As builders in Greece, you yearn to learn the secrets of Mount Olympus and discover the mystical city of the Gods: Mytikas. From here it is rumoured that they watch over the lives of the mortals below with their supreme reign. In order to discover these mysteries though, you'll need to construct affluent cities and spectacular temples at varying heights of Mount Olympus. Can you make your way towards the divine light?
First Impressions
The artwork on the box really drew me into this game, with it's bright colours and fantasy style theming, that then revealed upon closer inspection it's Greek God storyline and Mount Olympus base. Inside, the components were nicely arranged and although there isn't a compartmentalised storage system within, it's design works well for the tokens and resource cubes that form the basis of the game, along with the stacked up mountain board and God board. Speaking of the components, I was impressed by the quality, the tokens are cardboard but popped out easily from the punch boards and I didn't feel concerned about damaging them in the process. The resource cubes are wooden yet lightweight, the God board has a really nice finish with sealed edges and the mountain board is really sturdy with eachlevel of the mountain glued in place to create a simple layered effect which serves it's purpose well and limits damage from having to construct it each time as well as mitigating the risk of knocking everything flying when accidentally nudging it out of place! I was really impressed by the rules, they were easy to read and understand and didn't leave me needing to reread them during the game!
Game Play Overview
Mytikas has a variable game length, ending when 1 of 3 conditions is met, enabling you to either race towards one specific goal for a shorter game or eek it out by planning your turns to mitigate thechances of the end game being met to early. Players take it in turns to move their builder to a new action space (2 per God) and carry out the main action. If they have earnt the favour of that particular God, they may also (or instead of the main action) carry out the bonus action. Once a player has completed their action(s), any other player who has earnt the favour of that God, may spend their favour token to then carry out the main action as well. Once all other players have spent favour tokens if they wish to, play passes onto the next player. Their are a variety of actions in the game, some allow you to build a certain type of building, some allow you to collect a set of resources at a certain level, others allow you to move your resources up the mountain, whilst some give you the opportunity to earn the facour of a God. Play continues with each player taking turns to carry out actions and spend their favour tokens on their opponents turns until either 3 of the 4 levels of Mount Olympus have been fully built, 1 player has built all of their buildings or all of the lock tokens have been secured by players. Final scoring then takes place and the player with the highest score wins.
Pros and Cons
This game has a nice twist to the resource management mechanic of many games in that you have to move your resources up the mountain in order to build ta each level, however it is free to send items back down the mountain. That being said, it can be really frustrating when you've spent several turns moving all your resources up to a higher level only for one of your opponents to pip you to the post and secure the last building slot on a level before you get your next turn. Fortunately, there is no restrictions aside from having the resources at the required level to build on the higher levels, i.e. you can build on level 4 before building on level 3 or level 2 as long as you have the resources you need at level 4! With the varying end game conditions, this game has a good amount of replayability, there are plenty of cards with a multitude of deities on that you can earn throughout the game ensuring that you can easily get a different combinattion of cards every time you play.
Final Verdict
Overall, this game surprised me in how well designed it was and how much fun it was to play. It's shorter game time but plentiful strategy, makes it a great option for filling a half hour gap with a strategic game or striking the balance between a heavy strategy game and a quick lightweight game for those mixed gaming groups. I'm looking forward to getting this game to the table again and can see it quickly becoming a firm favourite in our household!
In conclusion, we would rate this game a 9.5/10
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