Last updated on December 1st, 2025 at 10:20 pm
Trials of the Thief-Taker – Roleplaying Game Review
Trials of the Thief-Taker is a Roleplaying/Books/Adventure game from Choice of Games LLC, first launched in 9th August 2017.
It’s rated 12+ and currently has 16+ ratings on the App Store.
What Makes Trials of the Thief-Taker Stand Out
In London, 1729, before they had police, they had you: thief-takers, hunting criminals for cash! Fire a flintlock and sip gin in the age of powdered wigs. Will you grow rich catching smugglers and highwaymen, show mercy, or become a crime boss yourself?
"Trials of the Thief-Taker" is a 140,000-word interactive historical adventure novel by Joey Jones, where your choices control the story. It's entirely text-based, without graphics or sound effects, and fueled by the vast, unstoppable power of your imagination.
As a thief-taker, paid by the court or hired by the victims of crime to recover property and, for an extra price, bring the culprit to justice, you'll stalk your prey across the misty commons and narrow rookeries of 18th-century London. Lead a gang of unwashed ruffians (or stalk the streets alone) as you apprehend highwaymen on lonely roads, and root out crooks and counterfeiters in inns and coffeehouses. Through cunning, force, or suspicious connections, you will find your mark.
You may strike a blow for justice, making a name for yourself and bringing good people to your cause. Or you can create the crimes you intend to solve, stealing the goods you'll be paid to recover, bribing prison guards to let your associates go, building your criminal empire while everyone lauds you as a hero.
Be quick or cautious, proper or disreputable, generous or mercenary…it's all in a day's work for a thief-taker.
Load your flintlock! There are thieves to take.
• Play as male, female, or as a woman disguised as a man; gay or straight.
• Make your way through a world ruled by manners, harsh laws, and lurking treachery.
• Run an empire of crime or establish the first police force…or both at the same time!
• Capture, befriend, or romance corrupt officials, escape artists, courtiers, highwaymen, smugglers and grave-robbers.
• Immerse yourself in Georgian lingo: learn the difference between a cove and a swell, a blue pigeon and an ark ruffian.
• Play the high-stakes dice game Hazard in the gaming houses of Covent Garden.
• Make your way with your silver tongue, a good horse, your street smarts or with two fists flying.
25% off until August 16th!
This Roleplaying game offers engaging gameplay and regular updates for mobile players.
Player Feedback
As a newer release, Trials of the Thief-Taker is building its player community. Early feedback suggests .
Recent Updates & Development
Latest Update: 27th June 2023
Recent improvements include:
Bug fixes. If you enjoy "Trials of the Thief-Taker", please leave us a written review. It really helps!
Download & Availability
Trials of the Thief-Taker is available through the official App Store for iOS devices.
Get Trials of the Thief-Taker on App Store
Requirements: Requires iPhone 5s / iPad Air / iPad Air (Cellular) / iPad Mini 2 (Retina) / iPad Mini 2 (Retina, Cellular) / iPhone 6 / iPhone 6 Plus / iPad Air 2 / iPad Air 2 (Cellular) / iPad Mini 3 or later.
Compatible with iPhone and iPad devices.
Player Experience Highlights
Community Insight:
We will give this one 4.5/5 if we can. This is a complete package. This game feel complete compare to some other COG games. However, it has a common issue with a lot of other COG games: the ending part is rush. You can easily tell that the last 2-3 chapters out of 10 chapters are going fast and the decision becomes way easy. You choose to become the crime leader, you will become one. It doesnt have the resistance to make any decision at the end part while in the early you have 50/50 chance to not being able to catch thieves, which make it more realistic and fun. Overall complete and fun. We just wish the author either extend the later chapters to make it feel more complete or cut some chapters and detailed other chapters instead.
Just like a Choose Your Own Adventure book but more engaging. Solid writing and good choices.
We're going to have to disagree with some other reviewers. We had a very fun time with this one. The major point in its favor is how many choices there are in this game and how they all interact with each other is pretty great. We've now played three times. The first we played as a corrupt money grubber, the second time we played as Falstafian drunkard who always tried to do the right thing be damned the consequences, and the third time we played as a self-righteous fighter for the law. Not only did such decisions give us (obviously) very different endings, but decisions built upon each other and each play through led to vastly different subplots and threads. So often we find that many of these choice games barely register your choices and so we were very pleased with how dynamic the story was in taking into account of our decisions. Its not quite deserving of a five. The characters are generally thinly sketched, but this is a game about role playing and we found it fun and well worth the download.
The description implies that romance options are available, and that the story goes far more in depth than it truly does. We played this story through 6 times- same basic story each time and NO romance. Disappointed.
Not a bad game, though it did feel rushed and lacked the depth of other choice of games. The relationships felt shallow, the romances were almost nonexistent in many respects, and we didn't care for our character the way we have in the past with other interactive fiction games. It was an interesting concept that felt as if it lacked the depth of a complete experience.
User feedback from Apple App Store
App Details
- Version: 1.0.7
- Size: 22.92 MB
- iOS: 11.0 or later
- Languages: EN
- Content Advisory: Infrequent/Mild Alcohol, Tobacco, or Drug Use or References, Infrequent/Mild Cartoon or Fantasy Violence, Infrequent/Mild Mature/Suggestive Themes, Infrequent/Mild Profanity or Crude Humor
- Developer: Choice of Games LLC
Last updated: 27th June 2023 | Genre: Roleplaying, Books | Developer: Choice of Games LLC