GameZig

A week ago I got that special email from the makers of Mythos inviting me to join their closed beta playground. Initially I had to create an account with the usual stuff; user ID, password, email, and etc. No problems on that end registration was simple and didn’t require any credit card information. Next came the download which was a surprisingly smaller than I expected 500mb (I was expecting something like 1 gig or more), but I have to remind myself this is still the beta and there’s plenty of room for expansion. After the download came the installation and about four total, end-user agreements that I had to agree to before I could actually install the game. Finally I installed the game and started it up.

There’s a long loading process for the first time you actually run the game. After the initial loading the game jumped right to the log on screen. I typed in my user info, and the gates of Mythos were opened for my playing pleasure. Like most MMORPG’s you create your character, which in Mythos there are four races: Gremlin, Cyclops, Satyr, and Human. There are also three classes to choose from: Bloodletter, Pyromancer, and Gadgeteer. We all know that every MMORPG has similar types of characters and classes, i.e. Bloodletters are your tanks (the guys who are big and can take a lot of damage). Your Pyromancers who are the mages or spell casters of the game. And then my personal favorite the Gadgeteers or your archer/rifler type of character class.

So how do these characters stand out you ask? Let’s just take a minute and discuss the art style and the type of image that is being portrayed within this game. The first race that jumps out is the Gremlin who has this fat cigar jutting out of his mouth, which instantly made me laugh with amazement, because it looks so cool. Now this Gremlin character instantly gave me the impression that this game is going to be one bad ass game to play. All of the characters have their own personal quirks that make them stand out as well as their own race advantages and disadvantages. Which I won’t go into detail about since its a little boring to read about character stats on a game you can’t even play. From the start the artwork portrays to you the feeling that this game is going to rock your socks off.

Okay, I made a human gadgeteer for my first character. In the beginning you are put right in the middle of a dark cave with one door to the north. So I click around a bit trying to figure out how the control skeem works and once I seem to get the hang of it I click on the door…BAM!!! Four skeleton soldiers come charging straight at me and I start shooting my gun at them and the bones start to fly. This is intense is all I have to say. I make my way through this small tunnel with a few more skeleton kills and come by another door. I open it up and once again I’m being attacked by a few skeleton soldiers and two skeleton archers in the distance. Lucky enough its not to difficult to kill all of them. I walk down this cave corridor and when I get close to another door two zombies emerge from the ground and start to slowly charge me. I blow their heads off (we all know that’s the only way you can kill a zombie) quickly open the door and there is another empty room with a little gateway for me to go through. I click on the gateway and a short loading screen pops up.

When I come back I’m in a little village standing next to a catholic type church, and a man is standing there with a question mark over his head. I click on him and he thanks me for cleaning out all of the demons in the building and pays me a few copper coins and rewards me with a piece of armor and some experience. Instantly I level up to the 2nd level with a bright flash and a little arrow at the bottom that begs me to click on it. So I click on it and a simple graphic menu opens giving me the option to increase my four basic stats: strength, dexterity, wisdom, and vitality. As a gadgeteer I want to make sure that my dexterity is very high so I put four points on it and one on vitality. There is also another upgrade section that opens below this window with a bunch of pictures and two separate skill points. I’m a little confused so I move my cursor over one of the images and a text bubble pops up with info on what this upgrade skill and that upgrade skill do for my character. Since I’m a gadgeteer I increase the efficiency of my rifle with the two points out of six making my rifle shots more powerful. Next he tells me I need to travel to a larger town up the road and so begins my online adventure.

I’ve learned that when traveling from place to place, the game generates a random mini area between those two areas in the game. This little random area is populated with monsters, treasure chests, and plants that you can harvest crafting materials from. These areas are full of baddies and lush bright landscape. Sorry, no doom and gloom here until you reach a cave or haunted house. When you play this game you do get the feeling of Diablo dejavu. Its a load of fun to play and the world is constantly growing day by day, as more areas are added to your world map. Another great thing about the game is that you can find some really cool weapons and armor just by adventuring. In fact I haven’t once bought a piece of equipment from a merchant yet, simply because the stuff I find is more powerful and better than what the in-game merchants offer.

It looks like this game is coming together very nicely and will provide hours of enjoyable play-time for everyone. More kinks and bugs are being found daily and everyone who is playing seems to really get a kick out of it. It seems like this game is going to draw a big crowd of fans and newbies alike. This game has a load of potential and should be up and running for everyone very soon. For now try to have patience for the release and pick up your old Diablo games and hack away some baddies.

By: Jared Kimball

Jared is a freelance writer and artist in his spare time. Feel free to visit is website: http://www.jaredkimball.com and check out some of his free artwork and put in a request.

Images provided with courtesy of Mythos.com

Lively launched sometime yesterday and from all I’ve read pre-launch it was supposed to be Google’s version of Second Life.  I virtual world where players could explore real world environments and interact with other people.  This thing was supposed to redefine how people view and use the internet.

So far, bzzzzzzzzzzz.  That’s my buzzer sound.  I know it’s way to early to tell given that all massive projects such as this generally have a rocky start, but I was expecting Google to be a little different.  I figured with their financial backing the powerhouse would be launching something like this perfect right out of the gate.  Unfortunately it doesn’t look anything like I imagined.

Basically, you have to register for a Google account, fortunately I already have one.  Then you have to download and install Lively, which actually is pretty painless.  After that, the fun begins.  You create a room, no not a world or a city - just a room.  This is your personal chat room where other people out on the net can join and interact with you and eachother.  You can pick a room from a wide variety of shells that are predesigned, no you can’t design them yourself - at least not yet.

You decorate the room with furniture and items you ’shop’ for out of what has been designed so far.  In much the same way you can configure your avatar from pre-designed choices.  Not exactly the best experience so far, but better than just a plain chat room.  Which seems to be all this really is.  You can go from room to room by a browser menu but you can’t really walk from room to room or explore in any traditional sense.  Even moving around in your own room is not really walking as much as it is double clicking on a place you want your avatar to be and it appears there.

That said, I’m in the mind numbingly slow process of setting up a GameZig Lounge type room, in the probably going to be over-used shell of the underwater super hero base - which I just had to have.  But I’m going to give it a rest for a day or two and let Google smooth out the bumps because trying to shop for items in Lively is going to make me pull my hair out.  For now, if you have lively installed feel free to visit the GameZig headquarters - for the meantime I have it setup where guests can help me by moving and placing items.  I would love some inspired artistic help here haha.

Electronic Arts announced they are releasing the MySims franchise to PC this October. Previously, the game was only available on consoles but they’ve gone and built a PC version and beefed it up with some new features. Ohhh the humanity! Why did they have to go and do this to me? I’ll admit I got a little addicted to the original Sims games thanks to my lovely wife but this doesn’t look a thing to me like the originals.

The list of features in the game from fully customizable characters and the ability to design and build homes, restuarants and other buildings and items in the game sounds familiar when thinking of the original Sims but this one takes on a very, very cartoony feel.  Cartoony is okay in some games to a degree but I think this is playing off the Lego’s franchise style computer characters just a little to much, check out the screenshot from the game below:

I just know, judging my how childish the game looks, that my wife is going to love it and make me play!  Arrrgh!  They do have some features I think were missing in the first title though like the ability to play online with up to seven other people.  That would have been nice before when the Sims looked, well…human-ish.  I’m going to give this one a negative vote just based on the above screenshot and try desperately to keep my wife from ever discovering it’s existance.  Don’t tell on me!