The Results of the 1999 Survey

Assassins

Well... Assassins. The absolute favorite mission of the subjects of my survey. But... not of me.

Okay. Assassins. The mission where you start in Farkus' shop and see him die. The mission where you trail the two assassins, and follow them to the house of Ramirez. The mission where you - if you have been far too long in the gameforum - know where the last piece of 100 loot is. The mission where you have to grab the silver poker, and Ramirez purse. The mission, where, sadly, not all the guards are female (oh, another hint that someone in here spends too much time in the gameforum, hehe). The mission where you set off the alarm, and have to find your way back to Home Turf. The mission where Home Turf looks oddly similar to the starting area of Lost City. The mission with the odd room full of guards in the 1 floor. The mission with the odd Burrick area in the basement. The mission with the city roofs. The mission with the suddenly appearing 4 black dressed guards in the garden. The mission with the incriminating stuff in Ramirez' bedroom and in Ramirez' bath.

Hm. A mission that is cool, indeed. I think I am in the mood for the data analysis now. *g

(Prepare that I have done a similar long summary for my most preferred missions, too. *eg)

[Descriptive Data], [Scores], [Comments], [Final Comments]

Descriptive Data about this mission

The absolute favorite map of the majority of the subjects, no questions. And it has also a not very large Std. Nevertheless: Note the fact that some people gave that map a very low rating. But the percentage of those people is very small.

The distribution of the scores

Score	N	%	Y-axis: "N", X-axis: "Score"
1	87	38.7
2	43	19.1
3	26	11.6
4	25	11.1
5	16	7.1
6	8	3.6
7	7	3.1
8	4	1.8
9	3	1.3
10	2	0.9
11	1	0.4
12	1	0.4
13	2	0.9

Well... Some people might have given that mission a low rating. But they were in the minority, so to say. Okay. 70 % of the people considered this mission as one of the top 3. And the number of people who gave it the score 1 is amazingly high.

No other correlation was significant.

Another short (and maybe harsh) summary about the people who loved Assassins: They loved probably the missions with a very 'normal' feeling. They disliked the horror or the creepyness or the tomb raiderish feelings in RTC, THC, and Lost City. And they disliked the really mad feeling in the last 3 missions. Sadly, or happily, neither age, gender, education, nor times played correlated significantly. Else I would have enjoyed to add in this harsh analysis the fact that these people most probably had played the game not so many times, but well, then not. ;-)

Comments

Short Summary

Well, most of the comments were of course about the fact that the people loved the mission. That they felt like real thieves. That they loved the city streets, the many possibilites, the non linearity, the human opponents.

The negative points were mostly pointed to the fact that the mission should have been larger. Yes, the probably largest mission of the game should have been more enlarged. I think that the point 'Trailing the assassins becomes dull after the third time' is a really good point: I doubt that this mission had such a extreme replayability factor as other missions. And another point was the similarity of Assassins to Bafford. Both had a similar plotline: Get in and steal a valuable item. Both had human opponents. If the game had had only missions like these two, it would have been more boring, IMHO.

Positive Comments

The realistic atmosphere.
Human opponents.
The architecture and the wonderful design.
The conversations of the guards.
Lots of sneaking.
The sightseeing aspect in the city.
'This is what thieving really is.'
The shadowing the assassins.
The plotline.
Very non-linear. Lots of possible strategies.
The motivation of Garrett: Revenge.
The secret passages.
The changing routes of the assassins while the shadowing part.
The assassination at the beginning.
'The best. The perfect Thief mission.'
'Half of the fun of this mission is the excellent plot setup.'
'Loved jumping from roof to roof.'
'Following people is groovy.'

Negative Comments

It looses steam at the end.
Too few things to read.
Too short. It's too easy and too quick to finish.
Guards are too weak.
City was a bit empty.
'Silly that the mission started out finding who wants me dead and then taking some little purse.'
It was somehow obvious that the initial objective would change.
Not hard enough.
The mansion was too simple.
Killing Ramirez was too difficult.
'Lotsa suspense. But the third time you follow them, it gets annoying.'
The shadowing part was too difficult.
No clue for the secret passage with the silver poker.
Entering the other houses in the city was not possible.

Some personal comments

Yes, I like Assassins, too. I love it not so much as I love other missions, but I like it. No question. The problem is that it is not so scary as other places, and that the guards are very predictable. Maybe I should try other approaches, and not always the very sneaky approach. I have to admit that I never had to fight two or more guards down there in the basement.

It is the most favorite mission of the game for the very majority of the people who have played Thief. But I doubt still, that I would have enjoyed the game this much, if it had only missions like that. I prefer to be scared, not to be in realistic settings.