Thief Review - The Meh Project

[SnakeoilSage]

I'd be willing to forgive a lot, given that I have the original Thief games and still enjoy them immensely. I just got to the Bank Heist level on Expert in Thief 2 before I started reading this review. If I want a game where the "sneaking is the sneakiest and the sprawling levels are the sprawliest" as Yahtzee would say, then I can just play those.

But. You mentioned in your review that the factions and story of the original games is gone and only a thief named Garrett and a city called The City exist. That's a problem. That's a big problem for me because one of the core aspects of Thief as a series has been its unique setting, where everyone is kind of grey in morality and the only difference is the conflict between Order and Chaos.

And it might seem petty, but no Stephen Russell? That's low, Square-Enix. And you're already dangling from the bottom rung. This story could have been easily adapted to portray an older Garrett, hell it practically READS like a direct sequel, and no one would have complained. Not. One. Person.

Excuse me. I have to go see to a thief about a bank job. The rent is due, and my landlord is even tougher than the Hammers.

 

[svenjl]

I've watched some gameplay vids with commentary, as well as read several reviews. Two of the main criticisms seem to be the story (both in terms of content and the way it's told) and the way certain mechanics are implemented for use. The story and exposition of it have copped flak as much because in a 'cinematic' sense the game over-explains everything, rather than letting things evolve over time through gameplay and exploration. Then there is, for example, the rope arrow which can only be used when the intended target is marked in the appropriate way - thus the game limits and dictates what you can and can't do in an overt way.. This also goes for climbing around the environment. 'Dishonoured' handled vertical movement and exploration much more naturally in that if a ledge, window or wall was within Corvo's ability to reach it you could get there. It wasn't as arbitrary in the same way as 'Thief' seems to have made it. Therefore Garret looks (I haven't played the game yet) much more restricted as a rule, unless the game dictates that you can suddenly exhibit thief-like agility in traversing the environment. It would have been better for Eidos to design levels to match what garret can do, rather than ultimately highlight what he can't.

 

[synobal]

I've really been enjoying the game. It's stealth mechanics are really solid, the movement and such feels really good. My only complaint so far is context sensitive jumping.

The story is a mess and garret wears a corset, but it's good, a really solid game. Honestly all the reviews for this I've seen remind me of the reviews for Alpha Protocol, and how it was pretty much panned all around but ended up being a cult classic.

thats my issue as well. context sensitive jumping was a really bad design choice. i get they didnt want people mistiming jumps and doing a swan dive off a roof top but still it feels hand holding and paint by numbers thieving

Try customizing your difficulty then, I started it up on the default mode and was like "Ya this is way to easy" went back put it on custom disabled most everything (except for chapter only saves and a few others) and went back. So much more fun.

 

[Nurb]

It's basically Deadly Shadows all over again, but it's not worse, so the disappointment isn't as bad as it was then, so it's just average with NO visual style at all.

The City reminds me of a more built up city in Skyrim.

 

[Silly Hats]

Eh.. it's not as boring as what people are making it out to be, i'm still enjoying it - Though anything similar to Thief is always worth supporting. They've put a lot of effort into making it and I appreciate that atleast. I'd give it a 4/5.

I've been blazing through in 'Ghost' and the storyline seems to be flowing fast enough.

My only recommendation is to immediately turn off the music - it really really adds to the atmosphere. That and playing with a pint of Imperial Red Ale.

 

[svenjl]

Eh.. it's not as boring as what people are making it out to be, i'm still enjoying it - Though anything similar to Thief is always worth supporting. They've put a lot of effort into making it and I appreciate that atleast. I'd give it a 4/5.

I've been blazing through in 'Ghost' and the storyline seems to be flowing fast enough.

My only recommendation is to immediately turn off the music - it really really adds to the atmosphere. That and playing with a pint of Imperial Red Ale.

From what I've seen and read, this seems to be the way to go (including the ale part of course). Play it on as hard a difficulty as possible with lots of the assist type options turned off. Really make it a test of patience and stealth skills and become immersed in the world on that basis.

 

[MrCalavera_v1legacy]

(...)can anyone tell me if the maps are like the ones in the first two games?

I'm afraid maps are even worse than in Deadly Shadows. Not that those in DS were godawful or something, but downplaying level design aspect even more is a big 'no' in my book.

EDIT:

Spoiler: I can't believe I forgot this one

I took one look at the picture of those claw-hand things and got an immediate "oh crap" feeling.

Oh man, freakin' Craybeasts *shudders*. Those things creeped me out even more than Haunts.

 

[O maestre]

This review is meh. Doesn't tell me anything about the game.

Seriously, every other review on Thief is so ambigious as to why it's 'bad'. If it's such a mess explain why. That's the point of a review.

I was thinking something similar. I didn't like this review, the way it was written, the way it based a piece of ridicule in the review off of a console specific feature (how does the Xbox version handle gadgets??) and in general, the review was just.. Meh. The phrase "secret hidden vault" just reeks of bad writing.

I've actually seen a number of poor reviews on the escapist, which is oddly out of place here, in my opinion.

really don't see if I can take the reviewer seríously he didn't even get the release date right... or was this released in 2013? and half of the review was about narrative, how about expanding the paragraph about gameplay, or going into detail with the mechanics of this game. I haven't played a thief game before so I have no frame of reference, and therefore need a more details, nevermind I'll see if I can find some sort of lets play

 

[DarkhoIlow]

I am the one in the camp of "I enjoyed it" which seems to be growing smaller and smaller.

I did play all the previous Thief games and I do realize that they are the better product. But unfortunately we are living in 2014 where some standards and casualizations/consolizations must be made in order to get the most bang for your buck for having to cut out content and features so that the games can run on ancient 8yo hardware. It still amazez me how the developers can make a supposed "next gen" game even work on consoles with 512 ram.

In a world where Dishonored was already released and set the bar quite high somewhat for stealth/action games (it was overall a well received game), it's quite hard to try to please both the fans and the ones that are not familiar with the previous games (which in this case is kinda the majority) and try to cater to the crowd that thinks "Oh, this is another Dishonored!" and in this case it failed.

The game was good overall, but the ending was rather lackluster and anticlimactic.

 

[VladG]

From the little I've played, I can say the gameplay is competent, for the most part. Stealth is pretty solid, and it's reasonably fun to play. Hiding in shadows works pretty much how you'd expect, though the enemy AI isn't as solid as they claimed and, coupled with the fairly restrictive level design, doesn't offer any sort of emergent gameplay. The experience is pretty linear overall.

Sound design is pretty bad, and it actively detracts from the experience, both breaking immersion and impacting the gameplay. Hopefully it will get patched. I personally find the voice acting pretty amateurish and the writing even worse. Garret's lines feel unnatural and forced, making him feel more like a petulant adolescent than a cynical master-thief.

Visuals are quite beautiful, and run well on a new, middle-spec PC(~40 average FPS with everything maxed out). Textures and models aren't great, but the lighting and post-processing are very good, so overall the game looks great (even if the visual design is fairly bland and unoriginal)

For someone who hasn't played the original games, but still enjoys good stealth gameplay, Thief isn't all that bad. The core gameplay is solid. But you won't get much more out of it. Story is standard and boring, and so are the characters.

However if you have played the original games, the lack of proper story, atmosphere, characters and the comparatively very restrictive gameplay will completely kill the experience for you. This is not a good Thief game.

 

[MrBaskerville]

If the story is the thing holding it back, then i might give it a go, i was planning to skip the story parts anyway... The question remaining is, is the story something you can easily ignore or is the game filled with those stupid unskipable pseudo cutscene moments where you are forced to walk slowly while people talk into your ear? In other words, is it filled with stupid shit like Dishonored was or is it hidden away in logs and cutscenes?

 

[iseko]

It seems a lot of these complaints (more specifically the audio problems and frame rates) can be fixed with an update or two. Sad that that is necessary but it is the time we live in. The story being meh is not something you can fix that easily. However if the core gameplay is in order (and it seems to be) then all is not lost. I wonder if they will fix it though. Time will tell. Still... it looks a LOT better then a lot of games out there. I think what we have here is a case of: being judged by the games that came before. Which is fair and not fair depending on the way you look at it I suppose.

I for one am going to wait this one out. Buy it when price is cut in half or on sale somewhere. Maybe by then there will be some updates for it.

 

[Blood Brain Barrier]

The original Thief was ordinary. Original perhaps (although how original can you be with a story about a guy who steals stuff?), but I didn't find anything about it very interesting or well done. It was also very frustrating with the game telling me I should be invisible but then being spotted.

 

[Quellist]

Colour me unsurpised. The only thing that im a little shocked by is that they got some decent gameplay in there, even if it is horribly stilted and constrained.

Guss Dishonoured will retain its crown as the true spiritual successor to Thief, even if it doesn't have a light and shadow mechanic

 

[Hawk eye1466]

I've been enjoying the game for the most part, I do miss the old voice actor but to the new ones credit he does a decent job with what he's been given. The stealth works and the environments are alright. My two biggest problems are that the hub world at times is a maze that takes forever to get around without just beating the guards unconscious, and occasionally the audio gets messed up and you hear conversations you shouldn't or they repeat nonstop.

It's not as bad as I feared it would be but it's not as great as I hoped, although if they do make another I really hope they learn from this and improve because this could have been great but it's only average.

 

[RJ 17]

So the new Thief is basically Dishonored with less focus on stabby-stabby and super powers? Pretty much what I thought it'd be.

 

[AzrealMaximillion]

This review is meh. Doesn't tell me anything about the game.

Seriously, every other review on Thief is so ambigious as to why it's 'bad'. If it's such a mess explain why. That's the point of a review.

I was thinking something similar. I didn't like this review, the way it was written, the way it based a piece of ridicule in the review off of a console specific feature (how does the Xbox version handle gadgets??) and in general, the review was just.. Meh. The phrase "secret hidden vault" just reeks of bad writing.

I've actually seen a number of poor reviews on the escapist, which is oddly out of place here, in my opinion.

really don't see if I can take the reviewer seríously he didn't even get the release date right... or was this released in 2013? and half of the review was about narrative, how about expanding the paragraph about gameplay, or going into detail with the mechanics of this game. I haven't played a thief game before so I have no frame of reference, and therefore need a more details, nevermind I'll see if I can find some sort of lets play

I agree. I'm borderline done with reviews written on websites as they've stopped being informative and are becoming more opinion based.

The point of a review is to first and foremost inform the potential consumer and lately on this site and many others, reviewers have forgotten this. This is also compounded by the rampant defense of "its he reviewers subjective opinion" as a valid excuse by other forum posters.

Video games are unique in that there are a lot of objective criticisms that can be made about them, more so than movies and TV. Reviews have by in large forgotten this and choose to state only their subjective opinion games. With no objective information to go off of the review is pretty much invalid.

It's the same situation that got Total War Rome 2 a 4/5 on this site when the game upon release was not mechanically fit be sold to people due to the obscene amount of bugs and game crashing glitches.

 

[sageoftruth]

I am so happy to see this game getting slammed with mediocre scores. Maybe that will teach developers to stop bastardizing established franchises with "muh gritty grimdark reboot."

Uh... I'll be the first to admit I haven't played much of the original Thief games, but they don't strike me as being light and cheerful. Hell, this Garrett sounds like he's less of a bastard than the original.

Most of the charm really came from the NPCs in the earlier games. Garret's role was merely to cynically comment about the environment around him but said environment included a religious cult based on technological progress with verse-spouting sentry bots, and hilariously dumb guards, who were clearly educated in nothing outside of guard duty. I'd say it's a gritty reboot if the guards end up going from being hilarious to being just plain menacing.

 

[ResonanceGames]

So the new Thief is basically Dishonored with less focus on stabby-stabby and super powers? Pretty much what I thought it'd be.

No, that's not what it is at all. Thief is linear, full of cutscenes, 3rd person climbing sequences, tiny load areas, button mash sequences, and a tedious city hub that leads to all the missions. For all their superficial plot and setting similarities, Thief is almost the anti-Dishonored.

 

[Krantos]

No, that's not what it is at all. Thief is linear, full of cutscenes, 3rd person climbing sequences, tiny load areas, button mash sequences, and a tedious city hub that leads to all the missions. For all their superficial plot and setting similarities, Thief is almost the anti-Dishonored.

Erm.. granted I'm only about 1/2 way through the game, so far that doesn't really match what I've experienced so far.

1. Thief is no more linear than Dishonored, even less so in many instances. And you can even go for a while without doing story missions by exploring the city and chasing down side missions.

2. The city hub is only tedious if all you want to do is the story missions. There is a ton of stuff to find and places to loot in it if you do a little exploring.

3. There are only 2 instances that I've encountered button mashing -Opening windows and crawling through certain passages. (Though, to be honest, this still baffles me since there is no need for it at all).

4. I've also only encountered three 3rd person climbing sections, each of which lasted about 10-30 seconds. I still don't understand why they were included in the game, but they're so infrequent it doesn't really warrant getting upset over.

5. And the only cut scenes you see are at the beginning, end, and once or twice in the middle of story missions. Average running time for these scenes are about 1-5 minutes.


Don't misunderstand me, the game has some problems, but it seems like people are giving it a much worse reputation than it deserves.