Video Game / Mythos

Only the very brave - or the very foolish - would enter Harborough Asylum.

Mythos: The Beginning is a Survival Horror RPG for PC, developed by Dark Gaia Studios (of One Night and Legionwood fame) and released in September of 2014.

Envisioned as a love letter to the Gothic Horror films of the early 20th Century, Mythos is the story of a famous paranormal investigator (whose name, background and appearance is decided by the player) tasked with uncovering the mystery of London's dreaded Harborough Asylum — a place rumored to be full of ghosts, zombies and other nasties. It is the player's job to search the asylum for traces of three missing university students, all the while fighting for their life against the Eldritch Abomination that has taken control of the grounds.

The game attempts to combine classic survival horror gameplay with the structure and mechanics of an old-school dungeon crawling RPG. There are stat checks, dialogue trees and non-combat proficiencies, but there are also jump scares, resource management and an emphasis on avoiding enemies which can decimate the party in a single encounter.

Like most adventure games, Mythos is best played without spoilers. Read the tropes below at your own risk.

This game provides examples of:

• Abandoned Hospital: The game takes place in a disused lunatic asylum. It was closed down in 1914 because the lead doctor was subjecting the patients to occult rituals.
• Affectionate Parody: The game is "inspired by 1930s pulp horror movies".
• A Friend in Need: In two of the game's endings when you're trapped by a falling rock and have to rely on Luana to help you. She'll only save you if she likes you.
• All There in the Manual: The game has some tutorials, but the mechanics are explained in far more depth in the Investigator's Handbook.
• Anti-Frustration Feature: If you enter the game's final room without any supplies, it helpfully leaves a cache of them on the floor to help you fight the boss.
• Apocalyptic Log: You find several notes left behind by former employees of the asylum.
• Asshole Victim: It becomes apparent halfway through the game that someone has to be Kraxat's host. It ends up being Blacktail.
• The Bad Guy Wins: Act like an asshole throughout the game and you accept Kraxat's offer at the end.
• Badass Boast: You can make a few of them.
• Battle Theme Music
• Bittersweet Ending: The Karma ending. Why is it bittersweet? Kraxat is dealt with, Luana is letting the public know about the Old Ones, but you're dead.
• Body Horror: Quite a lot of it.
• Bold Inflation: Peter seems quite prone to doing this.
• Boss in Mook Clothing: Any of the normal enemies could be this due to the player character's (by design) frailty.
• But Thou Must!: Inverted — you have the option of simply walking out the front gate and leaving the asylum at any time. Who cares about completing the rest of the game, right?
  • Later played straight when Blacktail arrives and breaks the gate's control panel to prevent you from leaving.
• Cat Scare: There's a literal one when you first enter the stairwell in the main building.
• Captain Obvious: "Watch out, it's a trap!" Why thank you for that observation, Peter. It's not like we didn't notice the roof slowly descending upon us.
• Cruel to Be Kind: Want Peter to survive? You'll have to alienate him to the point where he decides to take his chances on his own, making sure he isn't around in the endgame.
• Descending Ceiling: The second crest puzzle. You can avoid getting squashed by putting the Fake Crest in the old one's place.
• Defeating the Undefeatable: The ingame lore tells you Kraxat is an ancient demigod responsible for destroying countless worlds, but you can just shoot it to death with your .32.
• Eldritch Location: The Old Ones' world.
• Enemy Scan: The Study Enemies skill.
• Enter Solution Here
• Elite Mooks: The "Old One" enemies. They usually appear alone, but a single one of them tends to be more powerful than three normal mooks combined.
• Evil Is Hammy: Played straight intentionally. The game is, after all, a pastiche of pulpy horror movies.
• Get A Hold Of Yourself Man: You can do this to your companions when they begin to freak out. Usually it doesn't work unless you have the Persuade talent.
• Giant Spider: You can encounter them in the juvenile ward.
• Heroic Sacrifice: Peter can do this, if he hasn't decided to leave before the end of the game.
• Hidden Supplies: The bonus items that only exist if you have a high Sense attribute. They're impossible to find ordinarily.
• Intrepid Reporter: You can choose a journalist background for your character.
• Jump Scare: Plenty, though not quite as many as Dark Gaia's previous games.
• Laser-Guided Karma: Choose the wrong dialogue responses or threaten an NPC one too many times? Say goodbye to the perfect ending.
• Locked Door: Despite the fact that there's a specific talent for lockpicking, you usually have to find a key or solve a puzzle to advance.
• Multiple Endings: There are four of them.
• Nintendo Hard: The combat is very difficult on the default setting, with your character doing little damage to monsters while they wipe the floor with you. Reviewers complained, leading to an update that allows for difficulty levels, but even the easiest, level zero (supposedly if you just want to enjoy the story) can be challenging.
• Non-Elemental: Strangely for an RPG, there are no elemental properties whatsoever.
• Nostalgia Level: YMMV, but many of the locations are reminiscent of the first One Night game.
• One-Word Title
• Point Build System: You level up your character by spending EXP directly on attribute increases and skills.
• Relationship Values: How you treat your companions ultimately determines what happens to them in the endings.
  • Interestingly, being nice isn't always the best option, as the only way to save Peter is to force him to leave by being nasty to him.
• RPG Elements: HP and SP, full-fledged turn based battles, dialogue trees... the game does bill itself as a "survival horror RPG".
• Save Point: The "save rooms" scattered throughout the game. You can also find Notepads that allow you to save anywhere, but they can only be used once each.
• Scratch Damage: Averted — if your Guts attribute is high enough, you can cancel out enemy attacks altogether.
• Shout-Out: There are plenty, to other Survival Horror games and Gothic Horror in general.
  • When generating a random name for your character, you can get Harker, Helsing and Mina.
    • You can also end up with a character named Mulder (if male) or Scully (if female)
  • The main antagonist of the game is a member of a race of Eldritch "Old Ones".
  • And let's not forget the shout-out to Resident Evil 1 in the credits list.
• Skippable Boss: All of them, provided you've taken the time to master the correct talents.
• Spiritual Successor: To the One Night trilogy.
• Story Breadcrumbs: You can get the gist of the story just by playing through normally, but much of the important background detail is hidden in files you can only access with certain talents.
• Survival Horror
• Tactical Door Use: Exiting and re-entering a room resets all the monsters within back to their default positions.
• The Unfought: If you have the right talents, you can bypass every battle in the game.
• Zombie Gait: Played straight. They even groan "brainnsss".

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