Nope, the stealth component is lacking given Splinter Cell and Thief are contemporaries. Also too little gameplay. It's got some cool AI quirks though.
I'm 19 and I played Thief 1 & 2 when I was like 14. I grew up playing Thief 3 a lot too when I was like 8 or 9. We're out there.
I think they're so-so games all things considered. I hate loot limits since that shit just means running in circles when you're done with other objectives, and the AI is terrible. Gameplay wise they're just kind of disappointing even if level design and atmosphere was ace. I don't really like replaying them much.
The AI, as I mentioned. It doesn't really impose any real challenge and they're really easy to kite even if you get caught and they have no real skills at sweeping like say, Chaos Theory or MGS AI. Of course, it's a much older game than either of those, but still. The AI are just a nuisance that you have to bonk (and you have a very very clear and obvious path to bonk them virtually 9/10 times) more than anything.
In essence it's more of an adventure-exploration game (and it does that part very well) than it is a gameplay game since the AI isn't that interactive if that makes sense.
Aforementioned loot limits too, they're really annoying on some maps on higher difficulties and finding those final pieces of loot can be painful. Some missions have a huge surplus of loot, and some don't, with some of that surplus being in much harder to find secrets. A guide is an option, but that's also an annoying experience because a mission can be an hour+ long and you have to carefully read loot lists, recall what you found and what you didn't one by one if you're just looking for a pitiful 100 gold to get the mission over with. Some pieces of loot can be as obtuse as a tiny ring on some random mound of dirt.
I appreciate it for what it is, what it innovated and what it's good at, and I'll probably get around to doing another playthrough of Thief 2 soon, but I really start to just tap myself out and lose a lot of my engagement when I'm fed up with the more tiresome aspects of the games.
Also, Thief 3 is shit.
2 years ago
Anonymous
I think the AI makes it so you can make mistakes but it's not an instant game over. It does get alerted more easily after it's seen you though and also tells any guards it sees to be on the lookout. My gripe with a lot of stealth games is after you get caught you have to load a save or gun everyone down because the AI is relentless or they have guns so you can't run away. Also the level design makes it so if a guard sees you then you aren't immediately blocked until they give up because you can just go around them as there's usually multiple paths.
I think the adventure stuff applies more to 1 than 2. 2 is a pretty streamlined traditional stealth experience. >Some pieces of loot can be as obtuse as a tiny ring on some random mound of dirt.
Haunted Cathedral. It was so bad about this.
2 years ago
Anonymous
>Some pieces of loot can be as obtuse as a tiny ring on some random mound of dirt
The stealth components in MGS2 were actually pretty good, but I agree that Thief and Splinter Cell did it much better. It's a shame that MGS gets all the praise for revolutionizing the genre when the Thief trilogy's stealth mechanics were far superior.
>need a guard's eyeball for retina scan. >shoot him, triggers alarm. >hide him in locker until alert phase is over. >open locker >guard's body falls to the floor and then disappears.
Technolo-
The thing about Splinter Cell I just don't care for is the plots, at least of the games I played. It's not that I hated, I just didn't give a frick bout it
The Fatman fight gives me ptsd and is “that” part of the game, but overall an amazing game and even more so when you think about just how advanced it was at the time.
the view cones are gamey compared to what you'd find in splintercell or thief but unlike mgs1 2 manages to make a pretty compelling challenge out of them. I also feel the guard interaction outside of line of sight is ironically more complex in 2, splintercell, even chaos theory feels kind of robotic in comparison.
>the view cones are gamey compared to what you'd find in splintercell or thief
Pretty sure those games have view cones too, they're just don't show it to you on a GPS.
Damn I’m not even joking when I say thanks for the story Gramps
I’m an 18yo who grew up on the GC and mostly Wii, and only got into retro games and PlayStation when I was around 15. I only got a PS3 last year and played MGS2 for the first time late 2021 and it’s by far a top three game for me, it’s fricking amazing. But anyways, I love hearing stories from people who were there when it was new
I loved MGS1 and VR Missions as a kid but when I saw 2 at a friend's house I didn't like it for a reason I can't remember. Now MSG was always over the top but I look at the series today and it just feels too weird, sort of like capeshit or anime. What the frick happened to it? I loved that feel of weird espionage in MGS1. When did it change?
It changed with 2 yeah. Reminds me kind of code veronica, the earlier entries in the series were very carefully kept in line with western expectations, they were western b movies. And then at some point they decided to just let it rip and not hide the weirdness they'd do domestically, western audiences be damned.
Why do I have to ask a 45 year old? What if I asked a 10 year old instead?
2 years ago
Anonymous
A 10 year old would still know who Mario is. It was to show that Fortnite is likely to be just another fad that'll fade away eventually while Nintendo games have had a more lasting impact on pop culture.
2 years ago
Anonymous
>A 10 year old would still know who Mario
Not necessarily. Like you said about the 45 year old, he might have a vague idea
Just stop being a fricking drone. Your logic is dumb. You could use the same logic with fricking pac-man
2 years ago
Anonymous
>A 10 year old would still know who Mario is
Lol
Lmao
And the funniest (or saddest, really) part is that you yourself are in your late 20s, but try to posture as "le real boomer"
2 years ago
Anonymous
What do you even know about my age? When have I postured as a real boomer?
Because it petered out early in the PS2s lifespan. The Syphon Filter games are a total miracle on the PS1 considering that team had no idea what the frick they were doing. Still, they did pull it off, but it's a slightly above-average third-person shooter, not a stealth game.
So fricking bored of the Thief comparisons. For some reason no rules seem to apply when making it. My only guess is that it's a kind of PC homosexual legacy thing.
Splinter Cell though, haha, hilarious. I'll even say this--I really like those games. I think the first several Splinter Cell games are pretty cool, but in terms of "stealth" it's hilarious. uh-oh sam, careful when you step on those crunchy rocks! Except, you can cheese though, but anyway--uh oh, be sure to shoot out the lights? No lights to shoot out? Awesome, just stand in a corner with a shadow in it and enemies will look straight at you and see nothing. "Whoo turned out da liiights?" Amazing. Total package, especially when you consider the story is complete grocery store checkout Clancy tactical mumbo jumbo bullshit. At least Michael Ironside sounds like he's asleep on all of his line reads. Definitely the superior game.
Metal Gear Solid 2 >Guards can hear you >Guards can see you >Guards know your last location and will sweep the room >Guards radio for help, help arrives, and doesn't leave until caution phase ends >Guards can see your footsteps of dirty, wet, or in snow >Guards will wake sleeping or KO'd guards >Guards will notice when others are missing and they will be replaced >If a dead guard is found, alert phase begins and guard is replaced
Splinter Cell >Guards have next-to-no situational awareness >Guards can almost never hear you (watch out for the fricking gravel or whatever) >Guards cannot see if there's even a suggestion of a shadow near Sam >Guards never look up, but at least crawling on pipes or split-jumping is cool
Thief >bonehead AI poses no threat whatsoever >end of story
The AI wasn't Thief's strongest aspect, but the stealth was far more authentic despite that. >no mini-map showing you exactly where the guards are located and which direction they're looking >you had to listen to the guard's footsteps and mumbling/whistling to figure out where they were >even peeking out into a hallway would run the risk of you getting spotted (leaning around a corner doesn't make you invisible unlike it does in many other stealth games) >you had to conceal yourself, either using the darkness or cover (even if you weren't entirely hidden behind cover, it would still reduce the chance you'd get spotted) >different types of surfaces would generate more or less noise >guards will notice dead bodies. it wasn't just MGS that had it >guards become more likely to spot you in the darkness or react to noises if they've been alerted or had spotted you previously, forcing you to be more cautious
Meanwhile, MGS2 gave you a radar telling you exactly where the guards are and was even kind enough to show you their vision cones too, because apparently they all suffered from myopia and couldn't see you down a wide open and well lit hallway if you were running more than 10 metres away from them. And from what I remember, the sound mechanics weren't that impressive; either you were making no noise or a lot of noise. Although I admit the footprint mechanics were well done and I wish Thief had them too.
The vision cone is great because it gives information to the player as to where the enemies can see, and plan your moves accordingly. In Thief this is always very fuzzy, and involves a lot of trial and error. It's not that Thief's guards don't use cones or that their vision is realistic, the cones are simply invisible.
>The vision cone is great because it gives information to the player as to where the enemies can see, and plan your moves accordingly
while this can be a good aspect it isn't necessarily the end all be all. A fuzzier representation of guard vision can incentivize caution and avoidance instead of just confidently running through every patrol pattern.
When would you ever have to chance the guards cone of vision ever anyways? You're invisible in darkness. I can't tell if that other guy is blaming the game for being bad or if he straight up never played the game at all and is going off vague things he knows about it.
You have a gem that tells you how dark the area you're in is. You can hear guards coming. If you're directly behind a guard there's 100% chance he wont see you and there's never a situation where you have to chance the guards cone of vision. Yes you actually have to use your brain and not play the game like it's glorified pacman.
It just sounds like you spammed quicksaves without actually git'ing gud at the game.
The guard's peripheral vision. It is not realistic so you can't use your real life knowledge to find its limit (like in every game), and the gamey vision cone isn't visible, so if you try to walk past a guard from the side, you have no consistent standard to measure whether he can see you or not. It's a matter of trial and error.
their peripheral vision is worse than their regular vision though, just like in real life. it's not like they will immediately sound the alarm unless you're really out in the open. usually they will just say something about rats. the only unrealistic thing about it is that they won't immediately turn their attention towards whatever it is they noticed in their peripheral vision.
no but the narrative is really good except the bad translation
MGS3 is a better game, MGS2 is better as a whole. It's my favorite game of all time, in fact.
Nope, the stealth component is lacking given Splinter Cell and Thief are contemporaries. Also too little gameplay. It's got some cool AI quirks though.
Thief is shit and irrelevant, immersive sims are a meme genre, and the only Splinter Cell worth a damn is Chaos Theory.
Ok so you're not interested in having a convo. Good luck.
can you actually form a coherent argument without vitriolic buzzwords
Based reply. Zoomers fear him.
what the frick kind of zoomer is playing Thief
I'm 19 and I played Thief 1 & 2 when I was like 14. I grew up playing Thief 3 a lot too when I was like 8 or 9. We're out there.
I think they're so-so games all things considered. I hate loot limits since that shit just means running in circles when you're done with other objectives, and the AI is terrible. Gameplay wise they're just kind of disappointing even if level design and atmosphere was ace. I don't really like replaying them much.
What's wrong with the gameplay specifically?
The AI, as I mentioned. It doesn't really impose any real challenge and they're really easy to kite even if you get caught and they have no real skills at sweeping like say, Chaos Theory or MGS AI. Of course, it's a much older game than either of those, but still. The AI are just a nuisance that you have to bonk (and you have a very very clear and obvious path to bonk them virtually 9/10 times) more than anything.
In essence it's more of an adventure-exploration game (and it does that part very well) than it is a gameplay game since the AI isn't that interactive if that makes sense.
Aforementioned loot limits too, they're really annoying on some maps on higher difficulties and finding those final pieces of loot can be painful. Some missions have a huge surplus of loot, and some don't, with some of that surplus being in much harder to find secrets. A guide is an option, but that's also an annoying experience because a mission can be an hour+ long and you have to carefully read loot lists, recall what you found and what you didn't one by one if you're just looking for a pitiful 100 gold to get the mission over with. Some pieces of loot can be as obtuse as a tiny ring on some random mound of dirt.
I appreciate it for what it is, what it innovated and what it's good at, and I'll probably get around to doing another playthrough of Thief 2 soon, but I really start to just tap myself out and lose a lot of my engagement when I'm fed up with the more tiresome aspects of the games.
Also, Thief 3 is shit.
I think the AI makes it so you can make mistakes but it's not an instant game over. It does get alerted more easily after it's seen you though and also tells any guards it sees to be on the lookout. My gripe with a lot of stealth games is after you get caught you have to load a save or gun everyone down because the AI is relentless or they have guns so you can't run away. Also the level design makes it so if a guard sees you then you aren't immediately blocked until they give up because you can just go around them as there's usually multiple paths.
I think the adventure stuff applies more to 1 than 2. 2 is a pretty streamlined traditional stealth experience.
>Some pieces of loot can be as obtuse as a tiny ring on some random mound of dirt.
Haunted Cathedral. It was so bad about this.
>Some pieces of loot can be as obtuse as a tiny ring on some random mound of dirt
True on all counts
somehow the worst take possible within the first 5 replies
shit taste
only a double gay would have that taste
Why do you guys get so butthurt about Thief but not Splinter Cell?
The stealth components in MGS2 were actually pretty good, but I agree that Thief and Splinter Cell did it much better. It's a shame that MGS gets all the praise for revolutionizing the genre when the Thief trilogy's stealth mechanics were far superior.
What did Splinter Cell do that MGS didn't?
It focused on its one thing and did it very well.
The holy trinity of stealth games.
Thief 2: The Metal Age
Splinter Cell: Chaos Theory
Hitman: Blood Money
Purely in terms of stealth gameplay mechanics? No.
As a total package though, I'd say yes.
>tranq an enemy soldier
>drag him to a flaming pipeline between struts
>nothing happens, he doesn’t spaz out
>not even a codec call
Technolo-
>need a guard's eyeball for retina scan.
>shoot him, triggers alarm.
>hide him in locker until alert phase is over.
>open locker
>guard's body falls to the floor and then disappears.
Technolo-
No story wise mgs1 where there's no whiny b***hy Raiden or mgs3 gameplay
If we're talking only stealth mechanics, Splinter Cell blows it out of the water, if we're talking overall, probably
Both Mgs and splinter cell have humor and brilliant voice acting. The only thing I can give the victory to mgs is its style and graphics.
The thing about Splinter Cell I just don't care for is the plots, at least of the games I played. It's not that I hated, I just didn't give a frick bout it
The Fatman fight gives me ptsd and is “that” part of the game, but overall an amazing game and even more so when you think about just how advanced it was at the time.
MGS2 isn't really much of a stealth game. Even compared to others in the genre at the time.
Does it even count as a stealth game? It's full of forced alerts and combat sections. For stealth fans MGS is terrible.
>It's full of forced alerts and combat sections
there isn't really that many. I think there's only 2 in the game with regular enemies.
the view cones are gamey compared to what you'd find in splintercell or thief but unlike mgs1 2 manages to make a pretty compelling challenge out of them. I also feel the guard interaction outside of line of sight is ironically more complex in 2, splintercell, even chaos theory feels kind of robotic in comparison.
>the view cones are gamey compared to what you'd find in splintercell or thief
Pretty sure those games have view cones too, they're just don't show it to you on a GPS.
>get MGS2 as coomer teen
>see these types of posters in the lockers
>JIZZZZZZZZZZZZZZ
>get camera
>take pictures, save them to PS2 memory card
>have a personal porn collection in MGS2
You had to take what you could get back in my day!
Damn I’m not even joking when I say thanks for the story Gramps
I’m an 18yo who grew up on the GC and mostly Wii, and only got into retro games and PlayStation when I was around 15. I only got a PS3 last year and played MGS2 for the first time late 2021 and it’s by far a top three game for me, it’s fricking amazing. But anyways, I love hearing stories from people who were there when it was new
>thanks for the story Gramps
uhh sauce
Mariko Okubo
Damn how sad now it takes me so much depraved shit to get off anymore
Otacon has unique dialogue just for this. MGS3 has similar coom posters too.
>The best stealth game ever made?
Second Sight
I loved MGS1 and VR Missions as a kid but when I saw 2 at a friend's house I didn't like it for a reason I can't remember. Now MSG was always over the top but I look at the series today and it just feels too weird, sort of like capeshit or anime. What the frick happened to it? I loved that feel of weird espionage in MGS1. When did it change?
It changed with 2 yeah. Reminds me kind of code veronica, the earlier entries in the series were very carefully kept in line with western expectations, they were western b movies. And then at some point they decided to just let it rip and not hide the weirdness they'd do domestically, western audiences be damned.
Damn Japanese, they ruined Japanese games!
>MGS
>stealth
stealth in halo combat evolved is really good
stealth% on aotcr is amazing
Why isn't this series as remembered as Metal Gear and Splinter Cell?
Because it's exclusive. Before you even get into subjective opinions about quality, it's an exclusive series so naturally it will be less popular
that only became relevant in the seventh gen when the 360 gained parity, if it was on ps1 or PS2 the exclusive label didn't really apply.
what? ESL-kun, english please
Nintendo games are exclusive and they're easily the most popular.
Anon, what. Fortnite and COD destroy Nintendo games in popularity
Ask a 45 year old who Mario is and he'll know. Ask him what Fortnite is and he'll have a vague idea that it's what his son plays.
Why do I have to ask a 45 year old? What if I asked a 10 year old instead?
A 10 year old would still know who Mario is. It was to show that Fortnite is likely to be just another fad that'll fade away eventually while Nintendo games have had a more lasting impact on pop culture.
>A 10 year old would still know who Mario
Not necessarily. Like you said about the 45 year old, he might have a vague idea
Just stop being a fricking drone. Your logic is dumb. You could use the same logic with fricking pac-man
>A 10 year old would still know who Mario is
Lol
Lmao
And the funniest (or saddest, really) part is that you yourself are in your late 20s, but try to posture as "le real boomer"
What do you even know about my age? When have I postured as a real boomer?
Yeah, the broken and hardly playable PC port of Metal Gear Solid as well as the maligned remake are the reason the game was more popular in the 90s.
Because it petered out early in the PS2s lifespan. The Syphon Filter games are a total miracle on the PS1 considering that team had no idea what the frick they were doing. Still, they did pull it off, but it's a slightly above-average third-person shooter, not a stealth game.
The PSP games were great though
old fashioned overhead 2d aged better than a 5th gen tps with tank controls, and the story was generic network tv tier.
When I played the game the first time alot of the meta narrative stuff flew by my head
However I still enjoyed the game more than MGS1
It's not the best stealth game ever. I'd put V above it, and I'd probably put more if I was me into stealth games
The game barely lets you play for more than 10 minutes without interrupting you with a cutscene or 3 hour long codec call.
Just skip them if they bother you so much.
I wish they'd remaster it and take the fricking green tint out
they did remaster it for PS3 tho.
No
So fricking bored of the Thief comparisons. For some reason no rules seem to apply when making it. My only guess is that it's a kind of PC homosexual legacy thing.
Splinter Cell though, haha, hilarious. I'll even say this--I really like those games. I think the first several Splinter Cell games are pretty cool, but in terms of "stealth" it's hilarious. uh-oh sam, careful when you step on those crunchy rocks! Except, you can cheese though, but anyway--uh oh, be sure to shoot out the lights? No lights to shoot out? Awesome, just stand in a corner with a shadow in it and enemies will look straight at you and see nothing. "Whoo turned out da liiights?" Amazing. Total package, especially when you consider the story is complete grocery store checkout Clancy tactical mumbo jumbo bullshit. At least Michael Ironside sounds like he's asleep on all of his line reads. Definitely the superior game.
Metal Gear Solid 2
>Guards can hear you
>Guards can see you
>Guards know your last location and will sweep the room
>Guards radio for help, help arrives, and doesn't leave until caution phase ends
>Guards can see your footsteps of dirty, wet, or in snow
>Guards will wake sleeping or KO'd guards
>Guards will notice when others are missing and they will be replaced
>If a dead guard is found, alert phase begins and guard is replaced
Splinter Cell
>Guards have next-to-no situational awareness
>Guards can almost never hear you (watch out for the fricking gravel or whatever)
>Guards cannot see if there's even a suggestion of a shadow near Sam
>Guards never look up, but at least crawling on pipes or split-jumping is cool
Thief
>bonehead AI poses no threat whatsoever
>end of story
The AI wasn't Thief's strongest aspect, but the stealth was far more authentic despite that.
>no mini-map showing you exactly where the guards are located and which direction they're looking
>you had to listen to the guard's footsteps and mumbling/whistling to figure out where they were
>even peeking out into a hallway would run the risk of you getting spotted (leaning around a corner doesn't make you invisible unlike it does in many other stealth games)
>you had to conceal yourself, either using the darkness or cover (even if you weren't entirely hidden behind cover, it would still reduce the chance you'd get spotted)
>different types of surfaces would generate more or less noise
>guards will notice dead bodies. it wasn't just MGS that had it
>guards become more likely to spot you in the darkness or react to noises if they've been alerted or had spotted you previously, forcing you to be more cautious
Meanwhile, MGS2 gave you a radar telling you exactly where the guards are and was even kind enough to show you their vision cones too, because apparently they all suffered from myopia and couldn't see you down a wide open and well lit hallway if you were running more than 10 metres away from them. And from what I remember, the sound mechanics weren't that impressive; either you were making no noise or a lot of noise. Although I admit the footprint mechanics were well done and I wish Thief had them too.
The vision cone is great because it gives information to the player as to where the enemies can see, and plan your moves accordingly. In Thief this is always very fuzzy, and involves a lot of trial and error. It's not that Thief's guards don't use cones or that their vision is realistic, the cones are simply invisible.
>The vision cone is great because it gives information to the player as to where the enemies can see, and plan your moves accordingly
while this can be a good aspect it isn't necessarily the end all be all. A fuzzier representation of guard vision can incentivize caution and avoidance instead of just confidently running through every patrol pattern.
When would you ever have to chance the guards cone of vision ever anyways? You're invisible in darkness. I can't tell if that other guy is blaming the game for being bad or if he straight up never played the game at all and is going off vague things he knows about it.
You have a gem that tells you how dark the area you're in is. You can hear guards coming. If you're directly behind a guard there's 100% chance he wont see you and there's never a situation where you have to chance the guards cone of vision. Yes you actually have to use your brain and not play the game like it's glorified pacman.
It just sounds like you spammed quicksaves without actually git'ing gud at the game.
>glorified pacman
lmao i was thinking the exact same thing about MGS1 as i was reading this thread
The guard's peripheral vision. It is not realistic so you can't use your real life knowledge to find its limit (like in every game), and the gamey vision cone isn't visible, so if you try to walk past a guard from the side, you have no consistent standard to measure whether he can see you or not. It's a matter of trial and error.
their peripheral vision is worse than their regular vision though, just like in real life. it's not like they will immediately sound the alarm unless you're really out in the open. usually they will just say something about rats. the only unrealistic thing about it is that they won't immediately turn their attention towards whatever it is they noticed in their peripheral vision.
You do know that the radar could be turned off in the first two MGS games.
All of the points on splinter cell is incorrect and every point on mgs also applies to splinter cell. This bait thread can’t even be convincing
Someone stole my MGS2 copy 🙁
Now I have MGS1 and MGS3 versions of the collectors trilogy edition.
Poor man's Tom clancy couldn't write a good stealth story. Agnes kaku triggering the fanboys will never be not awesome
metal gear is a james bond movie on vidya form not a steath game
sadly this kind of applies to hitman 3 as well
MGS is barely stealth
Compared to what?
mgs is not a great stealth serious, but still mgs 3 plays far better
>but still mgs 3 plays far better
it's more ambitious but I definitely wouldn't describe it as playing far better.
the free camera in subsistence alone makes a world of a difference
well because it's japanese it's beyond a stealth game it's a religion now