Ironworks Gaming Forum - Thief 3 member review (PC version)

I just finished about 6 hours last night of playing thief 3 and thought I'd give some first-hand impressions of the game.. (and of course I'm not payed to give a review).

Hmm, where to begin.. (the tendency is to bitch first, but I'll try and avoid that)

So let me first state that its worth purchasing at full retail. BUT, if you haven't played the first two, then the current two game package at $20 US (found at most gamer stores) is a FREAK'IN bargain.

1. Controls: the orginal wasn't that good and neither is the new game - at least as far as user dexterity is concerned. With the PC version you have even more key controls than the original, this can be overwhelming at first (to learn) and even more difficult to play throughout the game, because you will need to use several keys AND ALL of this is made vastly more difficult because the game should only be played in an almost pitch dark room. By all means, if you have a microsoft sidewinder (or similar device), USE IT! (such a game controller makes the game fairly easy to use the controls, especially in the dark. In this respect the X-box version MIGHT be better.)

2. Graphics: they are excellent, considerably better than before - but the real question is, "do they add to gameplay?" Yup! Once you get over the initial impression of the drool eyecandy the graphics don't seem to add much to the game, and for the most part they don't. Whats critical is the game (and your graphics card's) transform lighting. The shadows in the game (and the light level) are phenomenal!!! And lets face it, this game is 50% about sneaking in those dark spots - so Kudos to eidos for bettering the original! Also the quality of the night lighting/sky is better. As far as hardware is concerned you do need a graphics card capable of doing these cool T&L's. Additionally the card should have a fair bit of memory (and your cpu should be reasonably good to). But if your system is decent then the game seems to work rather well. I've got an original nividia g3 card with 64 meg. on a cel. 2.4 - and there are no problems whatsoever with my monitors resolution of... 1600 by 1024 (I've got an SGI widescreen lcd). I'd say its pretty impressive that the game with that much detail can run without a hitch on my system at that resolution.

3. Movement EDITED: over-all worse than the original. Whats really FUBAR'ED here is attacking with either your knife or your blackjack (and you should really use your blackjack to knockout people to preclude a fight). In the original you had an "intensity" level to your swings that was FAR MORE REALISTIC. Essentially you pressed down on the left mouse button and held it down to increase the intensity (the longer the hold, the greater the damage or assurance that you would knock someone out). The new game doesn't have this at all for these weapons, (it does though for the bow). Instead its simply a left-click motion which produces a jab-like motion from your character with either the dagger or the blackjack. For the dagger this means you can't effectivly assasinate an opponent by sneaking up and holding the button for a bit for a powerfull dagger plunge (this really sucks!), the best you can do is prick your opponet multiple times by repeatedly left clicking - and of course the opponet will cry-out (and then your screwed).
Even worse is your blackjack. The jab-like motion of the left-click gives you no depth perception to properly make a knock-out move. Until you get the hang of it, you'll likely bump into your opponent before you are able to knock them out. And if you get to close to the opponent then they will notice you and the blackjack won't work (i.e. knock them out).
Note that both knife work and blackjacking behave a little differently if the victim is stationary (but that rarely occurs).

NOTE: VERTICAL MOVEMENT IS LIMITED see #6 below.

4. Thieving: better than the orignial, (and in some cases substantially so). Pickpoceting is really difficult in this game (though not so difficult that it can't be done) - but thats the way it should be (and the AI is excellent here). The difficulty here is getting it done while not being seen - if your seen then that person recognizes you every time you pass by them in a lit area and they will run to the guards. It was hard in the originals and even more so in the new game. You also have lockpicking. This at first is annoyingly difficult to figure out (book and tutorial are worthless here), but once you have played with a lock for a half-hour plus of real-time you should figure out the basic mechanics. After you have picked a dozen plus locks you should be relativly competent in picking any lock. The reviews I've read treated this as a ho-hum game feature, but I think the developers did an excellent job here (for the most part). What these reviewers missed is the "time" element. Imagine yourself crouched down trying to pick a lock with a patrol guard that happens by every 5 minutes, if your not totally concealed by shadows you could very well be spoted if you don't pick the lock quickly enough - so it realisticly puts the time pressure on to pop the lock. What the developers screwed up on is that picking the lock doesn't seem to make any noise to nearby characters - a serious flaw, but not fatal. Most of the other basic "lifting" is similar BUT in this game if you happen to pickup an item with no real worth (i.e. one that doesn't "sparkle"), then you must drop the item to do anything but walk/run. This is interesting because droping an item makes more sound (as does bumping into certain items), this can of course alert your presence to nearby opponents (and I don't remember this from the first two games - at least not to this level of realism).

5. AI: The AI in the original was very good, here its excellent! Depending on what action you are taking (and what "opponents" are taking), you will get a variety of "responses" that inlude: verbal, alertness conditions, attacking, and fleeing. The original games had this, but it wasn't as sophisticated. For instance at one point in the game I was waiting to knock-out a guard* when a pedestrian walked past the guard, noticed him and cordially greeted the guard. The guard in turn litterally said, "bugger off".. LOL! Moreover that sort of verbal confrontation doesn't happen often, the AI is more sophisticated than that - it only does that very infreaquently so that it doesn't become utterly repetetive (though most of the dialoge is repetetive). And its not just verbal dialouge, the guards are more aware than pedestrians generally - though you do have drunk guards! Pedestrians become more aware when they are personally involved (i.e. you've just ripped them off or you knocked-out someone in their visual range). You also have new factors such as blood stains or dropped swords that can alert patroling guards that see this.
*Note however I did run into a spawn problem with knocking-out CITY guards. If you take out one of their guards and drop the body where it won't be seen, another guard spawns back into the same patrol rotation as before. I don't know whether this is a glitch or not (or if it was only a one-time deal), but it isn't very realistic. Edit. I have knocked out other guards without a respawn - so I think it was a bug.

6. World characteristics: very similar to the original games, though more visually detailed (the hammerite temple was stunningly beautiful). (What I haven't seen here visually is quality water effects.) Here though your "chapter" progression is not as defined and limited. Several of the chapters revolve around the city, but in this game once a portion of the city is revealed by the game you can usually go back to other portions of the city you have been in before - before completing that new chapter. This allows you to sell stuff at different fences and purchase gear from different suppliers. However these transactions are VERY limited and frankly are not much better than the orginal games. What is different is that you can stock-up on previously spent supplies AND this doesn't even mean you have to buy the supply, any place you have found a particular arrow (say a water arrow) will respawn for the next chapter. For instance the fountain outside your home will always contain 2 water arrows for each new chapter. Additionally this spawn phenomenom occures for the people in the city and their cash to a lesser extent. So you will almost always have someone to pickpocket from any of these previous chapters.
So far I'm fairly disapointed by the vertical manevering allowed in this game (though I haven't even gotten to the Docks chapter yet). Its not that manevering is overly difficult - its that the world for the most part isn't to creative for allowing vertical movement. Sure, several areas have overhead beams, but where they are present they are TOO obviously over-present, and they are not required for the chapter's completion. Its really that the architecture in the game isn't condusive to rooftop activities like it was (to an extent) in the orginals, and when it is - its weak.
Additionally, sound in the game isn't quite as good as the original. The mood isn't set as well because of it. Nor is there the really cool industrial music for the chapters cutscenes.
Finally, the chapter progression now uses cutscenes that are digitally done (like the movie final fantasy). Though this is my personal preferance, I actually preferred the orignial's fantastic comic-book art.

Conclusion (so far): B-, the other original games I'd give an A-. The full grade deduction is a result of the poor handling of "high-wire" acrobatics and close quarter attack functions (which cannot be offset by the new features the game has). But my remcomendation still stands, I'm having a very good time with the game.

[ 06-03-2004, 03:30 PM: Message edited by: ScottG ]