VideoGame So Ok it's Average
Thief 2014 is an average stealth game. While a decently fun game on its' own, it hardly measures up to the original series.
The good: It's definetely a stealth game. Not being detected is definetely possible on most levels, though the plot cutscenes sometimes make the main character put himself in plain sight instead of hidden, gameplay wise you can almost always avoid detection. The AI is certainly above the originals. Something that should be brought to attention is the absurdly high customizable HUD and difficulty. You can combine so many self imposed challenges that you can make the game virtually unwinnable, and hiding elements on de HUD will also help you make the game more to your liking. The game also gives you a wide array of tools to complete the missions, allowing you to complete the game on your favourite playstyle. Unique loot and collectibles make exploring worthwhile.
The ok: The way the world is presented is very lackluster. Everything is seen trough color filters, mostly gray and blue, sometimes other colours but rarely the colourful mansions that its' predecessors featured. There isn't true darkness in the game as well, you can tune brightness down but that brings a lot of problems since the game just isn't made to play that way. No mission gives the same open exploration that many of the old games' missions had. Every level is divided into small sections and only within them you have freedom to choose your approach. Because of the level of detail, most sections are rather tiny, even though the chapters themselves can be quite large by combining many sections. It's not so bad if only because most stealth games take this approach, but a step down compared to the old games.
The bad: Sound is often buggy, dialogue is rubbish, so is the main story. Very little creativity and very weak. The story expects you to sympathize with a character that has no redeemable qualities. All the characters are flat, including the protagonist. Unexplained frame rate issues on a lot of cutscenes, though that may change with patches and fixes.
Without relation to the rest of the series, it is an average but fun game. Worth buying on a discount. Certain features would be very welcome on the old games, but many design decisions cripple it and prevent it from being a better game.
VideoGame Not Worth the Wait
Platform reviewed: Xbox 360
As a fan of the original trilogy, I wondered if gamers would ever see the franchise again. Since Deadly Shadows, games inspired by the franchise such as Splinter Cell Chaos Theory, Mark Of The Ninja, and Dishonored have been released to universal acclaim. However, it was not until 2014 when Eidos Montreal finished the long-awaited revival of Thief. Sadly, when compared to its spiritual successors, Thief falls short.
The game is not a total wash. For one, Eidos Montreal nails the visuals for the game. Even on 7th Gen consoles, the graphics look fantastic and the dark, gloomy lighting of the City fits the tone of the franchise. The swoop mechanic was also a nice touch and felt great when I had to get out of a sticky situation in a pinch. Finally, I enjoyed creating my own Custom difficulty with mods such as slower movement and Final Death.
Unfortunately, just about everything else in the game is a colossal disappointment. The level design is more linear than Deadly Shadows, yet strangely infuriating due to its horrid navigation prompts and minimap. The fact that Garrett can't jump freely (high-profile instead, a la AC) worsens this, since there's only so many ledges and corners that can be climbed or jumped on. Also, the game wants players to use Focus, since the design of the last few levels made it nigh-impossible to clear them without it.
The game also feels incomplete. The frame-rate drops frequently and the audio design contains numerous glitches, such as repeating dialogue and missing sfx. Worse still is that the AI is hopelessly inconsistent. On Master difficulty, there were times when guards did not notice me in the light, only to quickly spot me in the shadows. Given that the inverse should be true, this is a rather bewildering bug that almost broke the game.
Moreover, the game entirely abandons the mythos of previous games. Gone are the Pagans and the Hammerites. Instead, we have the run-of-the-mill "Occupy" plot. Without spoilers, this ultimately leads to two poorly done boss levels and ends with a blatant DLC hook.
In short, Thief (2014) could have been great, but its numerous flaws make this revival very disappointing.
VideoGame Depends on how much you love the other Thief games
To put it simply, if you are a fan of the previous Thief games, it will be that much harder for you to enjoy this one. I myself grew up with the series, and rank the original two among my favourite games of all time, so I had an especially hard time getting over the ways in which this newest iteration distances itself from the series. I found myself angrily challenging every difference, big and small, and thus struggled to take the game as seriously as I should. It isn't that a reboot can't work - the likes of Tomb Raider or Deus Ex:HR shows you can change things up and still have a good game - but if you are going to change the formula and risk the fan's ire, you'd better make a good enough game to justify all the changes.
Once I managed to get over the differences (the sooner you can do this, the better) The actual core game play of sneaking and stealing is fun, at least for the first few hours. Evading deadly guards, going at your own pace, and looting a massive mansion from top to bottom all feel pretty fun. The addition of a "swooping" mechanic to replace a standard jump button does a great job of letting you get around faster whilst spending most the game crouching, and encourages you to take riskier, more time sensitive manoeuvres, which feels nice when it pays off. Unfortunately, having to watch the same scripted animations for climbing, picking up objects, and opening windows gets old. Moving around the city becomes tedious too. The city has some wonderful three dimensional design and looks lovely at times, but it does the Thief: Deadly Shadows thing of segmenting the city - albeit much worse. Getting around requires you to enter windows (which hide loading screens to the next section of level), but finding these windows can be an awkward and perplexing search. How the hell are pedestrians supposed to get around this place?
The worst thing though is the story. After so many re-writes, the story has become an aimless mess that squanders the series' unique lore, transforms Garrett into an expressionless husk, and culminates in a lazy, insubstantial, literal cliff hanger.
My verdict is this: Rent it and give it back before you make it to the end.
VideoGame Dishonored Thief: Solid Creed
So, about five years ago, how many people had "Thief reboot" high on their priority list for future games to be released? Yeah, thought so. Nobody really wanted this, but when the end result is such as I will soon elaborate upon, maybe it's for the best it was released as a reboot and not Thi4f, because if you thought Deadly Shadows was a lackluster follow-up to those two original games-the very best stealth gaming has to offer—you've got another thing coming.
The first thing I think of when recollecting my experience is boredom. Sneaking has been dumbed-down to the point that you can ghost the game just fine without the audio on, which is basically the greatest crime you could commit in a Thief game. Moreover, probably at least an hour of actual freakin' playtime is spent watching repetitive canned animations of opening windows, picking up objects, and extinguishing candles... it just takes what little fun is left right out of the proceedings. Did nobody test this game for long play or what?
Despite a certain level of effort and variety, the levels are glorified hallways, and the missions simple and rote. The old games managed to convince you, somehow, that levels went on for miles beyond what you could actually traverse, and that they might still hold undiscovered secrets even after your eighth playthrough. No such luxuries here. Oh, and should you be discovered, or hell, even if you just knock someone out, the game sees fit to play super-loud Scare Chords when this happens. That's so beneath everything Thief stands for that I just have to laugh.
And don't even get me started on the "story"... it's about as dull, generic and derivative as you can get. It places importance on itself that it never manages to live up to, and just feels "dark" for the sake of it... because hey, it's 2014 and`mindless grimdark sells, right? Sure, the old games were dark, but they knew how to keep the story grounded with some dark humor and, dare I say, real human emotion. Call it Darkness-Induced Audience Apathy or whatever, I just stopped giving a shit after a few hours.
Thief is an uninspired mess that is more reminiscent of other stealth series than anything else. And they couldn't even make it fun. But, hey, at least I got some worthless trophies out of the whole affair... yippee.