The Thief Series

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The Best Thief Installment

  • Total voters
    53
Blue Screen of Death said:
This thread showing up presents me a good opportunity to ask a question. How the fuck do I get into Thief in any capacity? Gold has been rotting in my Steam library for many years now.
By all lines of logic, it should be something I click with easily. I love adjacent games like System Shock or Deus Ex, but anytime I boot up Thief, I lose the will to play it really quick, and get lost trying to navigate the first level somehow.
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Dive into the missions. Many missions have multiple routes you can take, so just go for it. You will probably get lost, you won't collect all the loot and secrets. You might want to play on the easiest difficulty to remove objectives and lower loot requirements.

Use your map. You can actually click to write notes on the map.

I don't know what version Steam and GOG are installing, but most long-time players are probably going to use a utility like TFix to apply the latest unofficial patch and various fixes like widescreen/resolution support. I think it can download and install texture packs for you too. I'll have to figure it out again when I install Thief Gold to play The Black Parade. I think AngelLoader is the latest and greatest utility for fan mission management (there have been several of these over the decades).


Edit: To install The Black Parade on Windows:
  • Installed Thief Gold using GOG Galaxy. Realized everything wants a non-protected path so moved it out of Program Files and into a C:\games folder after closing GOG Galaxy.
  • Downloaded and ran TFix 1.27 (the separate T2Fix is used for Thief 2).
  • Downloaded The Black Parade and put it in the FMs folder.
  • Downloaded and ran AngelLoader in a separate folder. It requires you to make a "Backup path" for files like saves and screenshots that get removed when you uninstall a fan mission.
  • Added the "FM archive path" that I had put Black Parade in. I didn't have to extract the 7z archive.
  • Clicked "Play FM" which installs, then plays.
  • I changed the default keybindings and lowered mouse sensitivity. I loaded the "Thief Classic" presets and changed the Lean Forward key to 'F', that seems fine so far.
I can already see how this campaign could take forever to play. I'm starting on Expert too.
 
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Blue Screen of Death said:
This thread showing up presents me a good opportunity to ask a question. How the fuck do I get into Thief in any capacity? Gold has been rotting in my Steam library for many years now.
By all lines of logic, it should be something I click with easily. I love adjacent games like System Shock or Deus Ex, but anytime I boot up Thief, I lose the will to play it really quick, and get lost trying to navigate the first level somehow.
Click to expand...
You could try playing a little of 2 first, I had the same problem with Gold but somehow going back to it after playing 2 made it click immediately. Just remember to edit the controls, because the vanilla ones are really weird in modern times, where WASD is the standard. And I think the Steam versions need to be patched manually to run well in modern pcs unlike GOG's, which come prepatched with Tfix lite so those are just install and run if you're not going to add mods or fan missions.
 
I only started playing Thief Gold half a year ago and got immediately hooked to the series. The series quickly became one of my all-time favorites alongside STALKER and Deus Ex. The amount of world-building, atmosphere and love Looking Glass Studios put in these games is something I've never experienced in any other franchise. Then there is the fan community which provides almost endless amount of content to play, 25 fucking years after the original game came out.

Blue Screen of Death said:
This thread showing up presents me a good opportunity to ask a question. How the fuck do I get into Thief in any capacity? Gold has been rotting in my Steam library for many years now.
By all lines of logic, it should be something I click with easily. I love adjacent games like System Shock or Deus Ex, but anytime I boot up Thief, I lose the will to play it really quick, and get lost trying to navigate the first level somehow.
Click to expand...

Like The Mass Shooter Ron Soye mentioned, use your map with the compass (which is VERY helpful in later missions), use Quick save frequently, especially before entering a room/area and always thoroughly search every single room for loot and secrets. Also try to blackjack everyone so you can explore the levels in peace. Hide the bodies in places you're 100% sure no one goes to. Use lean to listen in on behind closed doors to listen if someone is in the next room.
 
Finished Black Parade finally. Overall a really good game but I think I prefer Metal Age. The only level I didn't like was the elemental one, but that's just my opinion. I plan on replaying it eventually once I set up the colors a bit better for my monitor


Only thing I can knock down on it were the voice actors. Many of them were trying too hard and definitely didn't have the vocal cords for their roles. Also I swear the cameo at the end was AI generated.
 
Chitty Chitty Bang Bang said:
Also try to blackjack everyone so you can explore the levels in peace.
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Blackjacking makes a big difference for the newbies, removing patrols from the equation as you pile up the bodies in some dark corner. Experienced players will "ghost" instead which is significantly harder.

Dr. Geronimo said:
Only thing I can knock down on it were the voice actors. Many of them were trying too hard and definitely didn't have the vocal cords for their roles. Also I swear the cameo at the end was AI generated.
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I just started mission 5. If the cameo is Garrett, there has been an amateur VA who sounds a lot like him voicing several fan missions over the years. I think it's SlyFoxx over on TTLG.
 
The Mass Shooter Ron Soye said:
Blackjacking makes a big difference for the newbies, removing patrols from the equation as you pile up the bodies in some dark corner. Experienced players will "ghost" instead which is significantly harder.


I just started mission 5. If the cameo is Garrett, there has been an amateur VA who sounds a lot like him voicing several fan missions over the years. I think it's SlyFoxx over on TTLG.
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The character is Victoria. Her presence isn't relevant to the story at all. Like most mods these autists most likely don't know a real woman.
 
For anyone who is playing Thief Gold for the first time, when you get to play the Thieves Guild mission, play as long as your patience holds and then press CTRL´+SHIFT´+ALT+END to skip to the next level, which is in my opinion the greatest in the series.
 
Last day to get Thief (2014) for free on EGS. You don't want to pay for this one, folx.

Dr. Geronimo said:
The character is Victoria. Her presence isn't relevant to the story at all. Like most mods these autists most likely don't know a real woman.
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They had two female VAs, listed in the credits as Pukey Brunster and Shadow Creepr, definitely amateurs from the Thief fan mission community which is why they didn't sound fantastic. We're at the point now where AI would have been better for copying Viktoria's voice. I'm sure there are debates about AI on TTLG, since there is obvious interest in replicating Stephen Russell's (Garrett's) voice.

I can excuse Viktoria not appearing much in the actual story because she didn't really need to be. Her appearance in readables, briefings, and the ending helped fit the campaign in as a virtually canon The Dark Project prequel.

On the plus side, they got Daniel Thron from the original games to return as a Keeper.
 
Thief as a series is one of my longest standing hyper-fixation games. Played it a lot with my mum as a kid. She would sit me on her lap and we'd turn off all the lights and play it on her old ass Dell computer. All it could run was Thief, the OG Baldur's Gate and Morrowind at the best of times. The Hammer Haunts to this day are still my least favorite enemy type and their noises make my skin crawl. I do think it's funny as hell to kite zombies into a big pile and then flash bomb them or fire arrow them to death. Burricks are kind of cute in a "they're so ugly they're cute" way. A lot of enemy types are fun and unique in their own way. Though Mages can fucking suck it. Fuck the mages.

I ended up starting to play it myself on the hand-me-down Dell when I was old enough to be trusted to play vidya games by myself at eight-ish. Did eventually end up playing and beating all the games properly around fifteen years old, felt a sense of achievement doing that. Played them all on expert to get the full experience, but man, Thief Gold's extra missions made my head hurt so much. Dad bought me the 2014 game. Whilst it does leave a lot to be desired, I do like what it tried to do. I still play it sometimes cause the challenge modes are fun. I think I have a couple hundred hours clocked into each game cause I pick them up and play them again once every year or so. Overall, I like the world of Thief and what it offers. It's a fun, weird, Medieval-Victorian-Magical-Steampunk romp. No other series has really captured that same magic, though Dishonoured comes close.

Side Note: I was on tumblr during the resurgence of Thief and Dishonoured. I can say without a doubt in my mind the most insufferable people in these fandoms are the Garrett/Corvo shippers. I don't mind shipping normally but good lord it was the only thing anyone seemed to talk about.
 
MsFrancisFoster said:
Played them all on expert to get the full experience, but man, Thief Gold's extra missions made my head hurt so much.
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The recently released Black Parade fan campaign has excellent level design compared to the OMs, and it's a love letter to The Dark Project (a direct prequel). It's also a great showcase of what NewDark can allow mappers to do. I hope someone on TTLG has crunched the numbers on the scale of these newer missions, but by glancing at the patch notes for NewDark you can see that some of the engine limits have been increased by 1-2 orders of magnitude:
Increased the maximum number of visible on-screen terrain polies from 1024 to 20480
Increased the maximum number of visible on-screen objects from 128 to 1280
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I was replaying Thief Gold and Thieves Guild is so boring OMG. It's amazing how Black Parade missions seem 10x bigger, if not more, without being confusing and tedious like that mission. Locations like Ramirez Manor are so barebones too, with all of the empty rooms. +25 years of computing power + much better tools and a relatively thriving community have helped keep Thief alive. Now you can get a much better experience but it runs fine on an old iGPU.

 
The Mass Shooter Ron Soye said:
The recently released Black Parade fan campaign has excellent level design compared to the OMs, and it's a love letter to The Dark Project (a direct prequel). It's also a great showcase of what NewDark can allow mappers to do. I hope someone on TTLG has crunched the numbers on the scale of these newer missions, but by glancing at the patch notes for NewDark you can see that some of the engine limits have been increased by 1-2 orders of magnitude:

I was replaying Thief Gold and Thieves Guild is so boring OMG. It's amazing how Black Parade missions seem 10x bigger, if not more, without being confusing and tedious like that mission. Locations like Ramirez Manor are so barebones too, with all of the empty rooms. +25 years of computing power + much better tools and a relatively thriving community have helped keep Thief alive. Now you can get a much better experience but it runs fine on an old iGPU.

https://youtube.com/watch?v=xc0VnVuwqYQ
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See I've always wanted to get into Fan Missions, cause as a little spergling, I used to watch Ye Olden Thief LetsPlayers do run throughs of Fan Missions on youtube. But I've never once been able to get any of the fanmission loaders to work. (Tech Retarded.)

One of these days I'll figure it out. Maybe.

Either way, it's all very impressive what a dedicated bunch of autists can do. I'll give them all the kudos. It does look, feel and sound like a love letter to what made Thief, well, Thief. A fun, tongue in cheek, but ultimately slightly gritty fantasy world where your goal is to steal things.
 
MsFrancisFoster said:
See I've always wanted to get into Fan Missions, cause as a little spergling, I used to watch Ye Olden Thief LetsPlayers do run throughs of Fan Missions on youtube. But I've never once been able to get any of the fanmission loaders to work. (Tech Retarded.)

One of these days I'll figure it out. Maybe.

Either way, it's all very impressive what a dedicated bunch of autists can do. I'll give them all the kudos. It does look, feel and sound like a love letter to what made Thief, well, Thief. A fun, tongue in cheek, but ultimately slightly gritty fantasy world where your goal is to steal things.
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I put some instructions here. I installed it on Windows 10 and used TFix and AngelLoader.
 
https://crowdershop.com/products/joke-thief-t-shirt (archive)
Thief_box_art.jpg T-Shirt-25SC-JokeThief-black-Front-Mockup.webp
I saw it on a Crowder Rumble thumbnail on the Grayjay home tab and recognized the font + hand.

Thief-like free and open source game The Dark Mod 2.13 brings better AI vision and new graphical goodies (archive)

Warren Spector and Thief's game director are making a multiplayer immersive sim called Thick As Thieves (archive)
 
Maniacal Foreigner said:
Which one?
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Some "Mike Chrzanowski" guy (I think that's how it's spelled? Fucking polish names). Apparently he goes by "Aimee Chrzanowski" now, catched him commenting on a youtube video about a certain fan favorite drunk guard saying he used to go by "Mike C.", and oversharing stuff that had nothing to do with Benny, but helped with matching names in Mobygames.
 
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