Thief Gold, solely because of the Cathedral levels.

I'll just say up front that I prefer the original Dark Project to Thief Gold and think they should do something similar to Broken Sword about making the original available, but Thief II is just one of those rare beasts that improve upon everything that was already great about the original... very much the Godfather II of video games.

I would like Deadly Shadows a lot more if the interim between missions was less obnoxious. (any ways to make it less so?)

Thief II, like the poster above stated, has cameras. Everything else about the game (even the meh missions aren't so bad) is nice, except for those damned cameras.

They are the same for me. Their differences compliment and complete one another. I cannot discriminate. But i prefer thief Gold AND 2 over Thief: Deadly Shadows. Give me back my Looking Glass and Dark Engine!!! And constantine's sword!

Of course Thief Gold has less bugs, it is the second edition of the game. Thief 2 never got a second edition.

Thief Gold.

Thief Gold has less bugs. Mainly because Looking Glass shut down shortly after Thief 2's release.
Thief Gold has more variety when it comes to missions. Thief 2 feels very limited in that respect though a couple of them are better than any Thief Gold mission.
Thief Gold has more open-ended maps. Thief 2's maps are "tighter" as the developers said, which I'll translate to "less open-ended". There's very little you can do with Rope Arrows in Thief 2.
Thief 2 does away with some annoying elements of the first game (undead/beasts) only to introduce equally bad ones (watchers/iron beasts).
Much of the game's lore is introduced through the abundance of texts and books found in Thief Gold. Comparably, Thief 2 feels like an expansion that focuses entirely on the Mechanists.


I'll admit however that Thief Gold's map system is a pathetic piece of crap. Thief 2 also has a better villain, and some pretty good System Shock 2 inspired horror elements (ghosts/servants).

I picked my favorite when I picked my picture on gog - it's the cover of my favorite game, for those who want a puzzle.

But I noticed a few themes reading through these posts:
1. Enemies who survive blackjacking (robots, zombies) are the least popular. Either the atmosphere was spoiled by zombies, or spoiled by robots.
2. People who picked Thief 1 favored it's story and atmosphere. It really was a dark project, in many senses.
3. People picking Thief 2 liked the level size, and the improved engine. They got more out of each level.

For me Thief 2, because of those Cathedral levels.

Not just those though, I didn't really like any of the undead dungeon crawly levels. I much prefer the city based thievery of Thief 2. That's also what I imagined the first game to be like when I first heard about the series.

I know a lot of people do enjoy the undead levels, but not me. It was Return of the Cathedral where I actually gave up on the game, watched the cutscenes online and started Thief 2. Mostly because it came after a series of missions I found frustrating: I got lost in The Lost City, then hated the hidden switches stuff in Undercover, and then the cathedral gave me more freaking zombies.

I also got lost in The Lost City and I didn't like the hidden switches at all in Undercover. I'm currently at Return to the Cathedral but I had to take a break as I'm not in a mood for yet another undead fight.

I prefer Thief 2! Better missions, better story, better enemies, and better overall!

I like them all, including thief 3 (no idea why some call it trash) for different reasons. I hear you on some of the more convoluted levels in gold though. Especially the cathedral and the one with the switches. Oh we're gonna make you find every switch, but give you no clues as to where they are XD I think I just looked up a vid in the end to find them. In fact there was more vid-finding for the first game than for the second so far. But at the same time the monster levels in gold nicely broke up the regular ones. Even if there were a bit too many in the end. I havn't yet finished thief 2 so maybe my opinion on them will change (just finished the rooftop/ skyscraper one which was pretty great).

Fantastically written, both games had things that spoiled it, monsters or robots. But thief 2 built upon TDP and added more gadgets, larger levels, an improved engine. But best of all geared more towards being a thief than fighting and sneaking your way through dungeons. That was what i liked so much more about T2. I felt like I was doing more thievery than TDP. I also enjoyed to atmosphere of T2 including the soundtrack.

I have completed Thief Gold and have just started Thief 2: The Metal Age. At this point, I would say that I prefer Thief Gold. The reason is the variety of settings in Thief Gold. I may change my mind once I get further into Thief 2.

Thief Gold, just for the haunted levels and the hammer haunts in particular (still trying to work out all the things they are chanting).

I enjoyed thief gold more than thief 2. In thief gold the levels were much more maze like and complex, many of them didn't even follow real world logic, this may be a downside for many people but for me its a good thing. In thief 2 the levels are more grounded and reality and the design of the levels seem more tightly together and realistic, so the feeling of exploring the unknown is mostly gone aside from a few exceptions. I also enjoyed the atmosphere more in thief 1 than 2. I would take exploring abandoned tombs with traps and ghosts and zombies over mechanistic towers or facilities full of annoying robots any day. It may seem like i'm really hating on thief 2 but i'm not, i really like thief 2 and there are a few levels that are surpass many of thief 1's levels like "life of the party".