Thief: TIS - Volume One: Cop In The Shadows - Playing Feb 10th - Feb 24th - by SneakyJack
DarkThiefsie on 14/2/2009 at 05:43
Difficulty: Expert
My Playstyle: Natural (Knock out whoever I want whenever I want)
Ghosted: No
Secrets: 0 out of 0
Loot: 2519 out of 2729
Pockets Picked: 4 out of 6. I did not miss any I know of. I think one is Lord Archer´s key, the other is probably the classical T2 bug.
Knockouts: 27 (well knock out everyone i guess)
While airborne: 2
Kills: None
Total Time: 59 Minutes 34 Seconds
I liked this mission - it was fun and provided what I like to call a 'classic' thief experience. When compared to, say, the official OMs, i would say the quality of the gameplay stands strong (thief itself has good gameplay), but is let down by a hard to comprehend story (why is Garrett a cop? How did this happen?) and by lack of difficulty. I liked the architecture - the city architecture may have been a bit sparse but it conveyed a sense of a silent, sleeping city (though more unarmed opponents would be nice around the city - like beggars) - but there is a lack of logic in some areas that would require me to suspend my disbelief in order to maintain my immersion. Like why is Basso in a part of a city that is locked behind a door, with the key being kept with a 'A' guardsman located in a room high up in the rooftops? Another good example would be the 'green rooms' - located in the second part of the city after you get the lockpicks (near the machine rooms). Everything about that area was green and kinda reminded me of the original dooms (along with a nifty secret area that require mantling)
However, I really enjoyed the rooftop climbing and the mansion area. The mansion, I believe, is a high point in the mission and also illustrated a marked improvement in design and construction (perhaps showing that the designer got better and more confident as he designed his mission - something I still aspire to do). Thanks for this great mission!
- DarkThiefsie
er90120 on 14/2/2009 at 18:47
Difficulty: Expert
My Playstyle: Knock out anyone who seems hostile.
Ghosted: No
Secrets: 0 out of 0
Loot: 2417 out of 2729
Pockets Picked: 4 out of 6. I did not miss any I know of. I think one is Lord Archer´s key, the other is probably the classical T2 bug.
Knockouts: 28
Kills: None
Total Time: 1 hour 19 minutes Minutes 54 Seconds
I thought the mission was okay. A good way to kill an hour or so, but nothing amazing. Pretty straightforward. I enjoyed the rooftop portions of the game. It always makes more sense to me that Garret can't get into every place from ground level.
A couple of odd observations:
Why are the bars so tall? Are there giants in this town?
Ramirez runs really damn fast for a fat guy. I haven't played any missions with Ramirez in them in quite a while, was he always this fast?
The mechanist mechanic towards the end just stood there in front of me griping until I whacked him on the head.
One of the toilets (oversize, just like the bars) looked like it hadn't been flushed.
SneakyJack on 14/2/2009 at 18:52
Great reviews and comments Darkthiefsie and er90120. I didn't notice the height issue about the bars until I went back and replayed it after reading so many folks' comments about them :laff:
Great contributions so far, very interesting reads.
bedwine on 14/2/2009 at 20:13
Difficulty played Hard
Playstyle KO everyone I feel like.
Ghosted No (but I think it could be done)
Secrets 0 of 0
Loot 2557 of 2729
Pockets Picked 4 of 6 This included Rameriz
KO's 26
Kills 1 I dropped Rameriz into the pool after I KO'ed him.
Time 2hrs 29minutes
I agree with everything said so far. It wasn't the greatest mission but it wasn't the worse. Was this the authors first mission? In the early part of the game I got the impression the game was unfinished. It was almost as if he built a basic layout and hadn't planted all his goodies yet. As Sneaky said there were a lot of empty rooms and dead ends that could have been much more.
On a side note I had a lot of crashes with this mission. Apparently my system automaticly powers completely off if overheated. For some reason it only occurs while playing certain FM's. I just finished Rocksbourg without a hitch and I would have thought if anything that one would cause me problems because of the frame rate. My computer is on 24 hours a day most of the time and it only powers off with darkloader. I haven't figured out what is going on yet.
SneakyJack on 14/2/2009 at 20:25
Thanks for your playthrough contribution bedwine! I'm not sure if my system heated up during my playthrough but it is possible depending on how the mission was setup I'm sure. I know some missions are much more system intensive than others, obviously.
I know alot of you may have wondered why I chose this mission (other than it being suggested by pavlovscat of course!) - plain and simple I found it to be a very average, middle-of-the-road fan mission that wasnt bad by any means, but didn't stand out like a sore thumb either.
I did this to see the different reactions from folks and see how they looked at it through their own eyes - that and the fact that this is the first edition and the test run to see what kinds of changes I need to make to cause the threads to go more smoothly ;)
So no worries about mission choices - I've got the next couple lined up already and they are sure to be crowd pleasers. :D
gunsmoke on 14/2/2009 at 21:50
Quote Posted by SneakyJack
For the sake of discussion - could you tell us (constructively, of course) what things you didn't like about the mission or ways you thought it could be improved?
Yeah. Let me get home and write it out, and I'll edit this post.
DarkThiefsie on 15/2/2009 at 10:36
Hey all! Anyone else made any progress on this little gem?
You know, I often wondered what would happen if the AI in thie Thief games were improved to act more naturally. The one thing I realised after playing a cop in the shadows is that knocking out guards is too easy. As noted before, I play the game naturally (i.e. i try not to impose rules on myself except not to kill - which is usually an objective nonetheless). For example, it would be interesting if a guard would actually turn around (or look behind him or her) if he or she hears footsteps comming up from behind; or if guards could notice doors opening or hear doors being picked that are right next to them. Any thoughts?
SneakyJack on 15/2/2009 at 10:45
Quote Posted by DarkThiefsie
Hey all! Anyone else made any progress on this little gem?
You know, I often wondered what would happen if the AI in thie Thief games were improved to act more naturally. The one thing I realised after playing a cop in the shadows is that knocking out guards is too easy. As noted before, I play the game naturally (i.e. i try not to impose rules on myself except not to kill - which is usually an objective nonetheless). For example, it would be interesting if a guard would actually turn around (or look behind him or her) if he or she hears footsteps comming up from behind; or if guards could notice doors opening or hear doors being picked that are right next to them. Any thoughts?
In theory it sounds great to add to the challenge - but in a way part of the charm of thief to me is knowing your limits at all times. Most of the time I take comfort in the fact that I know if I have time to sneak up on a guard or not just by judging the distance - and though it may make it "easy" for me to sneak up on them knowing how they'll react and knowing their path.. it would almost be frustrating to have them turn around at random intervals only to catch you and send you running to the shadows.
Over the past few months I've become a blackjacking machine wanting to KO everything in sight - so super sensitive guards would throw me back into the shadows into ghosting - something I can't do for the life of me.
So I guess depending on your play style it may be a good thing - but for me I'd pass on it. I don't even like missions where you have to ghost and follow a target that stops to turn around all the time - I usually cant wait for that part of the mission to be over. :laff:
I think this would be a great thing to have scale to the difficulty levels. Maybe easy could have regular old guard AI - medium would have random travel paths and hard could have random travel paths with super sensitive guards that check behind them at random intervals as well. I don't know if this would even be possible in the dark engine but its a thought. I know I wouldn't be playing on Hard personally if this was the case :D
uncadonego on 15/2/2009 at 14:06
-I liked the atmosphere of the outdoor areas for the most part. It felt a bit like Thief 1 in many ways. A bit quiet and empty at times, but as someone else pointed out, the city sleeps while Garrett plies his trade. Or in this case, briefly revives his old trade.
-I thought the mansion area looked nice for the most part, but in some ways it seemed a bit out of sorts in its layout. For example, the two long carpeted hallways with stairs down a few feet then up a few feet. There were some other oddities, but it looked nice overall.
-The warehouse area method of entry is good ( I won't mention it for those who haven't played yet) but I would have preferred that the effect and cause of the opening door were within the same field of view. It's nice to see the results of your action. Not in absolutely every case, but I would have preferred it in this case.
-The warehouse equipment and AI broke the immersion for me. I was jerked out of the thief world into a different world. I held on though, and worked through it to give the mission a full chance.
-A bolder faced map would have been appreciated. I've made a mission with no map at all because Garrett got wacked on the head and woke up who knows where, so there was no casing opportunities. In this case however, he's a cop and should be able to get detailed maps of everything from the Corporation of the City of Dayport (that is if this is Dayport, can't remember all the readables right now), pretty much on demand. "I'm working a case" should suffice for an explanation without rousing anyone's ire or suspicions.
-I like one or two dead ends for realism. I don't think the mission failed in this regard, but I admit I felt a bit of disorientation and frustration at times with the areas to be found for just a bit of loot. It at times lacked a natural feel, as though the areas were carved in for something extra to do- a "forced" fleshing out, if you will.
-I enjoyed the use of the different classic Thief music loops in from area to area. Even though I lost immersion from time to time, the music helped to reground me in the Thief world.
-If this mission had not been picked as the TIS selection, I probably would have let my first half hour of this mission stop me. I persisted because I wanted to participate in this excellent new thread idea. This may end up being another beneficial effect of this series of threads: people may persist in missions where they didn't before.
**Overall I would probably give this mission between 6.75 & 7.5 out of 10. It had a certain classic feel in many ways, and it had some solid gameplay concepts, including a decent amount of use of the vertical axis.**
DarkThiefsie on 16/2/2009 at 03:38
Quote Posted by SneakyJack
In theory it sounds great to add to the challenge - but in a way part of the charm of thief to me is knowing your limits at all times. Most of the time I take comfort in the fact that I know if I have time to sneak up on a guard or not just by judging the distance - and though it may make it "easy" for me to sneak up on them knowing how they'll react and knowing their path.. it would almost be frustrating to have them turn around at random intervals only to catch you and send you running to the shadows.
Over the past few months I've become a blackjacking machine wanting to KO everything in sight - so super sensitive guards would throw me back into the shadows into ghosting - something I can't do for the life of me.
So I guess depending on your play style it may be a good thing - but for me I'd pass on it. I don't even like missions where you have to ghost and follow a target that stops to turn around all the time - I usually cant wait for that part of the mission to be over. :laff:
I think this would be a great thing to have scale to the difficulty levels. Maybe easy could have regular old guard AI - medium would have random travel paths and hard could have random travel paths with super sensitive guards that check behind them at random intervals as well. I don't know if this would even be possible in the dark engine but its a thought. I know I wouldn't be playing on Hard personally if this was the case :D
I know what you mean, but what I meant is to add to the challenge of blackjacking. In the sense that yes, you can still blackjack an opponent, but you shouldn't be able to, say, blackjack a line of guards walking down an opponent without one hearing the other being blackjacked. It would just give the game an additional level of realism - in the sense that you would have to wait for the opportune moment to blackjack a guard. Thief already has this - waiting for a guard to be in a not so well lit area and out of view of other guards before striking. It would be nice if this was taken to a new level - such as waiting for guards to actually be alone if they were in a group before striking, or waiting for a guard to start humming of whistling to himself before running up behind him and knocking him out (his humming or whistling stops him from hearing you sneak up on him).
