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It's strongly contendable that Mark of the Ninja is as good as or better than Thief when it comes to "best stealth game ever." However, MotN is 2D so... not really comparable.
"Unstable Footing" is the most fun I've ever had getting an achievement.
Agreed. It always seems disingenuous when the only difference between a dead body and an unconscious body is that one says "Unconscious." I mean, if you're sapping somebody so hard that they're out for hours, you can't really claim the moral high ground when they wake up with brain damage.
Alexios
Cores, shaders and BIOS oh my!
As long as it's something the game encourages you to do by making fights too risky, that's good. It definitely needs higher difficulty settings to restrict fatalities like in the first two games, with the highest allowing none of it (I too think circle strafing guards to kill them easily like you could do after figuring out how things work wasn't the intended behavior). Knocking people unconscious should have restrictions too, unless they've made them wake up in this game, which would be good depending on how they handle it. They could also try making you care about the humans a little bit more, with more emotional reactions and chit chat you can overhear, as well as the story clearly showing most are manipulated by others, so that you avoid killing them even without incentives. Oh, I also hope there won't be any stupid enemies like dinosaurs this time. Or that they behave better/are more fun to get past. I think my current biggest fear is having a character as super-humanly agile as the Assassin's Creed guys, making terrain traversal a piece of cake no matter what situation you encounter, rather than having to study the environment and figure out a route using your limited human abilities and tools. Stylish and meant to be satisfying fatalities included. After they show they have this aspect down, I'll then worry about the level design, story, modability, etc.
eXistor
Member
Good, expecting great things of this. Thief 2 was masterful.
As much as I like Dishonored, the superpowers nearly killed the game for me, gave me way too much freedom and you could do as you'd please just about all the time, not paying any attention to anything around you. I want my stealth games (Dishonored really isn't one) to be more grounded and real.
As much as I like Dishonored, the superpowers nearly killed the game for me, gave me way too much freedom and you could do as you'd please just about all the time, not paying any attention to anything around you. I want my stealth games (Dishonored really isn't one) to be more grounded and real.
WrenchNinja
Member
A target or two huh
gollumsluvslave
Member
Cautiously optimistic on Thief 4 after Deus Ex: HR
No boss battles please!
Thief is my favourite series of all time and an keeping my fingers crossed that Eidos do it justice.
But media blackout is necessary.
No boss battles please!
Thief is my favourite series of all time and an keeping my fingers crossed that Eidos do it justice.
But media blackout is necessary.
If it would be the "easy way", the game would not be that fun. All the problems before getting the stealthy takedown is hard. You have to learn the path of guards, which direction they facing, places to hide, etc. If you fail, you are almost always in a bad situation (which is too close to the guards). But killing on the other hand is very easy, since you have a bow and always enough arrows. The consequences can be a mess and it surrounds itself a feeling of failing, if you have to rely on it. But you still have a good chance to retrit and find another way (thanks to the open level-design).
Yes, the game playable in first person, but if never felt right. There is a big difference in creating a level for a first-person view or third-person view. Mainly it is how big a place have to be to look right and objects doesn't get in the way of the camera. In the third-person view places need to be bigger and objects like furniture need much more space between them. In first-person there is no need for this trick (other then don't get in the way of the player).
This is why they have to planed the third-person view from the begining or it would be almost unplayable. But hat would not be the caase the other way around. The game would only look really empty in first-person. Which the games does.
Yes, it unnecessary pads the game. It is intressting to go through the motion of a thief a view times (like the two times in Thief 2), but after every mission it becomes boring. Esacilly because it almost never changes and you only can break into the same places. I understand, that they wanted to show much more of the game-world and how Garrett is a part of it. It just would be much more enjoyable to have only a few well designed missions, so that they can stand out. It even hurts the atmosphere much more, since through the limitation of the console (who are the main reason, that Thief 3 has no big levels) the city looked very small. At the end i don't need to see Garrett do his preparation everytime.
Do you have forgotten the great variation of Thief 2 level-design? Yes, Thief 1 had too much dungeons and catacombs, but in Thief 2 you got four mansions, a police station, docks, an secret base with an submarine, the streets of the city, the roofs of the city (the path of thiefs), a long dungeon with different elements (forest, village, winter, caves, etc.), a bank, an citadel (with mainly humans), an remake of the lost cave-city (now with more humans and it is much less like a dungen anymore), an skyscraper and a big smithery. Many of those mission where very long and had a lot of freedom to them. There were still some good ideas in Deadly Shadows, especially the hunted asylum, the museum and the house at the beach, but overall it did not have variatiy and size of Thief 2.
Well, there were four years difference between the games it better had better lighting! But outside of that the characters, objects and envoiment all looked like lifeless plastic-figures. Thanks to the Unreal Engine 2. The dynamic lightning gave the game more possibilities, but i can't remember that it was used for a clever level-design-mechanic and Thief 1 already had moving light sources. The only real improvment was the option to press yourself against walls, which again felt like a menchanic for a third-person view, and that they gave Garrett an dagger, what made more sense for a thief. Other then that there were was no improvment and not even one new gadget or weapon, instead there were many missing. They even take away the rope-arrow, what really showed how much options and size the game lost.
It was a new sequel of the Thief series and the games set a bar, what can't be ignored. Even outside the comparison the game still had a lot of padding, empty and narrow level-design, not many options for an stealth games. Like i said, it was an ok game.
Expected, but I'm glad we got the confirmation. I love no-kill playthroughs in stealth games, which is why Expert was my ideal mode to play Thief in.
Now I want to see focus mode in action and this apparent navigation beacon before relieving some of my fears. I hope they're either toned down in the hardest difficulty or completely optional.
I also hope we can ghost through the entire game. Not usually my way of playing (I'm blackjack happy), but it's nice to have the option.
Now I want to see focus mode in action and this apparent navigation beacon before relieving some of my fears. I hope they're either toned down in the hardest difficulty or completely optional.
I also hope we can ghost through the entire game. Not usually my way of playing (I'm blackjack happy), but it's nice to have the option.
Not necessarily. You could do that in Dishonored too and the level design and power abuse still crippled Dishonored as a stealth game. Stealth doesn't just revolve around no kills.
levitan said:
You seem to get stealth so I think you will love at least the first 2 Thief games.
Yup - I played Dishonored with a stealth build, and it just wasn't very satisfying at all even with minimal use of those powers. I really hope the devs played the original Thief games and saw for themselves just what exactly made them the games they are, because DE:HR/Dishonored level of stealth in a Thief game would be a tragedy.
Moff
Member
are we now seriously arguing if the thief games are harder when you try to kill your enemies? why would players even bother to go a non-lethal way on lower difficulties? because of some kind of selfmade challenge?
no, the thief games are better than that.
you are constantly punished when you act lethal. mainly because more and more enemies are drawn to your location and its next to impossible to kill them all at once, the best you can do is run and hide, which will lose health and/or take at least some minutes to hide and let the guards become unaware again.
sure, its fast to shoots a guard with an arrow, but you cant ignore the consequences to that.
no, playing stealth is much less risky and easier, no doubt. thief has never been a game like deus ex which clearly welcomes different approaches, lethal and non lethal. killing is only a last resort in thief, garret cant fight well and is punished for it.
and for deadly shadows.
I always agreed that the level design was not on par with thief2, no doubt, but it had many other strengths, that might not put it over its predecessors, but certainly not much below. we wont agree on the first-person view though, I played it only in first person and not for a single moment did I have the impression of empty levels. it felt 100% right wile the third person view seemed clunky and just like a last-minute addition.
Don't really understand what the big deal is. In modern stealth games killing enemies is the same as knocking them out anyways. One just involves red stuff coming out of them. Call me when knocked out/sedated enemies actually wake up and wonder what the hell is going on.
Would be more interested in this is the best route was not to be seen at all. But nah, gotta have those instant take downs.
Would be more interested in this is the best route was not to be seen at all. But nah, gotta have those instant take downs.
water_wendi
Water is not wet!
This happens all the time in the games industry. Real progress is made in a genre or technique but its ignored. im guessing its usually because its harder to do. For example its easier to make a corridor shooter than a stealth game but the corridor shooter sells just as well or more.
I'm not very far into DE:HR yet, but I managed to finish the opening mission in full stealth and I thought it was fun. Maybe this changes up later in the game though. Also, I haven't really played any Thief game thoroughly (shame on me, I know), so I might be missing something which DE:HR lacks compared to those games. I recently bought all three Thiefs via Steam though, so I'll get around to them eventually.
Varna said:
Like in MGS you mean?
Also, there's another major difference. If a knocked out enemy is found by a comrade, they will wake him/her up again and they are back in the game. Many games with stealth elements to them do this.
SolsticeZero
Banned
Wonderful news. I get so much more satisfaction just blackjacking the fuck out of people rather than actually killing them.
HR's stealth is about as basic as it gets and it only gets more broken as you progress in the skill list. There's very few real alternate paths, AI is non existent, there's no real hiding places outside of crouching behind cover, the level design in general is find the vent or hackable door in each room to move on, and the skills only make stealth worse (like invisibility, completely silent footsteps, see through walls and so on).
Even though it's another game that I'm pretty sure you can finish without kills except for bosses, it can't be compared favorably to any real stealth game. Just like Dishonored.
This was a big problem with Dishonored's story. It punished you for taking an action path. Also it's no big deal if I leave a target alive but omg you killed a guard worse than Hitler.
I don't consider that a major difference because it almost never happens. Usually the way these games play out is you take a second to see the enemy path and then you proceed to kill/knock out all the guards. So it's all the same thing in the end. Now, if guards in another area would wonder why their buddies aren't reporting in that would make it interesting. But I can't think of any game that does this.
You're right about MGS. I had forgotten about that one. Rare case though.
Acquiescence
Member
That's the only way I play these games baby. Splinter Cell, Deux Ex, Dishonored... pacifism all the way.
Apart from, y'know, boss battles. Those guys have to die.
Moff
Member
the deus ex games are not really stealth games. basically each room offers a multitude of different ways to proceed. some of these ways involve stealth, others dont. so you cant expect from deus ex the same perfection in stealth design that the thief games offer, although the game offers the possibilty to be played 99% in stealth (bosses are the exception), there is even an achievement for it.
Yeah, there's an achievement for it.
Moff
Member
crysis 3 does this and its not really a good idea in a pure stealth game, realism is not always the best way to go in games, this is especially true for stealth games.
In the old school Splinter Cell games Sam is supposed to assassin maybe two or three people in the entire game. Generic guards can be avoided.
Ok, we have a naming misstake. There are four possibile options: Avoid a guard, knockout a guard, fight a guard and killing a guard.
Avoiding a guard can be hard and even impossible, but you have to face no consequenues immediately. Knocking out a guard is hard, but the consequences are not that big. Killing a guard is easy, but you have to deal with a lot of consequences. Fighting a guard is hard and you sill have to deal with many consequences.
Yes, the game is okay with killing guards and give you the possibility on the easy and normal settings. That's why is is easy and can be expolided (even so it can make things worse) But on hard you don't have the options, what is the reason why it makes the game harder.
Deserado has some enemies react like this and it works there, because the game gives you a clear hint, if two guards look out for each other. It would also work for Thief. The developers could hint the realtionship between the guards in the dialog: "If i don't come back, take vengeance for my dead!" "Yes, pal."
Im sure there are runs out there in which you don't even blackjack anyone.
Edit: ok what is this nonsense about guards being easy in the original Thief games? Maybe in the early levels when you deal with common guards, but hammerites or mechanist soldiers in later levels reduce you to pulp with just two blows, and they are everywhere. It would be really dissapointing if this game isn't the same.
cartoon_soldier
Member
So no mandatory bosses or anything? Yay!
Not really, I mean you'd want the game to be played stealthily but blackjacking someone is basically the same as killing them in one hit, it's not like you're supposed to avoid every guard
Actually note. Blackjacking is a quiet and human way of getting around an guard. Killing someone is nosiy, bloody and declares you as an cold blooded murderer.
WrenchNinja
Member
I know. I'm just musing over Conviction and Absolution.
In Thief it isn't, killing, even in one blow, is way noiser and problematic, even if you get rid of the body, you also have to get rid of the blood, otherwise other guard might see it and alert everyone. Getting rid of the blood makes you use a water arrow, which are scarce and expensive. You really have to plan things out. Very rarely is killing worth it.
Only next-gen. PS4, Nextbox, and PC.
Nice, thanks for answering.
To repeat myself in Thief there is difference between killing and knocking someone out.
There is, but not enough of one. You kill with a sword, there's noise and blood and a body. You knock them out, there's a body. While you can't get away with killing in every situation, you often don't have to worry about the noise or the blood.
Ideally guards would get back up after being knocked out for a bit.
Ideally guards would get back up after being knocked out for a bit.
D
Deleted member 102362
Unconfirmed Member
In DX:HR, NPCs could revive knocked out NPCs (at least those that had been tranqued), so maybe they'll bring that mechanic over to Thief 4.
Messofanego
Banned
Derrick, just wondering, are you too lazy to change your avatar to something you really like?
Or you like giving this persona that you're not a fanboy of anything?
Spy takes no joy in killing people.
An Xbawks-butchered game with claustrophobic levels, somewhat-detestable aesthetic, and a meh story is what it is.
Did I appreciate it properly for what it is? No? Woe is I.
I'd actually be willing to sacrifice an amount of verisimilitude in order to make knockdowns a quite dangerous proposition. Systematically knocking down enemies, thus eliminating any and all threat from levels is not stealth, besides being quite lame. I do find the mentality to treat knocking down enemies as a part of stealth gameplay very unfortunate.