Galaer on 30/11/2018 at 16:46

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Not gonna lie, city missions is my least favorite theme. No matter how interesting it is later, I always start them with resigned voice: "sigh... another city mission?" I played few hundreds of FMs and I noticed that city theme appears most of the time. Like for example in 2005 there was Novice Contest with bank robbery as a theme. I was really excited. First City Bank and Trust is my favorite mission in Thief 2. Unfortunately all these missions were just city missions with small bank inside them. I was really disappointed.

So my question is: why is there so many city missions? Are they easier to do than other type of the mission? Or maybe there is some other aspect I am missing.

Calibrator on 30/11/2018 at 18:03

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As far as design goes I suspect that a really well-made city mission is as difficult to design as a mansion mission, if not more complicated.
But I can't really judge this as I'm not a mission author.

As a player, however, I can only say: City missions are BY FAR my favorite missions. Always have been.

Now, this doesn't mean that I don't enjoy other mission types like "mansion", "prison escape", "pagan woods" etc. - far from it - but a nice city mission always gets a higher priority.

Maybe this type of mission is simply a combination of characterstics that resonate with me?

Exploration:
You often have to find a certain building. Think needle in a haystack - but usually easier. Cities and towns have character whereas the hay stack is more uniform. Even if you have a map the exploration aspect is always a strong ingredient.

Spatial gameplay:
Buildings often have cellars, roofs and various levels inbetween. Rope arrows (my favorite type of tool) are often useful, if not a necessity - especially to get into that single open window high above ground. While mansion missions often have secret ways you can also find them in city missions - and sometimes they span different buildings.
And then you discover that the quarter has a sewer system that you can use to sneakily enter buildings that are otherwise unreachable.

Compartmentalization:
Most buildings are separate from each other. Sometimes they are connected, but most of the time they are not. You could plunder one building and then climb into the next one. This is very satisfying for players as you (usually) get quick rewards. City missions are often offering more loot. Every building is a new chance (like a lucky bag) - and you can stumble on either a motherlode or a garbage dump. Perhaps even a dangerous one...

And especially in a Thief FM: Everything can happen!
First you are on the street, then you enter some inconspicuous small building, which leads into a bigger structure with a dank cellar. In that cellar you find a secret door or fake wall and behind that a portal into a another dimension - perhaps a small wood level with some beasties!
Some absolutely stunning accomplishments have been created with this kind of freedom and variety that only the classic Thief games offer.
A prime example is the now old Calendra's Legacy with its (optional) tomb in the first mission. I still love this campaign to death and replay it every few years.

And there are other advantages:
Like in a mansion mission you can advance methodically, one building after the other.
You can also often easily make breaks, at least while in the exploration stage and continue later.

And finally: I simply love the architectural style of medieval or steampunk towns.
This isn't a necessity, though, as I also love the Deus Ex or Dishonored games for their locations.

Galaer on 30/11/2018 at 20:44

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I have few problems with city missions:

1. It gives too much choices to explore. If city is big and there is no map, then city exploration looks like I get a choice of few paths, after making a choice I get another choice of few paths and it repeats and repeats and repeats until I get lost. I really want to get everywhere. For that I want to explore cities methodically, but with all these choices it's very hard.

2. City missions often have very similarly looking streets. When everything looks the same it's hard for me to notice where I was and where I wasn't. There was one Thief 2 FM that forced me to use apples to indicate places that I explored.

3. Background buildings. I want to check everything. So it's really lame when I see building with background door that I can't open because creator decided that this building is just acts as a wall. And that's all. Also if you enter building then most of the time you can only explore 1 tiny room and the rest of house is separated by background door.

4. Loot is scattered everywhere. This means that if you have problem with getting loot requirement, you will be forced to explore the whole city again. And city missions are mostly bigger than any other type of the missions.

5. Because cities are bigger there is also a lot more walking. Sometimes you are forced to backtrack and you lose many minutes for that just because streets are longer to give illusion of the real city.

6. Sometimes there are optional paths that leads to bigger areas. And they end in a completely different part of the city. For example sewers that can bring to a completely different district. This means it is even easier to get lost. And sometimes they are a paths of no return. You never know if you return to unexplored optional paths that you missed by taking this path of no return. And that's really annoying.

I'm fully aware that there are some city missions without this kind of problems. And also I'm fully aware that these are the problems probably only for me.

Aemanyl on 30/11/2018 at 22:44

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They are certainly more enjoyable than cities in real life. I too enjoy sneaking throughout the city streets.

Kerrle on 1/12/2018 at 00:12

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Yeah, this. Give me verticality and rooftops and diverse approaches with lots of exploration.

A personal favorite is the city map that eventually leads to huge, detailed and delightfully designed target manors (or banks or whatnot).