The Dark Mod Mission Stats for 2024

[Goldwell]

[thebigh]

Looks like we're going to hit the 200 mark possibly next year.

[Sotha]

Thanks for compling the list, GW!

15 years of TDM with 189 missions means almost 13 missions per year. Let's think what it means in a rough comparison:

Thief 1 had 13 missions. Thief 2 had 15 missions.

Therefore, on average, this community has created a new thief game worth of content every year. For fifteen years! Every year!

This is definitely something to be proud of, methinks! Congrats everyone! Thank big thanks for your hard work!

[AluminumHaste]

That's awesome to see! I mean you could tell it was getting to be a lot of missions based on the mission downloader page in the game, but it's nice to see that 2024 was almost a banner year for the game.

[joebarnin]

The mission count for 2024 is even more impressive when you realize that one of them was @JackFarmer's epic campaign Hidden Hands: Blood & Metal, which was really five missions in one!

[chakkman]

Hoping for some more missions in 2025...

[michael_a]

Seems like there are only 4 TDM missions in this year.

[Goldwell]

On 10/29/2025 at 4:17 AM, michael_a said:

Seems like there are only 4 TDM missions in this year.

Sadly yes 2025 seems like a bit of a low year for TDM.

 

I personally know of a handful of missions in active development. But as for their release, I would expect them all to be 2026 releases.

 

For me, I’m still plugging away at Shadows of Northdale Act 3. It seems to have hit a bit of development hell, combined with my busy personal life. 
 

I was determined to get it out this year. But it’s looking like another 2026 release too.

 

On the surface it might look grim, but behind the scenes there are some really cool FMs in the works. So I guess we just have to wait until that labour bears its fruit. 

[datiswous]

I think there was no contest this year.

[thebigh]

Yeah, I think it's about time we thought about the next contest.

[SeriousToni]

Is it only because we lack of contests ? I wonder why there was such a decline this time. The mod still gets improvements. Was it missing exciting new features ? 

 

[AluminumHaste]

I know there's a lot of doom and gloom with missions being released but look at it like this; every year there's enough content to equal a full campaigns worth of missions. It's like a full thief game every year. And the quality just keeps getting better, as mappers get more and more experience.

[michael_a]

I think it's better to have more missions and more creators than fewer. I don't know much about Dark Mod, but I think that with T1-2, a certain ceiling of what's technically possible has been reached, and that from now on, there will only be variations of what we already have.

I don't think the quality of the best missions is much better now than in the pre-Newdark era. Yes, Newdark allowed for larger and more sophisticated missions, but they're hardly much better than their less technologically advanced predecessors. I found T2X just as (if not more) fun to play than Black Parade, despite the latter's larger and more complex maps. And something like Plot Thickens gave me just as much pleasure as a behemoth like the recent Venomous Ambition or even Reflections in Red. The basic stealth rules in latter are not much more complicated than in former.

The quality issue, by the way, has another side to it. There used to be plenty of creators who weren't afraid to miss the mark, to release a not that great mission, a silly one, a stupid one, etc. Of the approximately 200 missions for T1 and 800-900 for T2, such missions and authors make up the vast majority. This is the case for the majority of missions in the Komag competitions. Currently, there are only a few of them, and everyone spends a long time carefully polishing their projects. 

[chakkman]

12 hours ago, michael_a said:

I think it's better to have more missions and more creators than fewer. I don't know much about Dark Mod, but I think that with T1-2, a certain ceiling of what's technically possible has been reached, and that from now on, there will only be variations of what we already have.

I don't think the quality of the best missions is much better now than in the pre-Newdark era.

The level of current missions for Thief Gold and Thief II is absolutely amazing, if you take the best missions avaialable. And, yes, they're another level than the older missions.

There are some seriously talented people in thie Thief FM community, and, they've gotten better and better over the years. A great example for that is The Black Parade campaign. 

What I rather wonder is why so few of them ever made FMs for The Dark Mod (apart from people like Melan). I can only speculate, but, I guess that 1. they're used to the Dark engine and the level editor, and 2. they consider the Thief lore and gameplay superior. Which I sort of can understand. For example, what I always notice is that the lore and readables are much more elaborate and detailled in Thief FMs, AND FM authors actually stick to that lore, while in TDM, everyone seems to go his own way. 

The TDM lore is incomplete at best, and leaves much space for interpretation. I won't comment on the gameplay again, especially the blackjacking, I've done that enough in the past.

Edited November 27, 2025 by chakkman

[Heuli]

I see 16

[chakkman]

That's 2024.

2025 isn't over yet, so, it's not yet in the statistic.

Edited November 27, 2025 by chakkman

[datiswous]

On 11/15/2025 at 2:24 AM, Goldwell said:

Sadly yes 2025 seems like a bit of a low year for TDM.

On the upside this might make some people actually happy:

https://forums.thedarkmod.com/index.php?/profile/34053-xolvix/&status=4090&type=status

Edited November 27, 2025 by datiswous

[JackFarmer]

11 hours ago, chakkman said:

For example, what I always notice is that the lore and readables are much more elaborate and detailled in Thief FMs, AND FM authors actually stick to that lore, while in TDM, everyone seems to go his own way. 

 

That's right and lots of great series (TP series, CoS series, Lieutenant series, Volta, PD, Northdale, etc.) have been the result. I don't consider that a negative, on the contrary.

 

Edited November 27, 2025 by JackFarmer

[Jetrell]

16 hours ago, chakkman said:

What I rather wonder is why so few of them ever made FMs for The Dark Mod (apart from people like Melan). I can only speculate, but, I guess that 1. they're used to the Dark engine and the level editor, 

I can only speak for myself, the one and only reason I have not made any FMs for The Dark Mod is the steep learning curve. I have used and still use the Dark engine and the Unreal engine but the idea of learning the ins and outs of Dark Radiant is simply too daunting.

[kin]

To those that have worked on it: How difficult is for A.I. at this moment to learn from existing database and build some propper fm's with input from an author? At least at an architectural layout only, that someone can work on?

[chakkman]

I can understand using A.I. for image creation, for pictures which appear in the FM, or maybe for textures and models, but, doing a whole mission with A.I.? Where is the fun in that? And, I wouldn't really want to go in the history books for being able to operate A.I. well...

The artistic/creative side should be done by humans, not by a computer.

I think the Wiki and tutorials videos are comprehensive enough so that anyone can learn mapping.

Edited November 28, 2025 by chakkman

[datiswous]

11 hours ago, Jetrell said:

Dark engine and the Unreal engine

Are these easier, or have you simply already learned it?

 

It's mostly the story and the inventing of the map layout and AI-pathing routes itself that I find difficult, not the technical part of mapping with DR itself persé.

[JackFarmer]

23 hours ago, kin said:

To those that have worked on it: How difficult is for A.I. at this moment to learn from existing database and build some propper fm's with input from an author? At least at an architectural layout only, that someone can work on?

I have no idea how that would work with DM/DR, but if it's anything like the AI projects I know from work, it will probably cause the concerned computers to explode and turn milk sour within a five-kilometer radius.

[Jetrell]

On 11/28/2025 at 7:26 AM, datiswous said:

Are these easier, or have you simply already learned it?

It's mostly the story and the inventing of the map layout and AI-pathing routes itself that I find difficult, not the technical part of mapping with DR itself persé.

Difficult question because for me it's a combination of different factors. The Dark engine is something that I've used for so long that it's hard for me to say objectively if it's easier or harder. I've also used the Unreal Engine for a very long time but I do find that the newest version is easy, intuitive, and it comes with a huge amount of support.

I think of new mission ideas all the time, the difficult part for me is being able to recreate my ideas using game/engine mechanics.