August 31, 2007

Flagship’s Travis Baldree discusses the evolution of Mythos
By Michael Lafferty

“We liked the game more and more as development continued on the initial ‘test,’ and it became apparent that we could make something that was enjoyable in its own right”

When Flagship Studios was first working on Hellgate London, the game was supposed to be a massively multiplayer online title. But the evolution of that title precluded that and it became a single-player affair. But the company had already been toying with the MMO elements and had the structure in place.

Hmm, what to do?

Well, how about spinning off the MMO assets into its own entity.

And so Mythos was born.

The press release for the title goes like this:

“Mythos is an online, action role-playing game that is free to download and free to play. Set in the land of Uld – a fantasy world arising from the ashes of an epoch-long war of darkness – players assume the roles of fantasy heroes as they explore, adventure, and quest through entirely randomized dungeons and environments.

“As players journey into Mythos’ ever-expanding universe, they select one of three races (Human, Elves, or Gremlins) and opt to play as a particular character class using a huge variety of skills and items. Through heroic quests players search for gold, gems, armor, and weapons, while unlocking the secrets of Uld. Mythos presents a constantly expanding, continuously updated world where something new lurks around every corner.”

When the opportunity cropped up to speak with Travis Baldree, the project director, GameZone jumped on that.

The game is very Diablo-esque (probably has to do with your development background). What differentiates this title from a Battlenet experience with D2?

Travis: The main differentiating factor is that there is no lobby. You meet and party with other players in shared towns and then venture in a party into instanced dungeons and wilderness, similar to the way that Guild Wars functions. The practical upshot is that you are put immediately into the world, similar to WoW and other MMOs.

This was developed, if I remember correctly, as a test for the multiplayer of Hellgate. How did this spawn off as its own entity?

Travis: Really it just grew over time. We liked the game more and more as development continued on the initial ‘test,’ and it became apparent that we could make something that was enjoyable in its own right, and could potentially support itself. The initial scope of the game just keeps expanding as time goes by, and our internal bar for quality continues to rise. There’s always something new and interesting we’re looking to add, and always something bothering us that we want to fix!

Anyone who has played D2 will recognize the combat mechanics, but there is a fair amount of customization that is possible. Was the variety within the class professions the driving force behind the (on the surface) lack of races and classes, or did it evolve as the title was developed? (Or am I completely off base in this whole idea?)

Travis: The aim has been to have very diverse classes, and then to continually add NEW classes. So we’re hoping to have the best of both worlds there.  We had initially planned to have more generic ‘spells’ that could be mixed and matched between the classes, but that just felt too soupy to us, and so we headed back to more specific class skills. The result is that it’s taking us longer to add more classes than we had perhaps initially planned – but it is still our objective to do so.

How much development time has gone into Mythos?

Travis: Development started roughly a year and a half ago. I was the only person on the project for about 6 months, and then we added 2 more, and we’ve slowly expanded to our current total of 10.

Why did you lock the camera into that one isometric perspective? Is it easier, from a development standpoint, to make the camera static and then create ghost images so you can see what is coming through the blocked angles at you?

Travis: The camera is locked in an isometric perspective right now for simplicity of play – we want to encourage casual players, and I’m not a big fan of camera management. That said, we may add some limited orbital functionality at some point to the camera, but our first priority is keeping navigation easy and intuitive for new players. From a development standpoint, there’s nothing inherently difficult about allowing the player to move the camera, it is all down to the refinement of your camera so that it is a help and not a hindrance.

How deep is this game in terms of teamplay and guild play?

Travis: We don’t have guilds quite yet, but we’re trying to encourage party-play right now with complementary skills for the different classes, as well as special Epic maps that really encourage going in with a party. At the same time, we’re also trying to be pretty solo-friendly as well.

Is there an overall story arc, or is the game merely an ongoing system of quests?

Travis: At present there’s no real overarching story, and it’s still sets of smaller quest narratives – but that’s not to say we won’t add some larger narrative threads as the game expands.

How much support is planned for this title down the road? Will there be free updates, or even expansions?

Travis: The aim is for the game to be constantly supported and expanded. I don’t think we’re really planning it as expansions per-se – just continual development and feature additions.

What do you think it takes to break into the MMO genre and be reasonably successful? With so many products out there and coming out, this must be a tough nut to crack (in terms of the genre). What will be the biggest appeal that Mythos brings to the table?

Travis: I think the biggest appeal for Mythos is twofold – first, it’s free. That’s always nice when dropping the barrier to entry. Second, it’s a quick and focused game – battles last seconds instead of minutes, and the moment to moment action is very different from most modern MMOs.

What do you most like about the game?

Travis: I love our weird races – the cigar-chomping gremlin is my favorite, and the fact that next week we can have something entirely new and different in the game. And I love working with my team!

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