ZylonBane on 16/9/2008 at 01:19
Quote Posted by demagogue
Whereas if you put another mission in there, I'd think you'd would want to repeat the overlap in Masks just to reestablish that continuity, and it was exactly the overlap that I didn't like.
The simple fix is to provide the player with a quick shortcut to where the new stuff starts. Unlock a door that was previously locked, unguard a passage that was previously guarded, etc. Or if that's not practical within the design of the level, just start the player where they need to be. The briefing video can provide all the needed context, and besides, nobody seems to mind that Return to the Cathedral drops the player right back at the front gate.
Quote Posted by R Soul
Would it be too much of a rip-off if the cultivator room was sealed by mask-based wards, and those masks were in... a museum?
A greater objection would be that it wouldn't make any sense. This is somebody's house, not a Precursor temple.
Quote Posted by Digital Nightfall
Move the cultivator to the museum. I like this idea.
It wouldn't leave much reason for "Masks" to exist though.
jtr7 on 16/9/2008 at 20:49
Moving the Cultivator to the museum is generally a good idea.:thumb:
This brings up another question: Do we just ignore the story set down, not only in the texts, but the movies, too? It sure would open up the possibilities, blasphemy aside.:ebil: At least some of the movie content could be edited.
For all our sakes, I'm holding off on listing out the canon anchoring things the way they are in the OMs.:angel:
As part of the unofficial Thief Universe Preservation Society, I'm mostly in agreement with ZB and demagogue, but I'll play devil's advocate to see where it takes us, knowing they cannot take my Thief discs away. If a challenge will stir up a creative defense, I'm all for it. Personal button-pushing doesn't count, as fun as it is for some of ya.
nicked on 20/9/2008 at 07:38
Here's where we originally had the missions placed (I think!):
Running Interference
Shipping and Receiving
Culture Break (Museum) - this was to be placed here by LGS, as a true introduction to Mechanist technology.
Raid on Willard Square (Slums) - our idea being that Garrett goes to the poor part of town to fence his museum haul, but the city watch does a raid looking for pagans and deviants, and Garrett barely escapes.
Framed
Ambush
Eavesdropping
First City Bank & Trust
Blackmail
Trace the Courier
Trail of Blood
Unnamed College Mission - this we envisaged as a trust-building mission between Viktoria and Garrett - he's not happy about it, but he feels he needs Viktoria's help, so he agrees to go undercover into a noble college and help one of the Professors (who is a Pagan sympathiser) who is being blackmailed by another member of the faculty.
Life of the Party
Precious Cargo
Kidnap
Casing the Joint
Waking the Dead - positioned here by LGS as a way to split Casing and Masks. The idea being that Garrett has some time before the Masks arrive, so he follows up a lead about the Book of Ash being used by necromancers (possibly on the Mechanist payroll) and visits their mountain stronghold.
Masks
Fallen Hammers - again placed here by LGS - our idea was to split the cutscene before Soulforge just before Artemus tells Garrett Viktoria has started her assault. When Garrett leaves Viktoria and says he'll come up with a better plan, he visits the old, run-down church that Karras was brought up in to try and find some evidence that will help him defeat him. We were still trying to think of some way to tie this into Soulforge - Garrett finds something that is of use in that mission maybe. Then after this, the second half of the cutscene is played and Soulforge begins.
Sabotage at Soulforge
EmperorSteele on 20/9/2008 at 09:18
Yeah, that all makes a lot of sense =) Thanks!
demagogue on 20/9/2008 at 17:40
Those are relatively well thought out plots and placements, and the conceits work. And I'm a fan of sticking to a plan unless something major intervenes, sort of related to avoiding feature creep.
jtr7 on 28/12/2008 at 13:32
Sorry, I thought this thread should include this:
Quote Posted by Randy
I don't really know if I can legally answer that or not, so I don't think I will. For one thing, some of the T2G ideas (I _didn't_ say "missions"!) are being integrated into T3.
Anyway, I didn't work on T2G for one day, cuz I was busy working on T3. Emil and Sarah did, though, among others.
Hah! I suspected as much!
Quote Posted by Ion-Emil
Okay, let me see if I can shed a little more light on some of the stuff we had planned for Thief 2 Gold. The four missions were:
-- An elite private college for the nobility, with a daylight setting
-- A necromancer castle complex, in the snowy mountains
-- A Hammerite church
-- A section of "seedy city streets"
While there was no real overarching fiction that connected all of the new missions, we were certainly interested in creating great fiction for each individual mission that would seamlessly tie into Thief 2's existing storyline (and in some ways, enhance it).
In the college mission we really wanted to try an environment set during the daytime. It was actually more like dusk, with orange sunlight -- Mike C. did a really spectacular job with the lighting.
The necromancers' castle complex mission featured the Book of Ash that was introduced in the Life of the Party mission. It had a pretty cool setting, a castle complex imbedded in the mountains, with falling snow; I really wanted to capture some of the vibe from The Shining.
With the Hammerite church/base, we basically wanted to show what the Hammers were up to during the events of Thief 2. They were at a pretty low point during the rise of the Mechanists, and the space reflected that.
In the "seedy city streets" mission, we wanted to show more of the city's dangerous side...street thugs, crime bosses, guards fighting with thieves, that sort of thing.
-----
Emil Pagliarulo
Designer/Victorian Slumlord
Thief 3 Team, Ion Austin
sNeaksieGarrett on 28/12/2008 at 19:44
Thanks for sharing, jtr7!:thumb:
jtr7 on 12/3/2009 at 02:43
I finally got around to comparing the Object Lists for miss4.mis (Framed) to account for the changes in object count.
So far, I've learned the Morgue, Laboratory, and the Jail section's Main Office, have had significant changes, and there's the addition of a room adjoining that Main Office, with shelves reminding me of the cage in Pavelock with all the shelves for prisoner's belongings.
A warning for those venturing within the mission: the intermediate area behind the HorzPortcullis from that Main Office, adjoining the Torture Chamber with the GuyOnRack, and the Door9s into the Cellblock, will cause a "...too many vertices" error if you go inside.
The freshly-cut servant, dead on the slab in the Morgue, that had the posterscroll near his head (m04b06, ruling the death as a result of "Paganism", and the body found in the sewers), has a bloodied meat cleaver (Butcher Knife) where the posterscroll was, and the posterscroll is on the new OfficeDesk at the south wall. There are more blood1 spatters in the room. The two slots in the OM's north wall for bodies have been replaced by four safedoors in the east wall, nothing behind them. The north wall now has a room, behind two Door9s, opened with a JumperSwitch, that looks like the beginnings of a walk-in freezer.
One of the Crime Lab's shelf-like tables has been removed, the one from the west wall, and the lab equipment and jars are moved over onto the one. The west wall has a Door9 modified to look like the "in case of emergency break glass" in Precious Cargo, and behind the glass is a Knife. There's a new OfficeDesk along the south wall.
In the Jail section's check-in station, or "Main Ofice", the three ControlPanels have been removed, and three Up/Down Switches fulfill their former function. The dwal3s texture above the deleted ControlPanels has also been removed.
The revised miss04.mis, for Framed T2G:
Has an extra AlarmButton (6, instead of the OM's 5).
Has an extra BarredDoor (4, instead of 3).
Has 3 less BigTable (14, instead of 17).
Has 2 extra blood1 (9, instead of 7, in the Morgue).
Has 2 less BreakWinS (4, instead of 6).
Has an extra broadhead (15, instead of 14).
Has a Butcher Knife (instead of zero, the meat cleaver in the Morgue).
Has 5 less CityWatchBan (21, instead of 26).
Has 3 less ControlPanel (4, instead of 7, deleted from the check-in station).
Has 3 extra Door9 (10, instead of 7, two added to the Morgue, one to the Crime Lab).
Has an extra Flat Switch (5, instead of 4).
Has 3 less GasFlame (12, instead of 15).
Has 3 less gaslight (12, instead of 15).
Has 12 HangElecLight (instead of zero).
Has 8 less HangSpotFush (33, instead of 41).
Has 1 JumperSwitch (instead of zero, in the Morgue).
Has 1 less Key2 (3, instead of 4).
Has 1 less Key3 (1, instead of 2).
Has a Knife (instead of zero, added to the Crime Lab, behind an extra Door9).
Has 2 less MechBanner (Zero, instead of 2).
Has 7 extra MechHangLamp (28, instead of 21).
Has 6 extra OfficeDesk (21, instead of 15).
Has 6 extra OfficeChair (41, instead of 35, one added to the Morgue, and one to the Crime Lab).
Has 19 OmniLightPoint (instead of zero).
Has an extra QuivArrow (2, instead of 1).
Has 4 Safedoor (instead of zero, most likely in the Morgue).
Has an extra SecCamera2 (6, instead of 5).
Has an extra SheriffsBowman (7, instead of 6).
Has 1 less SheriffsGuard2 (2, instead of 3).
Has 4 SpotLightPoint (instead of zero).
Has 2 extra torch (50, instead of 48).
Has 2 extra TorchFlameSmoke (50, instead of 48).
Has 2 extra TorchFlameYellow (50, instead of 48).
Has 3 extra Up/Down Switch (14, instead of 11).
Has an extra VicLightSwitch (9, instead of 8).
Has an extra whd4x8-2 (12, instead of 11).
Has 2 less whd4x8-3 (27, instead of 29).
Macha on 12/3/2009 at 21:54
Thanks for the work, interesting read.
