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Myth Commodore 64 System 3 1989


Myth: History in the Making



System 3 of the U.K. released Myth: History in the Making for the Commodore 64 in 1989. Myth is a mythic-themed hack n slash and platform game. Developed and published by System 3, C64 Myth was designed by Mark Cale, programmed by Peter Baron (Salamander), drawn by Bob Stevenson and composed by Jeroen Tel of The Maniacs of Noise.
 
In Myth the player assumes the role of a mortal hero who goes up against the forces of the evil god, Dameron. The hero battles through several mythic-themed stages before confronting Dameron in his realm.

Myth's platforming stages scroll multi-directionally in side-on perspective at 50 FPS. The hero of Myth can run left and right, crouch, leap forwards, jump directly upwards and diagonally upwards, pick up objects and cycle through and use inventoried objects. In addition, the hero can kick, jump-kick and punch low, middle or high. As well, when wielding the sword, the hero can thrust low, middle or high. On top of that, the hero can hurl projectiles from range. Impressively, the hero can forward-kick and jump-kick while wielding the sword.

  • Myth Level One: Greek Legend
  • Myth Level Two: Viking Legend
  • Myth Level Three: Egyptian Legend
  • Myth Level Four: The Final Confrontation (horizontally-scrolling shoot 'em up)

Each stage consists of three sections, but the sections cannot be revisited. Players must explore and solve puzzles in each section while avoiding or fighting infinitely respawning enemies, some of which drop useful items. Myth infinite respawns evoke Ghosts 'n Goblins of 1986. However, Myth stages are not similarly time-limited. Each stage features sub-bosses and cultimates in an end-stage boss.

Myth's hero sprite is well-drawn and animated. For example, the armed and unarmed attack animations are cool and the run-cycle was rotoscoped à la Prince and Persia of 1989. However, Myth's jump animation is not realistic in terms of jump-height, air-time or descent-animation. In addition, Myth features no parallax screen-scrolling.

Some of Myth's animations and graphics draw from Mark Cale's IK of 1986 (punch and kick animations) and Bob Stevenson's IO of 1988 (pixel art).

Myth audio is above average in that players can hear the sword unsheathe as well as sword-thrusts and the clang of steel on steel. In addition, Myth employs atmospheric sound effects.

Myth is audiovisually impressive and has great controls, but it is ultimately too short and too easy to beat.

Myth Amiga 1992



System 3 ported C64 Myth: History in the Making of 1989 to the Amiga in 1992. Mechanics-wise Amiga Myth is a straight port of C64 Myth; the difference lies mostly in presentation and audiovisuals. That said, relative to hardware specs C64 Myth is superior to Amiga Myth pretty much across the board. Amiga Myth is basically just a more colorful, hires remake of C64 Myth -- 3 years later. Still, Amiga Myth constitutes a solid release for the Amiga in 1992.

Screen-scrolling in Amiga Myth is not as smooth as that of C64 Myth. Sprite designs in Amiga Myth differ greatly from C64 Myth. For example, the protagonist sprite in Amiga Myth (Ankalagan the Spirit Hunter of Stonehenge) is Wolverine-like in appearance whereas the unnamed protagonist of C64 Myth is just a normal human.

Amiga Myth was designed and produced by Mark Cale, lead-programmed by Dave Colclough, lead-drawn by Robin Levy and composed by Don Howard. The comic strip was drawn by Colin Jones.

Amiga Myth was distributed on 3x 3.5" 880 kB diskettes.

Stages of Amiga Myth


  • Hades: Realm of the Damned
  • Skyros: Isle of the Sirens
  • Temple of Athenae
  • Maelstrom: Gateway to the North
  • Forest of Nidhogg
  • Asgard: Domain of Odin
  • The Valley of the Kings
  • Chamber of Anubis
  • Tomb of the Pharoah
  • Realm of Chaos (shoot 'em up)
  • The Final Confrontation

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