Thief 1. Do you like wandering not knowing where to go?

kage61 on 10/8/2008 at 18:53

So I played this years ago and always felt it was my favorite game and recently decided to load it back up. Luckily got it running on an old thinkpad.
I still think it's really cool. The only thing I don't like however, is wandering around not knowing where to go. I feel like its a total waste of time to spend how ever many hours of a mission just trying to find my way. I'm in the first mission now and for the most part I can find my way around but notice myself sometime walking in circles while trying to find the right way.
I just think it would be cool to have some sort of beacon that always tells you where you need to go, to eliminate all that needless wandering. What do you guys think?

Beleg Cúthalion on 10/8/2008 at 18:59

Have you used the map and your compass?

kage61 on 10/8/2008 at 19:50

Do you mean the one that can be loaded from the game. It's a pretty vague map I thought.
So with that map, I take it north is up, south is down etc. So I can use the compass and that map to try to navigate a little better?

Beleg Cúthalion on 10/8/2008 at 20:03

If the top of the map is not north, it should be written down somewhere. But yes, if you cannot find your way by running around, then you have to use the compass and the maps. This is one of the realistic elements I liked in Thief, although there are people who'd like to have a Diablo-II-styled automap. :tsktsk:

Thief13x on 10/8/2008 at 21:48

While frusterating at times, I really actually enjoyed it in retrospect. Even recently, playing the Sword was quite frusterated, but enjoyed it overall. Yeah, use your compass and map, Thief2 was better with this because it showed you where you were.

Tannar on 10/8/2008 at 23:03

I agree that the auto map in TMA was a nice addition but I rarely had any problem finding my way in TDP using the map and compass together. I actually prefer it this way...it feels more like exploring, which is one of the main draws about Thief to me.

Taffer36 on 11/8/2008 at 05:04

I rather liked that feeling of exploration. It kind of felt like you were casing the joint while in there. It was up to you whether you wanted to just head for the prize or explore around and take out all the guards to make life easier.

clearing on 11/8/2008 at 05:24

Quote Posted by Taffer36

Yes, I love just explore in the long time at whatever pace you want and do whatever you want.

Fraser on 11/8/2008 at 05:34

Oh yes, exploring and being lost heightened the tension in some of the levels. The first time I played the Haunted Cathedral I didn't know you could turn on the lights in the abandoned part of town. Things started chasing me and I kept getting turned around, dashing away madly through a street full of monsters and hitting a dead end or creeping off down some dark crumbling alleyway and thinking if I stayed really quiet I could catch my breath. And then I'd hear the moan of a zombie heading towards me. Fun!

BEAR on 11/8/2008 at 05:53

Quote Posted by kage61

Thief does not lend itself well to an arrow (the likes of which you suggest exists in Bioshock pretty much exactly, and I actually made a lot of use of it mostly because the game bored me such that I was having a hard time mustering the motivation to actually figure out where I needed to go).

The reason why is this: A lot of the missions are large buildings in a non linear format, so from a given room there is not an exact place you need to go at all times. Occasionally there is, but only in a few instances. When I play, I mostly explored the whole area checking everything out, stealing what I could, knocking out who I needed to, then decide in what order to complete the objectives. As such an arrow would be useless. A better detailed map would be the only thing that would help, but what you are really asking for is to dumb the game down which is exactly the opposite of what we all want.

What I would suggest to you (besides some smarmy asshole-ish remarks) is to get a good walkthrough loaded up for each map. When you feel yourself starting to get frustrated, load it up and read just enough to get you through. This is better than running around in circles, since it breaks the immersion worse than a walkthrough. The biggest problem to me is when you explore the entire thing and miss a single item and since there is nowhere you've not been, its really hard to find the item. That happened to me in an FM and it was incredibly annoying (the item was hid down behind a bed with no real good indicator where to find it).