Monomyth

+

i love the idea of this game but i have two major gripes.

1. please let me use my sword at least a bit more before having to smith it, i should have to repair every time i go to a town or my hub area, not every single time i see a forge.

2. i would love to go outside once in a while, i have been in a cave the entire game. i understand the lore being that above ground is a wasteland and what not but being in caves all the time is claustrophobic no matter how big you make it. if fallout can be outside then this game can be too.

other than that, the rpg mechanics and fluid dungeon crawling will keep you entertained for hours and the store that has been made so far is intriguing for sure, if you arent sure definitely pick up the demo, i was so into it i finished the entire demo dungeon.

solid 8/10 now, 9/10 at least if the above gets addressed.

This early access game seems like a great attempt to make an elder scrolls style game without all the bethesda jank and nonsense. I'm currently 4 hours in and can't wait to finish the game

This is a tough game in I think mostly all of the right ways. I actually used notes I wrote myself to help me with some of the clues I found in cell walls.. I have several times been down to nearly completely broken weapons, and enemies ahead of me, low on health, before figuring out how to self-discovery more spells that saved my bacon, only to later now need to conserve mana and rely on the new gear I had uncovered. It is full of puzzles, secret paths and loot.

Basically, this feels like a solo player DnD with a very unforgiving DM. Combined with some of the mechanics of other games like ever quest or even oblivion, while not being any of those. "Old school RPG" fits really well as a description as well. It requires patience and thought, but feels rewarding. I get this feeling it will eventually reach a point where I am simply defeated and can't figure it out and will require finding a guide online. But for now, I actually look forward to playing more.

I love games like this where you have total freedom. Smash an enemy with a box, stack 5 barrels to bypass an obstacle, or wipe out everything in sight and still make progress :)

This game rocks. Enemies stay dead when killed, a micro sandbox that so dense it feels like all the best highlight zones from skyrim in 1 location, Mystery on every corner, rewarding people for being smart and not children (like most games today)., simple but fair combat. You owe it to yourself if you've ever played elder scrolls and wanted to feel satisfied from exploring the world to play this game.

Opened the game and 10 hours disappeared. Brings you back to the 90s. Awesome Game.

Bravo. It really captures the feeling of old school dungeon crawlers akin to even the roots of Ultima Underworld.

You have just done what teams of highly paid AAA game devs have tried to do for a long time, and just can't get the feeling right.

Currently lost again, after being lost for an hour somewhere in the nowhere and I finally found a village. It was pillaged by outlanders. Thought I could look through the mines below and now I am running around again.

But honestly, this game is for the people that like to explore and find all the little things around the map, whilst always having one or two nasty surprises for you.

So far a really good experience, sometimes frustrating, but for me this isn't something bad. So far it always payed off!

Now I have to search where this new key of mine fits.

I couldn't recommend this game, but I also don't want to put a bad review. This game has a huge potential and a lot of interesting things.. but is too raw yet. And I am not sure that it will ever become polished so far it is a one-man-studio project. I quit my walkthrough after entering the fortress. It was nice to feel that arx-fatalis vibe, but sometimes it is TOO oldschool. If you want to make a good oldschool game, copying the old gamedesign is not always a best idea. You know, there is a lot of things we don't like in modern games, but there is also a lot of good things were invented since then

I accidentally hit a guard in a chaotic fight against monsters, now all guards are hostile forever, even after they kill me and i resurrect. Luckily for me this happened within the first two hours of playing

The rest is fun.

I love the way this looks now, but am afraid to put in too many hours bc Im worried about spoiling and replayability

It's a great adventure game. Can't wait to see where Development takes it!

On the whole though - Really promising game in its style and genre. I look forward to more of it. Definitely worth checking out if you are into the genre. Specifically if you have any experience plaything Ultima Underworld, Arx Fatalis, or King's Field. It's a well realized dungeon crawler with its mechanics highly influenced by King's Field/Souls and its design philosophy in line with immersive sim pioneers of the Ultima Underworld/Arx Fatalis sort.

The setting is actually really good - without too many spoilers it follows the Dying Earth tradition. The world is in a similar state as a Souls series game for those unfamiliar with Dying Earth as a literary/storytelling tradition. The fantasy is low magic and people have increasingly fled underground or into mountain fortresses after the surface turned hostile, though surface outposts and trade still happens - it's just increasingly risky. I mention setting so importantly because it is the primary motivator for this quest you character embarks on. Or rather the quest your brother and his ill fated expedition set out upon - never to be heard from again. You follow in their wake to locate them discover the fate of their mission (to recover a Macguffin rumored to be able to mitigate or avert the declining atmospheric conditions). Along the way you will discover the strange land they set out for and unravel its political intrigues, for all is not well in this strange place. Which is as good a motivation as any.

Mechanically it plays closer to King's Field than its other sources. You manage stamina, Health, and Mana in the same way as that venerable series. This is a good thing as the genre can be a little too easy without a stamina mechanic forcing you to consider how best to proceed in combat or evasive maneuvers. There's also a focus stat that impacts the speed at which you can hurl out spells, preventing spam fireballs for example. The game does however do stealth better than King's Field ever could (there's only so much mechanical depth the PS1 could handle mind you) - I would wager you could probably manage almost a full zero kill pacifist stealth run of whats in the game currently. I say almost as I think the first two rats in the game would still need to be killed but that said you might be able to just run and break contact with them, I admittedly have not tried. The downside is the pacifist character would be at a markedly lower level for most of the game as the experience system currently rewards kills. The flip side is they really wouldn't need that much character power to stealth and evade. Essentially though the game needs to more generously reward non-combat solutions by some means to make the stealth path truly worth pursuing.

The downside are surprisingly few:
- It's currently incomplete. Though that's not a rude surprise or anything, as of this writing (07/12/2024) it is in early access so know that going in and you'll be fine. Still it is largely the cause of all the other negatives that follow for the time being.

- The skills are imbalanced heavily at the moment as some are clearly more useful than others, and this matters a lot given that skill points are precious and there's currently no re-spec options (though that is in the works). Stealth is well realized enough as a mechanic that actually investing in the skill at all has dubious value at best - I suspect it helps de-aggro so you can give enemies the slip more easily after they've spotted you but I'm not sure. Speech seems interesting but as it stands there's absolutely far too few people to interact with for it to have value, this will hopefully have better realization once more NPCs and more dialogue are added. As it stands your best builds are taking a single primary combat skill (that isn't archery) and then any two of Lock picking (Strongest skill if you know where to go for what early but not necessary to be fair - though if the game ever develops a speed run community I expect this to be a primary), Anatomy (faster healing and a higher chance of recovering bandages after use, plus the chance to critically hit increases from Anatomy, and if that wasn't enough at 10 points you see the amount of damage you deal per attack and how much of their health bar that amount was), and Athletics (easily underrated at first but once you hit 10 in the skill you are SIGNIFICANTLY faster both just moving around and recovering stamina which is your primary resource - this helps managing combat much easier).

Strong early Access archetypes are I would say:
The Warrior/Knight Errant - Strength focused, Dex secondary for meeting minimum requirements on Sword&Axe weapons. OR Blunt weapons, same state spread, just usually less dex requirements. Athletics and Anatomy. Move fast, strike hard. No nonsense fighter whose life on the road has demanded a keen sense of treating wounds. Pay attention to your equipment load in your inventory screen, it impacts stamina recovery rate.

The Rogue - Dex focus, Strength Secondary to meet Piercing weapon requirements, which are your primary combat skill, then endurance for stamina. Then Lock picking. Anatomy is useful if you want to crit, Athletics is useful if you want to be hit less so take your pick. (I usually go with anatomy as the pierce damage weapons do REALLY good damage out the gate to most of the enemies available in early access and a critical can often one shot enemies) It's hard to go wrong as there's a very good Foil available very early if you're clever. This build might be the fastest one off the ground in early access right now - it basically switches on as soon as you get the Estoc which can be done in minutes. It's so good the fact that you don't meet its minimums for several levels is utterly irrelevant - just start putting holes in people ASAP and repair it every time you come across a forge.

The Mage - Haven't finished the game with this one yet but it is probably the actual strongest build. But you need a bit of fore knowledge on where and what spells are to really get the ball rolling (similar to an archery build in that regard - just that archery is currently MUCH weaker for now). Int with some cognition, Load up on Cosmic magic and lock picking for convenience. Would probably throw in a few points Athletics just to get around faster too.


- I will follow up with skills being a little bloated though. I don't know that we actually need three separate melee skills considering they are all fundamentally similar - I feel anyone professionally trained to use a sword would also understand fundamentally how a dagger or foil style sword works. The fundamentals of footwork, effective striking, and defensive screening are roughly the same. As it stands the game already groups Swords and Axes together to reduce this bloat, I just think it could go one step further bringing the combat tree down to Archery (Can cover the bows that are in the game, crossbows, and even throwing weapons if added), Blades (swords, daggers, and foil types - weapons made for combat exclusively), and Bludgeons (axes, clubs, and hammers - tools adapted to combat). Could just as easily go Close Weaponry and Ranged Weaponry. Stealth and Search could probably be blended too, Reasoning someone consciously trying to be stealthy is going to have a heightened awareness for hidden threats, mindful of every footfall before it happens as it were, which carries over to just hidden/unusual things in general. That's all just like my opinion though. In either case I think there's just too many things to sink too few skill points into at the moment.

Sigh, no thanks. I want my cash back, now.

Love the game style. everything you would want in a dungeon crawler

Still being in early access this game shows a lot of promise as an immersive dungeon crawler rpg single player experience, the world building is interesting and done mostly through very detailed world design, the story is simple enough to understand but unique and engaging enough to keep you exploring until the very end of the game so far, and looking forward eagerly to the next update. the ai is fairly basic and the different builds could use some balancing improvements and more variety for weapons and armor, but the level design is peak, the models are charming, and the lore runs deep and leaves you wanting to delve even deeper as updates roll in.

Great game, played as a pure mage and its interesting to learn new spells, apply them in the world and fight enemies with it. Cant wait for the next expansion.

This is a mixed review. I wish there was a third option. This game has some great bones, and its core elements are very fun. The magic system is cool. fun spells. Not enough combat, but the combat is fun. Great atmosphere.

The game suffers heavily from being very empty. The 15th time I've explored an extra room to find an empty chest, it gets very old. Why are there so many empty containers? it doesn't need to rain loot from the sky every time i open a door, but I am exploring to find stuff. Gimme Stuff.

The game also suffers from being too vague. You have to get "some artifacts". How many? what are they? where should i look? None of the characters can provide more information than, "I dunno, there around and there's a few I guess." it makes me feel like finding these artifacts is about as important as what I want for lunch, "I dunno, whatever I guess". I appreciate the lack of hand holding, but can I have a map so I can find the magic shop. I've stumbled on it twice, but the area is so confusing its hard to find again.

This game is a wonderful blend of Thief, Dark Messiah, and a hint of Arx Fatalis. Increase the kick range, add more stuff to be thrown at enemies, maybe a few spike traps that enemies can be impaled on, some finishers, a stealth kill system, and I think you've got the makings of a 10/10 game here. Play up the more dark messiahish elements more, and I'll gladly buy this game for as many friends as I can.

Disregard previous requests for regenerating mana, I didn't realize that the game already has that when you upgrade certain skills.

Generally surprised by this game and the mechanics available. Felt old school and kept me engaged up until the locked "Mines" segment, unreleased. Player freedom felt good. It felt like playing Oblivion in some aspects. And to me that is quality because I have better memories there than Skyrim.
Also think this was done by a solo dev; GREAT WORK. You should be proud!

Simply put it's a interesting/immersive game with a lot of room to grow.
Hats of to the creator for making a "true to blue" Kings Field like old school RPG.
Considering the price, it's a fun Adventure title for people longing for a good old classic first-person spell and swords Daggerfall like time.
It's one i'll be keeping a close eye on and wish other's to give the time of day to.
The added bonus of being able to use your own character images on the character creation is a great plus.
Two swords up for my personal favorite early-access indie game of 2024.

Honestly for an early access game this game goes above and beyond my expectations. From the interactivity to the cool puzzles this game is incredible. I can't wait to see what the devs have in store.

Scratches that oldskool rpg itch very nicely. Plenty of ways to get s**t done. No excessive handholding and immersion in your character/build is very good. Nice roadmap ahead and can't wait for there to be even more to explore. Wholeheartedly recommended if you remember fondly games like Ultima Underworld, Blades of darkness, Kings field and the like.

Kinda cool but WAAAY too short.

By the time i got into it and knew what to do and what do i want to build towars, it ended.
No respec and no real explanation to stats takes a way from build exploration as well

Monomyth has a series of interesting ideas, none of which are executed well. From clunky movement, low stamina, uninspired environments and enemies, terrible voice acting that should have been left as silent npc's, and an all around frustrating lack in quality of life aspects (such as inventory management and qualitative descriptions of skill and attributes)- I would recommend you buy this at anything under $5 or not at all.

Some things the game does well is not railroading character progression like so many RPG's. You can freely develop a character with stats and skills to your choosing. Not that any of it impacts gameplay very much. I found myself adding to Endurance and Athletics but noticing no real change in my stamina reserves or consumption. Added multiple levels to lock-picking and nearly half of every lock I came across was deemed impossible to pick. I'm not sure why I added to speech. The few NPC's I came across did not care about my ability to talk to them.

I love the FPS free aim style when it comes to melee games (The Elder Scrolls games, Elderborn, Zenoclash, Dark and Darker, you get the point), but I found myself having to hug enemies in order to hit them- and if the crosshair was not on the enemy model even by a pixel the attack would miss. When I did hit the attacks were incredibly unsatisfying. The enemies did not react at all.

There is a very unique and immersive aspect to this game where you can pick up objects in the world and perform tasks with them. Grab a lever, stick it in the wall, and repair a broken mechanism to open a door. Stack crates in order to jump on them to access a hidden loft. Drop some fish by a fire and cook it. All very cool. Except... Why would you do that? Immersion. You know what breaks all immersion? Two things: jankiness and limitations- both of which become fast obstacles in performing those tasks: which turn them into a series of experiments and chores trying to figure out how the creator meant this object or that object to be used. (Explosive barrels should be able to be lit with the torch in my inventory. It boggles my mind that this was not an option. And if it is an option, and I missed it because I'm an idiot- my bad- but I tried for minutes and minutes so...)

I know this is early access, so this may come across as quite harsh. I mean no disrespect towards the creator nor to anyone who enjoys this game. I would definitely give this game a try again if there was a serious overhaul but... I doubt it will get there anytime soon.

4/10

Huge, High quality solo RPG

Content :
"not too easy" enough, open world, exploration, vast world, secrets, NPC interactions, side quests, puzzle solving, parkours, fighting, utility magic, spell system, physics, dark/light effects, good storyline, good music events, overall coherence

Personal impression :
Arx Fatalis vibes.
At first it is easy to get lost, you might find new details after going over to the same places. Most places are full of details.

Few noticed bugs/inconveniences :
-some quests doesn't appear finished in the journal
-underwater spellcasting get you stuck into spellcasting mode until you're back to walking mode
-moonlight shards lost while used on the red inner sanctum door
-side leaning through metal gates to open it with the wall lever on the other side (noticed one in the lysandrian mace artifact tomb)
-melee range for some weapons are shorter than it looks
-not easy to find the 0 on the 4 digits locks with symbols (could have been a reset button, or a translation parchment somewhere)
-some side areas are only reachable with lockpicks which makes that skill absolutely needed

No expectation.

At the moment I'm writing, the game hasn't been finished yet and you couldn't get into the "inner sanctum".

Top tier game overall.

Fantastic dungeon crawling. Good level interconnectivity, secrets, progression. Some flexibility in how you approach things depending on your build. No bugs or issues encountered.

Take Kingsfield, Eternal Ring, and every ancient crawler/exploration delver, put them in a blender with a generational gap, technical ability, and some damn good looking shaders, and you have this absolutely brilliant gem. No, really. It does Kingsfield almost better than Kingsfield. (and almost as good as Kira's Lunacid too). Game's fantastic and nostalgic, yet new at the same time. Very refreshing and highly rec'd to anyone into old school games with modern sensibilities. I don't have a "review" but I have a "review" that you should just sample and support the devs.

Good early access following in the vein of King's Field. Some mechanics have incredible depth, while armor and loot feel repetitive. Happy to support this developer to see things progress.

Finished the tutorial/prison level, and the game is really fun. Combat is somewhat clunky, but that's fine. The imsim spirit is really strong with this one.

I don't really play Early Access games, so I'm buying this now to support the dev and will wait for full release.

If the dev ever considers adding localizations, please consider Ukrainian!

This game is definitely worth 20 bucks if you like dungeon crawlers like Arx Fatalis.

I would like to see loot from chests evolve a bit. I made some pretty neat discoveries in some hard to get to areas. Such as the archers perch hanging off the side of a bridge in the outdoor area. After all the timed jumps to get to the perch, all I was rewarded with in the chest there was the same longbow I've picked up time and again. I also found duplicates of echos stones. I would be neat if they were one-off items to find in strategic spots so that magic character builds could not get access to the most powerful spells to quickly.

This game is real fun, like it a lot. Am excited to see where it goes from here. jumped through a waterfall, found a magical barrier, used some magic dust on it to dispel it, got a legendary sword 10/10

Really, REALLY solid. Loved it, and will keep going back for more builds. Love this modern take on dungeon crawling like the old days, while having the world, and systems of Arx Fatalis

I`m sad ... the early access suddenly ended ... This game is an old school rpg dungeon crawler and this was so much fun so far !!! I don`t know why but I had some Thief 2 vibes (what was one of my favorites in my childhood) Can`t wait for the full game !

played the demo and found a solid dungeon crawler experience that provides a lot of interactivity. was glad to see it is updated regularly and that its being changed according to public feedback. enjoyable and at 25 ish dollars it is at a reasonable price for the current level of content imo.

I havent played an advententure game of this quality since 2007 and its still in early access, insane potential but already enjoying it thoroughly

Clunky stiff movements. Enemies kill my character with just one or two hits while they take a bunch of hits to kill even when sneaking up on them and striking them from behind it still takes many more hits to finish them off. Enemies look like stuff you would find in a asset pack with rubber looking giant rats and plastic looking ogres. Seems to be nothing to heal up with and what there is heals slowly. Died after accidentally eating poison because the ui showing what i was carrying kept fading out so i could not even tell what i ate in my rush to heal before a giant ogre was on top of me as super sonic speeds.

I can already hear LEGEND OF GRIMROCK, LUDUS MORTIS, DUNGEON OF DRAGON KNIGHT and FALL OF THE DUNGEON GUARDIANS etc calling me back to play them again.

Got like 10 hours out of the Early Access version in one play-through. Well worth the price point, IMO. I hope to see how the game is finished and what the story entails as everything so far is well above what I would expect of a single-person "dev team". Try out the demo at the very least

I have barely scratched the surface of this game.

However from what little I have gleamed, I can tell you if you enjoy games like Arx Fatalis, and Dark Messiah of Might and Magic then this game is 100% for you.

If you need your hand held and to be babied every step of the way steer clear of this title.

This game came out of nowhere for me and I literally could not put it down! I was SO sad to see I had reached the end of early access. I hope we get more soon! You should play this game!

Hello,
(early access, I will update this) this game feels really oldschool. If you are not into games with no minimap, quest tracker, etc.. then it is not for you.

Me personally I had a good time. It gives me mm9 vibes in a good way. For example the rude NPC oneliners. Pure gold.

To me, the puzzles were hard, and when it required backtracking i had to google it. But I am quite dumb and I did not keep good notes. For example I spent a looot of time scouring the map looking for the place that was not fully cleared yet, coz I had noo idea. Most of the stuff I figured out myself and that felt reaaal good.

So in conclusion, definitely requires a specific taste, but if are into that like me, it is a very good game.

Don't really have any similar games to compare to, as it is a genre I don't ever dabble in.
However, read the PC Gamer article and it piqued my interest, and given it has a free demo, I said what the hell.
It hooked me bad immediately and only after a couple of hours I bought the early access without hesitation and enjoyed the hell out of it. Can't wait for future updates/content!!

This is awesome! Even at this stage it is very enjoyable. Great level design and a ton of varied gameplay mechanics! It is challenging though as you are not given an exact location on a map to do some quest action but you are not even given a map in the beginning. Exploration becomes a challenge and much more rewarding when you do manage to solve some quest or get to some new area. Love it!

Hey so this game is great.
If you didn't enjoy the demo, me neither. Full game is significantly better. Trust.

If you require controller support, try out the Steam Controller (if you have one), it works perfectly with this game and can do everything except write on the map. Need a keyboard for that. I made a community layout for the steam controller, feels about as good as it can be, I think!

The magic system is boss. Though I don't know if I'm not far enough into it, but mana stinks and I always run out, there isn't enough mushrooms in the world to support 30 seconds of flame thrower hand.

Melee combat is ookkaayy, bout as dynamic as Skyrim.
Speaking of Skyrim, stealth archer. We're so back.

This games best quality so far is the exploration, looting, and dynamic mechanics. You can stack boxes, bake pies, brew potions, hand craft spells & your spell book. All within the 3 hours I played. Please note that at least 1 hour of that time was spent fiddling around with the controller.

All in all, I really recommend this game if you like dungeon crawlers. So far the story is.. there.. but it gives me a goal and a lot of games in this genre lack something like that. This game kind of feels like if you made Bleak Falls Barrow from Skyrim into a whole game and then built a bunch of cool mechanics around it. Classic dungeon crawler with a whole lot more than what meets the eye.

Amazing that this was created by one person, if you are they. Great fricken job. Absolutely cannot wait to play more of this game, I've wanted a game like this for so long. A real steal at $20, I would have easily paid $40.

This game is insanely good. It's a proper dungeon crawler. It doesn't hold your hand, and you'll come across a lot stuff you'll have no clue about, until you venture deeper into the game and pick up clues which give you a eureka moment for a puzzle you might have seen hours earlier. It's a very creative breath of fresh air of a game and the journal is very good for tracking quests. I love it. My one gripe, however, make a better map. The first level is a nightmare to follow on the map. Other than that, it's amazing.

This is a great game. Recently I have had troubles with being engaged with AAA titles. They look great but play terribly. Monomyth looks good but is a lot of fun to explore and try and solve. I loved the old Arx Fatalis and this is a similar in many ways. Anyway, I look forward to EA2, 3 etc.. Good luck to the developer!

10/10 RPG Dungeon Crawler ARPG experience. Blew my pants off when I got outside for the first time, was not expecting that. This game fucks.

This game aims to capture a classic, old-school vibe, and it succeeds in some respects. However, I can't recommend it. It either feels like an early access game or lacks essential elements that would make it enjoyable. For instance, the monster attack system includes unblockable Area of Effect (AOE) moves that instantly slow you down and prevent dodging—these are key combat mechanics, yet they limit gameplay.

The game has a basic note-taking system where you manually record locations, quests, and other details, but it feels cumbersome as the main tracking method. Additionally, gaining gear or experience lacks impact; after hours of play, there's little sense of progression. I’ve nearly completed the entire first zone, which feels empty and underwhelming. Unlocking a chest only to find basic items, like cloth miner’s shoes, makes exploration feel unrewarding.