There's some of my own schtuff after all the comments on Wasp's post.
: I don't have Chimera, and have only played Myth II at a
: friend's, but I must say that I felt that Myth II
: itself was "against the whole point of
: Myth". Where is the epic feel of Myth:TFL in Myth
: II? Where is the drama, the feel of the hopeless
: battle, the plot that grips you from start to finish?
: I mean come on, the end of Myth II was pathetically
: cliche. Oh no, the evil boss is about to blow up the
: world! We must stop him! I felt it was unworthy of the
: Myth name.
I agree a wee bit to this. There *was* a sense of major clichÈ with Soulblighter yelling "I have killed the whole world!" inside Tharsis and all that. Other than that, I think Myth II was a pretty decent continuation of The Fallen Lords. You can't be fighting totally hopeless battles twice. That's just plain silly.
: Why don't I like Myth II? Here are some reasons: -Too
: many living units. Myth:TFL had Thrall, Soulless,
: Wights, Myrmidons and Shades as your Undead rivals,
: Ghols and Trow as your living foes, and Fetch weren't
: quite clear. Myth II gets rid of the Myrmidons and
: establishes that Fetch are of all things
: "priestesses from another dimension" (sounds
: like a B-film title). Now we have no Myrmidons, and
: have a host of new living enemies: the Bre'Unor, the
: Mauls, Warlocks and the Myrkridia... and that isn't
: counting the Brigands, (whose entire concept as a unit
: is just plain bizarre in the first place--how
: believable is it that someone who has bad leadership
: RUNS slower for crying out loud, and that this
: justifies making a new unit?) and Dark Bowmen or
: whatever they're called... ooh, they're Bowmen but
: they're... Dark!
: Only one new undead unit, the Ghasts, was introduced, and
: they are only used once anyway if I recall correctly.
: I don't count the Ghosts, which were laughable if
: anything. No more horror of the undead, now that the
: bulk of enemy units are living.
My main problem with Myth II was that just about all new units were either not especially interesting (with little or no story behind them) or were lame-oh in terms of gameplay. Ghast, Stygian Knights, Mauls, Myrkridia (large and small), bre'Unor and brigands are all units that one might as well do without. The ghast and bre'Unor especially, the latter being what seems to a rehash of the failed Skrael.
: -Myth II ruined the Myrkridia. In Myth:TFL the Myrkridia
: were an ancient, mysterious, extremely evil and
: dangerous race that your nightmares had nightmares
: about. There is an ominous tale in the Codex about a
: man who would resurrect the Myrkridia. Then come Myth
: II and what do you get? NO plot behind the Summoner at
: all, he's just some guy that has decided to summon the
: Myrkridia back. The Myrkridia themselves are nasty, I
: suppose, but don't live up to their legend whatsoever.
Amen, brother. This I could not agree more with. I was saying this back in, like, early '98. The Myrkridia were NOT something to be just resurrected and put up for the display. No way in Hell could anyone have made them as frightening as expected. They were a myth and should have remained that.
: -Myth II ruined magic. In Myth:TFL magic was rare,
: exceedingly prized and most of the time you only heard
: about it. In Myth II you have magical suits of armour;
: Warlocks who fling fire left, right, and centre; and
: Alric and The Deceiver in a bunch of levels. You even
: pop back into the Tain for crying out loud... and
: don't get me _started_ on Bamlung the magical sword.
: You are also whisked through World Knots more times
: than I can count.
: -Myth II ruined the Fallen Lords. Shiver comes back? You
: get to use the Deceiver, who turns out to be some
: wierd balding guy? Give me a break. I'm surprised
: there weren't cameo appearances by The Watcher and
: Balor.
The Deceiver is depicted in the Myth: TFL manual. He stands with his famed scepter with a very neutral expression on his face. Could anyone maybe scan that image and put it up somewhere? Mebbe a pdf-version of the manual...?
I don't see any major problem with Shiver coming back. At least it didn't ruin the story. I would personally not have wanted her depicted, though. She would've seemed far uglier that way.
: -Myth II ruined the Heron Guard. Don't get me wrong,
: they're nice units but dressed up like that with their
: twin swords and especially their armour, they don't
: look at all like they should be to fit in with the
: Myth setting.
So the game designers had a samurai-inspired fling. Big deal. Or beloved Alric looks like a mix between Oda Nobunaga and Alexander Nevskiy to me.
I think the Heron Guard actually managed to live up their reputation. In multiplay, they even beat the crap out of Myrkridia (small ones) on an equal-point basis...
: In Myth:TFL the very existence of
: humanity was threatened and they still shuffled around
: with their shovels. Why are they all of a sudden
: worthy of becoming Guards again? Don't tell me it was
: that one level where the Trow and Mortar Dwarves (oh,
: and some Heron Guards too) stop some baddies from
: getting inside Muirthemne. Nice achievement but hardly
: worthy of casting off a legacy of shame.
Muirthemne is what mattered to the journeymen. Personally, I kinda fail to understand why they didn't go back to Muirthemne during the 60 years after the Great War, but I guess Alric becoming emperor was of great importance. That also makes one wonder how Alric suddenly came to know where the Ibis Crown was. Not even Balor knew that. But he *did* seem to know a thing or two that was few others did in TFL. Hmmm...
: -Speaking of technology there is also the issue of
: Dwarven Mortars and Ghol cannons, which seem to have
: become remarkably sophisticated and compact given that
: they have had a sixty year period, maximum, to be
: developed in. As for the Poachers, yes, that was a
: cute level wasn't it but it just ruined things even
: more. Secret levels, fine and dandy. Poachers with
: blunderbusses? Give me a break.
I wouldn't ever try to criticise technology in these kind of games. It's hopeless to get it very accurate. Dwarven mortars and cannon would mean there was some sort of gunpowder-like substance available, which would be mean that some sort of firearms had been developed already. The absence of cavalry is also striking. We know there are horses in the world of Myth, so where are the mounted armies? I don't mind it. It's still just a game...
Oh, and don't bash "A long awaited drinking party"... No one sees that as an actual part of the story.
: Oh yes, I nearly forgot that you ally with
: the Trow, earning their respect with of all things a
: game of Territories (boy, that sure proves your
: valour!)
There is nothing that suggests the Trow were inherently evil in The Fallen Lords. They seem like creatures who do whatever *they* see fit at the time. Be it working for the Light or the Dark, it matters little.
: As I said before, where has the feel of Myth gone?
: Myth:TFL had you with a rabble of the last troops
: humanity has to throw at the overwhelming enemy. It
: has you actually believing for a while that you're
: winning against the Fallen, until a catastrophic
: string of disasters--the volcano erupting, getting
: annihilated at Seven Gates, loss of Alric's army, and
: then the final blow, the civil war--forces you to
: embark on a desperate mission into the heart of the
: enemy's territory, knowing full well that meanwhile
: your homeland is getting plundered by the undead. I
: had a cold chill run down my spine when I read the
: mission briefing in Myth:TFL that begins... "I am
: not a coward [...] yet I was relieved to not be among
: those chosen to die." Then came the part about
: sacrificing the remaining twenty-two hundred men of
: the legion, which made the chill come back. Alric's
: desperate cries of "KILL HIM! KILL HIM!"
: while using the Eblis Stone still echo in my mind, and
: strike me as by far the best and the least cliched use
: of such words that I have ever seen, heard, or read.
You want to see *another* game of catastrophic distasters, annihilations of armies and desperate missions? (Kicking Shiver's ass wasn't too desperate, by the way.) Once would seem enough for me.
: Myth II, on the other hand, has none of this feel at all.
: Instead of doing things like helping the defence of
: Madrigal or eerily revisiting the sacked capital of
: the West like in Myth:TFL, you get to ramble around
: whining about Cruniac this and Cruniac that for half
: the game, and then all of a sudden you go and meet
: Alric, go through half the map, find the Deceiver,
: befriend the Trow, pop into Muirthemne, play through
: Shiver's death and are present for the final defeat of
: Soulblighter. When Shiver died the first time it was
: far more exciting and compelling than when she came
: back and was killed the second time, not least because
: you weren't THERE the first time.
Soulblighter wasn't even half as bad as the Fallen Lords. Unlike Balor and his chums, Soulblighter and Shiver and their armies were beaten up because they came at a reaaaaly bad time. That is, the beginning of a Light age. It all makes sense in light of the story in The Fallen Lords. Nothing about it is really contradicting.
: If Bungie ever makes a Myth III
*snip*
Bungie...
...will never...
...make a Myth III.
: What would I like to see if a Myth III were ever made?
Hell no. The genre itself has already been outdone. Anything new would have to be an entirely new game. And then you might as well change the plot.
Has no one noticed how Bungie does more less the same thing with Myth that they did with Marathon? A rogue character returns as the main attraction in both sequels, Soulblighter not being as important as Durandal, of course, but still. Chimera is clearly like Infinity with it's lack of connections with the previous games and slightly psychadelic storyline. I am dead certain that Chimera would've been packed with metaphoric and surreal prose and/or poetry had it been a full 24-level solo venture.
Peter Isotalo
