How many levels should there be?

[Hypevosa]

We all love thief, and that's why we're here... but when a story is dragged out unnecessarily long there's a problem. What do you think is a good number of levels for thief to have? (assuming the large level size of the old games)

I'd say the 14-16 level mark is perfect for me. Anything approaching 20 would probably have me going "GET ON WITH IT".

Does your answer depend on if there's a city hub inbetween? for me it doesn't, though I'd probably expend quite a few hours there.

Discuss

[jtr7]

Fifteen is a nice number. Three Acts, five missions each.

The trilogy had 13/16, 15, and 14, respectively.

[Nothke]

15, I agree. The already proven number is perfect.

[Thieffanman]

Fifteen or more missions here-- but the higher the number, the more spectacular the ending needs to be. If a player puts that much effort into a game, the ending needs to match the effort.

. . . and if there are city hubs in between, I hope there are little side missions to work on.

--Thieffanman

[jtr7]

Although I'd rather have more Thief than less Thief, if a mission feels like padding, it needs to be cut, or absorbed into another.

There have always been side missions, I just don't like it when it's an obvious fork in the road, but I like it when it mostly feels like something to do along the way. Get the Serpentyle Torc, find that valuable item you just overheard two guards talking about, etc.

[Zahr Dalsk]

10-20 very large missions.

And please, no hubs or free-town-roam like DS, they make it harder to get a nice neat set of start-of-mission saves together.

[jtr7]

TDS was all "Heart of The City" missions built around the Final Glyph concept. So now, we should be free to go to the furthest reaches of The City and beyond again! The hubs should be no different than the layout of businesses and alleyways of most real cities, and we should rarely feel like it is a hub. It should feel like home. Everything should just make sense where we find it, with some surprises.

But yeah, a three-act story, and however many missions it takes to tell it. A thriller, a mystery, noir, steampunk, strange fantasy, comedy, and no melodrama, no romance.

[kabatta]

The logical part of me agrees that 15 is a decent number, but the greedy one wants 26.

[jtr7]

Heheheh.

[Shadow Blade]

15 or 16 Large levels of heart stopping stealth action.

[Hypevosa]

I take that as the sealing vote for 15 levels.... now the question is, what to do with the rest of development?

[Platinumoxicity]

15 and a secret Blooper Reel

[citywolfdreams]

No City hubs please! They're fun at first, and then after the first couple of hours just become the boring place you have to pass through to get to your next mission. It would be more fun to simply spend that effort on simply expanding the beginning of each mission to take you through parts of the city en route to your target, similar to Life of the Party from Thief 2.

[Flashart]

Yes 15-20 sounds fine. In "Hidden + Dangerous 2" there was a couple of missions that had 2-3 "parts" meaning you got a couple of missions but with completely different objectives within vaguely the same area. So you might have a large "rooftop" journey", a building mission, and an escape through tunnels etc. I like this as it makes more of a story.

[Hypevosa]

Originally Posted by citywolfdreams

No City hubs please! They're fun at first, and then after the first couple of hours just become the boring place you have to pass through to get to your next mission. It would be more fun to simply spend that effort on simply expanding the beginning of each mission to take you through parts of the city en route to your target, similar to Life of the Party from Thief 2.

The city venture was half the level for life of the party... it would be like having TDS sized missions tacked onto a city hub again, without the reliability of the city hub. I'd rather have a well designed, plenty of flare and flavor city hub... if it says I'm in a mission I'd rather be IN the mission, i.e. where I'm supposed to be. If they make a city hub WELL, then I'd like to have it alot, but if they just make small loading sectors like in TDS, I'd rather not have it. To me, the city hub should just be the size of 2 levels combined in one... Have the thieve's highway, and make it really easy to get from one place to the other via the rooftops for those who want to just get mission to mission, and then let the people who ENJOY the city hub (like me) to travel the streets, pickpocketing random folk, and overhearing conversations and whatnot. Obviously there would need to be roof access for the fences and stores, but still, it could be done, and rather well.

[jtr7]

I don't want A city hub to have to go back to. I want mini-hubs spread way apart and not have to walk between city section after city section. Just end the mission, give me a cutscene/briefing, and drop me into another city section with its own little places to go aside from the mission itself.

[fayfuya]

15 missions, with few side missions or missions that aren't contacted with prophecies or so, it's just for Garrett's profit, but following to 1 or 2 of those missions Garrett find out something that is critical for the storyline.
And few diffirent endings for the game can be nice...

[jtr7]

It's not Deus Ex. We get a mission, we complete the mission, and get something extra for ourselves on the side. We complete a string of 15 missions that are all tied to one plot and the story ends. No different endings because that would require different stories. Thief is linear, but the player is allowed to complete the missions with a lot of personalization. Different endings make sequels harder to develop.



Of course, if someone wants to demonstrate the possibility... please do.

[Hypevosa]

Ok, here's the possibilities as I see it. I think that Garrett's being the one true keeper does put possibilities on multiple endings, either of erring to do what the keepers did, and have history repeat itself, going on and doing what he wants and not perpetuating the errors of the keepers, and then there's going out of his way to destroy the city by creating a tremendous imbalance. But personally I think Garrett would still do just what he wanted, but how much do we let the player control Garrett vs Garrett controlling the player?

[Nothke]

As you all say, hubs in the city of TDS were fun at first, but then became boring and repeatative. Ok, but the city can be made interesting... many people, many alleys, rooftops, sewers... you could make 50 different paths... assassins creed (I must mention this pagan game again) was never boring, even going 100 times through city. of course don't get me wrong thief is not a cimbing-jumping game...

[jtr7]

Of course the story can go in multiple directions from the beginning, but this is asking for three full games in one. I think one story is perfect, and I still believe the whole new Thief team has to prove themselves worthy successors of the legacy.

[Nate]

Well, if they DON'T have the city hub, they should have 15-20 big solid levels.

If they do include a city hub, they should have 15 levels.

Personally, I would rather they had more missions than a city hub.

[Hamadriyad]

15-20 huge missions are perfect.
And no different endings please.

[ToMegaTherion]

20 huge missions might be a bit much, depending on plot.

The original two games are a good length. Deadly Shadows is a couple of missions short, or, it has the right number of missions but a few of them need to be longer.

[DarknessFalls]

15-20 large levels. Probably 15, 16 of 17 is good because I think T1/T2 had that many and seems reasonable. 20 levels would be harder to make high quality throughout these days, unless they have a ton of resources to not let the quality slip. I don't want levels slapped together. 9 or 10 levels wouldn't be enough, imo; I'd feel like I got swindled.

If they opt for a small number of large levels, or a large number of small levels, I will be upset. I'm annoyed by the gaming industry pattern of making games that you can beat in 8 or 9 hours -- and even 4 or 5 hours in some cases. STOP already!!! I pay $60 for the game; I don't want to be able to beat it in a weekend.

No fluff or padding in Th4f. High quality, large, well thought-out and layed-out levels with hard-to-find secrets and secret areas that make sense to the level/setting and aren't just cubby-holes thrown in for no reason.

EDIT: Okay, I just read someone else's post in a different thread saying a mixture of some levels being large, some being smaller... I'd be okay with this. It makes sense. For variety and to mix up the pacing every so often, every level doesn't need to be huge.