TheDorkProject on 4/4/2013 at 06:50
Maybe there's zero % chance of EM listening to us about Russell, maybe that ship has sailed and even getting them to do a paid DLC for Russell's voice as an alternate option is simply never going to happen.
In all likelihood that's the case.
Maybe there's another purpose to the complaining. Maybe it's about complaining loud and long enough that eventually Mr. Russell himself hears that we did so, so he can have a smile and tell his wife or friends about the community being so upset that he wasn't in Thief 4. Maybe that will make him feel appreciated.
That's enough to justify the complaining, to me.
Remember this guy is a long time Shakespearean actor, and has done small roles on TV and movies... not a super star by any stretch of the imagination. Those types of actors often toil a whole career and never come anywhere near name recognition. The work he did on Garrett and making the original Thief: The Dark Project, in particular... the masterpiece it is, earned him some wailing and gnashing of teeth at this news, IMO.
The guy deserves to feel like a star, at least a little bit... at least this once. I hope the news of our disappointment and our petition, etc, make it's way to him.
Shayde on 4/4/2013 at 06:58
I agree with everything Renzatic has said. I may have preferred Stephen Russell and I may not be happy about some of the decision taken by Eidos, but wishing that the game doesn't sell is cutting off your nose to spite your face. I want the game to succeed and I want there to be a new game or at least hope for a new game every decade or so.
Fandom is like a marriage - at first you are completely in love, you worship tiny details. Things change and not always for the best but you make a choice to love the positives and hope that over time the minor negatives will either change or cease to matter in light of what is good. This is not an abusive relationship, NuThief doesn't have guns or a perky blonde sidekick. Eidos has finally started communicating with the community and has been met with bile and vitriol spewing from some quarters. This can have no benefit, Eidos can't change every little detail to match the (frequently contradictory) wishes of the original community. Manage your expectations, hope for the best and please don't try to poison something that you have no way of knowing the true value of just yet.
Nuth on 4/4/2013 at 07:01
This is not the game I wanted to see, but I don't want it to fail. If it turns out to actually be a good game, I'll probably rationalize it as taking place in some similar parallel Thief universe and play it. I just can't accept the new guy as the Garrett.
antihero276 on 4/4/2013 at 07:06
So, apperently we don't get Garrett because Russell has outaged the role. Here's another insane idea... why didn't they just center the game around an older Garrett, like Dark Knight Returns, with an new ongoing story and him dealing with getting older at the same time? Or here's another, if they were so dedicated to getting a reboot instead, by not just have a new character, and not rehash Garrett? There were so many ways this goddamn game could have gone, and they choose some of the stupidest options. Garrett has become a brand name to them alone, a mask anyone can wear, not a character, and choosing him at the expense of his voice shows just what a cash grab it is, and their company should burn for it. Their decision to bring in Stephen for voice acting and then get rid of him infuriates me to no end... a slap in the face to the man who made the character the hit that he is, and the reason they are using him again. If the whole nostalgia crap is their excuse for getting rid of him, then why is nostalgia the reason this taffing game is being made in the first place? To feel like a Thief again. Eidos Montreal and their Thief (note due to very facist-like rules I disagree with very much, i have been told I cannot spell Thief the way I want to in regards to Eidos Montreal's vocal pronunciation of the word. Only out of respect for the board and the people on it, my fellow Taffers will I comply to the foolish demand.) 4 project can go to hell... but that said... i believe we all need to focus on doing as much as we can to spread awareness and get more signatures for the petition... we have to put every bit of effort into it, as a thank you to Stephen and the former Looking Glass staff.
I hope someone finds a way of contacting Stephen Russell personally and writing a letter to him on our behalf, that'd be great.
skacky on 4/4/2013 at 07:15
Personally I'm not angry at Eidos Montreal for not using Stephen Russell, I'm pissed because they've been providing absolutely lame and ridiculous excuses over and over again, poorly justifying them and being generally clueless about their decisions. If they continue to piss off the fans, they'll get hurt pretty fast and more than they think.
TheDorkProject on 4/4/2013 at 07:16
I do think the better way to handle all of this and irritate fans less was probably to have you playing as a new Thief, a younger man who possibly is the protege of an aging Garrett. That way Russell could've voiced the elder Thief without needing to do any physicality they had in mind... there would be no reason the Thief you play as couldn't be as athletic as they desired... etc
Stephen Russell's Garrett instructing you on how to use your skills in the training mission... appearing in cut scenes helping you get to the bottom of the mysteries in the storyline... giving you Thiefy devices to add to your arsenal...
could've been cool.
Azaran on 4/4/2013 at 07:17
Quote Posted by TheDorkProject
As much as not having Russell bothers me, it is not a total and complete "deal breaker" for me.
The worst part about this for me is not only that it's not Russell: if Stephen Russell was really completely unavailable for the role for some reason (like, God forbid, he had died), I would have understood. It would still suck, it wouldn't be Garrett, but hey, that's how things turned out. What outrages me the most is that they were going to use Russell, and now out of nowhere made up this bs excuse to switch to that other guy. That's a slap in the face. This has been my favourite game for the last 10 years, and now this? You can understand why people are pissed.
Anyway, to throw something positive into the mix, I like Romano's voice, but it's not Garrett. He'd make a perfect Keeper (assuming they show up this time around), but not Garrett.
antihero276 on 4/4/2013 at 07:23
Quote Posted by TheDorkProject
I do think the better way to handle all of this and irritate fans less was probably to have you playing as a new Thief, a younger man who possibly is the protege of an aging Garrett. That way Russell could've voiced the elder Thief without needing to do any physicality they had in mind... there would be no reason the Thief you play as couldn't be as athletic as they desired... etc
Stephen Russell's Garrett instructing you on how to use your skills in the training mission... appearing in cut scenes helping you get to the bottom of the mysteries in the storyline... giving you Thiefy devices to add to your arsenal...
could've been cool.
Such as the little girl who tries to pick pocket him at the end of TDS... seriously, did they even consider that angle?
jtr7 on 4/4/2013 at 07:24
When they say the toyed with the idea of a new character, I wonder if they did consider the girl. I now wish they had gone with another Keeper-less character.
It's not ONE thing that is the deal-breaker. It's several things one after the other, all together. If I wasn't open-minded about it, I would've walked away completely in 2010. What was said in 2011 drove a stake into it. I started warming back up and then bam bam BAM! --Another new pile, a confirmation of old crap the previous team hinted at, and now a change excused with an intentional insult and two other lame excuses, and it's made the good things not worth it. There's still time to make it better, even by just no longer calling it something it's not. I fully expect a game designer to know how to make things look cool and pretty and awesome, and none of that matters but for superficial marketing and superficial consumers. Thief's strengths supersede the marketing visuals. Being tricked by dark and gritty visuals has nothing to do with Thief, and everything to do with typical modern entertainment aesthetics.
TheDorkProject on 4/4/2013 at 07:28
Quote Posted by antihero276
Such as the little girl who tries to pick pocket him at the end of TDS... seriously, did they even consider that angle?
I personally think having you play as a female Thief would have been too different from the original games and would have also just frankly been lame. I'm pretty sick of the badass supernaturally tough women in every... freaking... game and movie for the last 20 years. Just had enough of it.
There is probably a way it could've been done tastefully, but they wouldn't have done it that way. Looking Glass? Perhaps.
