Filcher - Thief-like made by single developer
Posted: February 2nd, 2023, 22:16
I know most users here like Thief, and those that don't should be cast out as the intellectual lepers that they are.
Sadly, not many developers particularly care to make games like Thief, and playing fan missions can only take you so far. Not to disparage the very talented Thief community, but a change in locale is very welcome.
GENERAL PREMISE
It's been a year since Sporey left the Blackburn Gang to make her fortune as a freelance thief. But when her former fence and mentor tracks her down, Sporey is forced back into servitude to settle an old debt. A temporary setback, she thinks. But these days, honour among thieves is wearing thin. Which of her old comrades can Sporey trust?
Filcher is Thief-lite - and by that I mean the developer clearly set out to make a game that tries to emulate the original as much as possible, but either due to inexperience, lack of time or resources was not able to fully realize such a vision.
By this I mean that the game lacks some mechanics present in Thief 1 and 2. Chief among them are mantling, varied objectives depending on difficulty, water arrows (or equivalent), **** arrows (or equivalent), pre-mission purchase screen, leaning against doors to hear better, and voice acting - to name the most notable ones. In practice, this means that the levels do not have the degree of verticality you would see in a Thief level, and that most lights cannot be put out unless you find a switch to turn them off. Levels will also not have the funny guard banter you would expect in a Thief game.
Not to say that Filcher is a bad game. It's very good in fact, just that it should be approached with the understanding that it was made entirely by a single person with access to limited resources.
NARRATIVE
The story is nothing special. Functional is the best way I'd describe it. Besides a few in-mission twists all the other story beats were fairly predictable, and the narrative played out as you'd expect it. That being said, if the player is willing to dig deeper in the penultimate mission it does cast a different light on some of the characters and their motivations.
The Paynesque comicbook cutscenes are a good example of the game's striking art direction and bring the characters to life.
The readables in the missions were always fun to discover and peruse, and combined with the environmental storytelling they help to make each locale feel more like a real place.
THE CAMPAIGN
What the game offers is a 9-mission campaign with varying objectives - from robbing the apartment of a rich couple, to a daring heist of a treasure vault inside a jewelry store, culminating with a raid on the city's police station and infiltrating the mansion of your former gang. No mission is the same, each one offering a unique challenge.
As an example, the first mission will require you to move across a room cross with laser tripwires, that you have hopefully sabotaged beforehand. The floor is marble, with a few carpets strewn about, and a guard is patrolling down the hall.
The room in question, from the game's store page
The mission where you are robbing the jewely store will require you tp deactivate and navigate past the security system - of which the most challenging part is going to be the shutoff switch for the vault camera - that gives you a scant 90 second to reach the vault door. This requires the player to have a very good grasp of the movement mechanics and map layout, especially if aiming for the "ghost" ranking. There's a degree of skill (or luck) to this sequence, as not only do you now need get to the vault door within the time limit, but also do so without being detected by the patrolling guards.
The vault doorA subsequent mission features a lighthouse that is constantly illuminating the restaurant you are infiltrating, requiring you to keep track of it lest your shadowy cover evaporates at the most inopportune moment (a mechanic very similar to the one found in Gloomwood).
Your main antagonist for the mission
ART DIRECTION
The most striking feature of Filcher is the art direction, and you will either love it or hate it. I previously described it as Dark Deco. If you have ever watched Batman: The Animated Series, you will instantly recognize it as a direct inspiration. While the graphics are very rudimentary, and all NPCs are 2D sprites, I found the game pleasing on the eyes since it emulates the look of the cartoon so well.
Example of inspiration from B:TAS
...and a screenshot from the game with a similar composition from the game's itch.io page
SOUND DESIGN
Another area where Filcher truly shines is the sound design. All sounds in the game have that clear, crisp feel of Thief 1 and 2, allowing you to tell just how far away a guard is from sound alone, what surface you are walking on from the sound of your footsteps, the alertness of the guards based on their grunts etc.
The music, on the other hand, is very understated, mostly used to build tension or set the mood, and never getting in the way of the gameplay itself.
ENEMIES
Standard guard
These will be your primary antagonists in most missions and come in a few variants (guard, cop, mobster). They communicate their alertness via silly grunts and are not terribly bright, but will investigate noises, alarms and if they see you while out of shadows or with your flashlight out (though only if you are shining it when they are looking directly at you, you can keep it aimed at the back of their heads and they will not notice it). Sometimes they will be equipped with flashlights, making them all the more dangerous.
Enemy guard with flashlightThey are all armed with guns and, unlike Thief, there are very few ways for you to fight back. The blackjack is much less effective if they are alerted to your presence, the dart gun takes time to knock them out and the flashbang gives you only a temporary reprieve, while their hitscan bullets pack a punch.
Dogs
Despite what you might assume, dogs are no better at detecting you in the dark, nor smelling you. The biggest challenge is that you can't knock them out with your blackjack, and that they are usually accompanied by a patrolling guard, so even using a dart gun to knock them out is a risky proposition.
Guards with helmets
The rarest and most challenging enemy of the game. No different from the standard guards, but the helmet makes them impervious to your blackjack, leaving only the dart gun as a way to take them out.
EQUIPMENT
Blackjack - works pretty much exactly as it does in Thief games - if you sneak up to an oblivious enemy and hit them on the head, they will be knocked out for the duration of the mission, unless an ally finds them and wakes them up.
Sleep-dart gun - your only ranged weapon in the game, but unlike in most other stealth games, hitting an enemy with the dart will not immediately put them to sleep, but will instead make them alert and aggressive, trying to find you and also alerting every other enemy they encounter on the way. It's usually very difficult to stay undetected when using this weapon: the ammunition is very limited, you need to arc the shots to hit enemies even at moderate distances, and headshots do not lead to an instant knockout. There are very few instances where you will wish to make use of this weapon, and will altogether avoid using it if you're going for the higher scores.
Lockpicks - work nearly identically as they do in Thief, but without the need to switch to a different lockpick. Much like in that game, the challenge and tension comes from the fact that picking a lock takes time, which you may not have.
Flashlight - fairly obvious tool, helps see in the dark, but will also make it easier for enemies to detect you.
Flashbangs - if you are using these, then you have already ****** up and will probably need to restart the mission. Their only real use-case is to blind the enemies for a few seconds so you can either hide (optimal approach) or shoot them with the dart gun (not a good idea).
Noisemaking windup toys - again, a fairly obvious piece of equipment that can be thrown to distract and draw enemies away from an area. Has far more uses than many of other items in your arsenal.
Clump of moss - works exactly as in Thief, creating a clump of moss on the ground you can run on silently, though limited to how far you can throw it, unlike the moss arrows.
DRAWBACKS
In terms of negatives, the biggest stumbling block for many people is going to be the fact that there are no in-mission saves. This can be frustrating in certain missions, especially if you are trying to earn the "ghost" rank, but since the levels are much smaller than those in Thief and can be finished in around 15 minutes or less, it doesn't lead to too much time being wasted. You are expected to go through the missions multiple times to find out all the secrets and the most optimal routes to complete your objectives. I can understand why people criticize the lack of saving, or even in-mission checkpoints. Later levels can be brutal, with a single mistake requiring a restart. That being said, there's nothing quite as heart-pounding as sneaking past a bunch of guards in a crammed security room to reach a switch and unlock a door to progress further.
There's also some additional quirks to the game. While the sliding mechanic is a good way to quickly navigate the environment, especially where you need to duck into cover quickly, tying it to the crouch command can lead to unfortunate accidents like sliding off ledges to your death or into guards, thus alerting them. Another puzzling quirk is that the doors close automatically after some time, which can be mildly irritating as you are forced to open and close them multiple times while waiting for a guard to pass.
All lights in the game are electrical, and while you can turn off many of them, many more are permanently on without any switch to shut them off, despite there logically needing to be one. I understand that this was done for game-balancing purposes, but I feel it could have been handled more elegantly and would have helped alleviate some of the more frustrating parts of the game.
The lack of mantling is also a puzzling design choice, since there are a few instances where having the ability to jump over low walls or fences to more easily sneak past enemies would have been a welcome option.
CONCLUSION
It took me about 14 hours to 100% the game, including finding all the secrets and ghosting all the missions, which for the asking price - either full or discount - was money well spent.
if you're on the lookout for more Thief, this is as good as it's going to get outside of fan missions.
PROS:
- gameplay that clearly tries to be as close to Thief 1 and 2 as possible and largely manages to do so
- varied missions, each with their own set of challenges and quirks
- unique art direction
- slide mechanic is a welcome addition, though no substitute for mantling
NEUTRAL:
- the protagonist is no Garrett and the writing is functional, if not particularly engaging
- enemies and certain objects are 2D sprites
- most of the equipment at your disposal is not very useful
CONS:
- lack of in-mission saving will be off-putting to many
- doors automatically closing after a certain time can be irritating
- sliding move can lead to unfortunate accidents on occasion
- guards mostly communicate in grunts, which sometimes makes it challenging to tell in what state they are in
- guards being sprites can make it hard to gauge what direction they are looking in
- lack of mechanics that were present in Thief 1 and 2 limits player options