Buy Now...

click image to enlarge

Mystery of Myths - Heart of Athens is a Hidden Object Adventure game that spreads its actions over four chapters.  This review is based on the Collector's Edition version of the game which bundles several bonus items to enhance the appeal of the main aspect of this title from the Domini Game's catalogue.  While some of the bonus items are available immediately, others will require a certain amount of progress before access will be granted.

The usual options for setting up the appropriate gaming environment delivered by Domini Games are available as you adjust volume levels, screen size and select from a choice of difficulty levels.  With this latter option you can select from Casual, Advanced, Hardcore or Custom levels.

Cast in the role of Elijah Reed, an agent of the Ministry of Mysteries, you are assigned to investigate the sudden rise in the number of attacks on the normal residents involving harpies activity in Athens,  An optional tutorial can be used to introduce the different features appearing in the game.  As usual the mouse pointer will change shape to indicate when different actions are possible.  Tools, such as a Journal (Tasks and Notes), Map, Inventory, Strategy Guide and Hint feature are arranged across the base of the various scenes populating the game.  You will also have access to fly-out options showing Collectibles progress and Decisions made on the left and right sides of the screen.

See also: Games

more

As you visit Athens to investigate the appearance of harpy attacks, it becomes clear that there is more to discover and that a special Amulet will have an important role to play.  This Amulet has the ability to allow its owner to influence the minds of certain mythological creatures, such as harpies, sirens and centaurs. to perform actions that they would normally not do.  It will be up to you to discover who is the current owner of the Amulet to stop the attacks and resolve the current situation.

Your investigation will take you to a variety of locations as you make use of collected objects that will sometimes need to be combined with others.  When meeting other characters, who have information to impart, a split screen mode will be used to deliver the spoken dialogue along with the current background scene.  Among the characters you will encounter there will be members of the mythology fraternity such as Medusa, Poseidon, Perseus and Pan. Such meeting will help you uncover century old secrets and mis-information.

At various points in your investigation you will be faced by Hidden Object challenges and mini game puzzles.  Following its normal practice, Domini Games offers users a choice of tackling an Easy or Hard version of the mini game puzzle while Hidden Object play, identified with an outbreak of sparkles, comes with an option to switch to Match 3 action if that suits.

Hidden Option game play often requires you to find words that are linked to images that have been spread over a number of pages.  You might need to find examples of harpy blood or find the parts of a scene that match specific samples.  When tackling mini game puzzles you might need to plan a route through a scene as you look for footprints left behind in a maze.  In other cases you might need to arrange explosions to cause the necessary damage to a blockage, repair the cracks in a statue and find your way through a maze in darkness.

Mystery of Myths - Heart of Athens can be downloaded from Gamehouse.com where it is priced at $19.99 or from Big Fish Games priced at £14.75.  The game requires a 2.0 GHz processor with 1024MB of RAM and 0.98GB of hard disk space running Windows 7 and later.

Mystery of Myths - Heart of Athens Collector's Edition | Big Fish Games

Mystery of Myths - Heart of Athens Collector's Edition | GameHouse