RPS Article on Thief genre from perspective of original TTLG dev

[Shadow]

 

https://www.rockpapershotgun.com/thief-developer-randy-smith-says-immersion-is-totally-incompatible-with-ego

 

Found it interesting. Hope you enjoy.

 

[chakkman]

What is TTLG?

TBH, I'm a bit tired of those "legends" riding on their legacy. Talking about "egos". Warren Spector also does a lot of talk of how glorious his games were, and yet he didn't manage to bring about a proper game in years. The most prominent disasters being Underworld Ascendant and System Shock 3, which will probably never surface.

Well, at least Randy Smith did some good stuff in the meantime. Although I also see quite a decline in the line of Arkane Studio's games... Deathloop didn't grip me at all, and I'm very sceptical that Redfall will.

Edited February 2, 2023 by chakkman

[New Horizon]

5 hours ago, chakkman said:

What is TTLG?

TTLG?  That's Through the Looking Glass Forums.  A looking glass fan community.  Has been around for a long, long time.

https://www.ttlg.com/forums/

[chakkman]

Yeah, I'm registered there.

What I meant was: 

Quote

RPS Article on Thief genre from perspective of original TTLG dev

I'll just assume that @Shadow meant LGS (Looking Glass Studios).

[Sneaker]

Hmmm.  The third person view in DS was a total, to use his words, contrivance... an ego trip if there ever was one.  I also felt pretty non-plussed they took away the rope arrow.  Yeah, I'm not bitter!

I do agree with him though on the cradle... I'm a total softie and didn't like the horror aspect.

[datiswous]

1 hour ago, Sneaker said:

The third person view in DS was a total, to use his words, contrivance

Well at least it looks better than the one in tdm..

[Bluehawk]

On 2/2/2023 at 8:14 AM, chakkman said:

Well, at least Randy Smith did some good stuff in the meantime. Although I also see quite a decline in the line of Arkane Studio's games... Deathloop didn't grip me at all, and I'm very sceptical that Redfall will.

Are you confusing Randy Smith with Harvey Smith?

Spoiler

Because I did too. 

 

[chakkman]

You're right. Never knew it were 2 separate persons. 

[Xolvix]

On 2/2/2023 at 11:44 PM, chakkman said:

TBH, I'm a bit tired of those "legends" riding on their legacy. Talking about "egos". Warren Spector also does a lot of talk of how glorious his games were, and yet he didn't manage to bring about a proper game in years. The most prominent disasters being Underworld Ascendant and System Shock 3, which will probably never surface.

The thing about "gaming veterans" is that there are very few who can retain the same creative level and quality as they age. When you're young, you have passion and energy and a willingness to almost break yourself for the craft. But as you age you have more responsibilities, you become more exposed to dumb office/team/management politics, you become a parent, you get tired, become more cynical, etc. The vigor of youth gives way to the treachery of age.

We even have a recent example. The Callisto Protocol had much of its media coverage and marketing focused on the fact that the game director (Glen Schofield) was one of the Dead Space co-creators. After its release, it more or less disappeared from talk entirely because the gameplay, horror elements and story were all unremarkable, bordering on mediocre. Games are made by teams and not one person and I'm not a fan of putting gaming veterans on a pedestal. Occasionally there's exceptions but they're also quite rare - Hideo Kojima earned his reputation with continued successes but most others have not.

Anyway, that's a bit of a digression. The article was fun read but I have my doubts of another official Thief game, even if it is free from Eidos now.

Edited February 7, 2023 by Xolvix

[chakkman]

10 hours ago, Xolvix said:

The thing about "gaming veterans" is that there are very few who can retain the same creative level and quality as they age. When you're young, you have passion and energy and a willingness to almost break yourself for the craft. But as you age you have more responsibilities, you become more exposed to dumb office/team/management politics, you become a parent, you get tired, become more cynical, etc. The vigor of youth gives way to the treachery of age.

What I also always noticed is that, when an industry or a "thing" gets popular, commercial and professional, the creativity atrophies.

Happens in music, happens in games, happens in movies, simply everywhere.

Must be why I still play games from the 90's, same with music.

The peak for games for me were the late 90's, early 2000's. Thief, System Shock 2, Deus Ex. I consider those the pinnacle of creativity in game design. It's unfortunate that everything go so dumbed down after that. But, It's understandable I guess, especially when you consider today's audience.

Edited February 7, 2023 by chakkman

[Anderson]

8 minutes ago, chakkman said:

What I also always noticed is that, when an industry or a "thing" gets popular, commercial and professional, the creativity atrophies.

Happens in music, happens in games, happens in movies, simply everywhere.

Must be why I still play games from the 90's, same with music.

The peak for games for me were the late 90's, early 2000's. Thief, System Shock 2, Deus Ex. I consider those the pinnacle of creativity in game design. It's unfortunate that everything go so dumbed down after that. But, It's understandable I guess, especially when you consider today's audience.

There's still good stuff like Pathologic, Disco Elysium.

[datiswous]

29 minutes ago, chakkman said:

The peak for games for me were the late 90's, early 2000's. Thief, System Shock 2, Deus Ex. I consider those the pinnacle of creativity in game design.

If you look for a new game, do you look for a new design, or something that resembles your favorite games of that time?

[Anderson]

The problem with this line of thought is when you apply it to everything in your life.
Like, the last good cars were in the 90's, early 2000's and then they started having lots of electronics and you can't repair anything etc. I mean these are obviously gross generalizations. There's some exceptions all the time. And it doesn't always mean that the exception confirms the general rule.

[peter_spy]

It's also an easier route^. It's not that there are no good games, movies, and in particular, no good music these days. It's just that the goalposts have moved. Quality stuff that used to be on national radio, tv or in major magazines, have moved elsewhere, to their respective niches. But there is an enormous group of people who would rather complain that things went downhill, and still demand that good stuff is spoon fed to them via mainstream media, rather than do some digging.

[chakkman]

1 hour ago, datiswous said:

If you look for a new game, do you look for a new design, or something that resembles your favorite games of that time?

Good question. There are not many new designs which are really innovative, or interesting to me.

[chakkman]

48 minutes ago, Anderson said:

The problem with this line of thought is when you apply it to everything in your life.
Like, the last good cars were in the 90's, early 2000's and then they started having lots of electronics and you can't repair anything etc.

I think the difference is that there was definite technical progress, and things which objectively make cars better these days. Nowadays' technical progress in games seems to be limited to graphical bombast. Which is sad.

[chakkman]

47 minutes ago, peter_spy said:

It's also an easier route^. It's not that there are no good games, movies, and in particular, no good music these days. 

Name some great games from the last 10 to 15 years. Great like the original Thief's, System Shock 2 or Deus Ex.

I know, I'm being a bit confrontational here, as I can't really see those games.  Hard to develop such games anyway, when everything remotely AAA has to be a commercial success, thus will be developed in a safe manner, so that the expenses will be covered 99% sure. And, that's the thing really, and why there aren't any great games anymore.

Note also, and that's my subjective opinion now, that games these days are way too cinematic, and way too little how games used to be: Games where YOU are the active protagonist, and don't walk through a movie with very little you have to do yourself. No doubt, games are great movies these days. That's not how I like games to be though. Games shouldn't be movies, they should be games.

Edited February 7, 2023 by chakkman

[peter_spy]

So, you want each game to be as genre (re)defining as Thief, SS2 or DX? Very reasonable, indeed. Not to mention that you're acting as a group I just described: you demand someone to do a research for you, and hand you results on a plate, so you can easily dismiss it. Still, a few examples, in no particular order:

Mainstream: Dark Souls, Resident Evil 7, Dead Space, Alien: Isolation, Fallout: New Vegas + DLC, Spec Ops: the Line, Dishonored 1 + DLC, Prey 2016 + Mooncrash, Hellblade: Senua's Sacrifice

Indie(-ish): Brothers: Tale of Two Sons, SOMA, Return of the Obra Dinn, Disco Elysium, Her Story, Talos Principle, The Stanley Parable, Pyre, Life is Strange

You could easily write an essay on why each of these is already a cult classic, although game critics probably have already done that, in one way or another.

Edited February 7, 2023 by peter_spy

[STiFU]

• Outer Wilds and Inscryption for their genre defining nature and utterly brilliant design.
• Sekiro for redefining Sword Fighting in video games and SIFU for adapting and expanding that to fist fighting.
• Hollow Knight for setting a new benchmark in the Metroidvania genre.
• Doom Eternal for introducing more players to the flow-state due to its mechanics.

Other notable mentions:

• Amid Evil for its awesome abstract level design in an oldschool boomer-shooter setting
• DEATHLOOP for combining a nice single player experience with an immersive multiplayer part
• There is no Game - Wrong Dimension just for being so absolutely meta and funny.
• OlliOlli World because it is simply a shitton of fun and comes with a soundtrack that instantly raises your mood.

[chakkman]

37 minutes ago, peter_spy said:

So, you want each game to be as genre (re)defining as Thief, SS2 or DX? Very reasonable, indeed. Not to mention that you're acting as a group I just described: you demand someone to do a research for you, and hand you results on a plate, so you can easily dismiss it. Still, a few examples, in no particular order:

No, I'm interested in what you personally consider to be a "great" game, when you talk about great modern games like you did.

Dishonored and Prey, yeah. But, what is Prey exactly? I think it vastly builds up on System Shock's ideas. And Dishonored does the same with Thief and Deus Ex.

Of course, you have a point about the rarity of genre defining games, fair enough. They are rare by definition. BUT, there's just so much copycat sh** these days, just made to bring in the hundreds of millions of € development and marketing money, playing as safe as possible, for a professional industry which kills creativity. That's the sad truth.

Not to mention the way games have evolved over the years, into cinematic "let the player do as little as possible because he rather likes to watch a movie than do stuff for himself". I absolutely detest that development. I recently played through Gothic 1 and 2, and, it was quite an eye opener, TBH. No quest markers, riddles, no 10 minute cinematics inbetween, no magical focus view to know which items in the game world you can interact with, no item highlighting, no nonstop babbling companions... just good how it used to be.  

It's interesting, by the way: I always thought this mod was a reaction on the way Thief developed since Thief 3. For about the same reasons I just mentioned: Dumbed down gameplay mechanics. Personally, I don't find Thief 3 half bad, I recently played it through, and it was loads of fun again. But, Thief 4 was very badly received, because it not only implemented a lot of the modern aspects of games these days that I described, but, also because it pretty much failed in converying the vibe, atmosphere and characters of the original games. Thus I'm always surprised again that modern games are held in such high regards by you guys.  I think most of them are absolutely bloody awful.

I agree though that Dishonored, Prey, SOMA (in parts... I absolutely hated the babbling NPC's), Fallout New Vegas, or Dead Space are nice games. Are they great games, or genre defining games? Hm... I don't think so. Fallout 3 came out before New Vegas, and, if anything, you could call that genre defining. Amnesia came before SOMA, so did Penumbra before that. I think the industry had its pinnacle in the late 90's to early 2000's. If you take Deus Ex for example, it screams "Let the game designers roam free" at you from every pore. At least that's how I perceive it.

Edited February 7, 2023 by chakkman

[peter_spy]

The thing is, the games I mentioned are not "my" great games; they are considered cult classics by players, game historians, critics, both mainstream and small media outlets, etc.

Dead Space is sort of Resident Evil 4 in space + Even Horizon vibes. It basically brought back space horror in times when nobody was doing any of that. Prey 2016 basically is System Shock 3, translating some of the classic SS2 goodness into more modern era. Dishonored is somewhere between Thief and sort of "pacifist Hitman", as it's not really about stealing stuff, first im-sim game in a really long time. FNV is "the proper Fallout 3", as some say: by original creators, with the mix of wackiness and retro-futuristic techno-horror stuff you had in Fallout 2. Bethesda did lay the groundwork with 3d assets and systems they made, but it was nowhere near as imaginative. You could argue that it's a similar situation as with Thief 1 & 2, the Metal Age is not really genre-defining in comparison to Dark Project, but it improves on it in many ways.

Also, it's easy to romanticize the late 90s and early 2000s, but it's also worth remembering many of these games sank the companies. LGS went bankrupt because of Thief 2, Ion Storm was closed after Thief 3 (which I also like, and made a couple of mediocre maps for, ages ago). While I don't want the cinema-popcorn-like entertainment, because I don't have much time for it, I certainly don't want developers to bleed for my pleasure, or for some kind of higher art goals.

[chakkman]

3 minutes ago, peter_spy said:

Also, it's easy to romanticize the late 90s and early 2000s, but it's also worth remembering many of these games sank the companies. LGS went bankrupt because of Thief 2, Ion Storm was closed after Thief 3 (which I also like, and made a couple of mediocre maps for, ages ago). 

I get that. The cult around these games speaks for itself though. Same with the original Tomb Raider games (don't get me started on the reboots...).

I pretty much accepted that I'm not the AAA studios' target audience anymore. I've never been a big fan of Indie games, but, I added more and more of them in my Steam account throughout the games. Some of them are really nice (to avoid the term "great" ), and IMO also show a lot more creative freedom than modern AAA games. The games also show that the pressure of big projects is just not there, and the developers can afford more risks. This may be the future for me personally, as it allows things which I simply miss from the "big" games. It's sad, because, games I liked in the past were mainstream, and now I have to resort to the edge, but, I guess that's how things go.

[peter_spy]

55 minutes ago, chakkman said:

Thus I'm always surprised again that modern games are held in such high regards by you guys.  I think most of them are absolutely bloody awful.

We're not in disagreement here E.g. I'll probably never understand why Ass Creed games are such a thing. In general, any Ubisoft game after Far Cry 3 makes me lose will to live after a couple of hours. And yet, they sell like hot cakes. But what other people buy should not be my concern. I'm just happy if find games that speak to me, 1-2 a year will do.

[chakkman]

16 minutes ago, peter_spy said:

I'm just happy if find games that speak to me, 1-2 a year will do.

I'm happy when I find those as well. Let's just say that it's gotten increasingly more difficult over the years.

I was really happy about Penumbra, Amnesia The Dark Descent and SOMA, for example, because, I wasn't at all convinced that I would like them. Turned out I liked them, a lot. Especially Amnesia Dark Descent was a really nice experience (and a very nicely rounded game in general, where you notice that a lot of thought was put into the game, and that it just "makes sense"). I think those are still niche games though. But, I guess so am I now. Niche.

[peter_spy]

I sort of bounced off first Amnesia, don't remember why exactly. But SOMA grabbed me very quickly, the man/machine despair, and both gameplay and setting being what first bioshocks sadly never were. I haven't played Subnautica yet, which is praised for its depiction of underwater adventures, but I still remember the dread of going further and further down the seabed. There is this section where you can fall off an edge, and into the deepest, darkest depths of the ocean a human can imagine. And when you do... The noises you hear while you are getting crushed by the increasing pressure – that memory still brings the shivers down my spine.