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Arnelos
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of the Free World
Sep 2002
time: 00:35
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As for my own posts on the subject, which earlier in the thread I said I'd repost from the TDS forum...
Here's my "review" of the game (if you can call it that) right after I finished the game:
quote:
Just finished the game. After finishing it and playing through the lengthy last level, I have to say that Thief: Deadly Shadows is arguably better than either Thief: The Dark Project or Thief 2: The Metal Age. The plotline is, in my opinion, more compelling than Thief 2, though perhaps on par with Thief 1. Thief 1's drawback was that Thief 2 had better levels. I'd say that Thief 3's levels are easily better than much of Thief 1, and probably on par with much of Thief 2.
Making the comparison of levels with Thief 2 is difficult, however. To be blunt, you're talking about apples and oranges and ultimately it's going to be a matter of taste. Personally, I find both to be good, just different. The rooftop level of Thief 2 and other such things aren't possible in Thief 3 because of the unfortunate concessions that had to be made for the X-Box, but Thief 3 brings to the table things Thief 2 never had: namely a far more compelling plot (in my opinion), a mission that will scare the crap out of you better than probably any other mission in a video game, and one hell of a great last level (which is an area where Thief 2 was very very lacking IMO). Even the final cutscene is great (and I love the nod to Thief 1 at the end of it  ).
Those who are completely turned off by the game are mostly those, I think, who have only played the Tutorial, demo, and first castle/mansion level. Frankly, that whole section of the game seems a dumbed down introduction to people new to the series compared to what comes later. The game gets both more challenging and FAR more compelling.
For those who say they like it, but see a lot of drawbacks due to things missing from Thief 1/2, I sympathize. Personally, I agreed with a lot of that sentiment early in the game and still do agree with one major gripe (the small level size). Otherwise, I don't think the gripes bear themselves out if you play through the game.
Is the game an enormous step forward in stealth gaming? No, I don't think so. Is it a really great stealth-based game with a very compelling plotline? Yes, most definately. Is it as good as Thief 1/2? Yes, at least in my opinion. I'd even argue that it's marginally better than Thief 2 because of the better plot and better than Thief 1 because they thankfully avoided some of the boring sections of Thief 1 (remember that you tend to forget the drawbacks of Thief 1 that were improved even in Thief 2 when your memory becomes so heavily tainted by nostalgia - to be fair, Thief 1 had some GREAT levels, though).
The final mission has some really great gameplay, too.
In the final analysis, I'd probably have to echo what I remember of the Gamespy review: It's not a great leap forward in stealth gaming, but it's at least as good as Thief 1 or Thief 2. I'd say Ion Storm did a pretty good job. |
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Arnelos
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of the Free World
Sep 2002
time: 00:35
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As for the cradle mission (sorry for giving away the NAME to anyone, but that's not really a spoiler in my opinion, seeing as the name is already on every "this is the scariest level ever" thread in the TDS forum), here's one of the things I wrote a few weeks ago after I played it. It's in response to a thread that started with the question "Cradle: Scariest Level?" and the first post asked if it was the scariest level ever.
quote:
This is hardly the first thread on this very subject. I think that provides you with your answer.
Seriously, A LOT of us have said that the Cradle level is not merely spectacular, but probably the best creep-value level of any game we remember playing. For me personally, as I've also stated elsewhere, it actually surpasses the creep-value of System Shock 2, which is the GAME that previously creeped me out most at the time I first played it.
The thing I love about the Cradle level (and I presume the genius of its design) is that it uses your Thief training against you. Specifically:
spoiler(highlight to read):
You've been trained across three Thief games to sneak around slowly in the dark and listen very carefully to noises. In this level, moving slowly and being on alert for any noise only serves to uselessly scare the crap out of you. The Thief games also train you to think of yourself as the nocturnal predator hunting his unwary prey. The Cradle level turns this entire mindset upside down and makes you feel intensely uncomfortable for being the PREY with an uncanny sense of your lack of safety, yet gives nothing tangible to focus that on. The Thief games have also trained you to use enemies as mental and literal landmarks and goal posts. You get so accustomed to watching and listening to the movements of your opponents and working a strategy around it that doing so becomes quite comfortable. The experience of not having any of those goal posts or landmarks can be quite disorienting; especially with that knocking sound coming from the attic and you left wondering when the first enemy is going to pop up and surprise you.
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So the result is that all of that Thief training you have ends up working AGAINST you - largely only serving to scare you more than you'd otherwise be scared (due to different behavior and outlook).
Quite an ingenious level.  |
Last edited by Arnelos on 21-06-2004 at 12:49
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loinburger
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Sweet Sauce Jones
Jul 1999
time: 00:35
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spoiler(highlight to read):
I was wrong on the Cradle Creatures -- it's possible to kill them, it's just a helluva lot more difficult than it is to kill regular zombies, and they don't dissolve away after you've killed them. The first time I played through I backstabbed one of them and then shot a fire arrow at it, and the damn thing still got up and attacked me. After dumping a bunch of holy water on it the creature eventually went down, but didn't dissolve, and there was no way I was going to get near the thing anymore.
As for the necklace around the neck of the statue in the museum, you've got to either jostle the necklace off or else knock over the statue. I took one of those big urn things, climbed it, and jumped over to the statue pedestal. This knocked the statue around a bit, and the necklace fell off. It was only worth about 130 gold, which is chicken feed compared to all of the loot available in that place, but still, loot's loot.
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04-06-2004 07:17
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