Let’s stop talking about leaks now to talk about… old leaks! Yes in amongst all this frustration and job security issues there was yet another leak of information but this time it was centered around an older game, Thief 2.
Now for those of you that don’t know the Thief series was a collection of first-person stealth games that focused on stealing rather than killing and is generally beloved as a cult classic of the late 90’s and early 2000’s. This leak actually came from an anonymous source and was picked up by a gaming archive group known as ‘The Project Eclipse Team’ and features a prototype of the second game in the series set several months before it’s official release.
The build and all the files that came with it shows off concept artwork, level designs, scrapped enemies and even entire scenarios that never made it into the final game. It even had a level designer, Romain Barrilliot, at Arkane Studios which features some team members from the original design team at Looking Glass Studios (who are now defunct), talking about it and the absolute treasure trove it is of developer insights, old level designs and interesting builds that never saw the light of day.
Obviously I am all for game preservation so something like this is a good leak that finally allows for fans of this series to have some intereresting insights into how the game was built and how the developers felt about it as they worked on it. I think almost all games should be open source and available to archivers once they are past their prime of retail success but that’s just my personal opinion.
That’s all for now, and as always. It’s not just a game, It’s a Life.