Thief: Deadly Shadows Comments by Kristan Reed

As good as Halo then.

/coat

/chucks Kami's hat out the door after him ;-)

Cracking review Kristan - glad to see that you noted the problems with the map. As I remember the last games actually noted where you were by highlighting the area you were in with a light blue colour and I seriously find myself missing this sometimes. However, it does force you to learn the levels a bit more, doesn't it?

So, are you gonna add a footnote about the difficulty bug? It's a serious issue, after all, and one that will truly lower the replay value.

And, naturally, great review. I agree with you on most points. Of course, the PC version only gets a 7/10 from me, because they could have done so much more...

Hmmm, the map is quite excellent. Of course it doesn't bleeding pinpoint your position, it's not a freaking radar, is it now? If there's one thing I've hated in stealth games it's a map which not only shows you, but often the objective and enemies as well. Such nonsense.

Hey, might as well get that out of the way first!

Great review though. PC version may entice me but only when they fix that bug...

I agree with many of your points Kristan, and I had one of my most enjoyable nights of gaming in ages with this on Friday night. However, the longer I play it, the more the idiotic enemy AI is beginning to grate on me. The game simply isn't challenging once you get the hang of it. As a result, the difficulty bug, combined with the terrible framerate (which you rightly say doesn't affect the experience all that much) make the Xbox version of the game pretty poor value for money IMO. I hate to bash a company whose game philosophies I admire greatly, but Ion Storm have really ripped consumers off with the shoddy Xbox versions of Invisible War and Thief. Which is a shame, because they're both such good games.

I guess the AI bug does need to be addressed somehow - but precisely how Ion Storm can do that on the Xbox without a full recall is open to question - seeing as Microsoft won't allow single player patches.

They probably won't. Which makes it fair to say that if you want a challenge out of this game to get the pc version and hope for a speedy patch.

>They probably won't. Which makes it fair to say that if you want a challenge out of this game to get the pc version and hope for a speedy patch.

"Nick in agrees with Mike D shocker (again)"

I don't think that Eidos have the kind of clout to make Microsoft do a patch for Xbox. But I also don't think the readily patchible nature of the PC game makes it better than a console format.

I am still bitter about Sin :-)

Microsoft might agree to supply a patch through an OXM coverdisc, but I find that highly unlikely. As it is, this game is a prime example of quality assurance gone wrong.

I think we're getting to the point where we've agreed more often than disagreed :-).

I have a friend to downloaded some ini files from a fans' site, and now the game looks much more as the original thief; I mean come on, the huge buttons and text on the screen?!!! I thought this company knew some things about designing games! (This ini files also shrink the buttons and text and order of windows on the screen - weapons, inventory items to normal proportions).

Thing with theif is that the map is just a guide,so you know the rough location of things..anything else would of felt out of place due to anything more technical not marrying up with the locales of the game.

Excellent review.

Gotta agree what has been said here already though, the map really isn't supposed to be more than a rough sketch, and it's good that way. Half the fun of Thief always was to explore the areas, and it works well and without becoming frustrating because the levels are usually built very logically.

For anyone with the PC version, AVault thinks there is a patch on the way.

However, if you can't wait there are some hackish fixes out there, like ThiefBot which runs in the background and continually updates the AI settings to your desired level.

Got this info from yesterday's PA.

>I think we're getting to the point where we've agreed more often than disagreed :-)

Yep. Strange but true.

I haven't had a chance to play the finished version of this yet. Although I worked on it a year or so ago when I was at Eidos. I am due to pick up an Xbox and start on the back catalogue soon, but won't be able to afford a decent PC for ages. So I will await news on the bug front.

I love the whole Thief concept and the map is a huge part of that ... the idea that you have a few details from "casing" the place earlier, rather than a full GPS navigation system :-)

What exactly did you work on, Thamuhacha , if I may ask?

Don't worry, I love the game, so unless the silly bow upgrades were your idea, I am not going to mock you. ;-)

Mock him, mock him !

I hate the way the cudgel works now... really hate it... annoys me every time I use it...

oh and... its unplayable on my laptop (even though I have a p4 3Ghz and radeon9600mobile in it), I'm forced to play on the old crappy pc at work...

the map has been like that all the time btw and it is definately better than halo...

>What exactly did you work on, Thamuhacha , if I may ask?

Marketing (although not much was happening a year ago!) ... so can neither claim credit, nor receive blame, for the actual game :-)

Oi "Clive" ... shut it.

"Of course it doesn't bleeding pinpoint your position, it's not a freaking radar, is it now?"

Maybe you should switch to decaf?

Agreed on the whole "framerate isn't a problem" thing.

Too many people have drawn instant comparisons with Deus Ex2 (for obvious reasons) but the stealth-based gameplay seem better suited to
the "limitations" of the engine than the FPS style of DE2, to my mind.

This game is, above all, highly immersive (my Holy Grail of gaming, really).

I love the fact you now get both 1st and 3rd person views. Somtimes you just need that extra peripheral vision offerd by the 3rd person camera (especially when clubbing guards) But I'll always stick to 1st person for that cack your pants feeling of immersion

The map thing. One of the shameys about the joint XBox dev is that the level size. It looks like they really worked hard within the limitations, so it's not as striking a problem as in DX2 - but they are still smaller, and finding your way is correspondingly easier. And I can live without a radar. I mean c'mon, I love Hitman to bits, but talk about being spoonfed. :)

the map has been like that all the time btw

No it hasn't - in Thief 1 and 2 it definitely highlighted the area or room you were in at the time with a light blue colour, plus the maps tended to be a lot more detailed, showing rooms rather than general areas like it does in Thief DS. It wasn't a GPS-type system by any stretch of the imagination but it was kind of helpful. Like I said though, it's omission does force you to learn the levels.

The Shalebridge Cradle = Level design perfection

Can someone please explain the Hank Marvin reference from the placeholder on the Review link???

>someone please explain the Hank Marvin reference

Lead guitarist for the Shadows. Most famous for working for Cliff Richard in the 60's.

And now sort of famous for being involved in EG's least funny gag ever. Sadly.

Aw c'mon, it's summer.

>Aw c'mon, it's summer.

So you are in at 5.55am thinking up better jokes?

Royal Fool
The Shalebridge Cradle = Level design perfection

The Museum is almost as good.

I love how you end the Cradle mission though, that moment when you see what's between you and the exit. Reminds me of The Hudsucker Proxy.

Can somebody tell me if, on the PC version, when you look at a name plate of say "the armoury", it shows you a close up of the plate that takes up the entire screen? Or does it, like the Xbox version, simply print the text in small at the top of the game screen?

The latter. Though the text isn't exactly what I'd call "small". ;-)

I'm surprised no-one has mentioned the inventory system. The obvious fact being that there isn't one. Sure you have your primary and secondary weapon slots but that's it. Everything you collect gets stored nicely and when you need to use an item that you picked up earlier, there is no need to select it.

Personally, even though many may call this dumbing down, I think it's better than the old system where all the items picked up were accessed in what is now the secondary weapon slot. It was a pain in the first 2 games when you picked up the umpteenth parchment in a level and then have no way of identifying which is the one you just picked up. Or fiddling with the lockpicks. Or trying every key on a new door before resorting to the lockpicks.

I do however miss picking up apples, saving them for later when you need a health boost. And I also miss the health potions not being instant, in the other games it took a while for the rejuvination which stopped you from going in gung ho.

Also, Ion Storm claim that the rope/vine arrows were left out because they couldn't get them to work in the Unreal 2 engine.

While we're at complaining about minor things:

The bow seems to lack power now, not because of the actual shots, but the way Garrett now draws it with too much ease. :-)

Cheers Uncle, though that doesn't help me. See, the reason I ask is that I was watching a dvd of the game off of the front of an Xbox mag yesterday, and as I was watching I was thinking that it looked quite a bit smoother than it did on my Xbox (yeah, you knew I'd get round to that old "the graphics on thief/splinter cell are shite" chestnut sooner or later - come on).
Stevas Status: "Fuck it all: my Xbox IS fuxx0r3d."
Thing is, as whoever was playing it got to the armoury, they looked at the name and - like I said - it flashed up a nameplate that covered the entire screen. "Aaahhhh," I thought. "This doesn't happen on the Xbox version; so THAT'S why it looks smoother. It's not even on the Xbox. Hang on," [insert double take] "IT'S NOT EVEN ON THE FUCKING XBOX? I did buy an Xbox mag, didn't I?"
After making sure I hadn't accidentally bought a PC mag by mistake, I assumed that whoever did the video had done it on a beefy PC and figured "what the heck - who's gonna notice?"
Um... I did.
Stevas Status: Annoyed that Xbox mag did vid using PC version, but happier that XBox is apparently NOT fuxx0r3d.
So I come in here and ask you lot with your PC version if this is the case, and... it isn't?
Stevas Status: Confused.
So what version DID they have on this video I seen then?

An old pre-release version?