Subtle Darkness

            Not everything’s as it seems in Thief.

            This is especially the case in Thief: The Dark Project. From the very beginnings of the game at Bafford’s manor, I knew there was more to this game’s story than being a thief. At face value, you’re just a thief going to steal some loot. But what a dark world! The Keepers lurk somewhere in the background; hints of ancient magics, past darkness, and the Pagans show in art and readables; AI converse about the “walled-off section of the City”; and so forth. Together it all works subtly to remind you, the player, that you are moving about in a world with its own history and culture. 

            There’s a sense of unease under everything. It seeps up through the cobblestones of the City streets and through the heavy stone of the nobility’s manors. It can’t be escaped. The technology of the City and the riches of its upper crust can’t contain the past which seeps through the darkness.

            In Thief II, this is not so much the case, though darkness can occasionally be seen with such examples as the catacombs in Eavesdropping, the mage’s home in Life of the Party, and the haunted library in Casing the Joint. But the Mechanist’s twisted technology takes the show.

            Thief III’s story, like the original Thief game's, is ultimately about an ancient evil lurching forth from the past. But even when the story does not explicitly thrust some long dormant monster into the modernized world of the City, there is the sense that something is wrong. There is some evil creeping about everywhere, at any point during most of the first and third Thief games.

Indeed, a major theme in the Thief games is that there is stuff going on in the background. You think this is just about a thief stealing loot? There are greater forces at work here. And poor Garrett always, unwittingly, gets caught up in them.

Everyone's Bad in the City, but Garrett Does Some Good

            There is a small point in irony to be made with the Thief story. Garrett, a thief, is bad. He’s an outlaw whom the City Watch will always chase down on sight. Yet, ironically, he seems to be the only figure in the City who does some good.

            First, Garrett doesn’t mess with anyone. He intentionally keeps a low profile. He doesn’t want anyone to know he’s been in their house, except for the fact of their missing valuables—he’s not out to make a mess or murder people.

            The Hammerites, the Pagans, the Mechanists, and the City Watch all have corruption and evil in their midst. They’ve all done some bad things. So what is Garrett compared to them? He may be the titular Thief, but he’s also the only thing close to a hero the seedy, corrupt City has. He’s like a Keeper. He wants to go unnoticed. He isn’t committed to any group. Detachment is key for the Keepers. Garrett thought he was leaving the Keepers and going his own way, and indeed he did for the most part, but he’s more like one of them than he realizes.

            Whenever Garrett does save the City, which he does in each Thief game, he never does it out of his own good will. He’s always drawn into it through his personal, selfish thieving enterprise. But he does save the City, nonetheless, and it’s the major groups—the supposed ‘law and order’ of this world—that seem time and again to be the ones trying to destroy it.

Technology vs. Magic

          “Hammer, anvil, forge and fire, chase away the hoofed liar; Roof and doorway, block and beam, keep the Trickster from our dreams.”

            So murmurs any given Hammerite guard as they patrol, Garrett listening from the shadows as he sneaks around. The Hammerites are more aware—indeed, it is central to their religious zeal—of what technology means for humanity than anyone else in the City.

            The Thief games hint at a dark past for humanity, when people ran around wild and scared, in the woods, worshipping strange, powerful, and evil gods, and fleeing from monsters. This past bleeds through in the game’s undead and monsters. In the same world as sword-toting guards there are giant spiders, lizard and bug beasts, zombies and ghosts. What do these things harken back to?

            Lord Constantine, or the Trickster, tried to bring back the dark past with his Dark Project. He wanted to blot out the light, have the world ruled by monsters again, and then have the people come to him and worship him as their god. In contrast, Thief II’s Mechanists wanted to bring even more technology to the City, and held an even more zealous hatred of the Pagans and of nature than did the Hammerites.

            Throughout the Thief games there is this dichotomy between the past, nature, and magic, on one side, and the future, civilization, and technology, on the other. It borrows, of course, much from our own world’s history, especially that of Western civilization.

“Vigilance is our shield, which protects us from our squalid past; Knowledge is our weapon, with which we carve a path unto an enlightened future.” 
This also Hammerite guards may say. They operate on a fear of regression into a primeval past. The pagans? They have no conception of progress or time, or at least they desire no progress and want time to stand still. Their world is one only of dances and monsters and darkness, and central within their world is awe shown towards arcane magic.

Thief as Noir

             It’s not rocket science to observe that Thief is akin to a noir film. The game almost always takes place at night; shadows hang over just about every scene; the design of the City gives it an abstract feel; and Garrett, both in demeanor and voice, comes off as a seedy private eye.        

            Thief: The Dark Project’s story could be portrayed as noir. Ken Levine, who contributed to the game’s story, said as much in an Irrational Behavior podcast. Garrett is the private eye, lured into a lucrative job by a sultry woman (here, Victoria), gets embroiled in this job hoping for a big payoff, only to be betrayed in the end, and not only gain nothing but lose something as well (here, his eye).

            Thief’s moodiness is certainly noir. While I wouldn’t describe the game first as being noir, that comparison can understandably be made. This is just a recognition of one of the many influences behind the brilliance of Thief. Add 'noir' to the list of medieval fantasy, D&D, Ultima Underworld, and so on.