Thief of Thieves: Season One

My Playtime: 6.9h (100% achievement, finished the game)
Grindy Achievement(s): No.
Optional Achievement(s): Yes (46 achievements).
Difficult Achievement(s): No.
Intro
Thief of Thieves: Season One is a story-driven, stealth game about Celia, a thief who is doing several heists. In doing so, you are free to do it however you want and choose any option in the dialogues that might or might not impact the future.
Pros:
- Your choice matters
- Multiple ways to solve a level
- Unique storytelling concept that makes you like reading a comic book
Cons:
- Bugs: autosave can randomly corrupt, random softlock
- It's hard to see where the enemies are sometimes due to the camera
- It is sometimes hard to see and walk to the location you want
Specs
Intel Core i5-9300H 2.40GHz, 8GB RAM, NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1650
Should you buy this game?
Yes.
If you like story-driven games with a lot of freedom and don't mind the bugs, buy this game on sale. Don't buy it for the stealth element because it's lackluster.
In-Depth Review
Visuals
Thief of Thieves: Season One has two types of visuals. The story cutscenes look like an animated comic book, while the in-game visuals use top-down, 3D models. The in-game dialogues still use dialogue balloons, though, to preserve the comic book feel. Since the models aren't shown in close range that often, they are hardly noticeable, but I can see them using outlines just like how it was drawn in comic books. Most of the NPCs don't have the liberty to be drawn that way, although the cell shading technique still works well to conceal them.
Story
The story is about Celia, a young thief apprentice who is stealing some objects with the help of her teammates. There are 4 volumes that tell about her 4 heists. All volumes can stand on their own, except the last one which incorporates part of the first 3 volumes in it. The game is full of dialogues at the beginning and the end of the volume, where you can influence the result to some extent.
Your choice matters. You can answer the dialogues from several answers, which can influence minor things like your relationship with people, which in turn might impact their future decisions. Your response also can affect the minor part of the heist part, giving you more or fewer options to work with. The heist will always work as planned, but the details will be up to you. I like how the game does this; it seems as if there is no limit to your choices.
The approach of using a comic book style gives a unique take on the story. I felt like I was reading a comic book, and it helped to capture the expression or even show cool scenes for the event. However, the dialogue will proceed automatically, and there is no way to go back or even pause it. You can only fast-forward a dialogue to show the next one, and you'll be doomed if you press that when the next dialogue shows up. That being said, there is no actual fast-forward option for a second playthrough - you are forced to rewatch the whole cutscene again with a bit of fast-forwarding by mashing either the A or space button in some dialogues.
The Game
Gameplay
As I said before, the game is split into two parts: the story-heavy part and the action part. In the story-heavy one, you can express your feelings by responding from several options. I believe silence is also an option since there is a time limit for your response, but I never try to do that. Your response might or might not change something, which will help you in the action part.
The heist itself is usually broken down into several sections. You need to do some preliminary research before you do the actual thing, after all, or maybe you just need to set up some things beforehand. These heists usually have several objectives that you can do, with some optional ones in between. These optional ones usually affect minor things in the story later on.
You are free to do the heist however you want. There is usually more than one way to do it, and you need to figure it out on your own. You'll find more options that you can take as you explore and gather intel from people. I like how they are doing it like this since I could do a trial and error to see what works and not.
Some QTE and minigames are also available. They are not hard, but the QTE might catch you off guard if you are not prepared.
Stealth
The stealth part isn't that clear, though. I thought I had to avoid from getting seen by everyone, but it turns out that you only need to avoid being seen by some guards. Other people might take notice if you do certain actions, but I didn't know that at first and tried to not be seen at all. That being said, it was hard to avoid being seen by someone.
First of all, your camera angle sucks. You can only change into two different angles, and sometimes, it's not enough to see where the guards are. There might be a marker indicating where they are and whether they have seen you, but it's often not helpful since the marker is too big for their actual location.
Second, sometimes it's hard to walk where you want. I sometimes couldn't see where I was when I was in dark areas - I had to move around randomly until I saw where I was. Walking on a narrow bridge or container that acts as a bridge also feels weird since you can fall off if you are not careful, and the camera angle doesn't help with that.
Third, the surveillance cameras seem to be bugged. I had the most issues with them because I sometimes couldn't see their cone light. The cone would suddenly show up when I came into their range, but there was no way I could know that there was a camera there without me remembering it beforehand. I did spot the cameras in the preliminary tasks before the actual heist, which might have affected them not showing up if I hadn't spotted it beforehand.
Luckily, the guards are mostly dumb. They can hardly see you in the dark unless you are very close to them, provided that they are not on alert. Heck, there was a guard standing to guard a gate and I could pass the gate from the corner without him noticing.
Length and Difficulty
Steam says that I finished it in 6.9h, but I believe my playtime was longer. I was disconnected and lost 4h of playtime stat from my Steam Client after I was connected again and I think that playtime wasn't reflected in Steam. As for the difficulty, the game is fairly easy to do. Checkpoints are abundant and you can try finding an alternative if you are stuck in one section. When I had an issue with those cameras, I found that I could disable them, and that solved all of my problems.
Issues
There was one instance when I lost my autosave. The save was gone when I restarted the game, although luckily, I still can replay from the volume select. I also experience a softlock where a cutscene won't trigger and I can't move since the game thinks I'm still on the cutscene.
Conclusion
Thief of Thieves: Season One has potential, but it was bogged down by its poor stealth mechanic. I like how you are free to do whatever you want in the heist and how your choice affects a lot of things. If you like these kinds of games that promote your freedom, I could recommend this but do buy it on a sale because it was bugged and the stealth mechanic ruins the game.

This is THE PEAK of comic to video game adaptation!
From the absolutely beautiful and stunning visuals, with incredibly good stylization, to the amazing sound design and voices, this game hit absolutely all the right notes when it came to immersing me into the story.
The background and the playable stages we so detailed and well crafted, yet they never felt cluttered and never detracted from the actual events unfolding over them. All due to the genius of the inherent comic book style. The hard shadows and the chat bubbles, which are staples of this genre of media, fit so well in this game. By leaving everything to silhouettes and a few hard contrasting colors, the game really gave me the impression of being a sneaky thief in the shadows. Also the use of the chat bubbles really struck me as an ingenious and faithful way to include the subtitles without feeling like they detract from the scene presented. By having the cutscenes play out in panels, like in a comic book, the developers could predict where to place the "subtitles" so not to disturb the scene, something you can't do with the traditional method of displaying them.
The story is very good and it's pacing is truly well thought out. It never feels like you linger in a place more then you have to, or that you are held up from the action by a conversation. The addition of timed answers to the interactions kept me invested and paying attention to what is happening.
From what i have gathered, this is just the first of 7 installments this series will have, with a story already tried and tested through the gauntlet of The Free Market. The fact that the first three issues of the comic book sold out upon release means that this is just the beginning of an astonishing story.
This game truly captivated me and introduced me to a whole new franchise! It really got me curious about the comic books as well. The sequel can't come soon enough
P.S. : My only grievance with this game are the controls and the movement who felt kind of stiff. But i think that's all due to the clear control scheme having controllers in mind. And sadly, i played this on a PC with a keyboard and mouse.
P.P.S. : I will definitely connect a controller to my PC when i'll do my achievement hunting to overcome this mild inconvenience. Also, achievements do add a neat little incentive to replay the game and see what you've missed the first time around.

Good game, especially if you like stealh games.
If has some bugs just restart the level

This is a different kind of game, at least as compared to the ones I've played before. If you could ignore a few issues (which I'd pretty much call nitpicks), you have a lot going in this game. There's great-looking comic-style visuals, amazing voice-acting, interesting level design, some unique gameplay elements, and interesting story-telling. The only reason for me to put this one aside (at least for now) is due to my growing collection of titles in my library that I'd probably need to take care of before I'd return to this one sometime later. I'd highly recommend this game, and I'm sure you won't be disappointed.

Pretty good story game, not too difficult and interesting characters

criminal behavior is always fun! who doesnt love a bit of stealing and lying from time to time?
theres numerous ways to "change your adventure" in the heists, so it gives a more customized feel to your gameplay. however, there are some pretty extreme limitations to what you can actually do. youve gotta do a lot of stealthing around, and if someone spots you, its basically game over unless you can get a few nice dodges in.
the game is also really janky at times. it sometimes bugs out, where the npcs get stuck in certain areas and you have to reload to you last checkpoint. ive had numerous situations where the game freezes at major points of the story and ive had to replay the entire level because it wouldnt progress, no matter how many times i reloaded the checkpoint. there have also been times where the comic strips from the story get stuck on my screen during gameplay. these went away once i hit the next cutscene, and reloading would have likely also fixed the issue.
overall, the story and artwork for the game is great, but the game itself is just pretty average, if not subpar. however, the bugs and glitches to the game arent really game breaking, so id still recommend. however, if they ever release a thief of thieves season two, i dont think ill be playing it.

Well this was overall quite good game, there were moments where it was good, there were moments where it was buggy and bad. I guess it's worth buying in bundle or on some bigger sale, but I definietely wouldn't recommend buying for full price.