Essential Mods for the Thief Series

The Thief series began in 1998 with Thief: The Dark Project, which was later enhanced with Thief: Gold a year later. This, along with Thief II: The Metal Age in 2000, remain the unparalleled kings of stealth games. As expected for classic PC games, they are very moddable. The mods below will allow you to enjoy these games at their best.

We will even include a mod list for Thief: Deadly Shadows, the third game which didn’t approach the greatness of the first two games but is still worth playing unlike the 2014 Thief reboot.

Note: The GOG version already comes with widescreen compatibility, so skip step 2 if you have the GOG version.

1. Launch the game to the main menu for the first time, then exit the game.
2. If not using the GOG version, install TFix, the unofficial patch. If you are using the GOG version then skip this step.
3. Install Thief Gold HD Texture Mod.
4. Run the NewDark Graphics Settings tool that came with the above mod, choose the settings you like including water settings. The mod should’ve provided a desktop shortcut for this, if not you can find the tool in Thief’s installation folder.
5. Install Thief 1 Ultimate Difficulty Mod. You can read the full changelog on that page. It really improves the game balance, especially by making AI less dumb and deaf.
6. Install Thief Sound Effects Enhancement Pack
7. Install the latest OpenAL Soft release; backup the OpenAL32.dll file in your Thief Gold directory, copy bin\win32\soft_oal.dll from the OpenAL Soft download to your Thief Gold directory and rename it to OpenAL32.dll. Read more about the installation here.

That’s all for the first game. For more details on Thief Gold HD Texture Mod, read this.

Note: The GOG version already comes with widescreen compatibility, so skip step 2 if you have the GOG version.

1. Launch the game to the main menu for the first time, then exit the game.
2. If not using the GOG version, install T2Fix, the unofficial patch. If you are using the GOG version then skip this step.
3. Install Thief 2 HD Texture Mod.
4. Run the NewDark Graphics Settings tool that came with the above mod, choose the settings you like including water settings. The mod should’ve provided a desktop shortcut for this, if not you can find the tool in Thief II’s installation folder.
5. Install the standalone expansion, Thief 2X: Shadows of the Metal Age. It installs as a fan mission for Thief II.
6. Install Thief 2X HD Texture Mod. This installs over the Thief 2X fan mission from the previous step.
7. Install Thief II Sound Effects Enhancement Pack
8. Install the latest OpenAL Soft release; backup the OpenAL32.dll file in your Thief II directory, copy bin\win32\soft_oal.dll from the OpenAL Soft download to your Thief II directory and rename it to OpenAL32.dll. Read more about the installation here.

This one is easy since it only requires one real mod mod, Sneaky Upgrade, which is a huge unofficial patch. The game is practically unplayable without it. Also install DSOAL (read more about the installation here) and NVIDIA users can improve graphics through NVIDIA Inspector.

So those are the essentials. Note that these games, particularly Thief II and Thief: Deadly Shadows, have many fan missions made for them, so feel free to check those out as well.