Two years of project diary for Thief: The Dark Project | Hacker News Reader

Two years of project diary for Thief: The Dark Project

thief-thecircle.com

14 pointsDysiode6 comments

Whatever happened to the stealth genre?

Thief: The Dark Project, Tenchu: Stealth Assassins, Rainbow Six, and Metal Gear Solid all came out in 1998 and it looked like the genre was really taking off...

I haven't followed video games so closely the last few years, but it seems like light stealth elements have been taken up in a few games and there's been sequels to those franchises, but it never became a really dominant genre.

Any thoughts as to why? I'd think with all the new processing power and AI improvements, that you could make a pretty excellent stealth game to appeal to both hardcore gamers and more casual players.

I'm not much of a gamer, so I haven't played any of the Thief games, but based on my understanding, it sounds like Assassin's Creed, which has been successful enough to get a sequel, at least. I can think of at least one other, Perfect Dark, but I am sure there are more.

Splinter Cell would be the obvious mention, although it's far too linear for my tastes.

I think people realized doing stealth for a whole game is too boring, but most action games integrate stealth mechanics now, or throw in a cursory stealth level. Even Halo has stealth, although I doubt anyone ever stopped to notice... it's like putting a karma system in Doom.

It may come down to the mainstream game industry's aversion to risk. The high cost of game development has meant fewer risks are taken. Perhaps the stealth genre is considered to difficult to get right or there isn't enough interest to make a decent return on costs.

Thief 3 and Deus Ex 2 happened. Basically a string of poor executions in a row just about killed it. I have been thinking about trying to put together a steam punk \ prohibition Chicago stealth game but it seems to never make it to the top of the priority list.

Nostaglia.

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