Age of Mythology: Retold Wishlist

In an alignment of the fates, Age of Mythology: Retold’s trailer was released not a day after I started replaying the classic RTS title. While it doesn’t have the same level of following as the Age of Empires series, Age of Mythology is a very enjoyable spinoff with a focus on mythology-themed units, god powers, and heroes.

While we don’t know anything about what Age of Mythology: Retold may be yet, it’s safe to assume it’s an update for the 20-year-old game. With my recent experience replaying the game and my truly ancient love of the game: Here’s my wishlist for a modern re-release of Age of Mythology.

Better pathfinding, please

While the pathfinding works well enough for traversing the map or small skirmishes, large battles are otherwise a total mess. Often, units will try to brush past each other like they are at a festival rather than on a battlefield; all shuffling past mortal enemies and fantastic creatures whilst trying to make their way to their intended target. This shuffle also makes ranged units much more powerful in large engagements, but they get trounced in smaller groups without support.

Units can also be a bit slow on the uptake when enemies start attacking them, often reshaping their lines as individual units decide that maybe stabbing the enemies back would be a good idea. Fully maxed-out armies will sometimes just decide that they don’t want to do whatever it is you told them to do. On occasion, units will also get stuck on terrain or behind decorative rocks or rubble; this is especially true for scenario maps.

How much of this is an old engine not playing nice with modern processors vs outdated unit AI is unclear, but this would be a massive quality-of-life change and may also require some rebalancing once units can actually find and attack targets efficiently.

Updated graphics

As much as Age of Mythology’s charm is tied to its dated 3D graphics, I would love to see the face of our hero be more than a smudge on a four-polygon head. Finding a balance between the original style, which did a great job with its limited polycount budget, and a more modern higher polycount could be difficult. Better quality textures would also be awesome and not too difficult for most units. There are a number of mods that already try to address the textures but updating the models and animations is a much more involved process. Let's get some polygons on that nose, shall we?

New skirmish AI

Skirmish mode is a staple for RTS games, but AoM’s skirmish has always felt a bit lackluster, at least once I was over the age of twelve. It has a few set personalities and follows these patterns to the best of its ability, but it's very mechanical. For example, in a team game, the AI will always focus on the human player, even to their own detriment. Which makes larger skirmish maps feel like a survival game, with your own AI allies doing little more than occasionally alleviating some of the pressure with their attacks. An update like the one Age of Empires received would be awesome for the longevity of the game, as a lot of players prefer playing against the AI.

New UI

Today I use a number of UI mods to enhance the game, from a see-through HUD, a more detailed villager count, and a number of smaller improvements. I simply can’t go back to the original HUD for more than a game or two, it feels so clucky and covers so much of the screen, even with the fairly recent updates a few years ago to allow it to have better compatibility with widescreen. If the team found a way to incorporate some of the more popular UI mods, it would be a welcome change. But I think they can do better with access to the backend. They can make something even better and more intuitive while learning some lessons from the most popular mods out there.

Updated tooltips & History popups

One of the reasons why I fell in love with Age of Mythology was the helpful tooltips and historical pop-ups. These provide context to the game, like mythical units and heroes. Since then our understanding of history, myth, and legend has expanded. It would be really awesome for some of the nerdiest nerds (like myself) to have access to an updated in-game encyclopedia. I would definitely put this change further down the list, as a revamped encyclopedia is no small task, and ultimately doesn’t change the feel of the game as much as other improvements we can look forward to.

I know that at a glance it may seem like I am ribbing Age of Mythology, but this is a twenty-year-old game. Despite its age, it’s still fun and has plenty of character, with a not-so-serious take on history. I’m going to summon a horde of zombies at the head of my army and then batter you with meteor strikes—that will never stop being entertaining. It has a fun campaign, complete with campy in-game cinematics, a wide variety of awesome god powers, and myth units from real-world stories that are a great foundation for a new coat of paint. I can’t wait to see how Age of Mythology: Retold turns out.