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I feel sorry for the folks at MumboJumbo who had to deliver Myth III to their overlords at Take-Two in a brutally fast 11 months. If the developers were given more time, they might have produced something special, but as it stands right now, this game is a mess.
The plot unfolds over 25 levels, but it never reaches the quality of the storytelling
we saw in the first two Myth games. There’s
far too much exposition between the levels, and the rendered cut-scenes are
atrocio us. The characters look like they were carved out of LEGO blocks, and
the animation is rather clunky.
The graphics are better — the characters are now true-3D and the trees move in the wind — and the battlefield can still be marred with blasts and littered with enemy body parts. The new units, like the flame-throwing Dwarven Smiths and the Trow Iron Warrior, are well-designed.
Unfortunately, all the units, old and new, suffer from significant AI problems. Units get lost within a large group and don’t always attack when you tell them to, and ranged fighters accidentally hit your own forces. These issues occurred in the original Myth but were pretty much fixed in Myth II; now they’re back and worse than ever.
I also had a consistent problem with saved games not working properly — they’d load, but the game would run at around 5 frames per second — and clipping problems were rampant.
Fans of multiplay will find numerous modes of play, including King of the Hill and Hunting, but only six maps. I had some problems with lag, but it’s hard to know whether that’s a fault with the game or with the GameSpy service (Bungie.net being long gone).
It’s entirely possible that after some patches Myth III will be polished to where we could recommend it, but it’s truly unfortunate it was released in such shoddy shape. This series is one of my favorites; I’d hate to see it end on such a sour note.