Thief fan missions and campaigns

[Unkillable Cat]

FM makers know what works, what doesn't, what is shit and what isn't. There's no excuse.

Here's a big error on your part. FM makers are people and act accordingly. Some of them are good at it, others are not. Some of them learn (the hard way), some of them never learn at all. Some of them know what they're doing, and some of them don't. It varies from person to person, so lumping them all into one group and assuming the same values apply to all of them is never going to work out, especially when it comes to what you expect from said group.

Some more mechanics to deal with undead without turning into first person shooter with water arrows.

- room above a pit with a switch floor

Pretty certain DromED will cry if you try this, otherwise we'd have seen this done a long time ago. Perhaps the opposite can be done, dropping heavy stuff on top of them?

- long narrow corridors player can block with crates

I'm not even sure crates actually stop critters, or that critters sense crates as an object per se.

build the entire level with lockdown switch puzzle in mind where the player has to manipulate sections correctly to seal hordes of undead from leaking into your/next section

This one is actually doable, but requires planning. Even so, there are many reasons why FM makers may choose to either restrict this to a small area, or outright reject doing this.

EDIT: Upcoming FM notice: Five Nights at Dayport. Yes, Thief meets Five Nights at Freddy's. I'l be giving this one a look.

 

[Max_b5]

I might have misunderstood what it meant but the switch floor is possible. However, if you make a whole floor an object it will look BAD and OBVIOUS (the wider the switch floor, the worse). Crates can block critters but they will try running through them as if they weren't there and that also looks terrible.

 

[Turtle-Zone 3000]

I might have misunderstood what it meant but the switch floor is possible. However, if you make a whole floor an object it will look BAD and OBVIOUS (the wider the switch floor, the worse)

Could this be made less obvious through lighting?

Also for another thing you could do with hordes of zombies have them segregated via height/platforms/islands.
Garrett's mobility ensures he can get past them but he might need to work fast before being overwhelmed.

 

[Max_b5]

It's easy to make them less obvious with lighting, yes, but it becomes a problem if the floor is too wide. The best way would be to build a terrain floor with block textures and make some of those blocks switch floors IMO.

 

[cowking]

I'm not even sure crates actually stop critters, or that critters sense crates as an object per se.

Spoiler

They do stop them. You can also move those big brown barrels by jumping/running into them repeatedly. Is it possible to make AI incorporeal (although that would be lame because the whole point is about player achieving control using his brain)?

You can also block a door from opening with barrels (crates don't work).

 

[cowking]

What Lies Below by Yandros for T2.

This missions looks cool as balls with NecroAge and bloom (screenshots don't do it justice), too bad it has some of the worst gameplay I've experienced. Dropped it shortly after I had to launch dromed to figure out what the author intended™.

Into the bin.

Random screenshot from cragscleft with NecroAge.

 

[Yandros]

So I can learn from my mistakes, mind telling me what about the gameplay made you quit? I'm guessing the small runes you have to frob.

 

[cowking]

I thought it would be fairly self-explanatory but ok.

There's unkillable undead in every section you have to cross (repeatedly). What's the point of player having 350g holy nades if even 2x don't kill one? Detection in this fm means instant quick-load because these are no zombies.

Ethereal haunts are near impossible to spot at medium distance, prolonging waiting times as this fm forces player to double back obliviously and frob-fuck every single wall, nook and cranny.

The fm is completely linear in every way. Even the way you must pass through a room is completely predestined and forced on the player.

Running into undead at every single point is not creepy, it's just lack of variance that turns to god awful annoyance when combined with the above.

Some shadows were fickle, meaning it looks dark but light gem isn't, and vice versa. Could be NecroAge though.

When I dropped down to section 14, seeing that haunt on the platform made me quit instantly because I've learned that FMs never get better if the beginning is this bad.

 

[Yandros]

Thanks for the input, I appreciate it. I understand that no mission is everyone's cup of tea, and your taste is very particular and well-defined. Now that I understand it better, I can certainly see how this mission wouldn't appeal to you at all. FYI, all of the undead are very killable using tools and ordinance, with the exception of Brother Reginald (who is easily killable with the rune on the wall at the top of the ladder).

 

[Unkillable Cat]

Since we're on the subject of "What Lies Below", I tried playing it back when it was remastered for a graphical overhaul, and I had to abandon it because one of the runes was a no-show. It just wasn't where it was supposed to be.

Therefore I must now rant and rave at Yandros for failing to teach his runes good manners and not having them show up for work on time.

On a related note, I dug up and had a go at an old Thief 1 FM due to current TTLG discussions, "The Golden Book". Garrett must break into a castle and retrieve a book stolen from the Keepers. This one is interesting for a couple of reasons, mainly that the author is clearly a very clever taffer, yet some of his decisions are somewhat bone-headed. The castle layout is simple, yet one can spot where a secret passage lies along the roof. What normally appear to be support columns more often than not turn out to be hollow tunnels. Game-vital items are kept hidden in and under objects, but due to Bad English it's often hard to decipher the clues leading to them. Hidden switches are kept in some devious places and some interesting ideas pop up now and again, but overall this mission requires the player bending over backwards (or just reading the walkthrough) to make any progress.

That's when I looked up the author and spotted a familiar name - Zontik, author of the legendary "King's Story" and a couple of other FMs with clever ideas. This just hammers in the point that Zontik is one of those taffers that needs a producer - someone who can sift out the bad ideas from the good ones and have him focus on those, instead of letting him run wild and put out some indecipherable mess.

 

[cowking]

Of Thieves and Rubies for T2.

A four part fm I dropped by 3rd mission, it's like the author completely lacks imagination. Levels are narrow personwide corridors without any verticality and gameplay consists of lockpicking front doors and jacking guards. The secrets just put me off on top of that because they made no sense at all. Intros and high quality maps give you the impression this is going to be a high quality fm, baiting you to continue.

Don't be deceived.

 

[Unkillable Cat]

I decided to build an archive of all the T1 and T2 FMs, half from the infamous Komag DVDs and half from this French Thief site. Skipping only some of the demos and the most 'useless' FMs (the Strife campaign, for example) this archive currently stands at 25 Gb in size...and I've yet to add in the 2015 and 2016 T2 FMs.

In among them I did discover an old T1 beta for "Mines of Margroth", the first mission of the "Ruins of Originia" campaign. I figured I'd give it a go.

And now I'm scratching my head over all the cut content that would have helped make the final release so much better than it is.

First off, the opening area is much easier on the eye, less clutter and better lighting. Secondly the wall textures in the mining town make much more sense and give a much better look and feel to the place. Later, once you get into the tombs and such beyond, things get even weirder. Floating glowing skulls give the various empty tombs both some content AND some actual danger. The first burricks you encounter aren't omniscient assholes, but dark-skinned burricks that eat all the light-giving mushrooms in the area - meaning you're left in almost pitch blackness with near invisible burricks. And those spiders in the side-room? Now the big one is a Chaos Spider out on the hunt. That makes this area MUCH more tense to get through. (Fortunately Chaos Spiders and Burricks don't like each other.)

Oh sure, there are lots of cool things missing and some things that are just silly (like the two buggers that just constantly panic and run around like headless chickens) but I'm honestly more bothered by the cut content than the missing content. This FM is one of my favourites, and yet I'm looking at an old beta, featuring content that would have made it so much better? Why was all this content cut out?

 

[Dev_Anj]

SlyFoxx Looks like Soul Tear's got a beef with you.

I asked SkyFox to voice Garrett for Raven's Nest. However, I was refused. Sly was very biased towards me, he said he was not sure that I will release a mission and does not want to waste his precious time (this despite the fact that by the time I released LIFE and BV).

http://www.ttlg.com/forums/showthread.php?t=147292&page=2&p=2339983&viewfull=1#post2339983

 

[SlyFoxx]

I don't remember who he is or what he was going on about. I have refused requests from time to time. No many but a few. Usually for one of two reasons: a new author who hasn't reached the testing stage or somebody who just seems a jack-hole. After reading his post at TTLG I'm going with the second option. Wait...is this the same guy who had a beef with Yandros....did beautiful brush work but had no clue about making the game fun to play?

 

[Unkillable Cat]

He made "Keeper of Infinity", which has left many taffers scratching their heads.

 

[Riskbreaker]

He also had some... interesting... things to say about the upcoming "The Black Parade" campaign.

Wait...is this the same guy who had a beef with Yandros....did beautiful brush work but had no clue about making the game fun to play?

Nah.
Tho, this guy's grasp of game design is dangerously close to that of certain Italian ex-cop with multiple PhDs, mad martial art skillz, impossibly active sex life and creepy man-crush on Yandros (and Melan, but that might've been jealousy rather than crush).

 

[SlyFoxx]

Ok I looked up his work. I remember the mission. Stunning to look at but horrible game play.

I think he wanted way too many one-liners turning Garrett into quite the chatter box. So if I remember correctly it was just artistic differences along with him not really getting on well with the rest of the gang.

 

[Yandros]

Yeah, Soul Tear is crazy talented with artistic design, but need to collaborate with someone who would design the gameplay to be less... Russian.

Speaking of Yandros-Penetretator the mad Italian, it's about time he made another appearance around here, things have been quiet lately. I noticed his mod over on modDb passed its scheduled launch date in August with no news and no release.

 

[Max_b5]

He also had some... interesting... things to say about the upcoming "The Black Parade" campaign.

Now I wanna know about that.

 

[Dev_Anj]

Max_b5 : A rough Google translation of his post:

"He wrote that it was ready about 30%. Proceedings of 4 people. Videos they do not know how (do not want to know), looking for volunteers. 10 missions clones with textures OM any of us would do fairly quickly. Offhand, the card type Shadow Politicts a maximum of two months of work (ie, work after work in the evenings and weekends on request). I certainly do, but it is not necessary to me, I will not be done simply "on the weak".

Yes, and technically his mission is simple: no kastum scripts, unique setting, dialogue, kamvatorov, special effects. I, you, Max, remember me come up with something unique , and that it takes most of the time. I have only one pawn shop to shop and quests done three months. But that such a complex game to collect raw materials from the finished LGS? It turns an ordinary Lego. The main thing that was the understanding and taste.

In skacky always all tidy. I like the proportions and dimensions of buildings and premises. However, neither the same level there is something out of the way, all the banal. The only thing that the "Chalice" strongly hooked kopipasting abandoned library "keepers" of grumbling, though carbon paper, but not everyone will be able to so, too, need a talent for copying the yet to come up with their quality and also to file - much more difficult. On your Maksimovskiy and 10 missions have 100 skacky missions."

Link to actual post: http://darkfate.org/forum/index.php?topic=5571.msg245336#msg245336

 

[Max_b5]

So he's basically jealous because Skacky can come up with better missions in less time?

 

[JarlFrank]

He's jealous because skacky makes better ice cream cones.

 

[Icewater]

Why do people get so butthurt about this stuff? TTLG can often be a bunch of carebears who forget the value of constructive criticism but I'm generally with their "I'm just glad we get missions at all" attitude. If I don't like a mission I just quit and play something else, I don't bitch at the author.

RPGCodex, why are people in the modding community so very retadred?

 

[ERYFKRAD]

RPGCodex, why are people in the modding community so very retadred?

TTLG seem okay in comparison to certain modders.

 

[Dev_Anj]

And yet we have ice cream cone man and "Keeper of Infinite Bullshit"...