Where next for the signature "scary level"?

[soopytwist]

The three previous games had those missions you could certainly define as "scary levels". So far we've had crypts, catacombs, a ship, and an asylum/orphanage, but where next?

Let's assume the developers are putting in at least one "scary level", but where could it be set? Initially I thought an abandoned hospital, but that seems too similar to the Cradle so how about a haunted prison? Full of the ghosts of dead convicts; and you could have one particularly nasty spirit...let's say his names Mad Old Man McGee, could periodically appear to the player in a manner that makes you crap your pants each time it happens. The draw back to that is we've already had two prisons featured in the games.

[george12123]

There are a couple of threads that say it should be spiders.

[Hypevosa]

could you imagine what would be walking around Cragscleft if that place ever came under disrepair?

I say we go there - and yes, I'm suggesting that it have been abandoned by the hammerites - probably unable to be kept up due to recovering from Trickster and mechanist problems...

Either way, it would be a really good nod to the first game, and the perfect setting for a genuinely horrific experience...

[Platinumoxicity]

An abandoned mining community and Hammerite power plant of Cragscleft, in a dark swamp valley in a mountain pass. The closer you get the less crickets you hear singing and the less there are leaves in the trees. Also the overall color saturation of the environment, and the amount of natural background noises decrease when you get closer. All of that creates a subconscious feeling of dread, while simultaneously guiding you to the right direction.

Inside the complex itself there could be some new innovative undead AI, such as invisible ghosts that only cast shadows, or better yet, enemies who's shadows themselves are the only thing that can kill you, if you step on them. The main thing about undead- and creature AI in Thief is that they're supposed to be very different from human AI. So why not make them completely unexpected and weird? Other ideas could include things that can see in total darkness but can only see movement, things that can use shadows as doors to step through to any other shadow in the level, or simply just things that don't attack you head-on but instead find a good ambush point and wait for you to come to them.

http://www.cubeupload.com/files/ca099desse2.png

[Ardanna]

An abandoned church, with some sinister past.

[jtr7]

The Necromancers' Fortress.

[Hypevosa]

Isn't a fortress a little large and not covert for necromancers?

They always struck me as the more subtle and behind the scenes guys.... at least until they somehow managed to raise a whole army.

[jtr7]

They are situated outside The City, in the mountains. They are corrupt Hand Mages, who came from a structured and fortified and multi-towered symmetrical place, set apart from the "Commons", with awful experimenting in the basement with animals and corpses by the elementalists, and Azaran as the leader of the splinter group, who disturbed his peers by reanimating dead rodents and insects before he left with followers to seek, and eventually find, the dreaded Book of Ash. The setting was intended to be inspired by the wintry mountain isolation of Kubricks' film adaptation of The Shining.


And I really hope there is no cliche of raised undead armies and crap like that, but something rather unexpected and highly disturbing, but definitely always behind-the-scenes and subtle until sometime in ACT III.

[AlexOfSpades]

Well, i have a little idea. Instead of a "scary" stage, we could just have a mission involving what happened to the Karras's armies after Thief II.

Because after his fall, i understand that the Hammerites took down everything the Mechanists created.. at least inside The City.

Many Mechanist factories may be around. Dark halls with defective light bulbs, flickering slowly, with the wind whispering melodies of solitude. Inside a lightless room, a lone recorded voice comes through, repeating Karras's voice - a hulking steampunk robot, rusty and decayed, walking tireless in his never ending patrol.

It would be more of a melancholical, almost depressive, place. Think of all those robots, once representing the state of the art. But now they're forgotten. Like a broken dream from a sad part of history we rather pretend that didnt happened. Like a mechanical graveyard.

Their joints getting more rusty as they fall slowly apart, in the need of repair - but unable to help itself. It is as naive and innocent as its mighty ; It may kill you quickly, but its also unable to even be aware of his existence. It looks scary, but its just a hollow child made of iron gears, crying rust.

A gramophone plays somewhere a sad song played in slow violins. Are they violins, or are they mourning voices?

That would take you away from the guard-dodging missions that may get repetitive after a while. Not scary, though, but could show a different kind of action for the game.

Specially because robots usually are taken down in different ways than regular guards, requiring different equipment and strategies.

[gabe611]

dark dungeon with unkillable creatures

Man, I never owned an xbox just the 360 and decided to play thief 3 on the 360. Despite the bad graphics compared to modern games on the 360, I liked it better than Splinter cell Chaos theory, Double agent, and conviction. Also liked it better than Assassins creed 1. Liked the Hitman games better than thief 3. Maybe thief 3 can give the assassins creed games a run for their money.

[Myth]

Mad Old Man McGee sounds like a Scooby Doo villain reject...

However i do like the "Haunted Cragscleft" theme. I also like the "Derelict Mechanist factory" theme, both with their own feel and atmosphere.

gabe611 your post had nothing to do with the topic at hand. This is also a Thief 4 forum, not Thief 3.

For me the scary levels top 3 is structured like this:

1. The Haunted Cathedral
2. The Cradle
3. Down in the Bonehoard

There are notable mentions among the fan missions. A Night in Rocksbourg for example. As always. the devs can learn a lot by actually playing the Thief 2 fan missions, at least the top rated ones.

For me the scariest level must have it's own feeling of dread, confinement and most importantly, it has to make the player feel small. The last mission in T2X was not scary for me simply because i could roofhop and outrun most enemies. The zombies i sometims hacked apart for fun. Nothing could actually kill me, unlike some hasted Haunts, Vampires, floating green skulls or other from fan missions.

I propose a return to the Old Quarter - a giant sandbox level with graveyards, abandoned homes, taverns, streets littered with zombies and other nasties. Dried blood decorating children's rooms (just no little girl ghosts please - the most worn out theme ever.), maybe a nursing home with ghosts of mothers and babies being overrun by undead, a butcher's shop where they sold human mean after the isolation from the other parts of the city, when people still lived in the Old Quarter but there were no supplies coming from the outside.

[JFSOCC]

What are the elements that make a level scary?
those I have identified so far are:

Unavoidable pressure. (IE unkillable enemies, Active pursuit, trap walls closing in on you)
Suggestion (like hearing the voices in the cradle. coming back to a place to find it different somehow. seeing enemies would actually decrease suggestion, so it's a tool that needs to be wielded with finesse)
Disorientation (Not having a map in a labyrinth level, A level in which perspective is so screwed that a water way might lead to a kitchen sink ;) A level in which the rooms move respective to one another, etc.)
Weakness: Lack of control over the situation. (building crumbling under you, no tools at your disposal. perhaps an extension of "unavoidable pressure")
Atmosphere (Moody music/sound effects, dark and stormy night, dead rats scattered around you... ties in directly with Suggestion)

Now, who can come up with a level that has all these elements: Pressure, Suggestion, Disorientation, Weakness and Atmosphere?

[Odyseeos]

No soldiers purge a garret
If you take a walk at night, carrying
a little silver, be
prepared to think each
shadow

[pocketed from R Lowell, pocketed from Juvenal]

[vesemir]

Sort of bestiary would be nice to see. Some animals could be blind but with perfect hearing, some deaf but with perfect vision, some with... something else :)
The point is you never know for sure whether to use water or moss arrows to avoid wandering beast of unknown kind.

[kin]

A return to the haunted Maw.:eek:

[AlexOfSpades]

No, not the Maw, please, not the Maw!

If i see one more crayman, spider or bugbeast, i'll have a heart attack. That level was so... insane, crazy and... omg.

Its too scary D:

[jtr7]

The Maw it is! :ebil:

[Myth]

I didn't like the maw all that much. It's not Thiefy enough, it ventures more on Indiana Jones land. I like my noir and depressing City thankyouverymuch.

[jtr7]

The only non-Thiefy aspect of it is total linearity. It is Thiefy, just not thievey for those who want to steal stuff like a Medieval GTA.

[Myth]

The only non-Thiefy aspect of it is total linearity. It is Thiefy, just not thievey for those who want to steal stuff like a Medieval GTA.

I explained why it did not feel thiefy to me, and it's not because I'm not able to haul 200 kilos of gold from it.

[jtr7]

Yes, you explained, but you didn't say Lost City and Bonehoard were too Indiana Jones-land, even though they recalled Indiana Jones much more than the Maw. The Chaos beasts and amusement park wackiness is pure Thief, even if it's not thievey. But I explained that.

[Tafferite]

I was quite freaked out by foe with no faces (fire spirits/asylum staff) ,especially as the fire spirits ran at you, dissappeared then resumed their patrol...Zombies and puppets werent scary for me.

So for me Id be most scared by an abandoned mansion with spirits (a murdered family/owner/servants maybe) that you 'defeated' only for them to resume patrol as they were unbeatable. So you'd be scrambling around before they came back. Id also put a few doors in that locked themselves to add to the tension.

[Sharazito]

Not sure. But think would be interesting some place under earth..