Thief Debuts To Mediocre Reviews

The latest title in the stealth game series Thief launched in North America yesterday for the PS3, PS4, Xbox 360, Xbox One, and Windows. Reviews of the game are mixed. Rock, Paper, Shotgun's John Walker says that the story is poor, but "it matters very little, since it's only there as an excuse to link epic, intricate and hugely enjoyable levels together." He also laments the loss of a dedicated "Jump" button, noting that veterans of the series will miss it. "There are far too often obstacles that a toddler could easily scale, but Garrett won't even try, and his refusing to jump certain gaps in order to force a challenge is maddening." Polygon's review says navigating the game's open environments was fun, but "In the latter half of the game, when a glimpse of that openness was dangled in front of me once again, Thief snatched it away with murderous AI and controls that didn't feel up to the challenge." They add, "a new obsession with scripted story sequences and stealth action often leaves Thief feeling like the worst of both worlds." Giant Bomb's review is brutal, saying Thief is "a game that spends an inordinate amount of time making the player do uninteresting things while shoving the more fun stuff so far in the corner you'd be forgiven for missing most of it."

Comments

Let's Play

[Kokuyo]

Thank god for Let's plays on Youtube. If I happen to find that the reviewers are right, I don't need to buy it and if I find that I disagree, I can order it after having watched a bit of gameplay. In that case, sure, I have to replay already viewed scenes, but it doesn't top the amount of frustration I get from having spent good money on yet another crappy game...

Some people don't like the slow pace

[sproketboy]

Some people (like toddler Alex Navarro) don't like the slow pace of these kinds of games. Web reviews are useless anyway. Youtube is a much better place to see if a game is good or not.

TotalBiscuit's review is worth watching if you want to decide for yourself.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?...

Re:Some people don't like the slow pace

[Nemyst]

It's also funny how TFS manages to portray the RPS review as negative when in fact it's lauding the game as being rather fun.

This really does feel as though the internet had already decided to hate the game before the game even came out.

You just got low expectations

[SmallFurryCreature]

There are people who liked Deus Ex: HR but those are exactly the kind of dumbed down console players that would have hated the original Thief and for that matter the original Deus Ex. It is the same people who think Bioshock is a worthy sequel to System Shock.

That doesn't mean the new games are bad, they are just the equivelant of the current Discovery Channel to the one from a decade ago. Dumbed down and simplistic.

You can see this reflected in the universal action key, because you know how hard it is to remember more then one key. Those who love this call it stream lined. I call it dumbed down.

Your choice what you think. But remember when you read reviews of these type of games that changed market, what games the reviewer likes. If you read a review by a scat lover about a turd, you best make sure you share his views before you bite down.

Re:You just got low expectations

[gweihir]

I disagree. I like Human Revolution very much and I liked Deus Ex 1 very much, as well as Thief 1 and 2. Human Revolution is only simplistic if you play it as a shooter. If you play it as a sneaker, it is great and does capture the spirit of the original exceedingly well.

Re:You just got low expectations

[Luckyo]

That is correct. Multiplatform games released for PC are often dumbed down because they are:
1. Not PC games - they are multiplatform releases
2. Expected to sell more on consoles than PCs - as a result main aspects of game design are focused on console crowd.
3. Both thief and DX:HR make very good example of this dumbing down. A lot of core mechanics of originals are simplified for reasons that they must run on a console and be aimed at console crowd. That means axing more complex features in favor of fast QTEs, simpler controls, linear or simplified tactical approach and so on.
All of these are present in thief. All of these were present in DX:HR. Both are still fun games in their own right, in part because originals were so good that even stripping them down still leaves a very good game.

Re:You just got low expectations

[Nemyst]

Oh my goodness, an honest to god PC Master Race person. How does it feel?

The Dark Mod

[Thanosius]

Go play The Dark Mod instead: http://www.thedarkmod.com/main...

Free, now standalone so despite the name you don't need Doom 3 to play it, plus it's cross-platform. You basically download missions through the in-game downloader, most of them really, really good, and get your proper Thief experience instead of the watered-down bullshit that this new Thief game provides.

Re:Mediocre reviews, but the game is fine if not g

[X0563511]

Yep.

Dove in on Master - and I'm actually going to start over on Custom and turn a bunch of extra hard-stuff on. Feeling right at home.

Re:Needs a Patch

[X0563511]

Quad 2.6ghz Phenom II with an nvidia 460gtx, and I get 30-40fps consistently on High settings (though with SSA off, which was eating FPS like candy and providing little discernible difference in quality when FXAA was also on).

I've no idea where your Radeon stands compared to my nvidia, but I do know mine isn't new, it's been around for a while now. Same story with my CPU.

My thoughts as a die-hard Thief fan.

[grub]

I love all things Thief and have since the first release of Thief: The Dark Project.

What the new Thief gets right:
- Stealth. Just as good as previous iterations.
- Lock picking. Similar to what we had with Thief: Deadly Shadows.
- Rope Arrows. Only because they are back after disappearing in Deadly Shadows- Lighting & atmosphere. I think they nailed it.
- Difficulty: Oh yes... they nailed this. The Iron Man setting looks great (you die, game over. You have to restart from scratch) as well as may other great tweaks. Like turning off that stupid Focus (see below)

What the new Thief gets wrong:
- Rope Arrows. Yay, they are back, but they can only be shot into special wood beams with rope wrapped around them. The original rope arrows could be shot into almost any type of wood, even walls and many trees, allowing for great exploration.
- Focus. This is Thief, not Dishonored. Fuck off, Focus.
- Swearing and sex. I'm not a prude, but I would have liked hearing more "Taffer" and "Benny's drunk"-type talk over "fuck fuck fuck fuck" and the hot sexness in the brothel. Some of us play these games with our kids.
- Scripted actions. Escape-type scenes. Very new Tomb Raider. Maybe it's part of 'reimagining' games that these scenes seem necessary.
I'm in to the third part of the story (the brothel) and while I am loving the new Thief as a die-hard fan, there are some serious shortcomings.

Re:My thoughts as a die-hard Thief fan.

[Darinbob]

That's too bad. I suspect there are people out there laughing and thinking that if adults don't want that stuff in games then we must all be prudes. This sounds gratuitous; with one definition of that word being "being without apparent reason, cause, or justification". It doesn't help the story, add to characterization, flesh out the setting, etc, it's just there because someone wanted to get away with it and be edgy. Except that too much of it and it just becomes stupid and puerile, actively hurting the final product.

Thief's 1/2 Magic Ingredients were....

[BrendaEM]

I have played Thief 1/2/3 and over a hundred Thief 1/2 add on missions. Thief's 1/2 Magic Ingredients were....

There was sophisticated programing for Thief 1/2. Light and sound mattered to the AI. There were locks, puzzles, contraptions, levers. Garret could use the rope arrow on any wood. Garrett could swim.

Thief 1/2 were made in New England, where Thief 1/2 was made, has a marked Autumn season. Notice how many leaves are strewn about in Thief 1. As someone from New England who now lives in Northern California, I will state that it's hard to imagine how creepy it is to be in a graveyard at night around Halloween, when you are a child. In Thief 1, that graveyard, is in the middle of a haunted town that you will have to make it back through, and yes, but you still have to go under it.

There were quite a few women working at Looking Glass Studio on Thief 1/2. It wasn't made in an all-male cloistered monoculture. Women make add-on missions. Women even cos-play Garret. If you want women to buy video games, hire women.

The biggest problem with the Thief reboot is the console game culture, where games cannot require skill to play. Ref: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v... You cannot move like a "Master Thief" unless you can control a character.

Sadly, Looking Glass Studio failed. Thief 1/2's (as well as SS2) biggest problem was it's graphics were very polygonal even for their time. Thief was never a breathtaking game visually, but once you got over that it didn't need to be, and that is why there will be many more missions for Thief than there will be for most newer games.

I might check out the new Thief, but for missions, I'm not expecting a mission as excellent as Ominous Bequest, or The Seven Sisters, or a story as good as Saturio Returns Home or The Bathory Campaign. I'm not expecting the care and devotion shown in Thief 2x or The Dark Mod.

Still, I hope there is enough in the reboot Thief, to go admit their faults and go on to get everything right.