Done with the game. While theres enough to like to warrant at least a playthrough, I also found it disappointing since a lot of the elements arent as fleshed out as they appear initially.
On a second playthrough, it became apparent that the main narrative is mostly a linear affair, with minor changes depending on ones choices. This wouldnt matter if the tale the game was trying to tell was a ripping yarn, but I found the writing and story to be largely forgettable; apart from a handful of character interactions, the characters shared far too little screen time for me to care about their fates, and there is a general lack of closure with regards to the fates of most characters, with no hints given as to whether their story arcs are considered finished. The best part of the games narrative to me was the constant stream of references to the first game.
In addition to this, the side missions were far too simplistic in their narrative choice. I would have loved to see more choices like choosing to side with one faction over another in addition to the choices of stealth/hacking/combat that the missions offer. For instance, in one of the earliest side missions, it was frustrating that I couldnt divulge the information I had collected to a third party, like I normally can in CRPGs. Moreover, there was hardly any dilemma to go with any of the side missions, and the one mission which featured an interesting moral conflict, Talion A.D., was also my favorite of the bunch since it featured zero hand-holding and significant consequences for ones actions.
Moving onto the core gameplay, the games unbalanced in how it rewards a hacker who resorts to stealth takedowns. While the hacking minigame is interesting initially, it quickly wore out its welcome, and had me wishing for an auto-resolve option determined by my hacking skill. I could have opted against hacking most terminals, but a lot of the backstory and to a lesser extent, alternate routes, are locked away behind hacking.
As a stealth game, at a glance it appears more than competent when compared to hybrids such as Assassins Creed, Alpha Protocol, etc. When compared to games that were designed around stealth though, I didnt find the stealth gameplay compelling due to a lack of challenge. The chief culprit here is the dumb-as-rocks AI, that when not stuck in an endless loop of trying to activate a hacked alarm panel, is far too near-sighted and lenient in detecting player presence. The Alarmed state should probably have been reworked to be far less forgiving, and there should have been more negative consequences for taking out a patrol than just reduced XP gain(or more, if one took them down non-lethally). For the sake of Thief 4, I hope Eidos Montreal rapidly improves in this regard, by fleshing out stealth to offer a lot more options than HR does.
Speaking of XP, an always-hostile playthrough is easily the most challenging and dynamic playstyle, but paradoxically gives the least xp. I prefer the Bloodlines way of awarding a chunk of xp for the completion of a task, irrespective of the fate that befalls the enemies. Either that, or Ghost should have reserved only for leaving every enemy and turret/camera, etc. untouched. In the grand scheme of things, it doesnt matter though, since Praxis points and XP are too abundant, making the planning of character builds feel inconsequential.
While I didn't love the game like I thought I would, going by the leak, I still think it will go down as one the best games of the year, thanks to the strengths of the non-linear Deus Ex design.
