Mythos

Apologies to Randall Munroe Yes, I really do believe you can’t honestly review an MMO without investing yourself in it for a fairly substantial bit of time, so that any oddities with controls and stuff become second nature and you can understand the core of what the game developers were striving for. A 1999 EverQuest review could have written all about the low polygons and stiffness of the character models, the laughably sharp-cornered world and so on, and missed the forest for the trees. You have to play a MMO long enough to see and appreciate the forest before you stamp a score on a review. ...

Penny Arcade starts off Freeday Friday with a little bit of snark about the Chronicles of Spellborn payment plan. While it’s true that you can now use a credit card like for every other game… I think trying to figure out their Coins-based plan is a fun game all on its own, don’t you? Reported everywhere is Lord of the Rings Online’s second anniversary promotion. Free to try again, 25% experience bonus on kills that stacks with all other bonuses, tokens you can trade in for cool stuff, etc etc. The xp boost is very nice, anyway. I haven’t seen what the tokens trade in for, but I have my suspicions I have a lot of Blueberry Tart recipes in my future. ...

In 2007, you could have surprised absolutely nobody by predicting that 2008, last year, would be the biggest, best year ever for MMOs. Triple A titles abounded – Age of Conan and Warhammer Online were both just going to tear WoW a new one, but heck, even WoW was coming out with its second expansion. Pirates of the Burning Sea would take MMOs into a new direction, Chronicles of Spellborn would be an indie hit from Europe, and Flagship would be following up Hellgate: London with their MMO homage to Diablo II, Mythos. ...

2008 has been an absolutely amazing year for MMOs, and my personal progress through them. Last year at this time, I’d just found the absolutely most perfect EQ2 guild – they were great raiders, loved grouping, and were fantastic people besides. With Clan of Shadows, I managed to do every flagging raid for Ruins of Kunark and was ready to step in and do my best to help the guild as they conquered Veeshan’s Peak. It wasn’t to be; I didn’t make the full membership vote. It wasn’t even close. That disappointment, along with other things to fill my evenings, eventually led to the end of raiding. Without raiding, though, I didn’t have much incentive to log in anymore. I tried to make things work with another guild, Delusions of Grandeur, but it just wasn’t CoS. I guess if I couldn’t make it in CoS, I didn’t want to settle for a lesser guild. ...

There’s a Diablo-shaped hole in my soul. With Mythos gone and Dungeon Runners going, there is a giant opportunity for a action-oriented RPG to swoop right in and make a grab for the crown. If there is a game like that out there, Cronous might be it… but on the first quick look, probably not. You get a choice of four classes – Warrior, Valkyrie, Mage and Savage. But whichever class you choose, you’re dumped nearly naked in the middle of a busy city. ...

I haven’t done a “what I’m playing” thing for awhile. So here’s my current roster of games, and I’ll start off with what I’m NOT playing. And that game would be Mythos. MMOs: Mythos had one of the strongest beta communities on record, with unparalleled access to devs. Community Manager Taylor Baldree would hold court in the #mythos IRC channel every night. Devs would respond daily on the forums. And all that was leading to a game that I very much wanted to play. With Hellgate: London’s reprieve by Namco Bandai, let’s hope there IS hope for Mythos as well. ...

My thoughts and good wishes go out to the folks at Flagship Studios, developers of Hellgate: London and Mythos. Word came today that they’ve closed their doors. Some rumors say their Korean publisher will be taking the games over, other rumors suggest that though Flagship is gone, the employees and IP could be snapped up by some other company. I can’t help but be reminded of Sigil’s employees standing out in their parking lot a year ago.I absolutely hope everyone lands on their feet. I never played H:L, but I did play Mythos a lot, and was really looking forward to its release.

I just had a thought, while writing the Mythos article. We all know where Mythos came from. Diablo II game play with a Warcraft art style. Diablo II came from Diablo, and Diablo was heavily influenced by the rogue-likes Moria and Angband, I think? Both those games were inspired by Hack, which was inspired by Rogue, which was heavily influenced by Temple of Apshai (I’m guessing), which took its inspiration from Dungeons and Dragons. ...

As is way too often the case, I start writing a story about a MMO for Massively, and then get drawn into the game. Such was the case Sunday night with Pi Story, and last night with Mythos (both stories will show up today on Massively.com). Mythos is an easy game to get lost in, but I have to admit I have not been playing much since Flagship introduced the Overworld. I was going to wait until all the new content was in (they are just working on Zone 2 now), and then do a weekend’s worth of leveling ahead of open beta to get a good feel for the new stuff. ...

Spent some time in IRC and on the forums waiting with a lot of other Mythos fans for the rumored arrival of Mythos’ Overworld, which turns the heavily-instanced game into a game which rewards exploration and wandering about in the same way Oblivion does. I managed to get it patched (finally), play it for awhile and do a quick write-up about it before I collapsed into bed. So check it out :) I’m really excited about this game. ...