Myth of Empires, at the time of its early access launch, was the most exciting new survival game in several years; however, in 2024, it is “just another survival game” in a sea of better survival games, and while its legal issues with snail games are a thing of the past, the damage has been done, and many gamers are weary of the developers, and likely will remain so for some time. .
Massively Multiplayer.
Co-op Multiplayer.
PvP Multiplayer.
Shortly after Myth of Empires was released into early access in November 2021, many people began to notice that it contained parts of the Ark Survival Evolved code base, something which would quickly be noticed by copyright lawyers for Snail Games USA, leading to a lawsuit and Myth of Empires being pulled from sale on Steam for over two years.
After a period of legal stalling by Angela Game (who I believe were unaware that one of their employees had used stolen Ark Survival Evolved assets until it was too late and then panicked), both parties agreed to settle out of court, with Snail Games USA partnering with Angela Game to distribute Muth of Empires on both PC and Console.
While some feel this has let “code thieves” get off easy, I honestly believe that the theft was not a corporate decision by Angela Game but rather the work of a rogue employee(s), and a settlement is for the benefit of everyone involved, including gamers, who now get to purchase and play Myth of Empires via Steam (and soon console) instead of relying on Angela Game’s previous third party launcher, which frankly was not very stable and to many people appeared a bit dodgy in light on the ongoing litigation.
Angela acknowledges that it caused difficulties for Snail’s business. By working together, Angela and Snail will put those difficulties behind them. Angela regrets any difficulties it caused Snail and looks forward to moving into this business partnership.
At the same time, we hope that, with Snail’s extensive user resources and excellent platform relationships built on ARK, they can assist us in our future publishing efforts, injecting greater market vitality into Myth of Empires” - Yi Ling Zheng, President, Angela Game.
I must preface this by saying there have been some phenomenal games coming out of China in the last few years; truly, Chinese developers have proven they are up to the task of competing with Japanese and Korean developers when it comes to making stylish and feature-rich titles; however, when it comes to live service titles, the gulf between eastern and western gamer culture has never been wider.
Region-locked servers are a very important issue to gamers on both sides of the divide, with most Western gamers wanting them while Eastern gamers feel they should not exist.
Honestly, I must side with the Western gamers in this regard, as much as I hate to see the gamer community divided into East vs West until the majority of Chinese gamers learn to play nice with others and, most importantly, stop cheating at every opportunity they won’t be welcomed by western gamers.
As someone who has played with people from mainland China and knows that not all Chinese players are cheaters (like not all Brazilian players are trolls, and not all Russian players are toxic.), I must admit that the majority of Chinese gamers do engage in toxic behaviour and cheating at a far higher rate than any other cultural demographic, with as many as 87.5% of all Chinese gamers having engaged in cheating over the past five years, a truly staggering percentage, and well above the global average of a mere 9.7% (excluding China).
What is curious about these figures is that it’s an issue of culture and not of race, with many ethnically Chinese players from other regions cheating at a lower-than-global-average rate; with this in mind, we can safely dismiss any right-wing theory about “lesser races” or other such nonsense and focus on the issue at hand.
To most mainland Chinese players, cheating is no big deal, bullying foreigners is no big deal, and being racist is no big deal.
Many Chinese players feel as if it is them vs the world, and we have seen time and time again in live service games Chinese guilds going out of their way to bully and harass non-Chinese players until they change servers or quit the game altogether.
While some stop at just bullying and verbal abuse, many take it further and actively engage in cheating to ensure their “victory”, and most are very open about doing so, making no effort to hide their foul play.
I have a good friend from Vietnam who opening says he doesn’t understand why people buy games and movies instead of pirating them, saying it’s more common in Vietnam to pirate than to purchase, something which other Vietnamese people (including a well-respected Vietnamese doctor), have confirmed this is how many in Vietnam view digital piracy.
Does this mean all ethnically Vietnamese people are pirates? Of course not, just like not all English football fans are thugs, despite English football fans as a whole being some of the most violent and rowdy soccer fans in the world, committing acts of violence and vandalism at a far greater rate than almost any other soccer fan demographic.
While region-locked servers unfortunately rarely work (due to heavy VPN usage in mainland China), something has to be done to ensure that players who do not want to cheat or play with those who cheat are not chased off by cheaters and those who enable them.
Unfortunately, right now, that means isolating China from the rest of the gaming community, something which honestly sucks for the 13%-ish of Chinese gamers (40M+ players) who do not engage in any illegal activity or toxicity or actively moderating live service titles with a zero-tolerance approach to cheating, nationalist tendencies and racism, an expensive, but necessary step if Chinese developers wish to be viewed as being unbiased by the gaming community.
Unfortunately, such accusations have plagued Angela Game since shortly after the launch of Myth of Empires, which I feel is unfair; many developers struggle to handle the overwhelming flood of toxicity and cheating being exported by mainland China, and expecting them to “do better” just because they are based in China is unfair, and honestly highlights the need for Chinese gamers to get their act together, and stop ruining online gaming for everyone (themselves included!).
Unlike most survival games, which utilise a traditional DLC business model, Myth of Empires utilises a more traditionally Chinese business model by selling a wide of cosmetic items and loot boxes,
While this doesn’t sound that bad, Myth of Empires is unlikely to stop at purely cosmetic items, as frankly, very few Chinese-published games do, with Chinese-developed live service titles often having the most egregious microtransactions and currency obstruction on the market.
No one makes a game as grindy as Myth of Empires without at least hoping they can introduce pay-2-win or pay-for-convenience items into the cash shop; as someone who has played dozens of survival games, I can safely say that Myth of Empires is perhaps the most grindy survival game on the market, making even vanilla rate Ark Survival Evolved look like a walk in park in compression.
While this scenario may seem unlikely if you had told me a survival game would launch with loot boxes in 2024, I would have said you are mistaken, and yet Myth of Empires not only has loot boxes with exploitive RNG, but rather overpriced lootboxes purchased with premium currency, at a price point that forces players to purchase more premium currency than they would need to unlock a single loot box, therefore enticing players to purchase even more premium currency and open even more lootboxes.
This is a vicious circle that could be devastating for those with compulsive behaviour syndrome, who are prone to impulse purchases or have a history of gambling addiction.
While I understand Chinese gamer culture is different, and many Chinese games are free-2-play and need microtransactions to survive, I also know that many Chinese gamers are sick of exploitive business models, and hopefully, they will find a way to pressure Chinese developers in a way that western gamers have succeeded in making developers release western ports of Korean titles, that while still terrible are not as money grabbing and exploitive as our fellow gamers in South Korea are forced to endure.
Many people point to the poor translation of Chinese games into English as a sign that they do not care about their English-speaking audience, but that is hogwash.
We notice the poor English translations because it is the language we speak; however, many Western games have terrible translations into other languages and often do not get translated into Mandarin or Cantonese at all, forcing Chinese players to read English or use unofficial builds to play the games they want to play in their native language.
I understand it is easy as a Western gamer to point at Chinese players as the source of most of the problems in modern gaming (gold selling, cheating, hacking, ultra-nationalist metagaming ); however, we cannot judge all Chinese players by their actions of bad actors, even if sadly that is the majority of Chinese gamers.
I am certainly glad that I am not judged by the actions of my entire race, gender or sexuality.
Honestly, as a Christian, I feel that loving everyone (yes, even the cheaters and hackers) is the only way forward for the gaming community.
Yes, we must deal with hackers and cheaters, but we must do so in a way that deals with the issue at hand without vilifying an entire nation or race, especially when you are talking about a nation as vast as China (1.4 billion people).
The way Myth of Empires allows players from all over the world to control and explore regions of the same massive map is impressive, and in theory, this system would be great if players from the corresponding region predominantly populated each region; unfortunately, this is not the case, and almost every EU and NA region and sub-region is controlled by one of just a few Chinese mega guilds who actively seek to drive away as many western players as possible.
Allowing guilds to control regions is fun; however, when an entire nation of guilds is unofficially united against all other guilds from other nations, a fun and challenging pvp encounter quickly becomes a digital genocide fueled by ultra-nationalism and racism.
Unfortunately, this problem does not only exist on PvP servers, with Chinese mega guilds invading PvE realms en masse to lock down every resource possible to funnel back to their compatriots on PvP servers.
Because of this issue, rampant cheating, and lingering (unproven) claims of the developers not doing enough to protect Western players from their countrymen, I cannot recommend anyone play on official servers; however, there are several unofficial servers which have great communities of people from all over the world, who want to win fairly, and not zerg and cheat their way to the top. I fully recommend playing Myth of Empires on one of those servers.
Myth of Emopires is very grindy and makes vanilla rate Ark Survival Evolved look like a walk in the park in comparison, and for those with a real life outside of gaming, playing with a large group on officials servers or a smaller group on a custom server with boosted rates is the only way to enjoy Myth of Empires without making it a full-time job.
Over the past few years, survival gamers have explored the past, present, and future of our world and many others, but never before have players been allowed to explore the exciting Three Kingdoms era in such a dynamic way, actively carving out a place for themselves in one of the most romanticised periods of Chinese history.
With epic heroes, massive battles, and more betrayals and counter-betrayals than the most intense Spanish daytime soap opera, no other era in Chinese history captures the imagination like the Three Kingdoms era does.
While Myth of Empires is not the best survival game on the market, its unique setting does make it far more appealing than it would be in any other setting, and I would love to see more developers experiment with exploring unique and interesting periods of history in future, as while zombies, aliens and dinosaurs are fun, there is plenty of excitement in our own history, and much of it would make a great setting for a live service survival game if handled correctly, and exploitive microtransactions were kept to a minimum.
Myth of Empires is a survival game built on Unreal Engine 4, so I will not waste my time explaining all the ways it is similar to every other Unreal Engine survival game nor touch on the elements that were clearly “inspired” by other popular survival games such as Conan Exiles (Thralls), Ark Survival Evolved (Taming), Atlas (Boats), etc.
Instead, I will focus on things that are unique about Myth of Empires so that you, the reader, can decide for yourself if the new mechanics make the MNythj of Empires a better game or just add an extra layer of complexity that does little to make the final product any more enjoyable.
Myth of Empires utilises a directional combat system that will be very familiar to fans of Conan Exiles, Mordhau, and Chivalry 2, and as far as survival game melee combat systems go, It is pretty much the most engaging system that PvP players could ask for, and honestly, even players whos tick to PvE content will learn to enjoy it, even if it does at first feel like overkill when facing off with npc that do little more than flail and stab at the player character.
Myth of Empires is one of just a few online games that allow players to aspire to political (or military office), which in turn grants them various passive and active perks, a reward for their skills in combat, diplomacy, trade and complete lack of social life, after having dedicated the better part of 500 hours to reach the very highest ranks in-game when playing on official servers (on unofficial servers with boosted rates this is a far more manageable and equally much less impressive a feat.
While many survival games cater for large guild vs guild encounters, Myth of Empires is one of just a few games (Atlas did it first) that is built around server vs server combat, with guilds being able to lay claim to entire regions and call in their allies to defend their territory or invade another empire (server).
Combined with NPC troops, cavalry charges, siege vehicles, airships, and heavy artillery, Myth of Empires offers large-scale PvP to a degree that isn’t possible in any other game still in active development (RIP Atlas).
Myth of Empires at launch has six NPC factions, which can be recruited and raided, and if you push them too far, raid you in return, in what is essentially a more fleshed-out iteration of Conan Exiles purge mechanic.
While players can starve off raids by paying coin to the faction leaders, after a while, players will tire of being forced to pay tribute, and it is then that players must trust in the strength of their defences, tames, and friends and allies, both human and NPC.
In addition to offering narrative flavour, each faction has its strengths and weaknesses, which not only make for engaging PvE encounters when tackling their strongholds but also allow players to build their army by recruiting units from a variety of unique factions, each with their unique benefits and abilities, very similar to the system found in Mount and Blade Warband and its sequel Bannerlord.
Myth of Empires allows players to level up a wide variety of skills that improve their effectiveness in a wide array of disciplines, such as mining, crafting, archery, one-handed combat, horseback riding, and lumberjacking, to name just a few!
In addition, players can assign expertise points to individual expertise trees, which in turn can increase XP earned when partaking in that activity by a whopping 600%.
With 900 levels of upgrades to unlock for each tree, unlocking every perk and passive bonus for each of the skill trees will take a considerable amount of time, and while assigning expertise points helps players unlock a few advanced perks quicker, overall, players who wish to reach the level 900 advanced perks for each tree, will have to spend dozens of hours fishing, mining, sawing, fighting, riding, building and hunting to reach their goal, a time commitment that honestly few will be able to give, without playing on a boosted rates server, or playing Myth of Empires like it was a full-time job.
Myth of Empires is a nice late Unreal Engine 4 game and rests both visually and performance-wise almost exactly midway between Ark Survival Evolved and Ark Survival Ascended; while it is nowhere near as pretty as the latter, it performs much better, and I was able to easily maintain a steady 60FPS/1080p on high settings on my 5700 XT build.
That being said, it is not perfect, and animal models, in particular, are of varying quality, with some animals, such as horses and elephants, looking fantastic, while rabbits, foxes, turtles and other small creatures look worse than many similar creatures found in much older games.
Overall, Myth of Empuires performs well and looks great, but you will be disappointed if you go into it expecting 120FPS or Unreal Engine 5 quality visuals.
Myth of Empires is a survival video game developed by Angela Game and published by Imperium Interactive Entertainment, it was released on 21 February 2024 and retails for $39.99.
Myth of Empires is available exclusively on PC.
As of August 2024, around 120,000 people play Myth of Empires on a fairly regular basis.
Myth of Empires is fairly active, and there are multiple active servers during peak NA/EU play times catering to various playstyles and/or regions.
Myth of Empires offers the following matchmaking options:
The Myth of Empires in-game store sells:
The following peripherals are officially supported:
Myth of Empires is unrated and contains:
Myth of Empires is a decent game; most survival gamers would not regret playing it.
Unlike most survival games, it offers a surprising amount of dynamic PvE content for solo players and small groups, allowing them to taste PvP-flavoured PvE content. While many of the new mechanics and systems in Myth of Empires are overly complex and have been done better before in other games, there is plenty of content to explore. Players have huge agency regarding how they wish to expierance that content.
However, with popular and unique titles such as Palword, Enshrouded and Nightingale taking the survival genre by storm, genre veterans maintaining their hold on the ebb and flow of the genre, Myth of Empires feels like “more of the same” at a time when survival gamers are eager for “something more”, and as a huge fan of the genre, I just find it hard to become excited about Myth of Empires, which is a pity as five or so years ago, I know it would have been a game that would have excited me greatly.
