HomeKeeper of the Prophecies Ep 4: Oracle of the Prophets
A Keeper of the Prophecies
a Thief 2 campaign by frobber
Episode 4: Oracle of the Prophets
Release Version 1a
==========================================================================
RECOMMENDED: CLOSE ALL OTHER PROGRAMS AND PLAY ONLY ON A FRESH RE-BOOT
==========================================================================
Overview
The Keepers have sent you to the “other side of time” – wherever that may be! Since time in the normal
sense does not seem to exist in this place, your pocket watch is frozen and you are no longer getting sicker.
But all is not well.
A permanent antidote can be found here somewhere. That is what the Keepers had hoped. So you must
now explore this strange world to find what the answer may be – and a way home.
Sometimes the cure is worse than the disease.
Supported Features:
Custom weather system
Custom fog system
EAX (environmental sound)
Absolute Bare Minimum System Requirements:
600 Mhz CPU
TNT2 graphics card (or equivalent)
128 MB RAM
Thief 2 Patched to Version 1.18 (unpatched Thief 2 not tested, but may work)
Minimum Recommended System:
1.2 GHz CPU or faster
GeForce 4+ graphics card (equivalent or faster)
256 MB RAM or more
EAX compatible Sound Card (highly recommended)
CREDITS for Oracle of the Prophets
Voice Acting
SlyFoxx – Garrett, Arcelious, The Guardian
frobber – Karras (on Victrolla)
Also, lots borrowed from System Shock 2 and various free (and legal) on-line sound sites.
Design Elements
frobber – mapper, story-writer, overall slave-driver (and slave)
Cyberblutch – custom AI models
Shadowspawn – custom objects (including one animated AI)
Thorin Oakenshield – frobber logo AVI 'movie' animation
Purah - with permission, textures borrowed from the Calendra's series
Saturnine – CamVator technology
SilentSleep – fade-up from black technology
Goober – comments and suggestions
Play Testers
Nightwalker
SlyFoxx
Peter Smith
Jericho
Dennis Nixon
Hawklette
Griffin
Madwolf
Shadowspawn
Goober
Dafydd ab Hugh
ffox
Audio
A fair amount was record and altered by myself. I have also sampled a bit from at least one well-known
cultural icon and downloaded from numerous free (legal) sound sites.
Sound was processed using CoolEdit 2000.
Playing Information
Do not save and reload when Garrett is attached to a CamVator. There are two CamVators in this mission
and in both cases he will stop at the end and stay attached for a while. If you save and reload, at best, things
may seem screwy; and at worst, you may break the mission so it can not be won. (For those not sure
of what I mean – “CamVator” is short for camera elevator, where Garrett is attached to an invisible moving
platform so the player’s viewpoint can be transported as though watching a movie).
Gravity is that of another world – about the same as Mars. It is part of the design to assume that Garrett can
therefore climb on very steep angles and jump down from very high places which normally would be out of
the question. Just because something looks nearly impossible, it may not be – and may, in fact, be required.
Some odd fogging effects are implemented using a custom technique, so it does not matter if you have
these settings on or off in the Thief 2 configuration screen. It will work either way.
The lighting may seem a tad bright. This is done for those machines which display the game too darkly.
If you usually run at maximum brightness, your game may not appear as realistic as I have planned. Use the
minus (-) and plus (+) keys to adjust your screen for a proper on-screen feeling.
Because of the complexity of the terrain, EAX ambient sound is highly recommended. Typical 2-speaker
or headphone use simply may not tell you enough about your threat situation, and you will be at a decided
disadvantage. Having said this, I have most definitely tweaked audio for 2-speaker and headphone use – it
just isn’t as useful as EAX 4-speaker sound.
In four cases, the player must touch (frob) an object from the inside. This may be mentioned in a mission
journal, but not always – so I also mention it here to limit confusion.
As with all of my missions, except for the level of annoyance, there is no real difference between Normal,
Hard, and Expert. So it’s really a matter of how long you want to play, and how annoyed you are willing
to become.
There is still more to come… If you win this mission, there will be a "to be continued" screen at the end.
You have been warned!
Oddities and minor bugs that won’t be fixed
GeForce 2 graphics cards may cause the sky effect to flash with an occasional dark triangle. This is a
graphics board issue, and I have not seen it on other machines. It only happens rarely, and since I have
limited the CPU needed to run the sky effect as much as I can bare, this will remain as it is.
The sky sometimes changes brightness abruptly. At first I tried to fix this, but have decided that it merely
adds to the odd feeling of the place – and since I can’t fix this, I declare it a “feature” rather than a bug.
Using Windows Media Player tends to prevent Thief movies from playing on many PCs. If you have been
playing any sort of media using Windows Media Player prior to playing Thief, you may need to re-boot
your computer unless you know how to disable Media Player from being the default program for AVIs.
General Information
Game: Thief 2: The Metal Age
Mission Title: Oracle of the Prophets
Filename: oracle_v1a.zip / miss22.mis
Difficulty Settings: Yes
Equipment store: Nothing for sale
Map / automap: No map – this is “the other side of time” and there are no mapmakers there!
New graphics: Yes
New sounds: Yes
New objects: Yes
New AI: Yes
Custom sky: Yes
Terrain: Completely built from scratch
Build time:12 weeks from first brush to beta testing
Multi language support: Only English
CamVators: Yes, at the beginning and end of the mission.
Briefing AVI: “frobber” logo, only
Revision History for Oracle of the Prophets
Version 1a – December 20, 2003 – Initial Release
Copyright
Subject to the copyright limitations specified on the Thief 2 game CD...
All original content of this fan mission is copyright (c) 2000-2003 by frobber, a.k.a., Ken Ramsley.
Hosting of this fan mission is allowed on any public or private network so long as distribution is at no extra
charge (beyond normal access to the network) and the zip file is kept intact and unmodified.
Re-distribution of an altered version of this mission including changes to any supporting files is not
permitted.
Without my permission, an unaltered version of this fan mission may be included on a CD/DVD-release
mission pack, provided that this CD is sold for the cost of production and shipping only, or is a freebie
given away in some other form such as a magazine-published mission pack promo.
Disclaimers
Any resemblance in the real world to events or people found in this fan mission are entirely unintended,
purely coincidental, and a complete figment of your imagination.
This fan mission is not made by nor supported by Looking Glass Studios (RIP), Eidos Interactive or Ion
Storm of Austin, TX.
Support
Post a message in one the following locations. Someone there will have an answer to most questions:
Fan Mission section of the Thief Underground Forums
http://www.3dactionplanet.com/thief/
Fan Mission section of the TTLG forums
http://www.ttlg.com/forums
Eidos Thief Missions Forum
http://www.eidos.com
If are really stuck, you can write to me… frobber@edanet.com … and I’ll see if I can help.
(I also enjoy feedback, criticism, and any other sort of player mail.)
BTW
Here are some of the places where this mission was built and tested…
Commuter train, Ashland to Boston, MA
South Station in Boston.
Flying to and from Washington.
Various airline terminals.
Accela train Boston to Washington DC
Union Station Washington DC.
Various restaurants while waiting for food.
Various hotel rooms instead of sleeping.
Back seat of various limousines.
(Occasionally) at home in my office.
Enjoy!
a Thief 2 campaign by frobber
Episode 4: Oracle of the Prophets
Release Version 1a
==========================================================================
RECOMMENDED: CLOSE ALL OTHER PROGRAMS AND PLAY ONLY ON A FRESH RE-BOOT
==========================================================================
Overview
The Keepers have sent you to the “other side of time” – wherever that may be! Since time in the normal
sense does not seem to exist in this place, your pocket watch is frozen and you are no longer getting sicker.
But all is not well.
A permanent antidote can be found here somewhere. That is what the Keepers had hoped. So you must
now explore this strange world to find what the answer may be – and a way home.
Sometimes the cure is worse than the disease.
Supported Features:
Custom weather system
Custom fog system
EAX (environmental sound)
Absolute Bare Minimum System Requirements:
600 Mhz CPU
TNT2 graphics card (or equivalent)
128 MB RAM
Thief 2 Patched to Version 1.18 (unpatched Thief 2 not tested, but may work)
Minimum Recommended System:
1.2 GHz CPU or faster
GeForce 4+ graphics card (equivalent or faster)
256 MB RAM or more
EAX compatible Sound Card (highly recommended)
CREDITS for Oracle of the Prophets
Voice Acting
SlyFoxx – Garrett, Arcelious, The Guardian
frobber – Karras (on Victrolla)
Also, lots borrowed from System Shock 2 and various free (and legal) on-line sound sites.
Design Elements
frobber – mapper, story-writer, overall slave-driver (and slave)
Cyberblutch – custom AI models
Shadowspawn – custom objects (including one animated AI)
Thorin Oakenshield – frobber logo AVI 'movie' animation
Purah - with permission, textures borrowed from the Calendra's series
Saturnine – CamVator technology
SilentSleep – fade-up from black technology
Goober – comments and suggestions
Play Testers
Nightwalker
SlyFoxx
Peter Smith
Jericho
Dennis Nixon
Hawklette
Griffin
Madwolf
Shadowspawn
Goober
Dafydd ab Hugh
ffox
Audio
A fair amount was record and altered by myself. I have also sampled a bit from at least one well-known
cultural icon and downloaded from numerous free (legal) sound sites.
Sound was processed using CoolEdit 2000.
Playing Information
Do not save and reload when Garrett is attached to a CamVator. There are two CamVators in this mission
and in both cases he will stop at the end and stay attached for a while. If you save and reload, at best, things
may seem screwy; and at worst, you may break the mission so it can not be won. (For those not sure
of what I mean – “CamVator” is short for camera elevator, where Garrett is attached to an invisible moving
platform so the player’s viewpoint can be transported as though watching a movie).
Gravity is that of another world – about the same as Mars. It is part of the design to assume that Garrett can
therefore climb on very steep angles and jump down from very high places which normally would be out of
the question. Just because something looks nearly impossible, it may not be – and may, in fact, be required.
Some odd fogging effects are implemented using a custom technique, so it does not matter if you have
these settings on or off in the Thief 2 configuration screen. It will work either way.
The lighting may seem a tad bright. This is done for those machines which display the game too darkly.
If you usually run at maximum brightness, your game may not appear as realistic as I have planned. Use the
minus (-) and plus (+) keys to adjust your screen for a proper on-screen feeling.
Because of the complexity of the terrain, EAX ambient sound is highly recommended. Typical 2-speaker
or headphone use simply may not tell you enough about your threat situation, and you will be at a decided
disadvantage. Having said this, I have most definitely tweaked audio for 2-speaker and headphone use – it
just isn’t as useful as EAX 4-speaker sound.
In four cases, the player must touch (frob) an object from the inside. This may be mentioned in a mission
journal, but not always – so I also mention it here to limit confusion.
As with all of my missions, except for the level of annoyance, there is no real difference between Normal,
Hard, and Expert. So it’s really a matter of how long you want to play, and how annoyed you are willing
to become.
There is still more to come… If you win this mission, there will be a "to be continued" screen at the end.
You have been warned!
Oddities and minor bugs that won’t be fixed
GeForce 2 graphics cards may cause the sky effect to flash with an occasional dark triangle. This is a
graphics board issue, and I have not seen it on other machines. It only happens rarely, and since I have
limited the CPU needed to run the sky effect as much as I can bare, this will remain as it is.
The sky sometimes changes brightness abruptly. At first I tried to fix this, but have decided that it merely
adds to the odd feeling of the place – and since I can’t fix this, I declare it a “feature” rather than a bug.
Using Windows Media Player tends to prevent Thief movies from playing on many PCs. If you have been
playing any sort of media using Windows Media Player prior to playing Thief, you may need to re-boot
your computer unless you know how to disable Media Player from being the default program for AVIs.
General Information
Game: Thief 2: The Metal Age
Mission Title: Oracle of the Prophets
Filename: oracle_v1a.zip / miss22.mis
Difficulty Settings: Yes
Equipment store: Nothing for sale
Map / automap: No map – this is “the other side of time” and there are no mapmakers there!
New graphics: Yes
New sounds: Yes
New objects: Yes
New AI: Yes
Custom sky: Yes
Terrain: Completely built from scratch
Build time:12 weeks from first brush to beta testing
Multi language support: Only English
CamVators: Yes, at the beginning and end of the mission.
Briefing AVI: “frobber” logo, only
Revision History for Oracle of the Prophets
Version 1a – December 20, 2003 – Initial Release
Copyright
Subject to the copyright limitations specified on the Thief 2 game CD...
All original content of this fan mission is copyright (c) 2000-2003 by frobber, a.k.a., Ken Ramsley.
Hosting of this fan mission is allowed on any public or private network so long as distribution is at no extra
charge (beyond normal access to the network) and the zip file is kept intact and unmodified.
Re-distribution of an altered version of this mission including changes to any supporting files is not
permitted.
Without my permission, an unaltered version of this fan mission may be included on a CD/DVD-release
mission pack, provided that this CD is sold for the cost of production and shipping only, or is a freebie
given away in some other form such as a magazine-published mission pack promo.
Disclaimers
Any resemblance in the real world to events or people found in this fan mission are entirely unintended,
purely coincidental, and a complete figment of your imagination.
This fan mission is not made by nor supported by Looking Glass Studios (RIP), Eidos Interactive or Ion
Storm of Austin, TX.
Support
Post a message in one the following locations. Someone there will have an answer to most questions:
Fan Mission section of the Thief Underground Forums
http://www.3dactionplanet.com/thief/
Fan Mission section of the TTLG forums
http://www.ttlg.com/forums
Eidos Thief Missions Forum
http://www.eidos.com
If are really stuck, you can write to me… frobber@edanet.com … and I’ll see if I can help.
(I also enjoy feedback, criticism, and any other sort of player mail.)
BTW
Here are some of the places where this mission was built and tested…
Commuter train, Ashland to Boston, MA
South Station in Boston.
Flying to and from Washington.
Various airline terminals.
Accela train Boston to Washington DC
Union Station Washington DC.
Various restaurants while waiting for food.
Various hotel rooms instead of sleeping.
Back seat of various limousines.
(Occasionally) at home in my office.
Enjoy!
• Uploaded 20.12.2003 • Size 40.87 Mb