Also, I feel really, really old. :p

But mind=blown right now.

Sadly, I don't realistically think there'll be anything else Thief-related rattling forth from my old noggin, if I was ahead of my time before (grin), I am now utterly out of time, for a great many things, unless a very large wad of cash suddenly falls into my lap so I can retire while I still have a few marbles left.

fortuni on 17/8/2022 at 06:21

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Yes this is how the mission finishes, The Phantom reported this issue in post #192 and Metalhead said he intended to fix it, but he's no longer around, so have reported this on Shadowbox along with other issues reported.