Reviving an old and successful franchise in the current gen is always going to be difficult. When it comes to a series such as Thief, the task at hand gets even harder considering the unique gameplay style and niche genre. PS Gang takes a look at How Thief 4 fares in the current gen.
Garrett, the main character steals almost everything in the game. He doesn’t even spare forks, pens and cups and this makes him a petty thief than being a master. His looks lack the charm, the pathetic acting and dialogue deliveries makes him a rogue rather than Robin Hood, who swipes innocent people.
Stealth play through is always a game of patience, needing to find the right moment to slip through the patrol of guards undetected and tackle one target at a time. It’s tough to beat the enemies in case they catch a glance of you, because of the unorganized close fights to be fought against more than two enemies. These kinds of fights are okay for stealth games.
Thief’s best part is the stealth, although it is tough, it gives enough spaces to avoid detection. The lighting of the game is impressive and there are some instances where you can steal from under the noses of the guards and go undetected. The Artificial Intelligence of the game is not as good as there are some glitches in the game, yet the guards are good enough to notice anything that Garrett does. The trick arrows in the game are limited and they can only be used in the fire and water. On the other hand the rope arrows can be used on leaking oil barrels and open flame lights. The access of the arrows should have been much wider in the context of the game.
Garrett looks like a ninja, in the swoop ability of the game, where he dashes out about 15 feet into the invisibility. This is a good thing done by the developers. This helps in crossing the gaps into the shadows to escape from the visibility of the guards. This feature also helps in coming back from a situation where you could find a guard right in front of you. Some of the other movements of Garrett are not good enough in the game. Problems were spotted in climbing and dropping down from a ledge.
The map of the game is not up to date. The city where the game centers is quite boring and frustrating. The narrow roads, rooftop lanes are confusing for the game. The map of the game also breaks down frequently and lasts as long as 20 seconds. This kind of problems makes Thief look like an old game. The citizens indulge in conversation every now and then and this makes life hard for Garrett to move from a point to another even with the minimap. There is a very low degree of continuity in the games and this makes life even harder.
The campaign side missions of the game have some interesting puzzles. Some of the missions are creepy and supernatural driven. In some other it feels like there is no way out and there is a very little room for actions. But at the end of the day there is some branching path out of it.
The campaign missions, provides opportunities to think and decide the ways of entering or exiting a building. There are various options of doing this like breaking through the door, climbing, through the roof or crawling through the basement. There is a rating on each of this mission and once you get caught there is the opportunity of trying other ways by restarting the mission.
The game is a bit darker, yet Garrett’s focus power is appreciable. There are focus upgrades available and hints of treasure whereabouts. The combat updates also are helpful in order to counter the enemies quickly.
Thief’s most interesting aspect are its side missions. The story can be skipped by choosing one of them. The game has a harder stealth mechanic, and it is not easier to get away after making a big loot. The city map is not interesting enough and the story too is weak with a lot of unnecessary characters. On the other hand Garret, the main character is not like a master thief but a kind of some petty thief.