Decline Thiaf Pre-Release Thread

[FeelTheRads]

Hopefully they'll keep telling themselves that after Squeenix whines about its sales.

In before the next "good for what it is" game on the Codex.

 

[commie]

Hopefully they'll keep telling themselves that after Squeenix whines about its sales.

In before the next "good for what it is" game on the Codex.

I can't see how this can be even that. It's just a shameless Dishonored/Ass Creed rip-off using the Thief name. There just is nothing in it from what they've shown to suggest it's any better than even those games at what it does. More that just being shit or even mediocre....it just looks boring and derivative.

 

[J_C]

Dubstep in a Thief trailer, I think we've reached a new low:



P.S: I think TDM's standalone release deserves a thread of its own.

There isn't a single moment, a single scene which reminds me the old Thief. The atmosphere is totally off, Garett is a fucking ninja, who knows kung-fu. Fuck it, where is TDM.

 

[zwanzig_zwoelf]

Dubstep in a Thief trailer, I think we've reached a new low:



P.S: I think TDM's standalone release deserves a thread of its own.

There isn't a single moment, a single scene which reminds me the old Thief. The atmosphere is totally off, Garett is a fucking ninja, who knows kung-fu. Fuck it, where is TDM.

(piano plays)
Bosso: Garrot, do you remember old times, si?
(piano stops playing)
Garrot: What timez? Tjokk loco, Bosso!
(laugh track while Bosso is dickstabbed and dragged into Shalebridge Gay Brothel)

 

[skacky]

I don't think this was posted.

 

[Hornawkawk]

this looks more like some movie trailer

The few times I bother to look at game trailers they always look more like movie trailers. If you pause the movie you may be lucky to catch a few frames of actual gameplay.

Then why is it called a 'gameplay' trailer? zzzzzz

 

[zwanzig_zwoelf]

this looks more like some movie trailer

The few times I bother to look at game trailers they always look more like movie trailers. If you pause the movie you may be lucky to catch a few frames of actual gameplay.

Then why is it called a 'gameplay' trailer? zzzzzz

Because Beyond: Two Thieves.

 

[octavius]

this looks more like some movie trailer

The few times I bother to look at game trailers they always look more like movie trailers. If you pause the movie you may be lucky to catch a few frames of actual gameplay.

Then why is it called a 'gameplay' trailer? zzzzzz

Looks like the gameplay mostly conists of cutscenes and scripted events, then.

 

[DalekFlay]

Preview on PC Gamer today makes the game sound a lot larger and more open world than I thought it was. Can't lie: liked the sound of that.

Gameplay sounds extremely derped down though, as expected.

 

[Hornawkawk]

Holy shit.
http://forums.eidosgames.com/showpost.php?p=1954967&postcount=16

To be fair and keep it real, any "truly" bitter people are a tiny minority surely.

Everyone in that thread says the music is great and spot on...

 

[Darth Roxor]

Can't lie: liked the sound of that.

Of course you did ^______^

 

[zwanzig_zwoelf]

Can't lie: liked the sound of that.

Of course you did ^______^

 

[DalekFlay]

Can't lie: liked the sound of that.

Of course you did ^______^

 

[JarlFrank]

I don't think this was posted.

Too many animations for grabbing stuff, opening stuff and touching stuff.
Focus is shit.
NuGarrett is a faggot.
Upgrades have 100% chance of being ridiculously overpowered.

Gameplay looks okay-ish though, as long as the stealth mechanics aren't utter shit it could be a semi-decent Ass Creed/Dishonored knockoff.
But it's going to be a shitty Thief game. There's no excuse for that.

 

[Borelli]

I don't think this was posted.

Spoiler

Too many animations for grabbing stuff, opening stuff and touching stuff.
Focus is shit.
NuGarrett is a faggot.
Upgrades have 100% chance of being ridiculously overpowered.

Gameplay looks okay-ish though, as long as the stealth mechanics aren't utter shit it could be a semi-decent Ass Creed/Dishonored knockoff.
But it's going to be a shitty Thief game. There's no excuse for that.

"and his signature swoop feels catlike and satisfying"

"signature swoop"

"SIGNATURE"

Of all the possible things to be Garret's signature they choose the motherfuckin swoop?

"Thief is looking like a strong contender for Dishonored's oldtimey stealth crown".

Fools can fight each other for the crown while the real king rules, from the shadows.

Builds your Roofs of Dead Wood.
Builds your Walls of Dead Stone.
Builds your Dreams of Dead Thoughts.
Builds your Games of Dead Fans.

EDIT: I do like the vertical focus the levels have even if they got from Dishonored. (and if Dishonored didn't have it then they wouldn't have copied it)

 

[JarlFrank]

This game is just trying to blindly copy Dishonored and Ass Creed. When I think about it, the contextual jumping reminds me of how it works in the Ass Creed games.

 

[skacky]

 

[Darth Slaughter]

I notice takedowns and rope climbing in 1st person perspective... so, they went back?

 

[Pika-Cthulhu]

Dubstep in a Thief trailer, I think we've reached a new low:



P.S: I think TDM's standalone release deserves a thread of its own.

Wow, that is fucking abysmal voice work there. Lack of emotion or urgency or anything. If they had that guy phone in his lines why not have SR phone in his lines? Fucking tragic, but at least SR doesnt have his name on this stinker

 

[Melan]

Here is another video from Free Germanistan showing gameplay from the city hub. Some climbing action, some breaking in action showing off Garrett's tools, plus the inventory/upgrades thing. Some of the city architecture is not half bad, although the navigable routes are kinda super-obvious, and you can see most of the action is contextual.

But once again, what it shows clearly is that EM really wanted to make the Guy Ritchie Sherlock Holmes game, but couldn't get the license and ended up shoehorning it all into Thief. If you look at the city architecture, you see the same crowded, blue-grey look. Plus "focus", the takedowns, slo-mo and all that.

 

[Melan]

Here are Beleg Cúthalion's experiences from TTLG. Emphasis mine.

OK, here we go. I was given the privilege to play two hours of the new Thief game in the stage of development it had about two weeks ago. I owe a big thank you to the guys from SE and EM in both Germany and Canada for setting up a very atmospheric event with fancy decoration, stage props, costumes for both employees and actors (curtisans!), stylistically appropriate chairs and benches etc. etc.... The whole event alone was adorable, so I give credit where credit is due. Joe Khoury from EM gave a little introduction (similar to the one at the Eurogamer Expo) and we saw a little playthrough across Stonemarket, basically the section we were about to play later.

The first difficulty for me as a PC gamer was to get used to an xBox gamepad which we were given even though we played the PC version (never saw so huge PC towers, by the way...) but that worked after some twenty minutes. The section was part of Stone Market which apparently forms the large centre of the City together with Southquarter (?). Dayport is on the east bank and the Old Quarter with the Haunted Cathedral district seems to exist as well; Auldale being on the west bank IIRC. The different City quarters will be more and more accessible as the game progresses. The demo started with the clocktower scene as in the movie above and I had the same uneasy feeling with Garrett's slightly cartoony face. The mask thing probably indicates whether or not Garrett feels safe in some environment or not. This is new but I couldn't blame the devs for it more than an FM author describing how Garrett wears black leather all the time, which would put me off, too. The clocktower looks great (and basically everything looks great in this game) but has a collection of jewel cases for special loot trophies. You can think about this more artistic/emotional interpretation of Garrett's stealing as you wish, but anyhow it looked like Garrett planned his private museum up there. The clocktower was a separate loading zone as was the Crippled Burrick Pub, the rest of what was accessible of Stonemarket (hard to estimate but several times larger than a single TDS City section map) worked without loading zones (or they were cleverly hidden).

The basic level design is great I think (and would be celebrated as an outstanding piece of mapping if it was an FM). Stonemarket is dirty, old, organic and highly three-dimensional. From the gutters to the streets, awnings and rooftops, this map screams "explore me!" from every trim. The AIs tend to appear a bit lifeless but that can probably still be tweaked, AI behaviour is one of the major issues at EM as we were told. The other major issue to be tweaked is the movement. When they said every edge was to allow mantling or climbing, I had hoped the contextual jumping stuff wouldn't be so bad, but at least this demo felt heavily on rails. Spots for mantling, climbing, jumping and speed vaults looked great and gorgeously animated when they worked, but their placement was still arbitrary with e.g. desks you could vault over and other where you couldn't (or jump down/not jump down an edge or jump across/not jump across a gap). All this happens by the way with some sort of "free running" button like in AC which isn't the worst idea IMHO but the implementation is, as described, more than wanting, especially with respect to the original free-form movement in the Thief games. Joe Khoury said that they are working on making it easier for the player to spot where which movement works but he also acknowledged my interjection that this would make the rails even more obvious. So the EM guys are clearly aware of the issues with the new game (and I doubt that they are not interested in solving them), it's just the question what can be done until next February (or in this period of game development in the first place).

I'll now post my notes from the review form because I'm lazy, so please ask me which things need explanation.
Pros:

Astounding graphics (but I’m not a graphics whore anyway), pretty multidimensional level design, gritty and gloomy atmosphere from visuals and music/SFX, attention to detail, nice elements like hiding in a cupboard, free-running looks and feels great (maybe a bit too much Vertigo zoom), side-missions given by NPCs are nice but shouldn’t turn into repetitive no-brainers like in Assassin’s Creed; if the “oldschool mode” will remove all HUD indicators, loot glint, blue glowing interactive objects, aiming assistant etc. that’d be great, non-Focus lock-picking and frame searching felt great, especially when challenging

Cons:

Movement feels heavily on rails, context-sensitive actions and animations sometimes feel arbitrarily-placed (dodging over tables, falling from edges―or not, mantling), and even if this will be fixed it will probably deviate very much from the free movement of the originals; animations take control away from the player, sometimes for seconds; some context-sensitive actions don’t seem to work when guards are alert, a general alert state like in Assassin’s Creed would be awkward, too (sometimes the screen tint wouldn’t go away forever); light-shadow and noise levels were sometimes hard to determine, three-stage light gem is insufficient, shroud takes away the awareness of the surroundings that a Thief should have; readables as plain menu text are a bit sterile, auto-save to the notes section is well… a bit hand-holding but anyway (same goes for other one-time actions like searching drawers); contextual music (CRAMPS still?) is great but the “alert” change too obtrusive IMHO; references to the old games sometimes feel a bit lukewarm, same goes for some of the dialogue writing; Garrett’s voice lacks character both in sound and words

Opinion on the City hub and the missions to do there:

City Hub looks and feels great, hopefully not all side-quests will be set up as such, so actual free exploration is not only possible but also rewarding; existing side quests looked great but shouldn’t turn into cheap no-brainers, so with enough “heart” this might turn out really cool

Summa summarum, prepare for a game that is indeed the "re-imagination" of Thief that the devs have always announced. It definitely looks enjoyable but will be a deviation from the original series at least in some basic gameplay aspects, e.g. in how it treats the player.

 

[Morgoth]

animations take control away from the player, sometimes for seconds

auto-save

hand-holding

“alert” change too obtrusive

Garrett’s voice lacks character both in sound and words

 

[J_C]

So graphics, sound and art design is OK/good, but gameplay is dumbed down and shit. Just as expected. But don't worry guys, it won't break immersion because you cannot jump whenever you want.

 

[Darth Slaughter]

This contextual action is looking a lot like the splinter cell conviction/blacklist. With a bit of assassins creed.

 

[zwanzig_zwoelf]

Who could've guessed that these guys worked in Ubisoft and on Assassin's Creed?

Spoiler