3 of 5 customers found the following review helpful:
 Like A Movie, 2004-06-29
I'm a 15 year old girl who would rather prefer talking on the phone than even associating myself with childish video games. But ever since 25 year old brother bought this game, I would always try to watch him play the character of Garret. I love this game, even though I never watched it. I just wish they would add more scarier stuff like the Hag level and stuff.
 ION STORM-NEVER AGAIN!, 2004-06-22
If any of you have tried to play Deus Ex 2: Invisible War (also an Ion Storm product) and had your computer crash constantly to desktop, stay away from this game. Seriously, you'll be throwing your money away. I've got an Athlon 2000 CPU and a Geforce FX 5200 (w/ the 256 MB chip) and have never played 2 games so piss poor in terms of stability. The producers say that the game should run smoothly at medium settings w/ the FX 5200. For the record I have everything set at the lowest possible settings and the game has crashed over a dozen times so far and I haven't even finished the first mission! There is a patch out now which I installed. Fixed nothing. Actually I spent quite some time trying to tweak things to get the game to run because I loved Thief 1 & 2 (not Ion Storm products). All to no avail. I'll personally never buy another game produced by Ion Storm. They should get out of the gaming business. There are way better developers out there. People who have played Max Payne 2 (excellent) know what I'm talking about. Or Splinter Cell-PT for that matter. Both ran excellently on my machine. Incidentally I've been playing vid games for years so I do know what I'm talking about. As for the positive reviews here, I truly don't know what to make of them. Maybe these people have the latest $400 video cards. I don't know. But if you've got what I have. Good luck. You're gonna need it.
23 of 24 customers found the following review helpful:
On Par with the series, 2004-06-22
Thief 3 continues Garrett's never-ending need to pay the bills. Taking place a couple years after Thief 2 concluded, we find Garrett unwittingly involving himself in a plot that might mean the end of time. The Age of Darkness, when light shall become shadow and life shall become pain.
IonStorm took over the Thief 3 project from Looking Glass for this installment, and with them, comes a new yet familiar view to the series.Gameplay: TTDS starts you off on a training mission that walks you through the aspects of the game. Like the previous titles, Garretts friend is darkness, and the use of a highly modified UT2004 engine allows for some impressive shadows. Now, unlike the previous titles, shadows not only look more realistic, but they move as well. Garrett has lost some familiar equipment from the previous series. Constantine's sword is gone, replaced with a dagger. Might be a bit of a turn down from the purist perspective but apart from the inability to block, melee is melee. Rope arrows are also missing due to an inability to code them to work with the engine, which is a shame, but they have been replaced with climbing gloves that allow you to scale certain walls. All in all fairly clean importation of thief 1+2 standards.
What's poorly done, however, is the new enemy AI. It seems the coders spent more time on the graphics, which though nice, are not what makes a Thief title worthwile. The enemy is more responsive to its environment, knowning that there are crates, stairs, etc in the room, but they do nothing about it. You might hear, "I better check behind those crates" if you alert one, but they will never check them. The AI gives up far too soon, even on expert difficulty, and makes for a VERY easy game. Also, the AI seems to be far less responsive to sounds cues from the previous games. I've been able to run up to a guard on a tile floor and blackjack him before he ever got into high alert (weapon raised) posture. Enemies might also respond to other missing AI but again, do nothing about it. Quite sad, as I was looking forward to the enhanced AI which was touted pre-release able to relight torches and make a run for the money. Add all this to the fact that any sort of alarm system, the greatest challenges in the first two games, and TTDS ends up being quite a cakewalk. Graphics
Not bad not bad. The engine is gorgeous, I'll give it that. Not all the textures are hi-res, but it is made up for with the beatiful lighting effects. Torch flickers and moving shadows just made me stare at the screen when I first loaded it up. These effects do come at a great cost. Very few graphics cards are supported and we're talking top end-boards here. ATI owners need to be aware that they need to run 4.4 Catalyst drivers or else they will have some horrible light glitches. Nvidia owners who own the FX 5200 chipset line - all 5200s and 5600s that those cards have poor pixel shading renderers and you will get horrible framerates. (I own one myself but was able to get by on the lowest settings). Again, very beatiful, but beauty was never Thief's selling points. Sound
The sound is superb. Very thief-esc with voice actors that you have grown to love over the years. The ambient sounds and music set the mood as always but as I stated in the gameplay section, there is something lacking in the AI's sound detection. I think it's been dumbed down a tad and they have gotten rid of the large disparities between the louds and softs found in the previous titles. Some may actually enjoy this more, but I used to love seeing a tile floor and actually fearing it in the first two. Overall
Well, it's not better than the first two, but it's definately not worse. The freestyle mode between missions is fun, but not needed as items are obscenely easy to come by as I beat the game on expert setting with full inventory and nearly 50,000 gold to my name. This game could have used some more optimization on the graphics end, and larger porting options besides the WinXP only setting as many gamers still use 98 on their rigs, but still fun.
The "immersiveness" (I'm tired of that word) of Thief 3 was almost non-existant until a certain point of the game, and had I written this review before then, it would have done much worse. However, I must say - there is a level in this game that scared me, scared me good. :) It's worth the buy, especially if you're a fan, and it will not let you down on the story. Though produced by a different company, they are true to the story started in the Dark Project and the conclusion will definately brink a smirk to a taffer like you.
17 of 20 customers found the following review helpful:
Fun and addictive, 2004-06-20
Thief: Deadly Shadows is an excellent addition to the Thief series. The opening chapter also serves as a tutorial, which should suffice for those new to the Thief series games (of course, Thief 1 and 2 are still worth the investment).The gameplay differs slightly from Thief 2. The stealth is the same, but it adds the ability to wander through the city at your leisure, sell your loot and buy gear whenever you want from "fences," and a few new toys (holy water to kill undead and oil flasks to make people slip - oh the laughs). Additionally, there are places where you interact more with other characters in a friendly way, immersing you into Garrett's world as as a thief. Why not 5 stars? My computer exceeds the recommended requirements, but I still cannot use the full video enchancements without major choppiness. This is a disappointment for me. In addition, the game has crashed on me a few times. Be sure to save frequently to avoid hassles with this (Quicksave F10 works well for this). Hopefully Eidos will release a patch to fix these problems. Overall, this is an excellect game that may keep you up late at night. The storyline is excellent and the stealth unmatched by any other game. If you meet the recommended system requirements and enjoy sneaking around, this game is for you.
1 of 1 customers found the following review helpful:
 my favorite game, 2004-06-17
Incredibly immersive game.
The transitions between locales are kind of poor but apart from that, I can't think of anything I dislike. It is a rare game that can make a person subconciously hold their breath; Thief DS does it all the time.
I have played Thief since the first episode and DS continues the stealth tradition.
Also, the music adds to the suspense.
Third person view is rather useless but a cool feature nonetheless.
It is definitely a game for older players (its bloody and all that).Personally, I like this game better than Halo (another of my favorite games).
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