Thief 4 may be in trouble

Several staff departures and an apparently unreleased trailer point to some trouble for Thief 4, though the game is still an active project as far as we know.

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Thief 4 was a no-show at E3, marking another trade show without mention of the long-silent game. According to several resumes from staff members, the project seems to have lost some of its talent and could be facing trouble.

Kotaku, with the aid of Superannuation, reports on a string of potential bad news for the game. According to recent resumes, audio director Paul Weir and level designer Adam Alim have left the studio; Alim replaced Pierre-Olivier Clement, who moved to another project at Eidos Montreal last year. Other recent departures have included two senior concept artists, a senior technical level designer, a senior animator, and a senior level designer.

On top of that, a trailer was purportedly set to be released in December of 2011, and some of the footage appears in a demo reel (seen below). The trailer appears to be done for all intents and purposes, but Square Enix seems to be holding it back.

On the other hand, one level designer says he designed "the last level of the game." That at least implies that the game has enough of its roots in place to establish finality, even if game design doesn't always (or even usually) follow in sequential order.

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From The Chatty
  • reply
    June 14, 2012 8:15 AM

    Steve Watts posted a new article, Thief 4 may be in trouble.

    Several staff departures and an apparently unreleased trailer point to some trouble for Thief 4, though the game is still an active project as far as we know.

    • reply
      June 14, 2012 8:23 AM

      Noooooooo!! I want Thief 4!

    • reply
      June 14, 2012 8:25 AM

      That doesn't necessarily suggest trouble; it may just mean that phase of development is over and they're not needed.

    • reply
      June 14, 2012 8:26 AM

      But.. but #yearofthebow !!!

    • reply
      June 14, 2012 8:32 AM

      ugh. between this and Prey 2, some of the most promising titles are looking like they may never come out. :(

    • reply
      June 14, 2012 8:38 AM

      This is incredibly sad news. :(

    • reply
      June 14, 2012 8:45 AM

      This doesn't sound like it's in trouble, just sounds like they've had some turnover. As for the trailer, there could be tons of reasons why they never showed it.

      After the strong showing of Deus Ex, I would imagine Thief's gonna be fine.

    • reply
      June 14, 2012 8:51 AM

      I find this hard to believe, thats a huge studio with a massive dedicated team that just delivered a blockbuster title last year.

    • reply
      June 14, 2012 8:51 AM

      Kickstarter confirmed.

      • reply
        June 14, 2012 10:53 AM

        I'd donate to get this game finished. So many great memories playing this series!

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          June 14, 2012 3:48 PM

          It'd need at least 10 mill if not far more, no chance

          • reply
            June 14, 2012 3:53 PM

            That's true, but there is another possibility for fan projects.

            Dark Mod probably wouldn't need that much to be able to generate enough assets to be completely standalone from Doom 3 now that it's GPL - that and a full campaign by the best of the fan mission guys could easily be done for what some Kickstarters have made.

    • reply
      June 14, 2012 8:56 AM

      that sounds odd..i would have thought they would have put the Deus Ex team on it to get it wrapped up.

      • reply
        June 14, 2012 11:15 AM

        They did, as i understood it they only had a small team working on Thief 4 while Deus ex was in development. And as members from the Deus Ex team finished they transitioned over.

        • reply
          June 14, 2012 4:21 PM

          I thought the studio had two full sized teams working parallel?

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      June 14, 2012 9:11 AM

      Gimme that bow upgrade!

      Get it done square-enix montreal!!

    • reply
      June 14, 2012 11:07 AM

      Several staff departures

      their bodies were later found piled in a corner

    • reply
      June 14, 2012 1:43 PM

      I see they sold out and changed the name. Nothing says "We don't give a @&^@# what you think" when you name your game THI4F.

      • reply
        June 14, 2012 3:09 PM

        grow up.

        • Ebu legacy 10 years legacy 20 years
          reply
          June 14, 2012 3:23 PM

          Just an observation: you're telling someone who chose the name "dookiebot" to grow up.

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      June 14, 2012 3:31 PM

      Paging Warren Spector..... Warren Spector, please pick up a white courtesy phone.

      • reply
        June 14, 2012 3:56 PM

        Sorry, Warren Spector can't come to the phone right now. He is currently neck-deep in Disney nostalgia and will be for the foreseeable future.

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          June 14, 2012 3:57 PM

          He also has fuck all to do with Thief.

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            June 14, 2012 4:10 PM

            Well he did some production work on the first one, but that's it. And I think that was during the Dark Camelot stage.

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      June 14, 2012 5:12 PM

      where is that kickstarter program so it can get finished?...

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      June 14, 2012 5:13 PM

      God damnit, the trailer looked like they were on the right path. On the other hand, if this thing goes to shit I'll have an excuse to play The Dark Project again.

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      June 14, 2012 8:23 PM

      I hope we see it one day.

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