I have never played the previous Thief games, so my review of this game will not be clouded by nostalgia and unrealistic expectations.
I am a big sucker for stealth and good atmosphere, both of which are found in Thief. The game is dripping with atmosphere, and for the most part this atmosphere will suck you in and keep you coming back for more. This dark, unsettling atmosphere is made even better by the great graphics.
The environments in fear consist of The City and the numerous locations that you visit throughout the game. I was not a big fan of the city. Simply put, it did not satisfy my craving for exploration and going from point A to point B started feeling like a chore after a while. The other locations, on the other hand, were great!
I really enjoyed all eight chapters very much. There are two chapters that stand out; the first is the whore house and the second is the asylum. Those two chapters were extremely atmospheric with great level design. The asylum in particular was extremely scary with a creepy history that you can discover little by little if you take the time to look around. The asylum is definitely my favorite part of the game.
While all of this is great, Thief suffers from a plethora of bugs and annoyances that can ruin the experience for some people. The most prominent of which is the sound design. It is HORRIBLE. Enemies keep spewing out the same crap over and over again. Conversations seem random and characters start talking over each other. Sometimes the music starts playing really loud and you could barely hear anything that is being said. Other times you'd see subtitles without hearing any dialogue. These problems will take the player out of immersion, which is sad considering how good the game looks. There is no excuse for an AAA studio to ship the game with such a messy audio.
The story is also ridiculous. It makes no sense! The ending doesn't answer any questions at all! And it's not like they tried to make the story vague and mysterious and open to interpretation...NO. The game simply fails at presenting its own plot. I don't know, maybe they have sequels planned that are supposed to explain all the answered questions.
The A.I. is extremely stupid, and I'm just going to leave it at that.
Overall the game is good. Thief is definitely not for everybody, but if you can overlook the numerous bugs and weak story, you're in for a very enjoyable game with an amazing atmosphere.