"THIEF" - Your current THOUGHTS & SUGGESTIONS & CONCERNS - All General Discussion

[auricgoldfinger]

Originally Posted by Platinumoxicity

So... exactly like Metal Gear Solid 2?

No? Since I never said that, it's highly unlikely that I meant it, either.

More like Resident Evil 4, where you get to play as Ashley for a short time.

[Platinumoxicity]

Seems kinda unnecessary. And would you rather somehow desperately explain why the other character is just as stealthy as Garrett, or have the other character be less stealthy, causing players great misery with the fact that they can't rely on anything they have learned in the game? Story inconsistency and diminishing of the uniqueness of Garrett's stealthiness, or bad gameplay? Pick your poison.

[Jace_Auditore]

Originally Posted by auricgoldfinger

More like Resident Evil 4, where you get to play as Ashley for a short time.

Now I´m picturing the girl from the T3 ending accompanying Garrett and saying "Garrett!" in a high pitch annoying voice for the majority of the game.

[Putkikameli]

Some things that crossed my mind:

I don't know if this has been discussed already, but what are other peoples thoughts on QTE? Personally, I effing hate them. There's no words to describe my infinite hatred towards that cancer of gaming mechanics. I sincerely hope EM won't include it in T4. If I need to start jumping unnecessary hoops to knock out a guard or do supah-kewl-blackflip-wallclimb-by-mashing-space bar-and-enter than I will be very, very angry.

The other thing is overly frequent and long unskippable cutscenes a la Max Payne 3. Please for the love of all that is good in this lousy world, NO! Only thing that's keeping me from re-playing MP3 is those damned cutscenes which consist 75% of the game.

[contrarian]

Quick Time Events, in my opinion, are annoying. Nothing more than a contrivance of developers to keep the players interested. They have no place in Thief.

Long (over 2 minutes) cutscenes, especially long, unskippable cutscenes are signs of lazy, self-important developers. They serve as nothing more than padding to a game that would be otherwise short.

But then to make the cinematics unskippable...that's nothing more than, "You're going to watch this 5 minute padding/cutscene and appreciate how great our animation skills are. You have no say in it. Watch it and like it!" Short games (under 12 hours) equates to nothing more than lazy developers.

Before this turns into a rant, I'd like to add a wish and suggestion. No checkpoints! Forcing a player to get to a certain point determined by the developers before a save can happen is....once again....lazy programming. It's nothing more than padding. It kills the immersion as you have to replay the same 15 minutes 11 times before you can save. It adds gameplay time to an otherwise short game. And it says, "We, the programmers, will choose when and where you can save. You have no choice in the matter. You'll save when WE say so."

You just might think I have it in for video game developers in general after that. And you're right. I'm most disenchanted with the laziness that studios have exhibited in the last 10 years. Don't choose laziness EM.

[cGREGgo]

Originally Posted by contrarian

But then to make the cinematics unskippable...that's nothing more than, "You're going to watch this 5 minute padding/cutscene and appreciate how great our animation skills are. You have no say in it. Watch it and like it!" Short games (under 12 hours) equates to nothing more than lazy developers.

You're wrong about that...

What they're doing is allowing us time to run to the refrigerator to grab another beer without having to pause our game!

[Putkikameli]

Originally Posted by cGREGgo

You're wrong about that...

What they're doing is allowing us time to run to the refrigerator to grab another beer without having to pause our game!

If I'd done that in Max Payne 3, my liver would have blown up when I would've reached the end of the game.

[tarvis79]

As usual, I agree with Yahtzee re: QTEs. "Press X to not die!" is horrible.

[Platinumoxicity]

Originally Posted by Putkikameli

If I'd done that in Max Payne 3, my liver would have blown up when I would've reached the end of the game.

Because Max Payne 3 has a horrendous bug that makes it impossible to skip some of the cutcenes. They are mostly in the beginning of the game, where the longest cutscenes are. The game tells you to wait for it to load the next ingame scene, but curiously that loading takes precisely as long as the cutscene does... Weird huh? And sometimes the loading takes 3 seconds less time than the 3 minute cutscene. And when you try to load into a checkpoint in that same level, loading the data takes 12 seconds because you aren't watching the cutscene.

...By the way, if we're going with the drinking, that's very immersive with MP 3. In the beginning you are forced to watch long cutscenes, and you go to the fridge all the time to get beer. But at some point the cutscenes start working properly again, and you can sober up. Just like Max does in the game. He wasn't sober in five years until the later half of the game, and didn't drink a drop after that point.

Originally Posted by tarvis79

As usual, I agree with Yahtzee re: QTEs. "Press X to not die!" is horrible.

I really wouldn't mind quicktime events like "press melee attack button to break free" or "press crouch to dodge attack". But the point where quicktime events go overboard is when the button you need to press alternates between several different possibilities. It's anti-immersion. Your game character forgets how to do something every time he does it, and needs to learn it all over again every time it happens. He forgets which muscles need to be utilized to dodge an attack. It's impossible to relate to- or immerse one self in a character who randomly refuses to do the same thing when you press the same button.

[video]

Only Garrett can provide a really good gameplay, and there are aspects platinum mentioned. I say NO to stupid annoying and ugly female noob.

[DJ Riff]

Originally Posted by DarknessFalls

Funny, Randy Smith (lead designer) says in the article T2 was a frustrating rush job.

If it's June 2003, they may not yet faced all engine problems he told about later.

[auricgoldfinger]

Another wacky idea that would never transpire (but there's no rule that the wishes and suggestions have to be plausable) and I think would be ultra awesome... the game has parts 1-6. Parts 1-3 are remakes of the 1st three games, using the original art assets (sounds, cutscenes) where applicable. 4-6 are a continuation of the plot from there.

[Darrek]

Guards on the roofs for our thief master,it will be difficult...

[keeperr]

Quick time events would ruin this game. Better implemented in childrens, arcade, splinter cell, or RPG games. I would be horrified if there was anything other than a lockpick to 'work' through...

Remember Fable where you get a job and have to cut wood, and pour drinks, or some other repetitive that doesn't let you play the game? Reminds me of like dance dance mania, the majority of nintendo wii games, guitar hero that kind of thing. Not my forte at all.

Hows about we can build our own tools? We dont just buy rope arrows, we go steal someones washing line, buy our arrows and combine them or manage an inventory. <bad idea

Speaking of inventory we could have a 'slots' system (thinking something like Deus ex) a bow or sword may take 3 slots, a dagger just two, flash bombs one etc. Though saying that I did like how T3 you could build your arsenal to whatever you want and (slowly with lag) scroll through them all.

[Putkikameli]

Originally Posted by keeperr

RPG games.

QTE for RPG's? NO! QTE's have no place in any game. Period.

[darkrain]

I would like T4 to be a sneaking game where it's gonna be hard to survive when the guards found you - not like these other games where it doesn't matter 'cause you got realy strong weapons and all this stuff -.- .

I would also like to have some riddels to steal some objects (to make it more difficult) and secret paths would be great too - but they should be hard to find.

The story is also very important for me.
A game can have the best grafic in the world combinated with a boring story - and I wouln'd play it...
It has to be interesting, things should happen that you don't expect to happen, the player should be able to identify with Garrett and maybe with some other characters as well, the atmosphere should be like T1 and T2 combinated with some new aspects etc. that would be nice

When you have to open a door or something else it should be much more difficult than in T1-3 because I just had to see the lock and I new how to open it -.- that was realy boring ... I need a challenge

[Syntia13]

Hallo fellow taffers! A brand new forum user here, though I read/skimmed through a bunch of threads before.

So... it's probably much too late in the development for my thoughts, wishes and suggestions to make any difference, but I'm going to list them anyway. ;D


- Mr. (possibly a god) Russell as Garret, complete with his dry humor;
- First person perspective being the main, if not only perspective. In TDS I couldn't shake the feeling that the devs made a TPP game, then glued a camera to Garrett's head to emote FPP and called it a day. It didn't work well. To much bobbing up and down and to the sides. I was getting motion sickness when standing still. The same applies to:
- Away with fidgeting when standing still. Garrett is a master thief, one of his basic skills should be standing still, and yet in TDS he keeps fidgeting to and fro, sometimes exposing himself to light when doing so. What was up with that?
- Bring swimming back, please - it was [insert impolite adjective here] to remove the feature and still put a big body of water in the game. The first and only time I got taken to prison was because I tried to take a bath. WTF? Did I started to drawn and the guards fished me out? What? O_O
- set a brisk walk as the default moving speed, please. This is a stealth game, not a race. Allow jumping when walking. (You couldn't do this in TDS)
- Leaning forward. It was immensely helpful, and I almost cried when it disappeared in TDS.
- Consider adding crawling to Garrett's skill set. He should be able to crawl under a fence or hide under a bed, I think, though I won't cry if it's not implemented - it'd be a nice addition, but nothing crucial.
- rope arrow vs climbing gloves - both had their weaknesses, though I'd take a rope arrow over gloves any day. (The gloves were ridiculous - they made Garret stick to the walls like Spiderman. It was uncomfortable in FPP, and looked downright silly in TPP). (The rope arrow was my best friend, but I had to increase my suspension of disbelief when using it - an arrow really shouldn't be able to hold my weight). My proposed alternative would be a grappling hook and a length of rope. You could add climbing on rough surfaces without any gear if needed, after all I can do that, so Garrett certainly can too, but that's not a priority for me.
- swinging on a line in any chosen direction - If Lara Croft can do it, then so can Garrett, that's all I'll say.
- Cut scene briefings! In sepia!
- Ability to eat stolen food without any effects on Garrett (e.g., no healing or similar). I liked the fact that I could munch on an apple while waiting for the guard to pass. It added to immersion.
- Either give me back Constantine's sword, or give me a crowbar. I need a tool to remove those boards from the closed off doors and windows.
- NO LOADING ZONES. Please. Begging you. It felt wrong and ridiculous to have to stare at the loading screen every time I wanted to cross a corridor. Bring back large areas with many points of entry, designed logically and with FPP in mind.
- 'secret' secrets. The ones I have to look for like a maniac, not ones flashing a big fat glyph of guidance on me.
- lockpicking minigame - the only good new thing that came with TDS, IMO. I was heaps more frustrating and realistic to juggle the pick, than it was to just keep pressing the 'use item' key until the doors unlocked. I loved it.
- revised noisy surfaces. It was great that walking on different surfaces made different levels of noise, but... it always bugged me, why were TILES the noisiest? It's so counter-intuitive! The tiles are one of the quietest walking surface, they don't clank like metal or resonate like old wooden floor (boards put over inter spaced beams - that's basically a giant resonance box, it should be one of loudest floors to walk on). I think that only surfaces quieter than tiles should be carpeted stone floor.
- Elemental crystals - I was always under impression that the elemental arrows were 'grown' by putting a special crystal near desired element. Note how the water arrow were usually found in water, fire arrows in fireplaces, and moss arrows seemed to grow on grass, and on one occasion (Life of the Party mission) it was growing down of a caved-in roof. Also, what I was picking up didn't look like an arrow at all (there was no shaft). So I always pretended that I'm picking up just elemental crystals, and immediately fixing them to my broadhead arrows. I'd love to see this idea actually implemented in T4. Garrett could be carrying a quiver of plain arrows, a pocketful of various elemental crystals and a few whistles, which he then could attach to an arrow to make elemental arrow or a noisemaker arrow. (Coincidentally, I didn't like the 'fireworks' noisemaker in TDS. I could easily imagine a whistle with a small rock in it, which would make the noise effect from first two games. The fireworks, I had no explanation for).
An idle thought - If there is a hub (city hub or Garrett's-apartment-only hub), Garrett could be growing his own elemental crystals by placing a limited number of plain crystals in fireplace, water tank, flower pot or ventilation shaft.
- About a hub - if there is one - please make it more about "I can chose which of three next targets I will steal first" rather than about "I must trudge back and forth between several fences to sell all my loot". While I might have like to have a choice in Thief Gold about which elemental key I will recover first/second/third/last, the TDS approach was very tiresome - especially with those blasted loading zones.

- let the player fully customize the controls, and support for 5-button mouse would be awesome too.

- And last but not the least issue : controls/interface/body awareness/interaction with environment.
Just a fortnight ago, I would plead for the controls to be designed with 'only keyboard' users in mind. To this day when I play thief 1 and 2, I use mouse only for aiming my bow. I tried to do the same with TDS, but it was horribly inconvenient, as I kept bumping into walls. (Only after I learnt how to tweak .ini files I was able to complete the game).
BUT.... Please excuse me while I ago on a bit of a tangent here:

A week ago I finished "Amnesia: the dark descent". I only picked it up because the description said 'you have to sneak in the shadows', so I was all like, Oh, it's kinda like Thief! ... which it isn't. At all. BUT... But it is FPP sneaker and by the gods is the interface incredibly amazingly awesome! If you haven't played it, check it out guys. At no point you can see any part of yourself - not even your hands - and yet I felt like I was RIGHT THERE, it wasn't Daniel picking up stuff and turning the cranks, it was I, I tell you! XD

Ok, a bit more detail: you moved with basic WSAD + space + hotkeys, there was leaning (!), walking, crouching, running - all the good stuff. But what gripped me most was interaction with environment. The frobable items weren't highlighted when they were in your reach - instead an icon of outstretched hand would appear. It may sound weird, but it worked, it worked very well:
Opening doors - press LMB and push to open push-doors, or pull to open pull-doors. (Now do it when there's a monster chasing you and you're not sure what kind of door you're dealing with! ). Press RMB to throw the door open, or press LMB and push/pull very gently if you want to just open them a crack. Peek in the other room through the crack if you feel like it.
Pulling levers - press LMB, move the mouse up to move the lever up, or down to pull the lever down. (or to the sides to move it to the sides, if it bends that way :P )
Turning wheels/cranks - press LMB and move your mouse in circles - the crank will turn in the direction you're moving it.
Picking up objects and putting them back down - press LMB to hold it. If the object is very heavy, you can only drag it, using WASD keys. If it's light, move your mouse around to move the object around. Press RMB to throw it. OR... press R and move your mouse to turn it over in whichever direction you wish. OR... move your mouse gently down and release LMB to gently and noiselessly put it down on whatever surface you choose. (You can see where I'm going with this, I'm sure. How many times in TDS did you unintentionally picked up a candlestick and then run around with it looking for a safe place to drop it? Too many bloody times, I'm sure . I spent a substantial amount of time picking up knocked over chairs, turning them right side up and arranging them neatly around desks and tables. Just because I could. (And it seemed to calm down Daniel. He needed all the comfort he could get, the poor twitchy fellow, afraid of every shadow :P .
The bottom line is: up until recently I'd ask to make the controls 'keyboard only' friendly. Today I beg you, devs - make it similar to Amnesia, it was ten times more thiefy than TDS, even thought I had to stay in the light to stay sane and there was nothing to steal. If you do this, I will happily forget all my keyboard hang-ups, grab my mouse and tidy the hell out of the places I break into. XD

Oh, and the most important request - release the game sometime this century, please!

[Platinumoxicity]

Originally Posted by Syntia13

"Amnesia: the dark descent"

...the interface incredibly amazingly awesome! If you haven't played it, check it out guys. At no point you can see any part of yourself - not even your hands - and yet I felt like I was RIGHT THERE, it wasn't Daniel picking up stuff and turning the cranks, it was I, I tell you! XD

Do your arms stretch like rubber when you try to turn a crank that takes a bit effort? In real life, there's direct live feedback. The crank actually holds back your hand. In Amnesia, you grab the crank at a certain spot, and then you drag your cursor way ahead of the point where you're actually holding on, as if your arm stretches because your hand can't keep up as it's turning a stiff crank.


I think that when a game like Half-Life has you holding a button to keep turning a crank, that is more immersive because the action is so simple. I think the item handling system in Amnesia breaks the immersion by three ways...

-Firstly, it gives no feedback, so the player's input is just vague vectors that the game interprets as forces being applied to objects.

-Secondly, 2d-manipulation of 3d objects in 3d-space, rendered as a 2d image, ensures that the forces you apply are always offset from the directions that one should be applying, so the game always needs to guess the approximate direction, when in reality a person would automatically apply the 3-dimensional force in the right direction in space.

-And thirdly, the system in Amnesia is "spectacular". Just the fact that a player can be "amazed by" how the objects are handled in the game makes it less realistic rather than more. Because, really, when was the last time in real life that you were amazed by how you can manually turn a handle and open a door? -In a more immersive game, that would happen with the press of one button, because that happens as naturally as it happens with real people and real doors. In Thief, you don't even think when you open a door. In real life you don't either. You just do it because it's a mundane everyday task that everyone does constantly. In a game, that ease of doing things should be simulated, with the automation of certain actions.

[Syntia13]

Originally Posted by Platinumoxicity

...

*blink, blink*
Dude, I can honestly say that I didn't understand a word of what you where trying to say about rubber hands, friction and 2D/3D/2D/3D.
Might be a language barrier.

Let me just address the parts I did understand.

Originally Posted by Platinumoxicity

I think that when a game like Half-Life has you holding a button to keep turning a crank, that is more immersive because the action is so simple.

Uh... In the pictures you were complaining about of lack of physical 'feedback' from the game. Pushing a key doesn't give you any feedback either.
So, you just press a key and watch an action happen on the screen... and you find that more immersive than making (counter)clockwise circles with your mouse to turn a wheel (counter)clockwise? Why? How?

Originally Posted by Platinumoxicity

-And thirdly, the system in Amnesia is "spectacular". Just the fact that a player can be "amazed by" how the objects are handled in the game makes it less realistic rather than more.
Because, really, when was the last time in real life that you were amazed by how you can manually turn a handle and open a door?

Never. And I wasn't 'amazed' when playing either. I whooped with joy when I discovered I had the ability to nearly perfectly control the environment - and then stopped whooping and just used that ability to PLAY in the style I enjoy most. Before you ask, yes, I do feel the need to pick up scattered books and straighten overturn chairs in RL, and was delighted to finally be able to do this in-game. People who don't care won't do this - instead they will feel a thrill of quiet satisfaction when they are able to quietly put down a piece of junk, instead of dropping/throwing it and alerting the whole neighborhood.

Originally Posted by Platinumoxicity

-In a more immersive game, that would happen with the press of one button, because that happens as naturally as it happens with real people and real doors.

...from personal experience, I must turn a handle first in RL, and no buttons are involved. :P

Originally Posted by Platinumoxicity

In Thief, you don't even think when you open a door. In real life you don't either. You just do it because it's a mundane everyday task that everyone does constantly. In a game, that ease of doing things should be simulated, with the automation of certain actions.

"click and push mouse to push the door" or "click and pull the mouse to pull the door" + "stop pushing/pulling when you decide that doors are open wide enough" - I didn't find it complicated, and never had to stop to think about what to do - except when I tried to push a 'pull door' - which happens in RL too - and even then it was just a split-second hiccup before I was pulling it. In fact, don't you find it strange that Garrett:
1 - apparently knows exactly which way the door opens despite never being in the building before, and
2 - feels that fully opening the door every time (which is sure to be notice if there's a guard outside) is the stealthiest way to go?

It goes back to the sense of easy control - I want to be able to open the doors just a crack, peek inside, then either open them further or close them back - and all it takes are two tine moves or my mouse - just as it would take two tine moves of my hand in RL.
I'm sorry but I don't get your interpretation of how immersion works.

[Viktoria]

Originally Posted by cGREGgo

What they're doing is allowing us time to run to the refrigerator to grab another beer without having to pause our game!

I chuckled.

[Platinumoxicity]

Originally Posted by Syntia13

I'm sorry but I don't get your interpretation of how immersion works.

My point is that automatically executing mundane actions like pulling levers, opening doors or turning cranks simulates the ease of doing those things in real life. You need to focus on actually doing those things exactly as little as you need to in reality.

Look up the game "Envirobear 2000". That is the automobile equivalent of the control in Amnesia. In reality you don't even need to think about pressing the pedals, shifting gears or turning the wheel. That's why in many games those are all automated. When you press left, you turn the wheel left in order to make the car turn left. You don't aim at the wheel, grab it by holding the mouse button and then move it in a circular motion.

Automating these actions means that players can focus on everything else around them. You don't need to concentrate 100% on manipulating objects because you have lived many years in this universe, equipped with your body and accumulated a hefty amount of muscle memory that allows you to execute common actions without even thinking about them. The intricate controls in Amnesia, ironically so, simulate the behavior of someone who has forgotten what he is completely because there is no muscle memory to regulate his autonomic actions in an environment. He doesn't even remember the simple actions like opening doors. He needs to focus on those common actions completely.

[Hamadriyad]

You may be right, but there is this: If you are a thief and you break into someones house, you have to keep attention your moves which you normally wouldnt. You cant open a door like its your home, you shouldnt make noise, you shouldnt open door widely etc. In this case, I think controls in Amnesia make sense.

[Moreth]

I've noticed a trend among entertainment companies of late. Most noticeably to me in Batman Arkham City game franchise, Movies and gaming and story telling seem to be drawing closer and closer together. So to the issue of cut scenes. I honestly have no problem with 3 minute 5 minute or even 20 minute cut scenes as long as A) they are skippable for the sake replaying and B) there provide real context and not just fluff and filler.

Rope arrows always bothered me a bit as well but suspension of disbelief would be a great deal easier if our hero carries a small yet powerful crossbow rather than a short bow. Then it seems it wouldn't be so much shooting "rope arrows" as it would a barbed metal spike with a line attached. Also to my mind it would be a much more "Thief like" weapon, moving from a weapon that mows down guards to a tool that needs to be prepped like any other Thief tool. However if that short trailer on youtube is correct we seem to be getting a mix of the two with a cool fold out steampunk type bow.

As Syntia and others have pointed out, lockpicking should be a challenge. As should safecracking or removing traps. (given the city Garret lives in I'd most likely firebomb even my bathroom door with all the shady characters about) However turning a crank should NOT require outside the game thought and shouldn't be a challenge unless an extra tool is needed ie a crowbar for a rusted crank.

As for zones. Don't. Garret lives in a fairly well fleshed out city. Between the sheer number of maps that can and should be reconciled and creativeness of the dev team expanding on whats already there, to me it should be an open sandbox type of world. You don't want me in a certain part of town, give me a reason. I wouldn't mind seeing a well thought out sewer and roof system for travel as well. I know it would be too much that every single house in the city were open to creative wealth redistribution but I would like the opportunity to NOT follow a linear path. I would honestly like my gaming experience to be different than that of other players and even when I replay. The current (last several years) trend of expansions in games should be planned for when considering replayability. After all if I move on to another game I find it difficult to go back and run the same pattern again even if it means getting to new content.

Most things I've read in this thread I do believe the folks who're making the game understand. After all, as someone stated earlier, most of the ideas are similar and plain old common sense. No Garret should NOT hang on a wall like the human fly till the guards get bored and walk away. Yes Garret should have reasonable fighting skills but they should never ever even a tiny bit be his first option. Having read several biographies of real life Thieves one thing is consistent across the board; famous Thieves generally go by the name "convict" at some point. Just as hiding in the shadows is about NOT attracting attention, so to should nearly every facet of Thievery.

Again I must apologize to those who've once again become trapped in yet another of my run on sentences and mass collection of grammatical errors that would make every teacher I've known grimace. Our community has provided some amazing feedback and from what I can tell it's almost uniquely civil. Well it seems that something shiny has grabbed my attention so I'll bid you all a fond goodnight and again thanks for being a great bunch.

-m-

Just a quick edit regarding the Batman Arkham city frachise. I will ALWAYS cheer for Harley Quinn above some masked do gooder.

[Jace_Auditore]

Originally Posted by Moreth

I've noticed a trend among entertainment companies of late. Most noticeably to me in Batman Arkham City game franchise, Movies and gaming and story telling seem to be drawing closer and closer together. So to the issue of cut scenes. I honestly have no problem with 3 minute 5 minute or even 20 minute cut scenes as long as A) they are skippable for the sake replaying and B) there provide real context and not just fluff and filler.

If something can be done in gameplay,dont do it in a cutscene.
That should be a basic game development rule.

[Yaphy]

Originally Posted by Jace_Auditore

If something can be done in gameplay,dont do it in a cutscene.
That should be a basic game development rule.

I disagree. If characters are just talking with each other for an extensive time it makes sense to make it a cutscene. I'm not very fond of the middle way cutscenes made in Assassins Creed. Those where you talk with someone but can still move around but with almost no control. Why did they make it like that? You both talk to each other but for some reasons you can dance around and do pirouettes. I prefer the cinematic experience where the well placed cameras play a role in telling a story. But the most important thing is that everything is made in the same way. The cutscenes should still use the ingame models and the usual engine. No prerendered cutscenes please. If they use prerendered cutscenes I hope that they stick to that. TDS had both for some odd reason. It looks tacky.