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Thief 2 #88634
08/17/03 08:16 AM
08/17/03 08:16 AM
Joined: Sep 2002
Posts: 3,798
Sweden
Drizzt Offline OP
Addicted Boomer
Drizzt  Offline OP
Addicted Boomer

Joined: Sep 2002
Posts: 3,798
Sweden
First, before I write this review, I will only say it is sad that Looking Glass Studios went bankrupt sometime after the release of Thief 2, but that did not stop some of the original workers to join the project of Thief 3 (now being developed by Eidos I think, with them as a big factor though), and this is great appreciated, as I can’t wait for it to arrive.

Thief 2 – By Björn Fallqvist

Thief was a revolutionary game. There can be no doubt about that. What we earlier had known as FPS-games was now suddenly old and too “simplistic”.
Instead, now we had to use our (or actually, Garrett’s) senses to a new level of magnitude.
We had to listen, to discover where enemies where, take care we did not create too much noise, use our eyes to be able to see where we could hide best and also use our ability with timing, so we knew exactly when and where it would be best to strike.
It was not just brain dead action anymore, but now it was more of a thinking game, where we actually had to PLAN (oh, the horror) and THINK (insert possible gasps here) of our actions, as well as take the consequences of what we did.

In many ways, Thief 1 was very non-linear. There were often just a few goals which had to be reached, and you seldom had any restrictions, which achieved a new level of freedom.
In many ways, Thief 2 is just the same. You get a few goals, which you must complete, but other than that, you are let loose to handle everything as you wish to.
Example from one of the most engrossing and immersive levels I have ever played, the fourth level (if I am not mistaken), where you have escaped an ambush at a pub by local guards, start in the shadows of the town outside it, and have to make your way home to the exact opposite part of it from where you are. All of this by night, when there are guards crawling everywhere, looking for you. A nightmare, some might say. A sneaker’s dream, I would say.
You can take any route you want, as long as you can reach it. You can sneak in the shadows all the way home, if you wish, but it is very hard. You can simply go on a rampage (although you will not live very long if you do)
Or you can just do as I usually do in Thief games; sneak around until you see a guard, civilian or something of the like. And to make sure they do not make a problem of themselves later on, you knock them out and drop them in a darkly illuminated area.
Or if all else fails, you can always try taking them out from a distance with the bow (the game’s most wonderful weapon, but more on this later). They usually die with just one arrow in the head, but they make an awful of noise about them if you kill them that way.
Or, if you want to become mincemeat, you can always try fighting them head-on with your sword, even if this is the surest and quickest way to become injured.
This is not supposed to be a fighting game, and you will notice it. One guard will injure you; two or more will hack you to pieces.

What about weapons, then? Well, in general it is the same as in Thief 1, with just a few additions.
To name some of those, we see the Scouting Orb (very handy; as you throw it, you can see what the orb sees, and rotate around, and thus scouting without being seen yourself) and Invisibility Potions (a dream item for thieves, but to keep the game balanced, they only last a few seconds, to be used in crucial situations).
Among old favourites, we have the blackjack (just sneak up, and THUD! That guard will wake up with a very sore head tomorrow), the bow (excellent draw-and shoot technique. The zoom view is very useful, too if you want to take out a guard at safe distance), the sword (pretty bloody useless describes it very well…or actually, I managed to kill an entire patrol of five guards once, but that was just pure luck) as well as gas mines, moss arrows (shoot them on anything and suddenly you got a thick nice quiet carpet), water arrows (use them to douse flames and wash away bloodstains), rope arrows (typical thing, just shoot it and a rope unfolds below it so you can climb it), noisemaker arrows (needs no explaining in a game such as this, eh?) as well as fire arrows (the only weapon to destroy some of the enemies in the game, who also scares me to death, sometime).

So, then, what is Garrett really up to in all of this? Well, of course he has to make a living, so that is a first answer, and the first levels reflect that quite well, as he gets hired to do a few jobs (which he completes with extreme precision, of course), but as you proceed, things get nastier and nastier. Not too spoil too much; I can say the main story is the typical “mystic” thing revolving about a prophecy coming true, Garrett being in contact with The Keepers again and meeting an old acquaintance of his.
Most important, though, are the Mechanists who play a big part in the game. Apparently, after the first game, the Hammerites divided into Hammerites and a group breaking free from them, calling themselves the mechanists. These mechanists seems to have been up to a lot, and of course, it is Garrett who has to stop them, whether he want to or not.

The level design for the whole game is nothing short of amazing, from the huge level on the city rooftops (also along with an obscenely big Mechanist-building, Angelwatch, this makes it a truly memorable experience) to the old forests and villages (once occupied by peaceful people, now mercilessly slaughtered by the mechanists).
In the city levels, there are dark alleys, rooftops, channels, marketplaces, storage houses, strips on the outside of windows, many-storied buildings giving an excellent view of the areas below, and so on. All this just adds to the freedom of the game. Do you see a wooden beam or strip somewhere? Shoot a rope arrow at it, and climb up on the roof.
Do you see a torch lightening a crucial passageway with a guard watching it, blissfully not knowing of your presence? Shoot the guard with an arrow? Might cause some noise, but you should be safe if a patrol come to his call, as long as they don’t appear somewhere unexpected (such as behind you, or beside you) or go search for you where you are. Shoot the torch with a water arrow? He might still hear you, and he will definitely be suspicious of the hissing sound. Shoot a noisemaker arrow somewhere behind or beside him? He will possible go investigate, so you might slip by, but there is also the chance that it will draw more guards to the area, making process even more difficult than before.
You always have to think about the consequences, calculate what might happen and simply trust your instincts, or take chances.
Make no mistakes; this is not an easy game. You will probably be frustrated beyond reason a couple of times, and the quick-save and quick-load key on your keyboard will be worn when you finish it, but it is worth it.

With most of the information about the game-playing itself, we still have the technical issues left. First of all, how are the graphics? For a game like this, the graphics suit perfectly.
Fog, smoke, shadowed areas, textures, it all floats together in a perfectly beautiful way, and even if the technique is not that new, amazingly both the exterior areas in the city as well as rooms, wherever you enter, are richly decorated for the most parts, and always feels “alive”, as if someone actually live there. No more of the feeling in many games that as soon as you enter a house, it feels abandoned or empty, nope, nothing of that kind here. You do not play a burglar. You are a burglar.
I somewhere read that the original thief had 16 million shades of black, and I do not doubt it, when you consider how much of the game is revolving about hiding in shadows, and different levels or visibility. For some, the darkness of the game might be a problem, but I only found it heightening the atmosphere and giving more “life” to the game, as most (if not all) is played during the night.
As in the first Thief, the sounds are top-notch. Excellent, simply put. Awesome might be even better a word. All areas have different sounds when you walk on them, which can be very helpful or dreadful from time to time; it simply depends on where you are, and if you want to hear guards, or avoid being heard yourself.
One thing which also has been inherited here is the ability of people talking in the game. Guards chatter sometime, civilians talk to each other (one amusing piece is about the how the Sheriff Truart guest’s always make such a mess at balls and festivities) and fanatics such as the Mechanists speak in quite the bombastic style, often with old-fashioned words, as if they were intoning some prophecy.
Ambient sounds can be heard everywhere, and the environmental sounds are very well done and always fits in with wherever you are. It can be the haunting sounds of catacombs, the calm sounds of the forest, or the sounds of the city at night. Whatever it is, it always fits the environment.

The Interface is practically the same as in Thief 1, with the Map (which allows you to do some careful planning) as an invaluable source of information.
What I don’t understand is that the game videos do not seem to work on Windows XP (even though I re-installed the codec needed for them, the game always skipped them), but it is not that big a problem, because the movies are in a folder in the game directory anyway, so you can view them whenever you want to.

The replayability of this game is quite impressing in itself, with all the many ways to try and take, but what really make it a gem are all the hundreds of fan missions floating around on the internet, ready for download. It was a stroke of genius to release the editor for this game, as it has resulted in numerous fan missions of varying quality (some excellent, maybe even better than some of the game’s, and some worthless) and it extends the joy of the game. More resounding applauds to Eidos and Looking Glass Studious.

The only problem I have with this game at all is that there is no way at all to interact with Non Player Characters such as Civilians. Either they run at the sight of you (shouting and drawing lots of attention and guards to themselves) or they are simply crucial NPCs needed for the mission. There is no way to change the storyline either, as it proceeds, and that annoys me a tiny but, since when you have completed the game, it feels as if something else should have happened (the end of the game annoyed me almost as much as the one to Realms of the Haunting, and it left me craving for Thief 3…incredibly much). But then again, it is not an RPG, but an action game…oh, sorry, action sneaker game it is then. So that might be too much to ask for.

That is all just trivialities, when compared to the vast levels, the freedom and the pure atmosphere of the game. Get it, and become a burglar for a few weeks. I’ll see you in court.

Ratings

Graphics: 9/10
Sounds: 10/10
Gameplay: 10/10
Story: 7/10
Replayability value 9.5/10

My Rating: 9.5/10


Are they dead? Yes. Unlike you they have but one life...and they wasted it for your sake!
Re: Thief 2 #88635
08/17/03 12:43 PM
08/17/03 12:43 PM
Joined: Jan 2002
Posts: 13,453
Texas
nickie Offline
Grand wizard of high mucky muck
nickie  Offline
Grand wizard of high mucky muck
Adept Boomer

Joined: Jan 2002
Posts: 13,453
Texas
Enthralling writing as always Drizzt; thanks for writing a great review! So many people just love this game, I have been tempted, although sneakers are really not something I gravitate toward. Love the idea of the scouting orb and the arrows sound most practical. Did the game have good music?


"How could drops of water know themselves to be a river? Yet the river flows on."
- Antoine de Saint-Exupéry
Re: Thief 2 #88636
08/17/03 01:28 PM
08/17/03 01:28 PM
Joined: Sep 2002
Posts: 3,798
Sweden
Drizzt Offline OP
Addicted Boomer
Drizzt  Offline OP
Addicted Boomer

Joined: Sep 2002
Posts: 3,798
Sweden
Music? Umm, as a matter of fact, I don't think there was any music at all. I think there are several reasons for that, though.
a) It would have spoiled the atmosphere
b) It would have spoiled the gameplay, trying to listen for footsteps and other things
c) I simply can't think of any music that would fit well without interfering.

It's kind of hard for me to miss something that I can't imagine would fit in smile


Are they dead? Yes. Unlike you they have but one life...and they wasted it for your sake!
Re: Thief 2 #88637
08/17/03 09:31 PM
08/17/03 09:31 PM
Joined: Nov 2000
Posts: 8,108
B.C. Canada
hagatha Offline
BAAG Specialist
hagatha  Offline
BAAG Specialist

Joined: Nov 2000
Posts: 8,108
B.C. Canada
There is music in parts of the game, but it's not really a big part of it. The ambient sounds are what's imortant - machinery, footsteps, talking -Drizzt pretty much covered it. There is one piece of overblown guitar work that is pretty out of place at one point.


I think I'm quite ready for another adventure.
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