Games that should be remastered

Is the "sneaker" really a genre? I'm not 100% sure, but I can definitely say these games don't really fit in any other category. You know the ones - double agent, espionage, thievery. There are quite a few games in here, done in both first and third person. Many of them are good as concepts, but the individual games aren't so memorable, like the Hitman franchise. However, some of them are just truly great games in and of themselves.

You may wonder why you don't see Splinter Cell on here... but honestly, is DirectX 8 so long ago that you actually need a remaster yet? I didn't think so.

Metal Gear Solid

This is one of the few console games to make the list. Made in 1998 by Konami, MGS was the first in the Metal Gear series to take the jump to a fully 3D engine. Though it's actually the fourth game in the series, it's the only one that many people know before the PS2 game Metal Gear Solid 3: Snake Eater. Initially MGS was released exclusively for the PSOne to some pretty massive critical acclaim, eventually earning both a PC and GameCube port. It has come to my attention after numerous comments that the GameCube version is indeed a full remaster (I had researched this pretty well and never saw that much of an update, but not played it personally) - however, I'd still love to see this game with some DX10 shine on it.

The story follows our hero Solid Snake through a cold and lonely mission into a nuclear facility overrun by a terrorist group. Hideo Kojima, the creator of the game, carefully scripted the story (which unravels via cinematics and radio communication) to slowly unveil Solid Snake as a complex, troubled character in a manipulative and dangerous world. He starts out revealing little, but as revelations in his mission shed more light on parts of his past that he doesn't know, he begins to divulge more of what he does know. The game is probably the most complete in the series story-wise, and easily sucks you in from beginning to end even if you've never played any of the previous or later games.

Rather than playing as an invincible hero designed to eradicate every bad guy still breathing, MGS relies strongly on stealth based gameplay. Though there are many times when fighting is unavoidable, levels were carefully constructed to allow multiple methods through most of its plot. Kojima started out in 1995 to make "the best Playstation game ever," and many feel he didn't miss his mark. He was so intent to develop a real-world experience that he even had SWAT teams give his designers training in weapons and techniques, and forced his artists to develop every single desk in the game individually. "If the player isn't tricked into believing that the world is real, then there's no point in making the game," he said in an interview.

Though the years haven't quite made the title totally obsolete (it's one of the best-looking games ever released for the original Playstation), it is certainly starting to show its age. It would be nice to see Solid Snake get a bit of an update without losing such a well-written story.

Thief Gold

Garrett the footpad is a character many of you will be instantly familiar with. Who here that even had a computer in 1998 wasn't getting lost in the shadows, water arrow in hand? Thief was pretty ahead of its time graphically, and its gameplay was something never before seen - an FPS where shooting was not only not your best option, but often your worst. Instead, the game focuses on cloak-and-dagger techniques, and it is possible to get through it without ever bloodying a single guard.

The original game was released in 1998, but the Thief Gold release in 1999 included three more levels that really belonged in the game to begin with. The story follows Garrett, a master thief with a bit of a chip on his shoulder but a great love of his job. Though it starts out wandering through mansions and stealing loot to fill your coffers in "The City," the game's scope gets larger expands to take you through long-forgotten ruins filled with monsters as you uncover an ancient mystery.

Though Thief II: Metal Age is often considered the best game in the series due to its thievery-based level designs (rather than the adventure that Garrett gets into in the first one), its plot is considerably weaker. In fact, the guys over at Looking Glass Studios said that the levels were designed first, and a plot then was created to fit them. That being said, however, nobody can say they didn't listen - the choice to design it like that was due to an incredible fanbase begging for more levels in The City. It was an admirable successor to Thief, and its own Gold version was in the works when Looking Glass went under in 2000.

Thief: Deadly Shadows, on the other hand, is often considered the death of the great franchise - it was developed by Ion Storm and was forced by Eidos to be a joint game between the original XBox and PC. Because Eidos was attempting to expand its own scope into the console market at the time, the developers were handcuffed to designing for the XBox and then just porting it to the PC. Because of this, it suffered from relatively poor graphics for the time, bad breakups between levels (which increased load times dramatically and needlessly for PC), and an interface designed for console play.

In some ways, my wish to see this great game remastered is already underway - some talented guys are making a total conversion known as The Dark Mod using the Doom 3 engine. Unfortunately, it's unlikely that this will contain the original levels and well-balanced gameplay of the first Thief. It would be nice to see a real publisher pick these guys up and give them the money and time to really recreate this great game. In the meantime, I guess we're just stuck with GarrettLoader, a freeware port designed to play the original games and fan levels.