...I don't get it.
There's this powerful editor like DromED, more than 15 years of experience earned that's freely shared by users of that editor, hundreds of missions that are the product of that experience, thousands of man-hours put into making all this, plenty of good ideas floating about... and what do we get? Banal shit boring efforts that have been done countless times before... and
better.
Yes, I'm talking about "Behind Closed Doors". It's a big cityscape mission with vertical elements... but that's about where the good parts end. None of what follows is really bad, it's just meh. I played for an hour before just giving up out of lack of interest. The murder mystery seemed somewhat interesting, but even that wasn't enough to keep me going.
# It's an obstacle course disguised as a cityscape. It's so apparent that everything is placed just so for the player - some things for convenience, some things for inconvenience. This never feels like a city, or a house... just a set of hurdles to overcome.
# For a cityscape mission there are too many artificial restrictions upon the player's movements. Too many gates that can only be opened from one side (with the levers visible but conveniently just out of reach) and too many key hunts for locked doors. Rope Arrows are not provided at the start of the mission, yet locations requiring them can be found very early on, meaning backtracking is required.
# To further "enhance" the gameplay of the mission, it starts with a laundry list of objectives that just
keeps growing as you play. I spotted some suspicious-looking bottles under a desk in a house just by the start, and sure enough I meet an NPC that gives me a fetch quest of finding bottles of strong spirits... including the aforementioned suspicious-looking bottles under the desk.
# On that note, I spotted some suspiciously placed potted plants in annoying places. I'm guessing these will be important for some reason later.
# There are too many jumps requiring absolute precision with no room for error. This isn't like squeezing in through an open window, I mean like having to jump from very thin ledges or balcony railings... most of which are made out of marble or metal, of course.
# Repeat after me: Dusk missions do not work properly in the Dark Engine. It's called the Dark Engine
for a reason. It screws with the light gem so that it's very hard to tell what is a shadow that will conceal you, and what is not... and that's before you change the light gem graphics to make it
even harder to gauge your concealment. Moving about becomes a gigantic chore of trial and error.
# Pulling tricks like making decorated balconies sound like stone when walked upon, but making the balcony railing sound like marble when walked upon, is not cool.
# Lack of consistency. The key to the Watch Station remains in my inventory even after I use it, but the stolen key disappears forever the moment I use it. What if I want to lock that door again, because, say, of the guard placed just beyond it? There's a room consisting of nothing but a draped doorway and an armoire that's
bigger than the doorway. They would have had to assemble the damn thing inside the room for this to make sense!
# EVERY piece of text is an audiolog! Worse than that, the NPC that gives you the fetch quest uses voiced lines to do so, yet there's a book next to him containing MORE exposition text from him! This is lazy to the point of being inexcusable.
I just can't be bothered with this. At least Mission 4 in Godbreaker is worth struggling with the horrible start (yes, I've played it), this one barely rises above mediocrity at any point.
I get exactly what
skacky is on about when he says this wouldn't be out of place in
Dishonored. It sure is bland enough to belong in a Bethesda title.
If I want banal shit boring, I turn to AAA-titles, not Thief.
