Dunedain

I think the release of Thief 4 will get a lot of gamers who've never played Thief before interested to play all the Thief games, which will be great. And then a good number of those will then hear about TDM and see how superb it is for making Thief fan missions. =)

I have to say, the old skeleton model was quite good, but that new one... just excellent. =)

I didn't know this SlyFoxx fellow does a very good Garrett style voice, that being the case, I guess you have the guy for a good voice for the Thief in the campaign.

Hmm, well, I guess it would depend on where the arrow hit and how much blood there was, could be a thing where a lot of the injury is internal. =P As to the duties, hmm... maybe opening a crate, the servant decides to use a big knife and it slips, giving himself a nice cut on his arm? =) Hey, I didn't say something like that was likely to happen. That's why it tends to make the guard more suspicious than the missing plate. =P

As to my estimates of minimum hours needed to record, that was based on if it were possible for him to record the lines on his own equipment at home. If he had to be brought to a place to record it and so on, well, that gets a lot more complicated... =) Well, at $4,000 you'd practically need a kickstarter to make it happen. =P Oh well, it's a nice thought anyhow. Hmm... I don't suppose we'll ever get to hear him again as Garrett (or any other thief) unless the petition actually works or some other company buys the rights from those idiots in suits at Eidos after Thief 4 comes out...

Well, there are lots of games with "space marines" in them, doesn't mean they are infringing on Aliens, they are just doing characters that are similar in general type. That happens all the time in games and movies. Obviously the main character you play as in TDM is a thief, everyone knows that. But as long as the story is not from the Thief games and Mr. Russell isn't saying lines that are specific to Garrett, there's no connection between Garrett and the thief in TDM, thus no grounds for complaint. Yeah, the character would be discussed with him in advance as much as possible, thus keeping actual work time needed to a minimum, it would be simpler if he were able to record where he's at. Hmm, 8 hours, huh? Guess it would depend on what his rates are per hour, but if we had a decent number of supporters, might not be that hard to do.

Well, 2 hours of recording time is probably a more realistic minimum. It would be great to have him record several hours of stuff, enough for a long campaign, lengthy static cut-scenes (with great in-game pictures of cathedrals in the background and so on) between each mission, comments from the Thief during the mission if something interesting is seen or found or happens during the mission, etc., but it would depend on the cost. But if we could get a couple hours, enough to record a good number of lines of dialog, that should do, I would think.

I voted for weighted, as some things should make a guard more suspicious than others. A small silver plate that's missing might seem a bit odd, but seeing a blood stain on the carpet is going to cause a good deal more concern from the guard. Sure, it might be that one of the servants cut himself while doing his duties, but still, it's likely to get the guard's attention level raised up a fair bit. And as to an earlier comment, yes, I think the Thief should have a short sword. In addition stealing things, he may have to fight off guards, strange creatures in the night, who knows what, and for that you had better have a sword. And Garrett always had one (Eidos sticking it's nose in doesn't count), and he's the ultimate expert on being a master thief in England. 8OP

It's disgusting that they aren't getting Stephen Russell to do the voice for Thief 4, Stephen Russell *is* Garrett, this is crazy. It would be like not having James McCaffrey, who's Max Payne, in the next Max Payne game, or changing the guy who's Batman in Arkham Asylum and Arkham City (can't recall his name, but he's perfect in the role), unthinkable. And I would be very willing to contribute a nice sum so we can compensate Mr. Russell for doing the voice of the Thief in a TDM campaign. He wouldn't be portraying Garrett, but another dark and mysterious master thief, and, as we know, he's quite excellent for such a role and would really bring the character to life. I imagine we would not need more than 2-3 hours of recording time for the entire campaign, perhaps even 1 hour, if things are carefully planned. I think a fan effort like this would really get press attention, too. "Thief fans are outraged that Stephen Russell, the voice of master thief Garrett in all the Thief games, will not be allowed to return to his role for Thief 4. So, they are hiring him themselves to portray another thief main character in fan-favorite mod, The Dark Mod! That is just the kind of story that game writers love to cover.

Has that helped solve this issue with the city backgrounds? =)

The *totally* not Garrett *wink wink* mod of medieval stealth and thieving. =P But seriously, this is The Dark Mod, everyone knows that and that's always been the name, can't break tradition now.

Ah, well, maybe one day you can get a desktop computer put together. Those are nice because you can get any card you want, and you can find good deals on older used nvidia cards that will blow away the laptop ones.

I meant to vote for highlighted auto maps like in Thief II, but voted for "classic" by mistake since I assumed classic in this case would mean Thief II style maps before I had carefully read all the choices, oops. I actually like the Thief II maps, because they give you an idea where you are, but not too precise, that you have moved from one area to another. So you have a sense of the flow of the rooms one to another, and how you are progressing through the building. They give you an idea of the general layout, but not so much detail that it feels artificial. They feel like real maps, rough sketches made by someone who has some knowledge of the place, but certainly not all the exact details like the architect of the building would have. They could perhaps be a tad more detailed, but still they shouldn't be too perfect. Keep that nice medieval hand-drawn parchment map feel.

Well, I'm glad it helped it run more smoothly. When making big levels, we can use all the help we can get. As a really huge building with lots of complex architecture in Doom III can slow down even a fast PC. It will look great, but it's nice if it runs decently, too. On the other hand, one of the nice things about TDM being refined and polished and getting better all the time and FM authors trying out all the new features, is that it can take advantage of all the newer hardware coming out over the last couple years that's far beyond what was available when the game first came out. So now the Doom III engine can really show what it can do with it's great lighting and shadows in a stealthy, moody mod that's like Thief. Hopefully you can get an nvidia graphics card soon and try that out on the cathedral, their Open GL drivers work great. Personally, I only get nvidia cards, just because their drivers tend to have less issues in games.

Does the new 1.08 version of TDM run faster on your hardware?

It says if you change your e-mail address in your profile, that will have to re-activate you account at the new address. Does that mean your account profile join date for the forum will be re-set to 2012, or will everything in your profile be the same as before you changed the e-mail address, but you just can't log in and post until you click the link in the e-mail sent to the new address? Thanks for any info.

Yeah, could solve performance problems and create some spaces for hiding and sneaking about. But it would look great to have that light streaming through the windows and across the cathedral. Hmm, maybe some areas open for the light to flow through, and some areas partially enclosed?

While I certainly don't have an automatic *expectation* of those sorts of things to be climbable, I don't object to them being climbable on occasion. As it is a lot of fun to explore and try different routes in and around cathedrals, castles and museums, or look for secret areas hidden above some clever way up, etc. But I would expect there to be some subtle visual clues that this particular viney spot is climbable, if there are many such vines over other areas of the walls, for example.

I think it should be added right away. Take advantage of the attention and excitement around a new thing like this. I didn't read down before voting and so voted to list it as concept, but if you can just download and play with the Steam version of Doom III and be up and running fast, then I think it can be listed as playable. The mod is so well polished already, one of the best out there for any game, that it can easily be presented as is. Would be great to have the campaign of connected missions in place, but that will come in time. The main thing is to get it out there where lots of gamers can hear about it and see what's it all about. And when they try it and see how finely crafted it is, what a real Thief experience it really is, I think many will become fans themselves. And may well get some additional team members that have the skills to help with the mod, once they see how much they like it. I mean the mod has been worked on for years and years now, I think it's ready for it's big debut to a large audience. =)

Doom III and The Dark Mod look great already, so no need to worry about this. =) But if some of the cool stuff could be added to TDM without breaking the mod or causing a lot of time to be spent on it, then that would be fine. SSAO would be nice for more realistic shadows around objects, if it worked well with the mod and didn't detract from the more important things that need done. If namespace could add this to the mod and have it be something that can just be turned on as a graphics option in the video menu, that could be cool. =)

No, I don't expect any of those things to be climbable. I only expect things that are clearly there for the purpose of allowing people in the place I'm investigating to climb to be climbable (ladders and such). If I want to try and climb to get someplace else, that's what rope arrows are for, or the much more rare vine arrows, if I happen to have some of those. Skill and clever use of such things is an important part of the whole Thiefy experience. And Sotha makes a very important point. Thief fan mission makers need to be very careful about what places they make climbable. The scarcity of them is one of the key points of it being so dangerous to alert the guards to your presence (and that should indeed be a dangerous thing to do). I'd say keep it to ladders or obvious stacked crates or dangling strong ropes, and keep the number of those low and at places where it's essential they be there. The rest is up to the player's resourcefulness.

Aluminum that is great work, love the light shining through the windows across the Cathedral. Just wonderful! This so has to get used to make a cool fan-mission. P.S. Really like the return to a darker look for the forum. Good job, much more Thief style.

Any further ideas for possible designs? Would be great to have a TDM t-shirt or hooded sweatshirt available.

Wow, that looks great! So you could have a stained glass window in a church, and see inside the church (through the non-stained parts) with the light (candles, lanterns, etc.) from inside glowing through the stained parts of the glass? Or be inside the church at night, and there be bright moonlight shining through the window, lighting the stained parts of the glass, so you could see them illuminated in the correct color?

How well can stained glass windows be rendered in the latest version of The Dark Mod? Would be interesting to see which technique proved most effective. Stained glass windows are so beautiful and so perfect for something like Thief fan missions, so it's great if a way can be found to make them look as real as possible.