Myth:TFL Betas

Long ago, our old friend Josh "Orange" Noel sent in several huge files, each containing lots of ASCII text extracted from the tags.gor files of Myth:TFL betas 3 and 4 (Josh was a beta tester). These can tell us much about the evolution of the story and in doing so help fill in the gaps in the story in the release version. Note however that details certainly have changed between these early betas and the release, so nothing here should be taken as gospel over release-version texts. But if it doesn't contradict anything, it's probably harmless and maybe even helpfull. So now, I submit for your viewing pleasure, the original texts from Josh's emails, and my reformatted versions.

• Myth: The Fallen Lords Beta 3 Extracts.
• Myth: The Fallen Lords Beta 3 Info.
• Myth: The Fallen Lords Beta 4 Extracts.
• Myth: The Fallen Lords Beta 4 Info.

Now, for those who don't want to go digging through a couple dozen pages of text, only portions of which differ from the release version, I will now elaborate on what, specifically, is so damn interesting about these beta texts. There are lots of little details with no real significance, so you pitpickers will still want to read the files.

On "Crow's Bridge" in beta 4, the lines regarding Madrigal being the desperate last hope for the Light, are missing, with a less drastic comment about not letting the Dark push them any farther north.

In the journal entry for "Homecoming" in beta 4, it is Murgen, not Rabican, who is said to have defeated Shiver.

"Ambush At Devil's Overlook" was formerly called "Challenging Stage", and was a lame Space Invaders clone, with waves of Soulless coming at you and you trying to destroy as many as you could before they passed off behind you. In b3 the subtitles were absent, but in b4 there were 'xx% destroyed', 'victory imminent', 'bonus stage', and other such messages. No real impact on the story though. In beta 4, the story was added, though the name still remained "Challenging Stage". The journal reads slightly different, notable the reversal of Murgen and Rabican again, but nothing significant was changed.

Remember how 'Champions' changed to 'Companions' on "Out of the Barrier"? On the b4 version of "The Five Champions", they are refered to as 'Companions' in the level's caption as well.

On "Out of the Barrier" in beta 4, Alric says Mazzarin killed Sinis at Seven Gates. Could this mean that the Shrine of Nix is in Seven Gates, or is the Shrine just that buried temple near where the conversation takes place?

The graveyard exit on "Silvermines" wasn't a graveyard at first, but was simply a pass on the northwest of the map. This is evidenced by the change of the quote "Now we must escape through the graveyard" from "Now we just need to leave through the pass in the northwest." Josh says that the journal entry for this level in beta 4 was "really screwed up", but that the Myrkridian king reference seems to belong there. Can any other beta testers confirm this please?

"Forest Heart" didn't have the kill-four-trow mission objective in b3, but instead was a simple search-and-destroy mission against "Soulblighter's forces". In b4, the mission objectives were changed to have you kill for four Trow, but you were also to confront Soulblighter himself at the Forest Giants' sacred statue.

In b4, the dates for the Tain levels were "May 20 (?)" and "May 21 (?)", instead of the "Date Unknown" from the release version. In addition, the journal entry for "The Smiths of Muirthemne" had a comment about their lack of food and water, and a mention that the only man who had dared drink from the shallow pools inside had gone mad. I wonder what the significance of this is.

In beta 3, "The Road North" was initially an 'ambushed' mission, where you had simply been ambushed by The Watcher (as mentioned on "Across the Gjol", even in the release version) and had to flee south with as many survivors as you could. In b4, it is changed to the bow-retrieval mission. There is also a mention of a cohort of the narrator, who is one of them men going on the mission to retrive the bow. There are a few unused quotes introduced here, which persisted into the release version but were still never used.

On "Across the Gjol" in there is another mention of the narrator's cohort. Who he is and what significance he may have on the story is beyond me.

On "River of Blood" in b3, you had to fight your way into the city and across the river, with a warning to 'watch out for friendly artillary'. Not much more can be garnered from this without playing the level. Are there any beta testers with b3 still lying around who can give us some input on this? Or anyone who just remembers the level? Josh says he recalls dwarven baloons being the artillary. In beta 4, the mission is changed to securing the bridge with a small force, but the term 'fight your way in' is still used. I'd hardly call sneaking around most of the forces 'fighting', though the few Trow, Myrms, and Fetch encountered along the way may count as a fight.

In beta 4, the captions for Alric's conversation with Balor on "The Last Battle" are on "Pools or Iron" instead, though the journal entries are nearly identical, confusing the issue quite a bit. There are a few significant changes to the captions too, such as an offer for Alric to replace the Watcher.

Further confusing the issue, the captions from "The Great Devoid" are on "The Last Battle" instead, while the journal entries are still essentially the same. No significant changes to the captions or journal texts on either level.

In beta 3, there were fourteen Avatara names, some of which are startlingly familiar. Roland, Gilgamesh, Beowulf... Tfear!?

The fates of Stoneheim and Myrgard are reversed in both betas, with Stoneheim falling to the Ghols and Myrgard being buried under thousands of tons of rock.

The Mahir names and flavor texts and present in both betas, though if the unit was implemented or not I can't tell. Again, any beta testers care to comment?

The gory Shade flavor text, the one with sheep-blood jam on barn walls, had an additional sentance in b3 attributing the gruesome acts depicted therin to the Shade named Scaripant. There were also twenty-five Shade names listed, including some we meet in Myth 1, such as Mazzarin, Cormorant, Sinis, and Scaripant, some we don't hear of until Myth II, such as Phelot and Herod. But the oddest one in there... is Damas! Was Soulblighter a Shade!?

Like the Mahir, the Skrael unit has flavor texts and names, but I can't tell if it was actually implemented. Yet another call to beta testers.

The flavor text for Soulblighter in beta 4 is the aforementioned Shade flavor text, but with the attribution to Scaripant missing. Again: was Soulblighter a Shade!?

Apparently people knew about Cave Spiders outside of the Tain, because a flavor text in both betas makes referance to mothers warning their children of the little eight-eyed buggers.

The Cave Spore has a flavor text in both betas. Was this ever implemented?

One of the Trow flavor texts from the release version was originally elaborated into two separate flavor texts in b3 and b4. And there's only one name listed in b3, "Igne Ferroque", though many other are added in b4, all in lower-case letters.

The Villager flavor text was altered between b3 and b4. Apparently, the villagers weren't conscripted "to fill the armies", but "to block the passes" of Bagrada and Seven Gates with their bodies, all before the age of 15. How cruel.

In Josh's email, there was a scrambled journal entry, with the date and location from "Sons of Myrgard", the caption from "Crow's Bridge", the text from "Flight From Covenant", and two odd sentances, one about Myrkridian kings and the other about the spoils of war. I can't make much sense of it. Can you?

The Eidos Pre-Release Info

Eidos, Bungie's European publisher, used to have a page on their site with all sorts of usefull Myth info on it. However, that info was published before Myth was released, and thus much of it no longer applied to the release version of the game. But that makes it prime content for a page like this one!

Unfortunately, I can't seem to find the page itself anymore. However, I did find an old post of mine from alt.games.myth, which you can see here. This post was a suggestion to implement all these unimplemented features, and thus a good deal of the information contained on Eidos' site can be derived from that post. I also remember a bit from the site by heart, which was not included in my post. And so, on with the show...

The Forest Giants were intended to be only killable by fire. The exact implementation of this is unclear, but perhaps they would "turn to stone" like they do now, except without actually being "stone". That is, they would just freeze. Then, while frozen, only fire would kill them, meaning that they could be healed back to life later on if enemy forces didn't burn them first. But fire was never implemented in Myth 1, so this feature of the Giants couldn't be either. There was also supposed to be an artifact called a Tathlam; a sack of severed heads which the Forest Giants would throw, similar to the Myrkridian Giant's special attack.

There were supposed to be balloons, presumably Dwarf-manned. The exact nature of these is unclear. Were they supposed to drop artillary strikes like Balin? Were they were they to carry other units? We may never know.

The Skrael were fast units with both ranged and melee attacks, similar to the bre'Unor. They worked for the Light, and could only go on marsh and water terrain; but they could go in any depth of water, being amphibious.

The Griffins were allies of the fir'Bolg, who prefered to stay out of ground-dweller affairs, but they could be called to battle by fir'Bolg horns. The sprites for these are still in Myth:TFL's artsounds.gor and Myth II's monolithic tags.

The Myrmidons were meant to throw shrunked heads as a special attack. What the story behind that was, I don't know.

It seems Trow were to throw big explosive barrels called "Rhi Bombs". The 'proj' tags for these are still in Myth:TFL, but they aren't complete, so the bombs flicker in and out of existance as they fly, and are frequently duds. But they are very powerfull. The Trow in Myth:TFL can also pick up a single chunk of a dead body, but they can't do anything with it; a vestige of their ability to pick up Rhi bombs, perhaps? It also appears that there is a throwing sequence for the Trow, taking something off their skull-belt. Maybe they threw skulls? But then what about Rhi bombs? As seen above, on "River of Blood" b3, you were warned to watch out for friendly artillary. Were there to be barrel-bombs used on this level near Rhi'anon, hence "Rhi bombs"? Maybe the Balloons that Josh remembers dropped them.

The anti-glow of Shades was meant to suppres all magic but their own. How this was to work, exactly, is unclear. Perhaps they were simply immune to all magic attacks?

The Dark were to have something like the Dwarven Baloons; the Undead Dirigible. The sprites for this are still in Myth:TFL's artsounds.gor, but the unit was never implemented any further than that (that we know of)..

There were Vampyres. We don't know anything about them, but they were to be there.

The Mahir, or Shadow Warriors, were initially nothing like you see in Myth II. They were shadows, creeping along the ground, and they would rise up into a black shroud, an "obsidion blade", which would then sweep around it's target in a mad fury, draining the life from it. Light units were powerless to stop them. But there was an artifact, the gleaming wands of Malagigi, which could force them into hidious existance. They were then humanoid, but a dark silvery metal seemed to cover them all over, and spines protruded every other inch. Only in that form could they be fought.

Then there were the artifacts. The Fever Stone made it's holder immune to Wight pus. The Speed Token, surprise!, made units faster. Aconite gave arrows poisonous tips. Deep Fen boots let units walk on water. And the Tarnkappe was a cloak of invisibility. There were many other artifacts listed on that page, but I only included a couple in my post, and I don't recall any others. If anyone out there does, speak up!

The Eidos pre-release page was also where the Fallen Lords were first named. Ashfear was their leader (now he's Balor), three were "ancient evils" (Soulblighter, The Voiceless One, and Bahl'al), and three were "turned from the light" (The Deceiver, Bonesplitter, and The Faceless Man). For more on these names, see The Names of the Fallen.

The page which I got the info in my post from was only one of Eidos' Myth pages, the Gameplay section. There were also others, including one on Story. If anyone knows somewhere that these pages currently resides, or happened to save the info to disk, please let us know!

The E3 '97 Movie

Mark Levin recently brought to my attention the QuickTime movie of an early version of Myth that was shown at the Electronic Entertainment Expo in 1997. Since the movie was so big, he sent me a blow-by-blow transcript, complete with screenshots.

But I've got a small version of the same movie on an old MacAddict CD, so that's what I'm basing this report on. However, there are some details I can't make out in the small version, so I use Mark's transcript as a complement to my own small copy of the movie.

The small version can be found on the January '98 MacAddict CD, and probably other places as well. For those without access to it who want to know all the gory details, I'm providing a copy of Mark's transcript, which was conveniently already in HTML form, here.

A flyover of "Crow's Bridge" gives us our first glimpse of the Myth interface. However, it's a drastically different look than we know from the release version. The status bar is just a greyish bar. The pause button is implemented, but two other squares are next to it and they are "empty" (showing only some dull pink pattern). The overhead map disclosure triangle is an arrowhead. Overall, it looks more native-American than the medieval look we all know and love.

Several shots later, another flyover, this time of what looks like "Homecoming". The camera sweeps over the statue of Connacht; however, it doesn't get to the cathedral, even though it goes far enough past that it should. Could this level have been changed somehow, with the statue (and the circlular part of the texturemap it stands on) being moved from wherever it is in this movie to where it is in the release version?

A spinning view of "Out of the Barrier". However, there is a notable difference. In the first part, we see a group in the distance, which appears to be Ghols in my small movie, and which Mark identifies as Ghols as well. There are two zerks in the foreground, and as the camera spins around we see a journeyman, an archer, and a dwarf behind them. But rewind there; look closely at that group of Ghols in this shot, and tell me if you think the lowest unit in the top-left group looks more like a Jman than a Ghol. As Mark points out, Alric is nowhere to be seen; could this Jman have been a stand-in unit for him?

One scene shows some Soulless floating through the graveyard in "Silvermines". As there was no graveyard - at least not mentioned in the subtitles - in beta 4 (see above), this could possibly be after beta 4, meaning that this was very close to the release version.

Another scene shows five archers and a dwarf crossing the bridge on "The Five Champions", and the terrain around it is different; most notably, there's no dirt 'wall' blocking you from walking under it from other sections of the map. This level obviously changed a bit before the release.

A berserk, a journeyman, an archer, and a dwarf are walking past the buried temple on "Out of the Barrier". The Bow of Stoning and the corresponding Ghol ambush are conspicuously missing. Yet another change in these two desert levels.

As noted by Mark, someone says "crow's bridge will be cleansed!" on a shot from - you guessed it! - "Crow's Bridge". Rather odd; see Mark's comment on this. Another shot from the same level shows the two guarding warriors fleeing the bridge, saying "oh my god, look at that!". Just a minor change, but notable.

The first sound in the movie after the comet-vortex-Bungie intro is "casualty" in the same "Crow's Bridge" sequence, followed shortly by some little splat noises as fir'Bolg arrows hit oncoming Thrall. It seems every impact or sword strike in the movie makes this little splat noise. The archers' arrows also have a weak little plonk sound when they fire. The dwarf, when he launches his moltov, makes inappropriate-sounding "burn!" noise, and a nasal "yeah!" he makes whenever he makes a kill. When an archer dies, he has this pathetic stock-sounding scream. Obviously, the sound improved alot between this and the release version.

In a shot from Bagrada, the Dwarves seem to have much better aim and distance than in the release version. They probably had to be toned down quite abit to keep from being super-units.

A shot of a Fetch firing on some zerks and Myrms on "If I Had A Trow...". But instead of the horribly frightening thunder clash we've been accustomed to... there's a little "bzzt". A zip, a spark, and little bzzt. Yet another major sound difference. And in the same scene, Mark speculates about further Fetch powers. It's rather obvious to me that the Fetch simply fired across the river (apparently "straight up" from the camera angle), and another Fetch on the other side fired back.

A few scenes later, we see a Wight for the first time. His death cry is hideous. I'm beginning to wonder if this was made before Total Audio came onto the scene.

Addendum: It has been revealed that in an old Game Developer article, Bungie mentioned that they had indeed fired their old sound guy before they went to Total Audio.

The Myth II Teaser

Thanks to Caleb Hutchins for pointing this out. On the Oct 98 MacAddict CD, and no doubt in numerous other places, there is a Myth II teaser showing plenty of scenes from TFL, its various awards, and then previewing Myth II. However, there are quite a number of odd things about this movie, both M2 things which changed before release and TFL things which coudn't have been changed since it was out already. I'll let the pictures do the talking. Well, and the words that go with them. Check out my blow-by-blow description with screenshots here.

The Making Of Myth:TFL

While searching my MacAddict Oct '98 CD for the Myth II teaser movie, I also found a Making Of Myth TFL movie by Total Audio. It's a generally funny watch, but not worthy of a complete blow-by-blow. There are a few interesting parts worth mentioning.

First is a conversation between Jason Jones and Bob Swan, who is credited as the voice of the Journeyman, and the Trow! Unfortunately we never hear any Trow recordings, or any recording from him at all in this movie. The conversation goes:

Jones: "As you are kicking the hell out of your enemies . . ."
[crossfade to later part of sentance]
"I mean you could be assaulted by thirty guys with swords and you'll kick 'em all to pieces."
Swan: "Well he is kind of a bully, isn't he?"
[everybody laughs]
Jones: "Yeah, oh, he is!"

So Trow were supposed to speak. Jones was more than likely exaggerating about a Trow beating 30 warriors, but it serves to get the point across: Trow kick. Ass.

The next interesting point is the origins of Soulblighter's creepy evil laugh. It was not planned for! Jeff Morrow, the voice of Balor and Soulblighter (though only credited as Balor in this movie), is recording some Balor lines, and then goes on to do Soulblighter's "Give me his head, and I will let you live bit." People in the studio laugh at how cool that is, and Morrow laughs along with them - in Soulblighter's voice! Jason Jones turns to face him and yells out "That's f[bleep]in' COOL!" Thus was born Soulblighter's laugh.

The last interesting part is Paul Heitsch, credited as "Hapless Villager". I wonder if they ever planned to call them that in the game or not. After he does a few recordings, one of which is a perfect "Sure, I passed him near the stone monument", someone behind the camera says "What a wuss." Everybody laughs, and Paul begins jumping up and down in a very wussy manner. Someone else off-camera says "Plus he hasn't seen a woman in a LONG time."

There's a few other funny bits with Dwarf recordings, and Jason Jones failing horribly at an attempted billiars break, but that's about all that's relevant to Myth's story.

The .GOR Files...

Hidden within the release-version .GOR files of Myth:TFL (tags.gor, artsound.gor, etc) are quite a number of unimplemented features, such as names and flavor texts from lost units, unused sprites, and sometimes almost-fully-functioning units that were never used. Many of these are already well-known, such as the Skrael, but I will document them here for completeness's sake anyway. If any enterprising haX0rs would like to try implementing some of these things and telling us more on how they work I'd love to hear about it.

In the "artifacts" group, there are three that I've certainly never seen in the game; an Eblis Stone (and no, it's not the one Alric holds on "The Last Battle", because that's not an artifact, that's part of a unit), and a "dwarf low ball". On a related note, Josh points out that The Watcher's arm is refered to as Bahl'al's arm in the map actions, solidifying my theory that the two are one.

In the "collection reference" (CORE) group, where references to graphics collections are stored, there is something called the "great googally". Your guess is probably better than mine.

There are "Flaming Soulless", who throw burning javalins that explode on impact.

In the "projectile group" group, there are several rather odd things. There's the "Myr dragon tooth explosion", "Rhi bomb explosion", and tying them together, the "Rhi dragon tooth explosion". Dragon teeth? Wha? Did the Trow raise dragons with explosive teeth and use them in their Rhi bombs? Further down, in "projectiles", are "Myr flying tooth chips", "Myr flying tooth chunks", "Myr flying tooth spikes", "Rhi flying tooth spikes", "Rhi flying tooth chunks", "Rhi flying tooth chips", and finally, the Rhi bomb itself (and secondary debris).

Perhaps one explanation for this is flying heads. The Trow have sprites for throw severed heads from their belts, and the Myrmidons were supposed to throw the shrunked heads of the enemies. Myr = Myrmidon, Rhi = Trow, and the teeth are the teeth in the heads they throw?

(Addendum: Andrew "IronDuke" Sumner writes to tell us that the "Dragon Teeth" are the spiky poles uses on levels such as "Sons of Myrgard" and "River Of Blood". The Myr versions are the ones in Myrgard, and the Rhi versions are the ones in Rhi'Anon. They apparently have nothing to do with Rhi Bombs. Thanks Andrew.)

In the "projectiles" group, there are some interested unused projectiles. There are dwarven "satchel bombs" in addition to satchel charges. The Eblis Stone shows up again, as something which can be thrown.

The 'ent god' seen on "Forest Heart" used to do a lot more than sit there and burn. Apparently it spit lava chunks, and could explode. That I would like to see.

There are six special fir'Bolg arrows, "of paralysis", "of killing", "of forking", "incendiary", "lightning", and "of stoning". We've seen lightning and stoning, and paralysis and killing are obvious, and incendiary is likely fire arrows (though fire war never implemented in Myth:TFL), but what is "of forking"?

An odd projectile, the "internal happy star", can be seen in tags.gor. What's it do?
SiliconDream notes that it is the sparkly stars that circle around the heads of 'confused' units, as in Myth II. So confusion was originally planned for Myth:TFL?

Those happy green cubes which Shades use are called "energon cubes".

There are several unused Soulless projectiles, "soulless gas" (large and small), and "soulless spear stab". While the "soulless gas" might just be the gasseous debris which disperses after a Soulless dies (as other body parts are technically "projectiles"), I've never seen a Soulless stab before. Well, archers can punch...

SiliconDream notes that the "soulless gas" is indeed the gas puff that come off when Soulless are hit or die.

There is a projectile called "watcher's other arm". Two left arms, eh...?

In the "strings", where most of the juicy goodies are kept, are a few secrets. A subtitle from "Across the Gjol" says "We're done for!", though this is never played in the game. Likewise, from "Sons of Myrgard", are the unused quotes "We must destroy more Ghols!" and "We must press on!". On "Seven Gates", someone once said "Uh oh." I wonder who, and why? "Ambush at Devil's Overlook" is chock full of unused quotes from it's previous "Galga" ripoff state. On "Seige of Madrigal", a warrior once said "What's that smell?", perhaps as foreshadowing to the arrival of the rotting exploda-corpses we call Wights. There are also some unused subtitles in "A Traitor's Grave", the same from the betas mentioned above.

Also from the "strings" are two flavor texts we never see, one for Balor:

"On the day Muirthemne was razed, the sun rose to reveal an army that seemed to stretch across the horizon, and at its center stood Balor with his standard silhouetted against the morning sun."

And one for Soulblighter:

"... but he has disappeared into the 'Untamed Lands' before, often for years at a time; always returning with something more unspeakably evil or singularly malignant than the time before."

Inside tags.gor I found a collection called "Cave Map". I exported it and opened it in Amber, and found that it contains 256x256 segments of the "Heart of the Stone" color and shadow maps. For those who don't know, maps aren't stored in segments like this, though they are divided up internally in to 256x256 mesh units. Josh mentioned to me that the betas have totally different formats than the release version. Could this be a vestige of the old format?

Apparently, Balor's body can fall all the way to the ground (instead of just his knees), though it never does. (Probably because they couldn't get the blood to spray right when it was on the ground). See here.

Zerks aren't all the hyperactive maniacs we think they are. Ok they are, but at least Bungie taught them how to slow down a little at times.

Did this Dwarf go to the Klutz School of Juggling?

Remember the Tathlam (above), the sack of heads which Forest Giants were supposed to throw? Well, it looks like Bungie at least started to implement it, as evidenced by this sequence of sprites from the Ent collection.

This may be well known, but it's new to me; Myrmidons, like warriors, can block, or at least they have sprites for it. See here.

And, like their long-lost kin the berserks, they can also walk as well as run.

Now what about those doddling little fir'Bolg slowpokes? We all know they can walk. But what most don't know is that they have a faster, longer stride as well. See here. They also seem to have different sprites for aiming up and down, though if they are vestigial of some past feature, or are simply decided on-the-fly by the engine, I'm not sure.

SiliconDream notes that the different aiming sequences are indeed determined by the engine, using the same mechanism that determines whether a Trow kicks or punches.

Shades appear to have two different daggar attacks, one of which swings in from the side, the other of which is a long slice down the front. This is likely related to the same height-determining system as above.

The sparrows and squirrels we know and love from Myth II were actually present in Myth:TFL, but never got so much as a walk-on role. Word has it that the squirrels nuzzled the player's units, inhibiting proper gameplay. Never heard anything about sparrows, though.

Spiders have a soft-death sequence, so they can die like the dignified creatures they are, instead of going all to pieces at the slightest provocation. Why Bungie didn't allow them this courtesy, we may never know.

The Trow have a partially complete sequence where they grab something from their belts and start to throw it. They also have a little sprite of a human head. Did Trow throw human heads?

There's a lost sequence of a Wight doing... something. Take a look for yourself, tell me what you think. NOTE: I have since received several suggestions about this. The it could be the Wight's victory cheer (wiping sweat off its brow), it could be throwing something (bits of itself?), or it may be an idle animation, shoeing flies away.

The Mahir are present, though broken. From tags.gor, the flavor texts:

" ... an obsidion knife screamed in a tongue he understood not, it's words violent, clear and distinct, tearing his breast and pulling him toward the dark thing which had risen from the shadows."

" ... what we pulled back was less a corpse than it was a carcass -- the barest ribbons of flesh clung to his ribs and spine."

And their names:

Keeper of the Dismal Paths, Thief of the Silent Fate, Darker Shadow on a Waning Moon, Quiet Student of Untaught Knowledge, The Goassamer Fate Awaiting all Fools, A Cheerless Gathering of Dreams, Pride at Dusk, Joyless Messanger of Still Places, Deemer of Suffering, Weilder of Dim Shapes, Serene Death Stalking, Silent Sacrifice in Vain, Ill Omens and Destiny, Seven Shadows Crossing, Broken Chains of Smoke and Night, Cloudless Night Without End, Waning Moon Over Lifeless Moor, Night Lost in Fog, Vile Oaths and Scorned Supplication, Solitary Walker of Darkened Lands, Hushed Whispers from Opened Graves, Whispers in the Ears of Evil Men, Faded Memories of Forgotten Nightmares, Misery's Wet Nurse, Broken Oaths and Unspoken Regrets

And some of their sprites.

Also present are the Skrael, with their flavor text:

"Every Skrael believes that he who dies in battle is reborn seven times to revenge himself upon his destroyers, and that each of these seven incarnations may itself give rise to seven more ... "

Their names:

He Who Gathers Cattails, He Who Swims Deeply, He Who Speaks Slowly, He Who Hunts Longest, He Who Throws Farthest, He Who Laughs Last

And their sprites.

And the mysterious Cave Spore:

The Spore, though immobile, are feared for their deadly vapor...

And their sprites.

And last but not least, the "Dirigible" and the Griffin.

There are also a good number of interesting sounds in Myth that were never used, such as "Massive Casualties" and "Token {Captured|Lost|Contested}". I suggest you find Bo Lindburg's "The Fallen Sounds" and look for yourself.

Son Of The .GOR Files...

Myth II is also full of a good number of secret hidden within, from story changes like the placement of Balmung to unimplemented features like Mortar clubs. The GORy details follow...

In the "artifacts" group, the sword Balmung as found on "The Ibis Crown" is refered to as "13 magic weapon", along side such items as "13 deceiver staff". There's also a collection reference for "13 magic weapon lightning". Was Balmung originally supposed to appear on level 13, "The Deceiver"? If so, why the story change?

In the "collection references" (CORE) group, there are three mentions of some sort of religious statue, "hidden god head", "Sacrificial monument", and "worship monument", on level 11, "Through the Ermine". I don't know about you, but I've never seen any more than one evil b'Y'laggo statue on that level.

There's a CORE called "magician", pointing to the collection "dwarf". I wonder what it's for. Was there to be a magical Dwarf in the game?

Shiver, in addition to her Whisper dream (primary attack) and ripple dream (take a guess), has an attack called a "freeze dream", which appears to work something like the ripple dream, except instead of an explosion on the ground near the target, a little swirl of white magic stars goes around the unit as a 'boom' sound is made, and the unit loses a lot of life. So why is it called a "freeze dream"? Was Shiver supposed to be able to freeze units, something like the Bow of Stoning from Myth:TFL?

The secret level "A Long Awaited Drinking Party" uses a mesh called "04a hunting party", when the level is actually 3a, not 4a. Was it originally supposed to be after "Into The Breach" instead of "Down a Broken Path"?

The Griffin is still present in Myth II, which is rather odd considering they took out working units like the Myrmidons and Forest Giants, but left the Griffin in. Were they going to try and implement it in Myth II?

There are two odd projectiles for the Myrkridia, the "two arm punch" and the "two arm spell". Could Myrkridia attack with two arms? And what kind of spells did they have?

Some other odd "projectiles", the Thrall body parts. There are normal parts you would expect, arms and legs and heads, and then a group of arms and legs and heads each prefixed with "myth1". So are there differences between Myth 1 and Myth 2 Thrall bits? If so, what are they, and why include the Myth 1 bits in Myth 2?

There are still fir'Bolg dying sounds in Myth II. Why? Well, there's no bowman dying sounds, that's why. Bungie just reused the Myth:TFL archer deaths.