Myth III: The Wolf Age

Myth III: The Wolf Age
Cover art for the Macintosh version of Myth III
Developer(s)	MumboJumbo
Publisher(s)	Take-Two Interactive
Series	Myth
Platform(s)	Microsoft Windows, Mac OS
Release date(s)	NA November 2, 2001[1]
Genre(s)	Real-time tactics
Mode(s)	Single-player, multiplayer
Distribution	Optical disc

Myth III: The Wolf Age is a 2001 real-time tactics video game developed by MumboJumbo and published by Take-Two Interactive for Microsoft Windows and Mac OS. It is the third installment in the Myth franchise, but serves as a prequel to the original game, taking place 1,000 years prior to the events of Myth: The Fallen Lords.

Gameplay

Like the previous installments, Myth III is a real-time tactics game, meaning that unlike the gameplay of real-time strategy games, the player does not have to worry about resource micromanagement and the gradual building up of their army; each level begins with the player's army already assembled and ready to go into combat straight away. Players control small forces made up of a number of different units, each possessing their own strengths and weaknesses. As healing is a very rare and extremely limited ability, units do not regenerate health, and there is no way to construct new units (although in some single-player missions, reinforcements are automatically received at a predetermined point), the strategy aspect of the gameplay is of paramount importance.

Unit formations are important in Myth III, as the game simulates a real battlefield accurately enough for maneuvers such as flanking and encirclement to be effective. When placed together in formation, units can provide an effective defensive front, block an enemy force's escape route, or exploit bad positioning of an enemy force by surrounding it. Terrain and environmental factors are also important. Rain or standing water will put out some fire- and explosive-based attacks. Archers on high ground are able to shoot farther than those on level ground. Most units will flinch when damaged, interrupting actions such as movement and attacks. This has many strategic implications; for example, if two or three melee units gang up to attack one enemy melee unit, it may flinch too frequently to have a chance to attack or escape.^[2]

Plot

Myth III: The Wolf Age is set 1000 years prior to Myth: The Fallen Lords and tells the story of Connacht the Wolf, a barbarian warrior from the lands of Gower, and his rise to power during the Wind Age, an era of savagery during which the Myrkridia almost totally annihilated humanity. No-one who had ever fought the Myrkridia had survived, and with nobody to stop them, they spread across the land. Only two human civilisations remained; the isolated Gower, and the city of Llancarfan. Additionally, The Leveler had returned once again, using the body of Tireces The Immortal, who had killed him a millennium ago. Now named Moagim The Faceless Terror, he begins to raise an army, enlisting the colossal Trow, as well as Bahl'al, the most adept Necromancer in history, to crush the last remaining remnants of humanity.

During a final stand in Gower, Connacht and his men manage to beat back the Myrkridia for the first time. Inspired by this feat, the clans of Gower unite. Connacht and the clansman fight back against the Myrkridia, and destroy many of their nests, pushing them back into the Dire Marsh. Connacht is heralded as a hero and is ordered to travel to Llancarfan to meet the Emperor of the Cath Bruig. On the way he saves the life of Damas, captain of the Heron Guard of Llancarfan. Damas then pledges his life to Connacht.

Connacht is placed in charge of a group of Llancarfan soldiers, to train them to fight the Myrkridia. After they defeat a Myrkridian pack-mage, they discover that Moagim is the one behind the Myrkridia attacks. Emperor Lietrim sends Connacht and the army to defeat Moagim but they are almost wiped out when Moagim counterattacks with his army of undead, Myrkridia and both the Trow and their Oghre slaves.

Myrdred, an Avatara who acts as an advisor to Connacht, suggests that they should find Mazzarin, the most powerful Avatara of all time, and persuade him to help them. Connacht, Damas, Myrdred, and a Myrmidon warrior named Ravanna make their way to Forest Heart to find Mazzarin, who initially Mazzarin shows no interest in their cause. However, when Connacht tells him that Bahl'al is helping Moagim, Mazzarin becomes enraged and decides to transfer his knowledge of the "Total Codex" (a book that tells of future events) into Connacht's mind, giving him knowledge of things long forgotten and events yet to come.

Upon returning to Llancarfan, Connacht heads to the Smiths of Muirthemne and speaks to the forgemaster Traval about a device that could imprison thousands of enemies. Traval says they could make this device, but they need the "Unkarak Tomen", a Dwarven tome of building from Myrgard. Unfortunately, word has been sent of a huge hoard of Ghôls laying siege to Myrgard, so Connacht heads to assist the dwarves. Connacht and his army find the bulk of the Ghôl horde and manage to destroy the majority of it. The few Ghols that remain swear eternal revenge upon the dwarves. In honor of humanity's aid, the dwarves form an alliance with the Cath Bruig empire, and Connacht retrieves the Tomen, delivering it to Traval. Several months pass until the "Tain" is completed. With the artifact in hand, Connacht and his army head to the Dire Marsh to put an end to the Myrkridia forever. They are able to imprison whole legions of the beasts in the Tain, and soon they came to the Black Spire where the leader of the Myrkridia, Thalor the Black, resides. Much to their surprise, the Tain has no effect on the enemies near the spire because of Thalor's artifact, the "Eye of Thalor", which grants him immortal life and protection from spells. With no other option, Connacht leads a small group of soldiers inside the spire and destroys the Eye of Thalor, rendering Thalor and his minions vulnerable. The remaining Myrkridia are then hunted down and killed.

Shortly after this victory, Moagim, enraged that the Myrkridia have been defeated, attacks Llancarfen but is repelled. Strangely, during the battle, Moagim showed no sign of weakness. Despite being struck with several arrows, he simply pulled them out. Observing the battle from afar through a spy glass, Connacht catches a glimpse of a small ornate scepter in Moagim's hand. Connacht realizes that the scepter is the "Rod of the Calleiach"; a legendary device that can make its wielder immortal. After a brief meeting, the Avatara Sardonnac volunteers to take a small elite force via a World Knot to Moagim's camp to destroy the rod. Upon arriving, they fight their way into the camp and locate the rod. Although Sardonnac manages to destroy it, the backlash of magical energy from its destruction kills him.

Back in Llancarfen, Connacht and Myrdred come up hatch a plan to free the Oghres from their Trow enslavement and incite a rebellion. With a small army at their command, they travel to a temple complex and Myrdred casts a Release Dream upon the Oghres, breaking the Trow's hold over them. The Oghres turn upon the Trow, destroying many of their cities. It isn't long before the Trow withdraw their support from Moagim in order to deal with the rebellion. A few days later, Connacht returns to Traval, describing to him another artifact that the Callieach called a "Sun Hammer". Initially, Traval claims this is beyond his skill, but Connacht presents to him a Callieach heartstone which was retrieved from the remains of Moagim's rod. However, even with this power source, the Hammer will still take months to make.

Meanwhile, Moagim lays siege to the land around Llancarfan, and decimates the Twelve Duns. Ravanna had been planning to return to the Twelve Duns alone, but her growing feelings for Damas had stopped her. With Damas and a small team of troops, she travels back to the Twelve Duns to rescue any survivors. Upon their return, Damas is court-martialed, but Connacht and Ravanna testify that even though he had disobeyed orders, he had saved thousands of refugees, not to mention over a hundred fighters. Upon hearing this, the emperor opts for leniency. Connacht heads back to meet the smiths of Muirthemne as he receives word that the Sun Hammer is complete. However, when he gets to their forge, he sees that a group of fanatics called the Spider Cult are attacking it. Connacht and some troops save Traval and a few smiths. However, the Cult have stolen both the Tain and the Sun Hammer. Connacht immediately rallies several hundred soldiers and lays siege to the Spider Cult's temple. Unknown to Connacht, Traval and the remaining smiths infiltrate the temple and kill off hundreds of cultists, giant spiders and even the spider god Syrkrosh, imprisoning her within the reclaimed Tain. At dawn, Connacht and his forces attack the temple but encounter no resistance. He makes his way to the temple's vault and finds the Tain and Sun Hammer along with a note written by Traval revealing what has happened; during several dangerous accidents during the construction of the Tain, the smiths were the ones responsible for bringing Srykrosh into the world and so felt honor-bound to defeat her. They felt the Spider God was attuned to them and could step back into this world from the Tain as long as they were here, so they imprisoned themselves within the Tain too.

Meanwhile, the Trow annihilate the Oghres. Having learned that the humans were the catalyst for the Oghre uprising, the Trow turn their focus to Llancarfan. On the way to the Trow lands, Connacht's armies fight their way out of an ambush by Bahl'al. Connacht knows they had somehow been betrayed for Bahl'al to have known their location. When they arrive at the Trow cities, they find the temples are being used as a staging area for Bahl'al's undead. Using the Sun Hammer, Connacht melts the Trow temples and cities, trapping the Trow inside a prison of molten iron.

Connacht then gathers the Llancarfan armies to defeat Moagim once and for all. Emperor Leitrim pleads with Connacht to let him lead his people in this greatest hour. On the way, they are again attacked by Bahl'al. In a dream duel, Myrdred defeats Bahl'al, who is subsequently imprisoned by Connacht beneath the Cloudspine mountains. The armies continue to pursue Moagim. In the night, Moagim sneaks in to the encampment and kills Emperor Leitrim, taking his crown, and sending waves of minions to attack. After the battle, Connacht and Damas lead a group of unwounded, highly skilled fighters to assault Moagim. Connacht and Moagim fight, and Connacht kills Moagim.

Leading his wounded troops down the snowy pass, Connacht encounters Mjarin, the late Emperor's advisor, who, Connacht realizes, is the real Leveler; Moagim was merely a puppet of Mjarin's. Connacht also learns that Myrdred is an agent of Mjarin. Myrdred had foolishly accepted the powers the Leveler had to offer, thinking he could save the empire. Connacht brands Myrdred "The Deceiver" and banishes him for his crimes. After denying Mjarin's offer to fight as one of his generals, Connacht and a group of men fight through a host of enemies to Mjarin himself, enabling Connacht to get close enough to behead him. The head, however, refuses to die, and Connacht buries it in The Barrier. Connacht then becomes Emperor of Llancarfan, and upon his coronation he issues three commands; the city of Llancarfan is to be renamed Muirthemne in honour of the brave dwarven smiths who sacrificed themselves, the northmen who died fighting Moagim are to be interred in the Mausoliam of Clovis where the first emperor was buried, and the mountain pass where Emperor Leitrim fell is to be renamed "The Stair of Grief."

Years later, Connacht calls Damas to him and tells him to destroy the artifacts of power (and hide the indestructible ones from him), revealing that he knows from the Total Codex, that he will return from the dead as the next Leveler and bring with him a new age of darkness; he does not want the Leveler to have access to any of the items of power when the time comes. After a long reign as emperor, Connacht leaves Muirthemne and travels back to Gower. From there, he disappears into the unknown east, not to be seen again for a thousand years, when he would return as Balor.

Development

In 2000, Microsoft purchased Bungie Studios, which had previously developed games for Microsoft's main competitor's platform, Apple's Macintosh,^[3] in order to have the studio develop Halo exclusively for Microsoft's new Xbox game console.^[4] Early development versions of Halo resembled a sci-fi clone of Myth.^[5] As part of the sale of Bungie, the rights to the Oni and the Myth series went to the video game publisher Take-Two Interactive who held a large share of the studio's stocks at the time of the sale.^[6] Take-Two hired the startup company MumboJumbo to develop Myth III based on Myth II‍‍ '​‍s source code. MumboJumbo had been founded by employees that left Ritual Entertainment, and Myth III would be their first game. Take-Two also hired many members of Myth II: Soulblighter‍ '​s modding community to work on both expansions for Myth II^[7] and the new Myth III.^[8]

The developers made significant changes to the existing code to improve the game's visual aesthetics, such as increasing the game's texture quality. The new engine also sported full 3D characters, each with 300 to 800 polygons and at least 13 different animations, unlike its predecessor which relied on sprites for characters and animations. Soon before the game's release, PC Gamer‍ '​s staff writer Jim Preston wrote that he was skeptical as to whether the developer had been given enough time to satisfactorily complete the game.^[2]

The developers worked to support the modding community by taking Fear & Loathing, the application used to create mods for the previous games, and creating a new, easier to use application known as Vengeance.^[2]

Shortly after the release of Myth III, Take-Two cancelled all development and technical support for all three Myth games, and the complete MumboJumbo Myth III team was laid off.^[9] Lead developer Andrew Meggs joined with a group of fans who called themselves MythDevelopers with the aim of continuing to support the games. Given access to the source code by Take-Two, they have continued to work to update the series.^[10][11] This group, and successor groups, have continued to support and improve all three games, with software updates for the latest operating systems, bug fixes, and the addition of enhancements and features to both the games and modding tools. The current Myth development group is Project Magma.^[12]

Reception

Reception
Aggregate scores Aggregator Score GameRankings 76.92%[13] Metacritic 76/100[14] Review scores Publication Score GameSpot 8.4/10[15] GameSpy 75/100[16] IGN 8.7/10[17] PC Gamer (US) 58/100[16] PC Zone 70/100[16]

Although Myth III received generally positive reviews, it was viewed as inferior to both of the previous Myth games. It holds an aggregate score of 76 out of 100 on Metacritic, based on twelve reviews,^[14] and a score of 76.92% on GameRankings, based on eighteen reviews.^[13]

GameSpot's Same Parker scored the game 8.3 out of 10, writing "Myth III‍ '​s single-player game represents the best the Myth series has to offer. Featuring great graphics, a memorable story, and plenty of diverse missions, Myth III‍ '​s campaign will present a welcome challenge for veterans and newcomers alike." He praised the move to 3D graphics and the storyline, lauding the decision to make a prequel and to give more backstory to who the Fallen Lords were before they served the Dark. He was critical of the lack of a multiplayer mode in the initial release version and compatibility issues with Windows XP, and he expressed concern as to whether Take-Two would be in a position to provide much technical support. However, he concluded that "Myth III isn't as well polished a game as its predecessors, but its strong single-player element and solid graphics make it a remarkable game in its own right."^[15]

IGN's Dan Adams scored the game 7.8 out of 10. He was especially impressed with the depth of the story and the 3D graphics. He also praised MumboJumbo for retaining the core gameplay elements but making some improvements. He was critical of the fact that unit experience didn't carry over from level to level as in the previous games, the long load times, and the erratic AI, concluding that "some unfortunate set backs, whether they were by design or bug dulled the experience a little bit, but not enough to hamper my enjoyment. Fans of the series shouldn't be disappointed by MumboJumbo's effort to follow in the mighty footsteps that Bungie left behind."^[17]

References

External links

• Official Site (archived 2002)
• Project Magma Official Site
• Myth III: The Wolf Age at MobyGames

Myth series The Fallen Lords II: Soulblighter III: The Wolf Age