Thief Review: Using the Shadows as a Weapon 101

The master thief Garrett has returned to put Ezio and his brotherhood to shame, showing them how to really pickpocket an un-expecting guard and swiftly get away with it in complete stealth fashion, no hidden blades required.

After the events of an accident Garrett is left unconscious for a year and returns to a city that is infested by a plague, the Gloom, and run by a baron that does even give a second thought to the poor which is starting to incite a revolution. Somehow all these factors relate to the accident that occurred 1 year ago and throughout your many thieving jobs you unravel the conspiracy and uncover the truth.

While this tale sounds like an interesting through line for the story to take place on it is executed poorly at every turn. The cut scenes that valuable story details are given in are terrible; with bad lip syncing, boring dialogue accompanied by just as dull characters, and flat movement within the cut scenes. They really seem like early pre-beta, sloppy versions of what the cut scenes will be when the product is finished.

This feeling is even further heightened by the aggressive drop in frame rate within the cut scenes and a lot of the time even in in-game time grievously affecting the overall experience of the game and taking you out of any immersive moments and reminding you that you are just a mere gamer instead of the master thief you were once fooled to be.  

But thankfully for the committed gamer the main and backstory are fleshed out by notes that can be found scattered throughout the levels. I would highly recommend putting in the extra effort as after The City seems to have much more personality and depth to it than the black and white picture of The City that is presented.  

The main character, Garrett, is a cool persona to experience the game through with a cool costume to boot that can even rival the hooded uniform of the Assassin Creed series; and when the box describes you as a “master thief” they weren’t lying. Being put into the shoes of Garrett is empowering; you really do feel like a master of your trade effortlessly skulking around The City taking what you please when you please with exact precision. This is a welcomed change of pace for the genre as in some stealth games of the past generation you can be left feeling like a clumsy buffoon awkwardly hiding for the 40^th time that level because you didn’t put your hand over your face enough when walking through a druggies apartment in a police raid.

The sound design for this game is very inconsistent. At times it works and adds to the immersion the game strives for but more than not the sound design heavily falters either making the world around you sound awkwardly out of character or sometimes just not recognising an action has been performed at all; leaving an unsettling silence as I hit a guy across the head or throw a glass bottle that the guards do react to, but no sound of shattering glass can be heard.

Thankfully though at its core Thief is a marvellous stealth game when it comes to gameplay. With only a small learning curve to overcome when it comes to the unique arrangement of its controls; this game is very capable of making even the loudest of players feel like an unseen assassin, even if only momentarily. One of the main factors that allows this is the inclusion of a crouched glide, giving you real speed to concur those long treturous corridors of light with only a second to spare before a guard turns around from that ever so elusive corner to find you and break the advantage of surprise you had upheld till that point.

However an equally as important factor works against the game, the combat. Once a guard discovers you, you will be swarmed by leagues of the imperial guard and have the choice to fight with a very strict, boring, and aggravating dual type combat system that is so useless I found myself not even bothering with a confrontation at all and simply restarting the game from the last checkpoint. This situation creates an accidental positive though as you are always forced into having to be stealthy and undetected otherwise you have to go through the boring routine of dodging and hitting, dodging and hitting; making you play the game how it was truly meant to be played, like an unseen badass.

A unique problem to the PS4 version is the use of the touchpad in the inventory system. The navigation is very unresponsive and hard to use or even sometimes see/understand where and what you are selecting on the inventory. It would have been a lot easier and better to use the traditional d’pad instead of forcing ‘innovation’ into an already solid system.

The missions of this game are also very inconsistent. Some are well thought out compounds of interesting architecture with challenging formations of guards and light to darkness ratio such as the prison mission; that are genuinely fun to play and evoke a second or third run through. But others are boring, uneventful, and monotonous with very little spurring me onto the end of the level never mind a re-play to try and perfect my thieving skills.

When exciting pre orchestrated set pieces do arise they fall flat especially in the face of other expertly crafted set pieces such as ones seen from the Uncharted series. When they do commence they feel clunky and clumsy, forcing you to run for your life but never really knowing where to run to escape the imminent danger.

Also sorely affecting the set pieces is the problem that haunts the whole of the game, the frame rate. Whenever things seem to hit another gear; the action, pace, or even just an explosion, the frame rate stutters pulling you straight out of the experience and moment;  leaving you painfully desiring a smoother, more polished game to sink your stealthy teeth into.

Overall Thief is a poorly constructed game with only a few saving graces coming mostly in the form of the expertly crafted stealth gameplay that has been implemented into the new Thief. However if you are looking for a next generation stealth experience this is probably the best path to take or at least worth a look.

Thief = 6.5/10

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