How to play Thief 1,2,3 on multicore-processor systems

[oDDity]

Whether it's an art is debatable. I'm rather tired of seeing anything that can't be put in any other convenient category being tossed carelessly onto the 'art' pile.

However, regardless of whether it is or not, game maps are designed primarily for their gameplay possibilities and opportunities (that is after all what games are for, hence the name), not so the player can go on a sightseeing hike for a few hours, and let's face it, game maps as simplistic and spartan as the Thief maps were hardly an aesthetic joy to behold.

[Domarius]

Whenever someone talks about "trying to get Thief 1/2" working, I immediately assume they want to play Fan Missions. What other reason is there? Each one (to varying degrees) has its own unique and interesting plot, and architecture. Of course the basic sneaking mechanics are the same, but the "puzzles" created with them aren't.

[OrbWeaver]

I would put mapping into the "craft" rather than "art" category. Once can of course debate the distinction for hours, but in my view something which has "correct" and "incorrect" techniques (such as optimisation etc) is a craft, rather than an art which generally allows the totally free expression of the artist.

[Order of the Hammer Bureaucrat]

That's if you consider optimisation, etc. When you think of creating hallways, lights, rooms, applying textures, it becomes an art. Just like in painting, mixing the pigments with tempera, and a bunch of other things is a craft, but brush-stroke by brush-stroke painting one's emotions is an art.

Edited April 23, 2007 by Order of the Hammer Bureaucrat

[Maximius]

I would put mapping into the "craft" rather than "art" category. Once can of course debate the distinction for hours, but in my view something which has "correct" and "incorrect" techniques (such as optimisation etc) is a craft, rather than an art which generally allows the totally free expression of the artist.

 

 

Can't both exist at the same time in equal measure in an activity? For example, Im a big time home cook, there are lots of correct and incorrect things to do in any given preparation. But I can say that art, free expression, plays a constant role as well. Aesthetic changes in color, texture, and taste are bounded but not defined by technique. I see the two as twined about one another rather than as contradictory.

 

Sometimes an incorrect technique leads to new creations, as in the time I made a spaghetti sauce in a pot I had make teriyaki beef in the night before. I left the dirty pot on the stove and the next morning tossed my ingredients in and let it rip. This is certainly not the technique for making anything, clean tools are rule number one, but the sauce was incredible.

[sxotty]

I would put mapping into the "craft" rather than "art" category. Once can of course debate the distinction for hours, but in my view something which has "correct" and "incorrect" techniques (such as optimisation etc) is a craft, rather than an art which generally allows the totally free expression of the artist.

 

Painting could easily be considered a craft as well by that definition. There is a reason there are art degrees and people take classes and such. Sure you can decide not to follow the established methods, but understanding why something is done and deciding not to do it is completely different than just doing some random bunch of crap a kindergarten kid might do.

 

Most mapping I would not categorize as art, but some I would. The problem has more to do with the need to get stuff out ASAP. The mapper would be at odds with his supervisors if he spent to much time on parts that have nothing to do with the story.

 

 

Exploring maps should be fun, but generally isn’t b/c they do not replicate the freedom of reality. That is precisely why attempting to make one subset of the game realistic and ignore the rest is foolish. That does not imply that any effort to improve the realism is a waste, but should rather temper the spastic urge to make everything perfect.

 

It would be wonderful if the architecture was somewhat realistic and had many different paths to an objective, but the AI would never live up to it. That means chokepoints are used to force the player through sections the AI can deal with properly. It is an unfortunate tradeoff.

[Order of the Hammer Bureaucrat]

But there is no supervisors in FMs. When I played Thief the first time I was amazed of the degree to which freedom of reality is replicated. I had played games in this order: Digger, Tetris, Barbarian on 8088, then Mario, Doom, Wolfenstein, Lighthouse which blew me away with the ambiance, graphics, story, and gameplay, Duke Nukem, Shadow Warrior which was the best interactive 3d world I've ever seen then, and then of course Thief.

The sounds of course helped to make it realistic, but the people were very real too. Their dark silhouettes in a doorway, the movement, the subtle shifting of weight from foot to foot, the coughing, all made them so real that I didn't want to kill them because of that little training in my brain which says I'm not supposed to kill humans, not because I wanted to ghost.

[AluminumHaste]

Well I have been trying to find a solution to a problem all users have with old thief games in multicore processor based systems. Game crashes after a few seconds. This happens due to the fact that Thief was not made for multicore tasking and games finds itself in an uncovenient situation while performing tasks. That means when an arrow extinguishes a torch, when your player dies there is a big chance of the game to crash! (to hazard a guess this happens most times 2 actions happen simultaneously).

 

So what one must do?

1. Download latest nvidia or ati drivers for its video card

2. While playing Thief press ALT+TAB! Then CTRL+ALT+DEL to bring up the Task Manager. Then go to the processes Tab, find the Thief2.exe file and right-click on it. GO to "Set to affinity..." button and unlick all available CPU except CPU 0.

 

This will make Thief up an d running even on Windows Vista!

Have Fun!

 

 

It would be nice if that worked, but it only works on a few computers. I've tried every single fix on the face of this earth, and nothing works. I get the menu fine, and everything, but as soon as I load up a mission, black screen and nothing.

I checked the forums all over the intraweb and nothing

[AluminumHaste]

Whenever someone talks about "trying to get Thief 1/2" working, I immediately assume they want to play Fan Missions. What other reason is there? Each one (to varying degrees) has its own unique and interesting plot, and architecture. Of course the basic sneaking mechanics are the same, but the "puzzles" created with them aren't.

 

I want to play Thief because I have fond memories of the experience, and I want to relive it. I'm not interested in only experiencing something new, because it's been so long since I've played them, I don't remember the original levels. I have a vague memory of them, but it's pretty clouded , so yeah, I just want to get it working. The only thing I haven't tried yet is disabling the second core in the BIOS, then try playing thief.....hmmm, I think I'll go try that.

[Domarius]

Have you guys tried searching for the same info but for other games? Maybe the same tricks work.

 

Especially if you searched for orginal Quake info. Wasn't the dark engine based off that?

[Order of the Hammer Bureaucrat]

Why not just get a computer that handles it? I threw out about 5 a few months ago, and there's one in the basement which I should get to throwing out soon. There should be plenty where-ever you live.