The Shroud on 8/11/2008 at 05:58

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As has been said, TDP had the best plot, hands down. Part of the reason for this is that, as the first game in the series, TDP laid the foundation for everything - it's the game that introduced the setting, the central character, the major factions, and the context for all that took place in the series. Because of this advantage, TDP had full jurisdiction over every aspect of both setting and plot, and therefore was able to mold the setting to serve the plot as readily as it molded the plot to fit the setting. The result was a completely seamless story that was solid and self-contained.

TMA did not have this advantage. As the sequel to a brilliant game, it had to contrive a new story that would adhere to some challenging constraints - it had to pick up where TDP left off, take the story in a new direction so as not to be repetitive, yet do so in a way that would remain true to the theme, and somehow achieve a quality comparable to its predecessor's. These limitations coupled with the game's disproportionate focus on better missions and its retrofitted plot, resulted in a convoluted, circuitous storyline that fell well below the standard set by TDP.

TDS had by far the poorest plot of the trilogy, and largely without the forgivable excuses of TMA. In fact, if anything, it should have been the best game in the series, but ended up just the opposite. In one sense, it held many of the same advantages that TDP had in that, due to it being the first appearance of its kind for X-Box gamers, and having been thoroughly re-thought and reinvented by ISA's design team, the game had the freedom and creative potential of a fresh start. In another sense, as the finale of the trilogy, it stood to gain the benefit of dramatic closure to a thrilling series as it would tie everything together and bring the arc full circle. Instead, capitalizing on the worst mistakes of TDP's and TMA's storylines respectively, TDS's plot was a slow, prolonged, badly retrofitted, hackneyed affair of substandard content and unconvincing contrivances. It could have and should have been the best of the three, but it wound up a disaster.

TDP will forever be the single-most defining, compelling, and novel piece in the series.

Beleg Cúthalion on 8/11/2008 at 08:13

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I liked all of them, although TDP always seemed a little too cliché-like to me (what Digital Nightfall once called "classic"). Oh, and I don't have any problems with the TMA structure, I'm rather impressed by things I don't understand right from the start (like that Mosley affair) and don't declare it as crooked. Plus, I don't think the stories were so different from each other.

PS1: Saying that the Keepers from TDS were worse than the Keepers from TDP/TMA sounds to me like the Titanic from February 1912 was better than the Titanic from May.

PS2: If I understand Krypt's last comment right, the story (Terri Brosius?) was the only thing in TDS that could be saved while many other things fell victim to the technical problems. So just in case someone wants to pull out the big LGS-was-better-than-ISA-club...

Ah, this is all so inaccurate... keep going, never mind.

Solabusca on 13/11/2008 at 06:19

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1) Keepers, Glyphs, and Magic - Sadly, I'd say you're a bit off base regarding Glyphs, Jarvis. Glyphs are shown to be something magical from the outset - AS are the Keepers - and Garret is shown to be something special from the outset, as well. In his first encounter with a Keeper, he notes that no-one else notices him; it's a crowded street scene. Something odd is going on. Yes, the Keepers do practice stealth overall, but in this case it's apparent that there's something more at work - and that G. is special because he can penetrate it.

I'll give you that the wands were a bit of a bodge, but I think that has more to do with the game engine than anything else. I'll concur that the sudden appearance of wands amongst the magic-using denizens of the City was a bit... off. New fashion trend, perhaps? I mean, the Pagan Shamans, the Hammer Priests, and the Keeper Elders (and the extra, side-add-on note that Necromancers use wands as well) suggesting that ALL magic-y types in the ThiefVerse do too, as of TDS is something of a stretch. But again, I chalk it up to implementation issues, explained away with a vague story-bodge of "Oh, it was always sorta like this."

My major TDS Keeper gripe is that the Keeper Enforcer/Assassins were as botched as they were - I really, really wish that whoever had develeped the correction for them would have actually uploaded the files somewhere. Truth be told, the concept was nifty, but the implementation was absolutely awful. Check in the T3 Editor's Guild to find a thread about remaking them - and pine for the fact that they've never posted the results.

2) Pagans - Yes, the Pagan pidgin was strained in this one - and as they had writers that have worked on the games from the outset, I have no idea where to lay the blame for that one.

.j.

Sneaksie on 13/11/2008 at 08:07

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TDP. Dark Project is unique because it is really dark in all meanings of this word. One of the things that i loved in the first game was a lack of coolie magic stuff in it. It was a refreshing change after all these crappy generic fantasy settings where magic is so common that almost everybody wears stuff like Trousers of Perception and shoots grapefruit-sized "fireballs". Magic in TDP was truly superstitional and thus rare and subtle, absent in common life. Garrett ran into magic things because he wandered into most ancient, dangerous and desolate places, not because he took a walk on a market day. Introducing of mages in Thief Gold (and filling Lost City with them) was IMHO a first step in bastardisation of the series, a step similar to introducing laughable keeper enforcers and kurshok in TDS. TDP was unique in all aspects and after that Thief franchise were dumbed down in TG and, to much larger extent, in TDS. TMA had its flaws like questionable plot twist but thanks to unique things like Servants and overall victorian style many people deservingly love it.

clearing on 13/11/2008 at 10:45

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I prefer T1 for story, gameplay, style, etc...