Thief is a reboot of the Thief series and throws away most of the lore - there are no Pagans, no Hammers and no Watchers. The game starts when Garrett, a master thief, is on a job with his former apprentice Erin. They run into a mysterious ritual from a faction loosely reminiscent on the Mechanists, and due to unfortunate happenings Erin falls right into the middle of it. Garrett blacks out for a year and awakens in the city which changed to a fascist regime in the meantime. Now Garrett has to use his thieving skills in order to find out what is going on (the common people are affected by a strange disease) and eventually stop the usual conspiracy. The basic structure is similar to Thief : There is a semi-open city hub structured into various districts. Just like in the predecessor, those are divided in loading screens and gradually open up over the course of the game. These can be freely explored until starting a self-contained mission at the designated point. Here lies the main difference to the previous Thief games: instead of sandbox levels, the design is completely modular and can be compared to the Clocktower level in Deadly Shadows . The set-pieces require the player to use their skills and stealth to navigate through. Between missions, Garrett can also find much loot in the city by just moving around and keeping his eyes open. However, the most lucrative is to take optional side missions. Here Garrett has to retrieve a certain object - usually it is just a quick burglary within the city, but sometimes they are real self-contained missions. Of course there is a useful usage for money: visiting a shop and stock up on equipment.
One of the game's special features are the difficulty modes. While there are the usual three standard types - the highest does not allow for kills or civilian knockouts - the player can also add several other difficulty options, e.g. disabling focus, more expensive resources, slower movement, no kills or knockouts, no quicksave or permadeath. Because those reward bonus points for bragging rights, the difficulty can only be changed when starting a new game.
Besides the main campaign, there is also a challenge mode. This mode re-uses some of the game's mission areas and adds special objectives. The modes are Chain & Gain (there is a timer running out which can only be expanded by collecting loot), Chain & Gain Limited (Chain & Gain with an overall time limit) and Special Loot Hunt (finding as much special loot within a time limit by using the "hot and cold" indicators). The goal is a leaderboards high-score.
The game also features magical abilities, such as The swoop move which allows to quickly move forward, and Focus which slows down time and has several useful perks. Those perks have to be unlocked with focus points which are also bought with money.
The PlayStation 4 version uses the DualShock 4 gamepad's light bar to emphasize the effect of being in the shadow (with a dimmed dark blue) or exposed to the light (with a bright white).
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