A couple days ago I had the misfortune of seeing the new art for Garrett in Thief 4. GameInformer ran a story on it, and there’s a lot of buzz going around so that aspect of what the images are, what Eidos has said about them, etc., is pretty much covered.
My love of the Thief franchise stems from the fact that Garrett has always been a gritty, noir character. He was written in the vein of classic D&D thieves. He was like the Grey Mouser, or Shadowspawn. He doesn’t fight unless he has to, and he’s better at getting away than using a sword. Instead, it looks like we’re getting Thief: UFC Edition, and less Shadowspawn than goth Chuck Liddell.
This game might wind up being really good. It might be a ton of fun. But with the direction they’re going, it won’t be Thief except in name and that really sucks. It makes me love Thief: the Dark Project even more, outdated graphics and all. It’s like comfort food, but with blackjacks and water arrows.