Age of Mythology

The Good
Slight technical improvements on the Age Of Empires II engine. The game is good. It's fine. In fact, it's just like age of Empires II.

The Bad
You're not going to ace any history tests because of this game. Unlike it's predecessors, it's not based on history but on fantasy. And that's pretty much the only difference. It looks and plays so much like AOEII that you would swear there were no changes, although there have been some technical refinements which consequently require more computer horsepower.

If it were viewed in a vacuum, Age of Mythology adequately represents the competency of the folks at Ensemble Studios. It has more visual whiz-bang than AOEII because you have colorful spells instead of simple hand-to-hand combat. When viewed in the real world where there are other choices, it seems like a dud.

The Bottom Line
It's just like Age of Empires II, only with magic spells.

The Good
*2nd Review Update

So there I was, hearing rumors of an Age of Empires III that turned out Age of Mythology. Unfortunately for us AoE fans, Age of Empires III turned out to be a pile of crap. At least AoM wasn't disappointing at the least. Hah, they finally use "mythology" has a main theme. See this is what happens when people start thinking "Medieval RPG". Hey, nothing can go wrong with "Medieval RPG Thinking" :p

Graphics
So Age of Mythology did a total upgrade to old AoE II game play. From 2D to 3D and very stable I might add, which was still rare considering 3D graphics were quite new, very unstable for a lot of games.

I remember the first time I saw the intro cut scene. My jaw was in awe. The sight of mythological units was somewhat amazing. The fact that I've never seen a giant beetle unit is very much memorable.

New Factions
The game itself comprises of the different approaches, which is represented by the 3 different races:

The Good
Several games have tried to become "Age of Empires 3". All have failed. (Empire Earth comes to mind...) O man, where to start! First of, the graphics are terriffic. While they may not be as good as Command and Conquer: Generals, they are still really good. The different civilizations are pretty varied. Although there is only nine different major gods you can choose from in the beggining of the game, every time you advance an age, you get to choose from two different "minor" gods, which gives you new abilities, technologies and units. Each of the three cultures, Egyptian, Greek, and Norse, are radically different. Each have different units, ways of gaining favor and different buildings. Some can get Calvary, others can get camels etc. This difference between civs is much more pronounced than other RTS. In other ones, most of the civs have pretty much the same units and techs except maybe one or two bonuses and a unique unit. AOM changes this, and makes each civ much different. The "minor" god feature also can have 2 players who start out the same major God, have at least slightly different bonuses. The "God Powers" are really cool. Each God has one that you get to use once. These do something pretty terrific that can change the course of the game. The powers varied from destructive to productive i.e. Meteor, which unleashes a meteor storm on your opponenets (duh) to being able to make a forest or gold mine appear. The game come with a campaign that lasts about 30 missions. (Although the ending is pretty bad. ) Also, if you don't know what a unit does, you can right click on the picture and it will automatically bring up the stats, what it's good against etc.

The Bad
The learning curve is kind of tough. When you build a myth unit, you may not know what to do. Some kind of silly stuff in the campaign, like people in those light armor suits or in "Egyptian clothing" in the middle of a tundra. Occasionally, when there's a close up cut scene ala Empire Earth, you will se some kind of ugly textures, although alot better than empire earth. Finally, units seem to move kind of slow. Even the Calvary, which zip around pretty fast in AOE. O, just remembered, the maps are small. I mean really small. Even the largest setting is dinky compared to AOE's map.

The Bottom Line
If you played AOE, you will like this game. Although the slightly steep learning curve may turn off some casual gamers, this is defenitely a must buy.