A warrior fights on the frontlines, the hunter fights from a distance or sneaks behind the enemy for stealth strikes, and the mystic uses a magical capability called “infusion” to psychically inhabit environmental objects and weaponize them against enemies. The first is their class: warrior, hunter, or mystic. These characters have a few key qualities. In both cases, the arc of the game is a discrete story that progresses over many years, following a rag-tag group of heroes assembled by the player. Others are vastly more generic, and lean almost entirely into the procedural tools. Some of these are more tailored to scripted plot beats by the developers, delving into a specific enemy faction and the way it must be destroyed within a long, mythic story. Each game of Wildermyth is divided into three or five chapters. Instead, it focuses on creating the conditions where unique stories can emerge. Wildermyth’s use of procedural generation is geared less toward novel enemies or giving you infinite replayable game levels. Procedural generation is also responsible for Spelunky’s levels, Enter The Gungeon’s dungeons, and the orc bosses that show up in Middle-earth: Shadow of War. The key concept that governs all of Wildermyth is procedural generation, or, the creation of game worlds and their contents based on some broad rules. The random event that puts the player character in contact with the mystical woman who can curse you with raven-ness is one of what feels like hundreds in the game, each of which can have major impacts on your created party as they attempt to beat back a monstrous horde threatening the world they live in.

There is no warrior-bird hero questline in the game. That story wasn’t fully written by the devs of Wildermyth. If you want curated lists of our favorite media, check out What to Play and What to Watch. When we award the Polygon Recommends badge, it’s because we believe the recipient is uniquely thought-provoking, entertaining, inventive, or fun - and worth fitting into your schedule. Polygon Recommends is our way of endorsing our favorite games, movies, TV shows, comics, tabletop books, and entertainment experiences.

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