Digi
If you're a fan of the Thief games, read on. I've discussed this briefly in the Thief 4 thread, but this deserves its own.
The Thief fan community is amazing. There are literally hundreds of professional-level fan missions for T1 and T2. And there's even an (unofficial) expansion to T2 called Thief 2X: Shadows of the Metal Age, complete with a new protagonist and coherent storyline. You need Thief 2 to be installed for it to run, but the game itself is free to download. It's buggy as hell, but worth a playthrough for diehards.
The Dark Mod (TDM) is the most recent evolution of the fan community, and it's quite incredible an achievement. And the best part is, it's all free to download, and you need nothing else on your system to run it.
It uses the Doom 3 engine to great affect. While the visuals aren't going to quite be on par with current-gen systems, it's still a visually appealing engine, and it's light years beyond T1 and T2 (and more varied than T3 in stylistic options). The engine is also light years beyond those games with scaling, vaulting, jumping, etc. which makes exploration more of a joy than ever.
The levels vary wildly, and allow for a lot of creativity. The best levels are every bit as good as any professional game, and I'd recommend this in a heartbeat to anyone jaded by the recent Thief release (it was visually stunning, but very subpar in gameplay by franchise standards).
The download comes packaged with a tutorial mission and "The Tears of St. Lucia" which was created by a team of experienced fan mission (FM) creators. Other levels can be downloaded through the main menu. There are, as I write this, ~70 fan missions. And while the fractured nature of FMs means that there is no overarching story, many creators will make a series of missions (the longest I've seen is 6) that have interlocking stories and the same protagonists and villains.
Adventurous gamers can also try their hand at level creation, with the Dark Radiant editor program (also free to download). I've dabbled with it briefly. I doubt I have the time to make full-scale missions, but it's intuitive enough that anyone with some computer savvy can quickly pick up the basics. Programming experience helps, but isn't necessary, and there are a lot of beginner-friendly tutorials in TDM Wiki and helpful folks in the forums.
If anyone gets into it, give me a shout. Having dug around and talked to some of the regulars in the community, I can point you toward some of the better levels. It doesn't require a huge investment of time, since you can play a single level and not be tethered to others. So I'd recommend it to anyone interested in stealth gameplay or the Thief series. Beats the hell out of Thief 4, and it's free to boot.
http://www.thedarkmod.com/main/
The Thief fan community is amazing. There are literally hundreds of professional-level fan missions for T1 and T2. And there's even an (unofficial) expansion to T2 called Thief 2X: Shadows of the Metal Age, complete with a new protagonist and coherent storyline. You need Thief 2 to be installed for it to run, but the game itself is free to download. It's buggy as hell, but worth a playthrough for diehards.
The Dark Mod (TDM) is the most recent evolution of the fan community, and it's quite incredible an achievement. And the best part is, it's all free to download, and you need nothing else on your system to run it.
It uses the Doom 3 engine to great affect. While the visuals aren't going to quite be on par with current-gen systems, it's still a visually appealing engine, and it's light years beyond T1 and T2 (and more varied than T3 in stylistic options). The engine is also light years beyond those games with scaling, vaulting, jumping, etc. which makes exploration more of a joy than ever.
The levels vary wildly, and allow for a lot of creativity. The best levels are every bit as good as any professional game, and I'd recommend this in a heartbeat to anyone jaded by the recent Thief release (it was visually stunning, but very subpar in gameplay by franchise standards).
The download comes packaged with a tutorial mission and "The Tears of St. Lucia" which was created by a team of experienced fan mission (FM) creators. Other levels can be downloaded through the main menu. There are, as I write this, ~70 fan missions. And while the fractured nature of FMs means that there is no overarching story, many creators will make a series of missions (the longest I've seen is 6) that have interlocking stories and the same protagonists and villains.
Adventurous gamers can also try their hand at level creation, with the Dark Radiant editor program (also free to download). I've dabbled with it briefly. I doubt I have the time to make full-scale missions, but it's intuitive enough that anyone with some computer savvy can quickly pick up the basics. Programming experience helps, but isn't necessary, and there are a lot of beginner-friendly tutorials in TDM Wiki and helpful folks in the forums.
If anyone gets into it, give me a shout. Having dug around and talked to some of the regulars in the community, I can point you toward some of the better levels. It doesn't require a huge investment of time, since you can play a single level and not be tethered to others. So I'd recommend it to anyone interested in stealth gameplay or the Thief series. Beats the hell out of Thief 4, and it's free to boot.
http://www.thedarkmod.com/main/