Genre: role playing game, dungeons and dragons, graphic novel, comic strips, turn based combat
Release Date: 2021
Developer/Publisher: Worldwalker Games
Fancy some good old tabletop role playing? But your Dungeon Master is busy with the kids’ football tournament this weekend? You can always try a solo adventure to keep your polyhedral dice rolling. Alternatively, Wildermyth may have an epic of two to weave, and a few creative surprises up its quills.
Story:
The tale is eternal, and in the case of Wildermyth, it is procedurally generated. The Yondering Lands are in need of saving. Lead a party of farmers against an evil menagerie of tentacular Gorgons, dragonborn Draugens, mechanical Morthagis or blue skin Deepists. Level up, craft better weapons, learn new skills and choose your tortuous role playing path.
Playability: Dungeon miniatures
Wildermyth is a combination of graphic novel and role playing à la Dungeons and Dragons. The turn based combat takes place on a grid populated with miniatures of your heroes, helpful farmers, monsters, and other useful props such as trees, rocks, furniture and buildings. If you’ve played D&D or Pathfinder with pawns or home printed miniatures, you’ll feel right at home. Choose your heroes from three classes: mystic (spellcaster), hunter (ranger) or fighter (bouncer?). Embark on a series of high adventures and campaigns told through comic strips. Wildermyth is a breeze to get into, with difficulty levels ranging from storyteller for the laid back old video gamer to one save completionists. Throw in some light resource management, a dash of crafting, and lots of eye candy bars.
Annoyance: Artificial narrative
Someday AlphaZero, having reached sentience and maybe bored with chess, will start writing novels. Wildermyth narrative is not there yet, and often feels like a collation of vignettes hastily and randomly put together by a rather unworldly algorithm. The verbose storytelling doesn’t feel natural, in turn weirdly awkward or perfunctorily clinical, like the neat sounding grammar of your average word processor. The tale lacks the imperfections and idiosyncrasies of humanity. Write dozens of paragraphs, tag them according to categories and let the app generate a “story”. The narrative gets bogged down in lengthy inconsequential chit chat between the heroes of your party. Eventually, all forgettable names, faces, backgrounds, all a blur.
Beauty: Pastel beauties and intricate artwork
The greatest comic books are born of the deep mutual understanding of a writer and a drawing artist. Change one, and your favourite series takes a different direction and a different tone. Wildermyth has outstanding visual artistry. The landscapes, the battle props, the inventory items, the maps, and particularly the monsters, have a very uniquely crafted style. The heroes (all average humans) are a little bland, with a change of wig or physical ailment here and there. Wildermyth randomly generates characters and postures through comic strips storytelling, which can result in heads ajar (or a hero with a serious case of scoliosis).
The Old Video Gamer’s Prattle: Amazing drawing outshines mechanical writing 6/10
The contrast between Wildermyth’s incredible artwork and disjointed writing can be grating. The narrative overstays its welcome by too many pages and you soon get buried under a pile of inconsequential anecdotes. Fast reading and clicking lets you enjoy the gorgeous visuals without the mood breaking blurb but it is less than ideal. Would a more scripted story with an old school human improve the narrative? Possibly. Meanwhile, revel in Wildermyth’s smooth turn based combat mechanics and take snapshots of its beautiful bestiary.
Keen to embark on another quest? Try out Hades, an action packed role playing game of Greek myth proportions. Alternatively, turn based strategists can trade pikes for tanks in the classic Valkyria Chronicles.
