Thief fan missions and campaigns

[Andronovo]

Any FMs with GOOD voice acting? I just want to play an FM with the protagonist snarking like in the official missions.

 

[Darth Slaughter]

Any FMs with GOOD voice acting? I just want to play an FM with the protagonist snarking like in the official missions.

Some big FMs/campaigns come with voice acting. But most are made by amateurs and the community themselves, and mostly are of good sound quality, but if the acting is good or bad, that is just a matter of taste and how much you are open to hear these guys impressions of garrett or any other character.

Slyfoxx is the official Unofficial voice of Garrett for fan missions. He of course sounds different than stephen russell, but since he's done it a lot of times, his impression is also great.

But a recent fan mission with new voice acting that is great is "Godbreaker". If only for a sean connery's emulation from the main character Conall...

 

[DrKubiac]

Firemage and I care a lot about voice acting, and we do a lot of work in our missions regarding VA and sound design in general, so you could check some of our latest missions. It's the same with skacky and squada, but it's mostly on the Black Parade which is still in the work, their individual missions don't have much voice acting so far.

Then, there are missions made by Random_Taffer and Yandros, who are excellent at VA and they do care about it in their missions. The CoSaS campaign has some good VA too. There are certainly more that I forgot.
As Darth slaughter said, in general Slyfoxx is fantastic as Garrett, but Andrew Bartmess is a newcomer in the fm scene and he does some fantastic VA and a convincing Garrett as well. Check for them in the credits and you shouldn't be disappointed. There's Goldwell too, but so far it's mostly on TDM.

 

[prengle]

The Cradle is a massively overrated level that has nothing going for it other than "It made me shit my pants when I played it as a 14 year old lad" and it feels completely out of place in a Thief game because it has no connection whatsoever to the overall Thief lore.

off the top of my head, there are a couple of missions that don't really hone in on any of the major factions (the bonehoard, for one, as well as the lost city) so i don't really have any issues with the cradle in that respect. i also have a reluctant hard-on for spooky atmospheric games and i do like creepy abandoned hospitals a lot so i'm really fucking biased. different strokes for different folks

I actually thought the following level, the Museum, was even worse - just another generic, bloated and giant glorified FM

the museum mission is pretty fucking lame though. not even dan thron coming back to voice the eye one last time can really salvage it. there's nothing explicitly wrong with it, it's just that there's absolutely nothing that sets it apart aside from that karras victrola which i kinda like and the eye, of course. as a whole, i generally like thief 3 but by god it somehow managed to make thief feel bland as shit in some areas. the cradle and moira's mansion were the only two really good missions i remember from it and it doesn't really have an interesting aesthetic like the dark project or the metal age - there's no cold dark fantasy pagan-y stuff like tdp or any of the victorian steampunk mechanist stuff from tma, it feels more like this confused mixture of the two that has no idea what it's trying to do

i need to play more fms at some point and i don't remember seeing a single standout thief 3 fm either. pretty sure the game was just destined to be lame

 

[SlyFoxx]

Any FMs with GOOD voice acting? I just want to play an FM with the protagonist snarking like in the official missions.

I would suggest starting pretty much where I started doing Garrett: https://thiefmissions.com/m/KOTP-Episodes1-9

It's a campaign mostly set in a city/cathedral , with a trip elsewhere you have to see to believe. The missions are large and at times difficult. It is rich with readables/story....more so than most. The designer (frobber) is an actual rocket scientist. He wrote a 75 page screen play of the campaign before he opened dromed to build the damn thing. It has its flaws to be sure but for such an early FM, I think it's the most ambitious thing ever built with the dark engine save for CoSaS's Mission X. It takes Garrett on a grand adventure.

 

[Unkillable Cat]

So... what is people's opinions on the ESRGAN texture pack for Thief Gold?

At first glance it looks super sweet, but I don't know for sure how faithful it's holding up. Some of the in-game paintings look horrible in it, though.

 

[nicked]

These days I just can't see the appeal of hi-res texture packs for the base game. Sure, it probably seemed important around 2004, but surely the game has retro/nostalgia appeal in its original form now. It'd be like replacing beautiful pixel art with hi-res paintings - just look at how the art style is butchered in the hi-res monkey island games.

 

[Unkillable Cat]

These days I just can't see the appeal of hi-res texture packs for the base game. Sure, it probably seemed important around 2004, but surely the game has retro/nostalgia appeal in its original form now. It'd be like replacing beautiful pixel art with hi-res paintings - just look at how the art style is butchered in the hi-res monkey island games.

Bad example. There's a distinct art style difference between Monkey Island of old and the "Special Editions" - to the point that anyone with half a brain and twice the experience called out the idiots behind the art design on the remakes.

The guy behind the ESRGAN texture pack at least is trying to stick to the original look. He can't succeed 100% because some of the sources are of such low quality that any method he uses to improve them will lead to horrendous results, but here we are regardless.

The biggest gripe I have with the texture pack is that it adds 1.1 gigs to the install size of Thief... which is more than the base game itself + TFix!

 

[Darth Slaughter]

These days I just can't see the appeal of hi-res texture packs for the base game. Sure, it probably seemed important around 2004, but surely the game has retro/nostalgia appeal in its original form now. It'd be like replacing beautiful pixel art with hi-res paintings - just look at how the art style is butchered in the hi-res monkey island games.

Bad example. There's a distinct art style difference between Monkey Island of old and the "Special Editions" - to the point that anyone with half a brain and twice the experience called out the idiots behind the art design on the remakes.

The guy behind the ESRGAN texture pack at least is trying to stick to the original look. He can't succeed 100% because some of the sources are of such low quality that any method he uses to improve them will lead to horrendous results, but here we are regardless.

The biggest gripe I have with the texture pack is that it adds 1.1 gigs to the install size of Thief... which is more than the base game itself + TFix!

1.1 gig is next to nothing compared to games nowadays. And texture mods are normally the most heavy in this regard. And talking about 1 Gb, I've seen there's a T2 FM which reaches the 2 Gb mark...

 

[Unkillable Cat]

In an effort to test out the ESRGAN texture pack, I'm replaying Thief 1.

Came across an intersting situation in Cragscleft: I had lured the Hammerites and the Zombies into a reunion, with casualties on both sides. As they killed each other without my direct involvement, the mission doesn't fail. HOWEVER, when I get close to Cell Block 4, the objective "sneak into the prison past the factory and mines" ticks off - and the mission immediately fails because I killed someone... except I can't think of any situation where I did, besides the above. Any idea on what happened? Did the game not check for casualties until the objective is ticked off? Is something else going wrong here?

 

[Max_b5]

Strange, the game never counts as if you killed someone when you're not directly involved in their deaths. The only thing that comes to mind is that you may have drowned a body.

 

[JarlFrank]

High res texture packs are bad because the architecture is still low poly, and high res textures look out of place in it.

FM authors using high res custom textures is okay because they also build more complex architecture that melds well with the textures.

 

[Unkillable Cat]

High res texture packs are bad because the architecture is still low poly, and high res textures look out of place in it.

FM authors using high res custom textures is okay because they also build more complex architecture that melds well with the textures.

I'm sorry, but what the ever-loving fuck is this? There must be something missing in this here 'logic', right? Did you even try installing the texture pack?

All I can say is do like I'm doing: Install the pack, then try playing the base game. Post your impressions. The author is looking for feedback on the TLLG forums.

At this point (where I'm playtesting Cragscleft to try to spot WTF is going on) there are some textures that look really cool, but others really silly. Most noticably because when it comes to floor and wall tiles (for example) they didn't create two sets that alternate. You know, instead of a corridor being painted with texture AAAAAAAA, have two textures (that look very similar, but are different) that alternate: ABABABAB. It looks much better overall, but at this point I think it's far too late to do that.

 

[Andronovo]

I would suggest starting pretty much where I started doing Garrett: https://thiefmissions.com/m/KOTP-Episodes1-9

I gave that one a try. Pretty dull in terms of gameplay, but your voice acting was solid. Anything better you've worked on?

I've been playing Death's Turbid Veil. Talk about pushing the dark engine with that one. The advanced lighting really makes it for me.

 

[JarlFrank]

Did you even try installing the texture pack?

No because vanilla textures are great and shouldn't be replaced.

 

[SlyFoxx]

I gave that one a try. Pretty dull in terms of gameplay, but your voice acting was solid. Anything better you've worked on?

I've been playing Death's Turbid Veil. Talk about pushing the dark engine with that one. The advanced lighting really makes it for me.

Well seeing as I found AKOTP very good I don't know about better. Did you progress past The Enterprise ? It's big, lumbering and a bit tedious but it sets the stage for the rest of the campaign and the actions does pick up from there. Anyhoo..

Builder I've forgotten more stuff that I've done than I can remember. Let us see: Lord Fishkill's Curse, Left 4 Dead, Mission X, leap to mind. I've worked with Yandros, Halpo, DrK, Hip Breaker, Random_Taffer, R Soul, redleaf, Ricebug, Lord Alan, intruder to name a few.

 

[Psych0sis]

Texture packs can try all they want to look pretty(if you want to call them that) but the levels weren't made with them in mind and they end up looking really out of place.

 

[Unkillable Cat]

At this point (where I'm playtesting Cragscleft to try to spot WTF is going on)

I found it. At the security checkpoint leading to Cell Block 3/4 there's a small hole in the wall that opens up into a small stairwell that leads below to some water-filled rooms. What I was doing was that I would sneak up to the guard at the checkpoint, bonk him with the blackjack, grab his body and crawl with it through the hole and finally dump it into the corner at the top of the stairwell. This made his head clip through the wall, and what I didn't realize is that the area beyond that wall contains water.

Meaning the guard was drowning while on dry land. The wall also blocked his pain sounds, so I couldn't hear him slowly dying.

Fun times at Cragscleft High.

 

[Max_b5]

So I was right

 

[JarlFrank]

At this point (where I'm playtesting Cragscleft to try to spot WTF is going on)

I found it. At the security checkpoint leading to Cell Block 3/4 there's a small hole in the wall that opens up into a small stairwell that leads below to some water-filled rooms. What I was doing was that I would sneak up to the guard at the checkpoint, bonk him with the blackjack, grab his body and crawl with it through the hole and finally dump it into the corner at the top of the stairwell. This made his head clip through the wall, and what I didn't realize is that the area beyond that wall contains water.

Meaning the guard was drowning while on dry land. The wall also blocked his pain sounds, so I couldn't hear him slowly dying.

Fun times at Cragscleft High.

That happened to me not in Thief, but in Dishonored 2. I dumped an unconscious guy in his boat, but the boat would bob up and down and apparently it sometimes dipped low enough below water to drown the guy.

Taught me never to dump any unconscious guys anywhere near water in any stealth game ever.

 

[Andronovo]

Did you progress past The Enterprise ?

Nah man, never even got past that green limbo. It's not that I couldn't beat it, it's just that if a campaign's first mission is THAT dull, it doesn't speak well for the rest of the campaign. Man if I have your word it gets better after that I'll give beating it a shot, but your voice acting was the ONLY good thing about it.

Being opposed too the very idea of texture packs is just stupid fanboy bullshit. It's a 20 year old game engine, there's nothing wrong with trying to make it look better. As long as it doesn't kill the framerate. I wish I had used some when I beat Thief 1 and 2.

 

[Icewater]

Did you progress past The Enterprise ?

Nah man, never even got past that green limbo. It's not that I couldn't beat it, it's just that if a campaign's first mission is THAT dull, it doesn't speak well for the rest of the campaign. Man if I have your word it gets better after that I'll give beating it a shot, but your voice acting was the ONLY good thing about it.

Being opposed too the very idea of texture packs is just stupid fanboy bullshit. It's a 20 year old game engine, there's nothing wrong with trying to make it look better. As long as it doesn't kill the framerate. I wish I had used some when I beat Thief 1 and 2.

The Enterprise is the first mission Frobber ever made. It's got some cool bits but he made a lot of newbie mistakes in it that he largely improved on later in the series. I'd say that it's worth playing, although it's a little inconsistent. Partway through the campaign there's a mission that takes places on some kind of asteroid thing and while the level design and environment are original I never thought it was very fun to play.

 

[marbleman]

I think it's time to post this again. Pay special attention to what the """mod""" does to the windows and the starry ceiling.






FUCK texture packs.

 

[Unkillable Cat]

For me your example is a case of apples and oranges. I'm trying out the ESRGAN texture pack which is currently only for Thief 1/Gold, but your screenshots are not only from Thief 2, but from a Thief 2 FM with custom artwork AND a completely different texture pack.

 

[Andronovo]

This specific texture pack doesn't work well with this FM. Therefore all texture packs are bad.

See this is the stupid fanboy bullshit I was talking about. What about fan mission that are specifically designed with texture packs in mind?