Thief: Deadly Shadows
| Thief | |
|---|---|
| Thief: The Dark Project | 1998 |
| Thief II: The Metal Age | 2000 |
| Thief: Deadly Shadows | 2004 |
| The Dark Mod (unofficial spin-off) | 2009 |
| Thief | 2014 |
Key points
- The Sneaky Upgrade adds widescreen/multi-monitor support and fixes various issues.
Availability
Improvements
v1.1 Patch
The latest retail patch is v1.1. Digital distribution versions already include this patch.
Sneaky Upgrade
The Sneaky Upgrade patch adds native widescreen/multi-monitor support, improves fan mission compatibility and includes adjustments for performance and stability.
- If you have previously used T3FovPatch, run it again and select 4:3, otherwise the Sneaky Upgrade FOV aspect ratio fixes will be incorrect.
Video settings
Input settings
Mods
- A detailed forum thread for mods and enhancements is available on the Steam Users' Forums.
Thief 3: Minimalist Age
Probably one of the most popular mods is Thief 3 Minimalist, which aims to provide an experience more like Thief 1 and 2 or more difficult in general. This is achieved by various game changes, such as fatigue, removal of 3rd person camera, choice of mission play style and various others. For more details visit ttlg forums. The mod is available at shack news.
Issues fixed
- A detailed forum thread for technical difficulties is available on the Through The Looking Glass forum.
- TweakGuides has created a comprehensive guide for fixing issues in this game. It can be found here.
Intro movie keeps repeating
This problem is caused by the game using more than one core (such as on dual-core or quad-core CPUs).
Disable intro movies
You can disable the intro clips and load straight to the main menu by following the steps below:
- Locate the DEFAULT.INI file found in
C:\your_install_path\Thief Deadly Shadows\System
. Create a backup of the untouched version if you like, then open it in a text editor (e.g. Notepad). - Search for PCSTARTUP and change ShowIntroMovies=True to False. Save and close it. Now the intro should not play.
Option - Dark Engine Fix
Dark Engine Fix, also known as DEF, can be used to load the game on a single core. Also works for the rest of the Thief series, their demos and also Silent Hill 2.
Lockpicking and ladder stuck bug
One of the most game breaking and annoying bugs is this one. Normally, Garrett will move closer to the lock, as soon as you interact with it and when he reaches a certain position, the lock picking UI will appear. The same is true for ladders. However, when experiencing this bug, Garrett will not move closer in a smoother fashion. Either Garrett will appear to be stuck in the air or move closer to his destination in a frame by frame like fashion. However, this is no frame rate issue, because environmental effects will still be displayed, actors will still move and the movement head bob is also active. This makes is very hard and sometimes impossible to interact with ladders and locks, thus this bug can even make a playthrough impossible.
The only known solution is to force a low frame rate. 60 fps seems to be ideal. If you have a 60Hz display, you can go ahead and activate VSync. If you have a display with a higher refresh rate, you may have to reduce the refresh rate of the monitor to 60Hz via your operation systems' options. One person also reported that the ingame VSync option didn't work for him, so he successfully forced VSync via the NVidia control panel. More information at the eidos games forum: http://forums.eidosgames.com/showthread.php?t=66716. The known solution was also posted in this thread, by Berry's message.
Use MultiSampling and Bloom together
Deadly Shadows doesn't allow you to set both MultiSampling and Bloom in-game; enabling either will disable the other one. To get around this, enable Bloom in-game (leaving MultiSampling disabled) and force anti-aliasing through your video card's control panel. Both effects will now display together.