Previous Next

Picture the scene. There you are, coming out of Tesco's with your carrier bag full of mixed vegetables, when Zamm! you're suddenly zooming through a tunnel of light, going baaaack through time.

"Panic not, humanling, for ye are the chosen one," croons an eerie god-like voice. "Only ye can defeat the evil deity, Dameron, who is making our lives a misery in ancient times. And if we, the benevolent gods, are not around to keep the human race going in the past, ye and thy race won't even exist in the future, let me tell ye."

With a strange "woo-eeee-ooo" sound echoing in your ears, you appear in a scrolling cave of rocky platforms. A quick jog and jump is all it takes to find that this cave isn't just any old scrolling cave isn't just any old scrolling cave full of rocky platforms. Sword-wielding skeletons patrol the ledges, and from roosts in the roof, fiendish harpies swoop down, talons bared. Your only defence is your fists, you feet and your cat-like agility, but if you're lucky, thumped monsters leave handy weapons behind for you to collect.

Carrying a sword replaces your array of punches and kicks with leaping lunges and savage slashes. Other weapons such as tridents and magic fireballs can be thrown with devastating effects.

After dealing death to the Chimera guarding the cave exit, you run outside, straight into a crowd of angry Greeks bearing a striking resemblance to the cast of Jason and the Argonauts. Watch out for the Siren, who lures you towards her then turns into a whopper serpent and gobbles you up. One judicious jab and she disappears, leaving behind a useful amulet.

At this point I should mention that Myth is nine parts platform beat-'em-up, and one part adventure. The thinking comes in at least once each section, when you meet the megabeast which requires some special tactic to kill. Anyone familiar with ancient mythology or even Ray Harryhausen movies will know how to deal with them, but they usually require a certain object from earlier on in the game. For instance, killing the many-headed Hydra has to be done Perseus-style, by somehow hacking off the Gorgon's head and using it to turn the Hydra to stone.

The game continues in this vein, taking you through confrontations with legendary monsters and gods from Greek, Roman, Egyptian and Norse mythologies, as well as a trip through Faery-type legend. This takes up four separate loads so there's a heck of a lot of playing to be done before you get to fight Dameron.

Inimitable pixel Picasso, Boob Stevenson, has designed the Commodore version's graphics which, in spite of their small size, are inticately detailed. The animation of the sprites, particularly the player's character, is very slick indeed, giving an almost Rotoscoped effect as he runs, leaps and kicks the heads of skellies.

Sound, too, is rather nice, running to some sampled speech and great clanking swords and thumping effects.

Myth's bias towards arcade action rather than adventuring makes it even more addictive than Tusker. Your little time traveller is such a flexible fighter that the gameplay avoids getting into the rut of walk-along-and-slash, so it's guaranteed to keep you occupied for many hours after you've shelled out your tenner. There's no doubt about it - it's another winner for System 3.

System 3 add another superb arcade adventure to their catalogue. In fact, you'd have to be pretty thtupid to Myth it.