Oktokolo

add me

Got through blackjacking everyone except... In total, it was straight forward fun and i would like to play one of these every one or two months (would try to play 'em all even with higher release frequency though *g*). Maximum satisfactional value may or may not be limited by modular building. But there are way too few "just some regular thieving fun" missions anyway. So pile up the missions please as your work helps keeping calm the little evil criminal inside me

Making the bow zoom optional is a nice idea. But instead of disabling it, it would be better to bind it to a key so one can decide to zoom (or not) depending on the ingame situation. I personally like the zoom but the waiting untill it starts is annoying.

The problem here is, that AI detects bodies lying around, raising alertness level. The AI reaction is right but the resulting stealth score points should not count. A solution that might work for most cases might be to add a "do not count for stealth score" flag by script before programmatically killing AI. That flag would have to be honoured by the game engine when deciding whether alert level changes caused by found bodies are counted for stealth score or not. Whether such flags should be erased when the player moves the body around i am not sure about though. Do people intentionally place bodies to be found by AI to trigger a change of behaviour?.

Making any missing AI detection algorithm would indeed induce a ton of gameplay bugs in old and new FMs and the developers surely know that too. So yes, its only about algorithms and assets for mappers to use. It would ease the life of mappers a little bit to have some generic voice assets fitting generic missing AI detection scenarios in the official game for example. Also maybe there are otherwise good algorithms that might impede performance when implemented by map scripting. But not seeing your comrade patroling for half an hour in a high security prison should induce some fear and maybe gets ya to start checking the cells or at least stops ya from sleeping this shift. Beeing yourself the noble owning the place and not seeing some guard on his post could also make ya tell the captain to go look for and boot that guard immediately. A gang member might notice the sudden disappearance of his buddy when coming back from taking a piss. There are countless possible settings that might profit from using (different) missing AI detection algorithms and reacting in some (situation-dependent) ways. Reaction would not always have to include searching, drawing the sword or alerting the surroundings. Even when alerting the surrounding it would most often not be logical to search for the player but for the missing AI or checking some spot or that some item is still where it should be. It is a little like having traps in missions. We got way to few of them too. But AI even just reacting in any way to not seeing anyone in a house that felt like an ant hill before i was going full blackjacking berserk would really add something to the experience.

For me The Darkmod really is even better than the originals (and of course better than the new "Thief" too). So it did not went that wrong in the end i think. I once was disappointed by the loss of that nice studio (also missed Bullfrog Productions) too. And it really is sad how it happened. But as time flew by The Darkmod raised and it maybe would not have got enough sun in the shadow of a commercial corporation pushing out one quality title after the other causing modders to constantly having to adopt to new engines and tools - maybe even having to open them for modding first. LGS did define the genre and implemented the reference titles. Now others adopt it and do variations on it like the great mappers here do in their FMs. We already have so much more different deviations from the original theme than LGS could have provided.

As a blackjack-centric player i really would love selected AI detecting missing comrades as a new spice enriching my gaming experience. I would also abuse that behaviour to lure guards away from their routes when it makes sense to do so. So it would probably not always make missions just harder but could also be used to provide another way for distracting guards otherwise really hard to distract without raising the alarm. The implementation should be bound to the vigilant AI that could notice other AI missing. That AI would at least need a variable for each tracked other AI containing the count of missed detections in a row. Depending on implementation of the detection algorithm more variables may be needed. Reactions of the detecting AI could range from sometimes barking over becomming more alert and even searching for the comrade to raising the alarm. Most often a missing guard should neither instantly trigger searching nor finally result in raising the alarm. Typical reactions for the common low-life guard would likely be to only bark for two or three non-ecounters, starting to search for the missing AI after that (not the player, but that does not matter when player gets spotted in the process) - maybe getting other AIs to search too (but they would not raise to the same alert level as when searching for an intruder as they only search for a comrade maybe sleeping at work). But after a while all AI would just go back to regular patrolling patterns. Reactions might also get less intense when AIs get missing but then be detected again to lessen the increase of annoyingness of path-finding-bugs as they are still common enough even in recent missions. Because of the same issue most AI-missing detection implementations should always treat AIs as non-missing when hearing their voice or seeing them - regardless of the comrade beeing on the right patrol route or spot to guard. The detection of missing AI could be implemented in different ways depending on the expected movement pattern of the other AI: - Not seeing the other AI when visiting specific places - Completing own patrol N times without seeing the other AI even once. - Same as obove but based on not hearing a response for saying something like "everything okay there?" (normally answered by something like "everything okay."). That would obviously need additional voice recordings. - Checking an automaton (or beeing that automaton) regularly to be used with a special token or combination by other AI (dead-man switch). That token (maybe a key) or combination could also be used by the player but would involve regularly comming back to operate the device. The player coukld also maybe able to rig (pick) that device up, so it never goes into alert state. - Like the dead-man-switch above but one AI sets it while other resets it and one or both detect missing counterparts by missing status changes. Straight forward ingame implementation would be a locked switch controlling an electric light.

Hmm, no harm done without harming someone who actually is alive. Beware of the implications of equalizing doing something in a game to a virtual person and doing something in physical space to real humans. But as you can read in my review: i nevertheless liked watching this art-house film.

Would like to hunt some bugs too.

Just replayed this on hardest and

I just replayed the mission on hardest and feel a strong urge to vote against the

This is an arthouse film implemented as a TDM mission... Regardless of the novell use of interactivity this is one of the short films actually worth watching - but be sure to do so undistracted. Technically there could be some improvements: P.S.: I could not resist to try the other endings and found

A classic Halloween mission with the expected scary things inside but a bit linear and somewhat feeling empty gameplay-wise.

This mission is beautiful and features a plot that feels fresh. And it really hits the Halloween bull's eye.

Trivial mansion heist mission playing in a crypt. Nice use of building blocks to create larger structures fast. I found no bugs. Gameplay:

Was a nice small mansion mission and i found no bugs. Only the player's voice was too loud. I am once more impressed by the small amount of time it seems to take for an experienced mapper to make something enjoyable. Played on hard (but guess by the time spent building that there is no difference between difficulties anyway):

Ups. Forgot about that copyright stuff that always hinders evolution of anything. Guess one would have to stick to fan missions and still would need to get permission from all the authors of each asset to be reused. Reinvention sadly could indeed be the easier path.

Just found this little unpolished gem and taffed through it on difficult. And surely it looks a little like a deathmatch level of a first person shooter (well, it is...), the textures are a bit blurry up close, the guards where easy to knock out despite almost the whole map consisting of metal surfaces, the architecture feeled oversized like originally beeing built for giants... But it surely played surprisingly well for a concept. I can imagine finding a downscaled version of this in a bigger map. Also would love to encounter a mission that is basically this filled with a poor folk's town of wooden shacks on the various levels (with local leader's shack on top level) or a pagan settlement that reclaimed that ole part of a plague-hounted city. The abandoned/repurposed factory style would be as fresh for a TDM mission now as it was four years ago. I think, recycling and polishing old geometry for new FMs has potential where old textures sadly often are just too low in resolution... And: Is it possible to make maps from T1..3 playable in TDM as well?

I played the old version a long time ago and somehow the new one feels much more immersive regardless of myself remembering some guard patterns and loot locations. I tried to look for quirks but found only minor ones:

Its so common to see odd texture alignments, texture fights and just plain wrong architecture in fan missions that i did not even knew what was "odd" with this mission until i entered the cellar. There it instantly broke my immersion because i realized that it is the absence of all that little immersion breakers, that caused that strange feeling. After that insight i was able to fully enjoy the mission till the end. I tried Dark Radiant to become a mapper myself years ago. But that beast is as good an example of unusability as the other 3D-editing tools i tried even longer time ago before completely giving up on the idea to make anything involving 3D models. Since the encounter with the beast i took it for granted that the available tooling would limit the quality of the missions regardless how good and experienced the mappers become. I seem to have erred - and am happy about that.

I really enjoyed this near perfect mission. What really took me by surprise was the incredible detail on the architecture and texturing. Cant remember seeing details like the realistic brickwork in the cellar or that roof framework in other missions. There are other really beautyfull and detailed missions out there. But this one is a step further. Played it on medium because i just cant resist blackjacking (almost) all te people. Are there more hidden optional goals?

Am not much a seafarer myself. But

Nice Mission with some odd architecture but good play flow.

After trying that new and shiny game they call "Thief", i really enjoyed playing the real thing again. This mission is not a consolified shadow of the past like what Square Enix and Eidos came up with. It truly extended my Darkmod experience again.