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Thief (2014) isn’t as bad as you remember, but gosh, no, it’s still not good enoughDishonorable

Dishonorable

So why this desire to defend it? Well, it’s partly because I remember reviewing it six years back, andfinding qualified enjoyment- trying to recognise it for the game it is, rather than measuring it against the games it foolishly tried to link itself to. And partly because I wondered ifDishonoredhad been called Thief: Dishonored, would it too have been so harshly judged? Maybe in 2020 Thief could be, if not amazing, a decent game in its own rights? Maybe?

Hmmmmmmmmmmmmmm.

We’ve got some huge problems. Take the voice acting. From the first moment it is so, SO odd. While I wasn’t ever one of the peopledemandingthat Stephen Russell be the only possible casting, it was just so utterly peculiar to replace him with such a nothing-voiced everyman. A sort of Nowhere, US voice that could be anyone. Especially giventhe justification for the change(beyond the completely barmy claim they needed the same person to do the voice that did the mocap stunts…) was that the voice no longer matched their super-moody goth-Garrett character design. Russell’s gravelly growl would have made far more sense for that!

It all feels so egregious! And I stress again, in both 2014 and in 2020, I was determined to give this game a fair shake. I’m not the sort to start writing green-inked letters of furious complaint because Garrett’s hair is parted one centimetre too far to the left, and I’d have been really happy for them to just reboot the series and start over in their own image. But instead Thi4f begins with an already-established Garrett, a long-time bandit of recognised repute, but seemingly holding a middle finger up to everything that came before to get him there. If you’re going to retcon, at least have the manners to create a new origin story. So much of how the game begins feels less like stamping their own identity onto the franchise, and more like working out what would most wind up anyone with a mind to care.

Then you’re pressing E to squeeze through gaps, hammering E to open windows, and incessantly having the controls taken from you so you can be dragged nostril-wise to the next objective. Remember when you’d overhear conversations between NPCs because you had the nous to stick around and listen, then gained extra mini-missions? You’re no longer trusted to do that. You’re too stupid for that now. And of course, OF COURSE, there’s a brothel level. And golly gee whizz, there’s more of that maturity with all those ladies walking about with their boobies out.

OK, look, here’s the real truth: the game’s fine. In fact, when it comes to the physical act of sneaking about the city, it’s actually a lot better than Thief: Deadly Shadows, even if for some godforsaken reason the game only lets you jump when it decides you’re allowed to. The rooftop pathways, the little burglaries and break-ins to commit on the way, they’re all far better implemented. Even mid-mission, as you’re sneaking from shadow to shadow, grabbing every loose item of loot, it can really feel like a Thief game in the odd moments. The swoop move, that lets you whoosh from one patch of darkness to another, is really good! It’d have been ace if you could whoosh in the proper Thief games. And yet, absolutely every single moment of it, no matter how well realised, is set in a game world that’s so utterly completely banal.

“I stole the book from the House of Blossoms for a man named Orion - The so-called ‘voice of the people’. He thinks he can save this city. From some of the things I’ve seen, I’m not sure it’s worth saving. Regardless, the people regard Orion favourably, Basso included, and his followers, the Graven, are growing. Still, between the Baron, the gloom, and starvation, there’s not much choice.”

I think that so perfectly captures everything that’s wrong with Thiefour. It’shorriblywritten, grammatically gibberish (theGravenare growing? Are they turning into giants?), but most of all, so unutterably dull. It’s bored of itself. It’s lifeless, miserable, positively sulking.

Which, I suppose, certainly suits nu-Garrett, and his teenage rebellion outfit. He looks as though he were kidnapped in 2004, then cruelly tortured in a darkened cell where he was forced to watch The Crow over and over on a loop for ten years. He looks as though he listens to Christian gothic metal. I mean, he’s clearly every member of [Googles ‘Christian gothic metal’]… Saviour Machine. (Except maybe for David Harbour there on the right.)

This is the tale of ThIVf. A well-made game determined to spoil itself. Here’s a sequence where for no given reason you can’t use the arrows you’re holding. Here’s a gruesomely heavy-handed allusion to the Nazis. And worst, worst, worst of all, here’s yet another scene where you’re discovered in a cutscene, and then forced to run away from chasing pursuers.

That last one bothers me the most. It so whompingly demonstrates such a fundamental misunderstanding of the Thief games, a series where people delight in ghosting levels, where the higher the difficulty, the less harm you can cause, the more unseen you must be. And here, no matter how much you steer your play toward that, it just decides for you it’s now going to be a half-arsed action sequence where you press jump when it says to press jump while explosions detonate all around you.

Judged on its own merits, it’s a quite annoying action game that had some promise. Every now and then it feels a bit like you’re playing Dishonored, and that’s a nice feeling. And then it goes and does something incomprehensibly stupid like trying to repeat The Cradle.

As ill-judged a decision as I could imagine, Thourth makes a display of supreme arrogance with its attempt to replicate, emulate, somethingicate Thief 3’s most famous and well-renowned level. But to add insult to injury, rather than setting it in the famed Shalebridge Cradle and thus perhaps even gaining some coattails to ride on, it chooses to have it be in… Moira’s island mansion. Yup, they pick the two best levels from Deadly Shadows, and conflate them into one awful one. Despite being the exact same external architecture, right down to battening up the basement hatch that had been an entrance in the previous game, Moira’s place is now, and apparently always has been, an asylum. And you’ll never guess what?! The doctors there were doing all sorts of terrible experiments on the patients, and turned them into monsters!

It’s just so galling! And pretty embarrassing. It offers none of the majestic sound effects, nor the tension-building slow reveals, but instead the utterly barmy inclusion of a giant invisible wibbly-wobbly monster stomping around one set of corridors with no explanation at all, and then a very tiresome sequence in which you must avoid the their-vision-is-based-on-sound patient-monsters. (Which is to say they were once patients. They show no signs of patience.) It even mimics the note-gathering of The Cradle, but with the finesse of a rhino in a tutu. It does have a couple of good jump scares! But having played the proper version of the level they were haplessly mimicking only a week ago, this is weak squash awfulness.

I think the lesson is, don’t watchBlade Runner2049 immediately after Blade Runner. Or Ad Astra after 2001: A Space Odyssey. Or maybe just play the Thief trilogy and then all the Dishonoreds, and feel great about your life choices.

Can I still play Thief?

Yes. It’s only six years old, and seems to have been pretty heftily future-proofed. It runs in 1440p ultra-widescreen with no issues. Although the load times are still terrible.

Should I still play Thief?

You know, probably not. If for some reason you were court ordered to never play Dishonoreds 1 and 2, then this wouldn’t be a completely terrible option. But you haven’t been. That would be super weird.