Raven on 18/5/2006 at 16:07

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PLEASE TREAT THIS WHOLE POST AS A SPOILER - IF YOU HAVE NOT COMPLETED T1 T2 and T3 don't read this and getting on playing those games, what is taking you so long?

I think an explanation is evident from the continuing posts. We have this fabulous idea of the Sentients – more objects akin to and perhaps as powerful as the Eye! This is the Eye that was possibly responsible for the old quarter catastrophe, an artefact so dangerous the keepers locked and sealed in the cathedral, splitting the key all over the city to ensure it remains out of the way., and then splitting it up even further is an worthy reincarnation for an “edios gold release”. An artefact that the Trickster (or at least the gods human avatar!) needed in a plot to crumble human civilisation by ripping a hole in space to another dimension! An artefact that almost half the first game centred around! This object talks and taunts Garrett, it knows the chosen thief by name and can manipulate his vanity “You clever man”. And we now have the frightful situation that the eye has been stored at the Museum, presumably has been gazed upon by the elite and powerful of the city – all those that the eye could corrupt. And there are others like him! (anyone remember the LOTR – thief tie up theories – about the eye being originally part of the rings, perhaps an imprisoned version of sauron or a ring wrath?)

Has the eye been responsible for what is going on, the civil war between pagans and hammers? What horrible repercussions await Garrett with the knowledge that the eye still has his eye, the too are linked now… and we know that Garrett is a bit lacking in will power. Are we to be tricked again?

All this potential – and is it weaved together in a fine story in the tradition of thief 1 and 2, gradually revealed and compelling to the end? No it isn’t. You pick up the half the artefacts in the museum and the rest have been annoying you in the “yet again so much potential but not executed well enough” inventory system. The plot is revealed while executing mario style death from above of stone statues you can now kill with your bow upgrade, oops I mean backjack upgrade, and badly designed keeper vikings. The museum is by the way sounded so lucrative I dashed to pillage it (being completely unengaged by the plot) only to find I was blocked BY AN INVISIBLE BARRIER. The museum is pretty lucrative, apparently it is a place where you can pick up some of the most powerful/dangerous objects in the world with ease and that they have been resting there apparently having no noticeable ill effect on anyone – if you can’t find them there maybe you can pick one up at your local discount taffer store – just follow the bloody great big obvious red hand (it is a good thing that the city guard are colour blind)

No instead of using the rich material created in thief one and two the game is built around the stupid idea of the hag. A shape shifting keeper that has only been kicking around for 3 or 4 life times (I am surprised they didn’t make her/him/it garrets dad, cause that would have been about as kewl as giving garrett a dagger for the cover art). To destroy this rampaging monster – serious question why was she rampaging again? Was it to stop the use of the glyths in the ritual that garrett was going to do to bring about her defeat and the accidental end of the keeper magic (maybe garrett taffed off that class in keeper history)? If that is the case then she must have been pretty crap at manipulating people; which is surprising considering she is a keeper (or five) - To destroy this rampaging monster Garrett uses the final gylth, presumably cancelling out magic (or at least keeper magic) from the universe – a feat requiring the use of ALL FIVE OF THE (possibly) MOST POWERFULL OBJECTS IN THE THIEF UNIVERSE. He does this to stop a monster that in its infamity holds a nursery rhyme, presumably 5 or 6 murders at the most and the attentions of 1, count it 1, crack pot hammer. (yes these are the same hammers that used to almost run the city, in fact they had a whole empire to their name. Oh and the pagans don’t seem to care either – which just says to me that gammel is obviously pretty harmless when compared to the forces of nature and progress)

To accommodate this terrible unimaginative small scale and cliché plot (sorry I mean the climax of the story) a whole new cilivisation is created which would be pretty neat if they were even hinted at in the first two games, how great would it have been if you had to steal the crown from the craymen? The underground city gets completely ignored, so we still have no clue as to why it was destroyed. And worst of all the artefacts suddenly became a whole lot less cool/powerful when we find out that they have a deal with the keepers, but that there ultimate end is to destroy something that looks like (and sound s like) you could kill it by blackjacking it (and from memory did someone not actually manage it in one section of the city).

In summary – that list of mostly poorly written and unthoughful comments the eye makes at you both hints at the potential of greatness a polished and well structured thief 3 could have achieved and at the same time reveals the patchy nature and truth behind T:DS’s Xbox development/focus and the new user friendly approach to the game. Any subtly in the telling of the plot was obviously removed due to the XBox memory (of the station and average gamers aged 13) not being able to store large character strings needed in the scripting of a creative and compelling plot compelling and replaced with a pointless upgrade garrett RPG appealing feature. Anyway feel free to start flaming if you have read through this post - but you know I am right. The misuse of the thief mythos was horrendous (akin to my spelling) - I enjoyed linking up the details in thief one and two expanding the plot and pretending there were extra levels of depth that the story held, but in thief 3 I feel like I am stretching the plot to cover poor story telling.

Lord Dalar on 21/5/2006 at 16:00

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Well raven, I almost agree with you, and after all everything is changed in the third chapter of this series, also the uniform of hammers, the city the look of everything. Thief 3 comes out as an evolution of Deus Ex 2, or somewhat a Mod of it.

I think that after all Ion storm made a playable game, but it doesn't have that something thief players already had and dreamed for.

I still think the Eye has been forced into the plot, because of giving continuity, because if you call the keepers with another name, if you ignore hammerites and pagans (don't tell me they were characterized as in the two other games, because they are not) Thief Deadly Shadows has only the "wanna be" stealth mode gameplay in common with the other two chapters, and some dark imaginary.

As for the new civilization, the fish frogs, or whatever they are, if you surf through the textures of the lost city, chapter 1 & 2 you should recognize a face on the wall drawn as a big fat one of them, who knows....I think they are not all that new invented, but obviously i wuold have preferred a third chapter concretly based on the background and on the structure of the other two (yes, also of thief 2 which one I hated)

I know I've got a little OT, but I also was replying to an explanation of many things...

Actually I think there will be no more "Official" Garret Stories, but after all it's not that bad, a real serious iniztiative would be a Multiplayer Pre existent World in that universum, where one can be a hammerite, a pagan, a commoner a citywatch, with the keepers as the overseeing staff members, but that's utopia ;)