baeuchlein on 9/1/2012 at 04:07

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First of all - thank you, LarryG, for these new insights into Garrett's early years, and your vision of a Keeper Academy. After a short period of getting used to things, I largely enjoyed the show.

Let's proceed with some technical things now.

The problem with the "crying baby objective" appears to be caused by a sound file with an uncommon sound format. I'll try to describe this without open spoilers now.

The file snd\ka\rattle2.wav should be played when the baby is soothed - or rather whenever the action which is meant to soothe the baby is performed, whether the baby is present or not. Anyone who already figured out what to do should know what I mean. Whenever I perform this action, I hear nothing, but instead the game crashes to the desktop the next time I go into the game menus ("O" or "M", for example) or read a papyrus. (System specs: Athlon XP "Barton" @1.7 GHz, 512 MB RAM, ATI Radeon 9550, Windows 98 SE; german Thief 2 patched to version 1.18 (no ddfix, no widescreen patch or anything else), Darkloader 4.3.1 beta)

Anyway, this sound file (as well as snd\ka\rattle1.wav, which apparently is never used during the mission) has a sample size of 32 bits and a sample rating of 48000 Hz. This is an uncommon format, especially for the time when Thief 2 was programmed. Win98SE cannot play this file either, but starts to search for a new sound codec instead. However, the Audacity sound editor run under Linux or Windows XP can play and even edit or convert such a sound file.

There are two ways to get around the problem.

First one: Convert the file to 16 bits sample size and 44100 Hz sample frequency. You will even hear what you're supposed to hear in-game, then. Put the new file into the mission's zip file and everything's fixed. I think that should be LarryG's job.;)

Second one: Install the mission via Darkloader (but don't start it yet). In your Thief 2 directory, delete the files snd\ka\rattle2.wav and snd\ka\rattle1.wav. Press Darkloader's "Play" button and enjoy the mission. You only need this to be done whenever you do what you're supposed to do to stop the baby from crying. Before and after that, you don't need to delete the files. This is not an actual fix, but an easy way around the problem for players who do not wish to mess around with sound file conversion.

To anyone who already saved a game before "the baby thing": You can still use these old saved games. Just ensure one of the fixes above is done just before you soothe the baby. For example, go to the baby (and don't perform the "soothing action" before), save the game, then exit Thief 2. Apply one of the two fixes (the second one being the most convenient - just delete the file mentioned above). Start the game again, load your previous saved game, silence the child (and get rid of what you needed to silence it), then save again. Done.

After doing this, it does not matter whether you re-install the mission at a later time (meaning the sound files are reinstalled from the zip file as well).


And now for some other things I'd like to say about the mission.

First of all, it's a nice mission (although not exactly my taste, but near enough), and the sheer number of sound files (almost three thousand!) already shows some of the time and effort the author put into this mission. There are enhanced versions of more or less well-known adversaries (e.g., the ones you encounter after about half the mission is done), and there are a few new things which the player can do in the mission (I think - the magic spells somehow didn't work on my system). The story, while not exactly a brand new idea, is good as well, although there are some things I do not understand... yet. I guess these will be explained in the sequels.

Almost everything I saw made sense to me (except for maybe Garrett having to pick the lock to his own room at the academy), and there's a comparatively large area to play through (although some parts appear to be a bit empty).


On the technical side of things, however, there are some not-so-good things. Apart from the baby problem mentioned above, there are other things that randomly went wrong during play. For example, I have a saved game right before the crying baby, and most of the time I could continue playing from this game normally. However, things were different at least two times. I was then unable to open a hidden door by pressing the appropriate button. While one could still hear the "Found secret!" sound, the door did not swing open. Whacking it open with the sword did work, however. Another hidden door encountered shortly after the first one behaved similar. Unfortunately, this problem appears and vanishes at random, so it may not be easy to reproduce and analyze.

In the attic, I arrived where the glyphs appeared on the wall, and saved the game. After loading it some time later, the glyphs had vanished. The sounds associated with the glyphs and frobbing them were still present, but I could not see what glyph I was selecting that way. Reloading the saved game several times and running around a bit suddenly let the glyphs reappear. Maybe the glyphs vanish if you reload a saved game where Garrett stands very close to the glyphs?

My troubles were not over yet. I had to try the "frob the glyph" thingie three times until it worked - and yes, I already figured out the right combination. Since others apparently encountered a similar problem, maybe it would be better not to use this type of puzzle in the sequels.

After finally opening the "special safe", my next problem awaited inside. The book was locked, and while in theory there should be visible and audible hints while picking the locks, reality turned out to be different. Most of the time the sphere-shaped metal thing on the lock went one way whenever I chose the right lockpick, and the other way when the wrong pick was selected - but at least once during gameplay, movement of the metal sphere was completely randomized, without any pattern.

The audio hints failed for me as well. Garretts remarks are too faint on my system, compared to the background sound played at this particular spot as well as the lockpicking sounds. I believe this is common with some non-english versions of Thief 2; I remember some kind of discussion on that subject with DrK when one of the Rocksbourg missions came out.

Someone stated earlier in this thread that he/she can't hear the background sounds which are supposed to play. I think this is another case of different sound volumes for various in-game sounds in Thief 2, although it's not a serious one.

There's not much an author can do to address those sound volume problems, but I think one has to keep it in mind when building a mission. Always have some "backup indicators" (like the visual one I mentioned before) in case a sound cannot be heard on someone's machine.


Last but not least, there seem to be a lot of unused sound files in the missions zip file. For example, there's some file with a name suggesting something like "a cow and goat bell from uncle", or whatever, among the sound files for the "New Keepers". I don't think this one is used in-game (maybe the "Bell of Wisdom" sound was made from this one?). And I did not hear CS05.WAV either, which is the complete audio part from a cutscene from original Thief 2. Furthermore, there are tons of Garrett's remarks (I believe it's everything he says in Thief Gold, even his talk with Cutty in prison), although we only hear a few of them during gameplay. Why?

I even wonder whether the 2951 (!) sound files for the keepers are really needed. If I got that right, there are maybe ten different kinds of keepers, which would mean each one has about three hundred different lines at his/her disposal. SOmehow, I find this hard to believe.

I think a bit of tidying up would be in order considering those sound files.

LarryG on 9/1/2012 at 05:06

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Thanks for your investigation. Since I have not been able to reproduce that behavior, I was not able to track it down. I'll take a look at your proposed solution.

He doesn't. He has a key in his pocket at mission start-up.

There were a few anomalous sound related events reported during beta testing which the beta testers were unable to consistently replicate and for which I was unable to find a cause. None of them seriously affects game play. Your experiences with the glyphs is so far unique. As for sound volume level problems, none of my beta testers reported anything like what you experienced on your PC. I am sorry that you have had troubles. You might try playing the mission on another PC. It could be your rig that is the issue. As I said in the README, "... this mission is right on the edge of what the Dark engine can support in terms of numbers of objects and terrain / scene complexity. It plays best on up to date hardware, and should be OK on most systems. However if your rig is marginal, there may be sections of the mission map which will stress it." You may be experiencing problems for those very reasons.

I appreciate the effort and care you have taken in your analysis. I will look into your suggestions and see what I think is practical for me to do at this time. Thank you.

baeuchlein on 9/1/2012 at 13:02

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I believe you have found a very large burial chamber, the one with the chariot, and there were several mages around. But there is another burial chamber somewhere in the Necropolis. The entrance may be somewhat hidden from view. If you haven't found this chamber, that's where you have to go now. If you have found it, on the other hand, and didn't find too much in there... then you missed something.

Oh, and did you search the "chariot room" well enough? There's a rather dark area with several identical-looking pieces of loot.



That sounds like some kind of bug, at least everything concerning those "floating keys".

reka1 on 9/1/2012 at 18:57

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Still need a hint that I can understand that will point me towards that treasure chamber or vault...!

Dafydd on 9/1/2012 at 22:28

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The good news is that I found a savegame from just before I took the last floaty key; the bad news is that I cannot for the life of me figure out how to upload a savegame either here or as a PM. (I know what savegame file to send; I mean I don't see any button or icon to click to attach a file. :confused: I may just be overlooking something obvious... can anyone clue me how to attach files? Thanks!)

I would rather PM the savegame directly to LarryG than upload it to the thread, if that's possible.

The bodies following "the event" disappeared and the floaty keys materialized only after I went through the maze and through the ancient residence area with the ghosts, then returned to the dormatory area.

Nearly all the rooms on the masters' floor had floaty keys, usually a couple. As I said, one went into Garrett's keyring, the other went into inventory separately. (I now have eight keys in inventory, not including the ancient key that opens the doors in the ancient residence area, and not including Garrett's keyring. As you will see, assuming I can attach the savegame somewhere to something, the floating key in this savegame is the key to the room in which it floats -- it locks and unlocks that door. But Garrett's keyring does not lock or unlock that door, even after collecting that key.

Dafydd