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Thief 4 is trash.


Mystry

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Not sure where feminists enter the picture considering Thief was made by a studio with a higher than usual number of women in key positions producing games which are rather popular with women (which is how feminism works), but anyway, I give the rant a healthy 8/10! B)

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Come the time of peril, did the ground gape, and did the dead rest unquiet 'gainst us. Our bands of iron and hammers of stone prevailed not, and some did doubt the Builder's plan. But the seals held strong, and the few did triumph, and the doubters were lain into the foundations of the new sanctum. -- Collected letters of the Smith-in-Exile, Civitas Approved

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Too much swearing IMHO. Let's say 6/10. :smile:

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To be quite fair I like the new UI, mostly because I tend to love minimalistic designs. I agree with most other points though. Level design doesn't seem that bad, but the gameplay is clearly overly streamlined.

 

Not sure where feminists enter the picture considering Thief was made by a studio with a higher than usual number of women in key positions producing games which are rather popular with women (which is how feminism works), but anyway, I give the rant a healthy 8/10! B)

 

I think he means video games as a whole, not just thief.

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Perhaps he should have said militant or radical feminists, as they are indeed often as immature as frat boys with their guilty until proven innocent world-view and perpetual Tori Amos music (to be fair Tori is quite a talented musician)... Ah college...

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Welcome, Tzaero!

Come the time of peril, did the ground gape, and did the dead rest unquiet 'gainst us. Our bands of iron and hammers of stone prevailed not, and some did doubt the Builder's plan. But the seals held strong, and the few did triumph, and the doubters were lain into the foundations of the new sanctum. -- Collected letters of the Smith-in-Exile, Civitas Approved

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I actually was in a fraternity, but I'm used to the deragotory comments and hate. In any case it was a lot of fun, a good place to network, and a long time ago in a galaxy far far away.

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My favorite activity has been taken over by ... feminists.

 

That's quite the non sequiter.

 

The fucking gold you steal isn't even used for anything. Theres no store where you buy equipment, you are just given a set of shit at the start of each 'mission'.

 

And how do you know this? One of the devs comments during the gameplay demo at E3 specifically said that you can use gold to buy equipment.

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This nerd-rage over something that's in beta stages, seems like a kid who came straight from the YouTube comments, just to vent over things, he 'wants' to be wrong in order to complain. You might wanna take a second look at the videos and read a few interviews, before going nuts and contradicting your own ill-defined statements ;)

 

Edit: For a pre-alpha I think this looks VERY promising and can't wait to see the finished product :)

 

I feel like I saw a bunch of models we also have in TDM, vine-crates and a few loot items, or am I 'seein things' as well?

 

The minimal design is awesome and I hope you can turn it all the way down, to only highlighted objects and mission updates. The hud graphics aren't quite "Thief'ish", so I hope they'll tweak that to something that fits the rest of the atmosphere a bit more.

 

There needs to be more modern games, that doesn't baby sit the player to the point where he forgets to think on his own. The human mind is an amazing thing, and when people can make an amazing game, it's a shame if we don't get to spend any mental energy on unwrapping it, to fully appreciate the work done.

Edited by Kvorning
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The minimal design is awesome

 

What "minimal design" do you see? I see a foggy swirl of darkness that blurs a quarter of the screen (doing the exact same function as the little dot in the corner), I see large animated hands floating on screen at all times blocking my view, I see a giant wheel in the middle of the screen when I select weapons, text popping up all over the place...and that's ignoring the stuff I assume you can turn off.

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objectives turn up in the top right of screen, saw

optional: dont kill and knockout guards

optional: pickpocket guard captain <name of captain>

so you should be able to stealth that map from what is shown as bonus objectives, but they are more than likely show more action in an E3 demo, else no one would watch it. So it has all the bells and whistle's turned on.

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@Springheel

Both in practical and literal sense:) The icon design is cool, it just needs to be tweaked towards a more 'Thief'ish' style. A 'drop' representing a 'water arrow' is great, though it shouldn't need the text as well, just the icon. Keep the interface as minimal as possible. I still think there's too much on the screen.

 

I like the hands. If they could signal what options are available, rather than some HUD icon, I'd be extremely pleased to see that for a change. The fog around the edge, to represent stealth level is too interfering, to give the 'feel' of being hidden. It's almost in every game today, that the red tint around the screen indicates level of injury, though honestly, most games makes that an annoyance, rather than a sense of injury.

 

Stuff like that needs to be subtle enough 'feel' it's function, without you constantly focusing on it.

 

I hope games get to the point, where all player information is made with visual indicators, instead of HUD numbers, texts and icons. The UI is usually always what breaks the atmospheric illusion and reminds they player, that they are in a game, rather than a story. :)

 

The first game that achieves fully functional immersion without an interface, is gonna rake in huge points for years, so I hope the hands, weapons and environment, get to tell the player everything... Of course with a setting to enable a HUD as well, for those who need familiarization ;)

Edited by Kvorning
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They have to deliver _some_ good elements of the game - after all they have the advantages that come with a couple dozen million $ budget, multi-year development time, experienced developers and artists, motion-capturing, all the stuff and time and brains one can get for money.

 

Beholding it from a more more general, not Thief-fan-centric worldview it might as well become a "good" game, commercially successful with modern visuals and "entertaining" gameplay.

 

But real Thief means quite difficult stealth, avoiding mass murder, having to be careful and somewhat thinking and skillful - or you die quickly.

And for deep immersion one needs a minimum of intrusive user interface blinkings and a maximum of believable in-gameplay-world-hints and -complexity - overhearing conversations, judging NPC behaviour - not

registering health bars, experience counters (HEADSHOT +90EXP) or awareness meters floating above guards helmets.

 

This, however, is not mass market friendly - most of the very successful games were those with modern, impressive graphics, carefully dosed violence/brutality, simple gameplay (mostly needing quick point and click reflexes) - Call of Duty, Battlefield, and the others- those brought in _billions_.

For a mass audience it has to be simple, forgiving, violent and entertaining.

 

Therefore, a "good" Thief game in our sense would be failing to sell many copies, because "we" are a tiny market.

 

 

 

The market dictates this to be a contraption one might call Battlethief.

"Good people do not need laws to tell them to act responsibly while bad people will find a way around the laws." - Plato

"When outmatched... cheat."— Batman

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Keep the interface as minimal as possible. I still think there's too much on the screen.

 

Well, I agree with both of those statements. I'm all for minimal design, I just don't see much of that in the new Thief.

In fact, they've gone the opposite way as far as I can see.

 

Instead of just loot glint from TDS, now they highlight all kinds of things atomic blue even when you're not near them, just to tell you they're usable.

 

Instead of a small lightgem, they've got the entire edges of your screen flashing or darkening.

 

The massive selection wheel in the center is like the silly TDS one taken to a ridiculous extreme.

 

Instead of an in-game bow sight, now it's a big, artifical crosshair.

 

The constant pop-up messages telling you what button to press, or what to do next, or where you are right now, or how many XP you just got, or when you can do a takedown.

 

And don't get me started about the on screen "radar".

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@Outlooker

You're completely right. It's easy to forget that over the past 10 years, games has been nudged in the baby-sitter direction. It makes it easier to sell to the console market, which generally is for people who prefer plug&play, and straight forwardness.

 

That's why I hope you can at least configure the UI from 'total beginner' to 'hardcore RPG nerd'.

 

@Springheel

Yeah I want to see all of the stuff reduced as much as possible, but again. User configuration, will hopefully give us the control over the appearance we want. In any case, at this stage, everything is in development and anything can be changed. Let's hope we don't get too disappointed ;)

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The light gem --> shroud change shows perfectly where it is all wrong-headed. If the light gem is obtrusive or 4th wall breaking, you don't "fix" it by adding an overlay that obstructs player vision and takes up most of the screen real estate. And you especially don't add it along with the focus thingy which turns the whole world into part of the HUD.

 

To me, this all says one thing: there is no coherent thought behind the game's design, at least not beyond throwing together a few common gameplay conventions from other titles. But Thief wasn't like that; it was actually thoughtfully and logically designed. This thing here is thoughtless and muddled.

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Come the time of peril, did the ground gape, and did the dead rest unquiet 'gainst us. Our bands of iron and hammers of stone prevailed not, and some did doubt the Builder's plan. But the seals held strong, and the few did triumph, and the doubters were lain into the foundations of the new sanctum. -- Collected letters of the Smith-in-Exile, Civitas Approved

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On the topic of light-gem vs shrouded edge, I again hope they do something with the hands. Why not make them the 'light-gem', so to speak? If the player's hands gets shaded like any other object in the current lightning of the player, a screen-shroud or light-gem wouldn't be unnecessary.

 

Of course only works if the player's night vision ignores self-shading =)

Edited by Kvorning
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  • a foggy swirl of darkness twhere a little dot would do
  • large animated hands blocking my view,
  • a giant wheel in the middle of the screen when I select weapons,
  • text popping up all over the place.

I hadn't really thought about the above points until now, now I will have to wait for the invariable tweaks/hacks to turn all this shit off before I consider playing the game.

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I guess that as they seem to played the demo on a console, the large inventory wheel may be due to the limited controlling abilities of a gamepad. You just don't have enough keys to select the weapons individually. I just hope that on pc this menue isn't there or can be avoided by choosing the weapon directly.

FM's: Builder Roads, Old Habits, Old Habits Rebuild

Mapping and Scripting: Apples and Peaches

Sculptris Models and Tutorials: Obsttortes Models

My wiki articles: Obstipedia

Texture Blending in DR: DR ASE Blend Exporter

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If the light gem is obtrusive or 4th wall breaking, you don't "fix" it by adding an overlay that obstructs player vision and takes up most of the screen real estate

 

Exactly right. That should be Game Design 101. In immersive sims, the screen is your window into the game world. You DO NOT obscure it with anything that isn't absolutely necessary. And what makes the shroud even more ridiculous is that they already HAVE a lightgem that gives you the EXACT SAME information! It's completely redundant.

 

My guess is that someone thought the "shroud" was a really cool idea, playtesters hated it, and so now they've added a regular lightgem, but they don't want to remove the shroud because they're emotionally attached to it and don't want to scrap the time it took developing it (see how it's all misty and cool and swirly and misty??). Same thing with the stupid hands floating in front of you like you're about to cast a spell. Probably took a shitload of time and money because someone decided that seeing your hands is "immersive" and therefore we have to see them ALL THE TIME, even when they're blocking the thing you actually want to look at.

 

In real life, you DON'T pay attention to your hands most of the time, any more than you pay attention to blinking. Your brain filters them out. When you make a game that forces you to notice them, it doesn't feel more immersive at all, at least to me. It just reminds you that you're controlling a puppet.

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