A tour of the Mythwild world

The shape of the world

A ring of mountains closes the world in on every side. Inside it, a long ridge divides a southern bowl, where you arrive, from a larger northern region given over to the race circuit. A suspension bridge and a stream channel through the ridge join the two. The highest point in the world is the Summit in the Alps, about 157 metres up. The full-screen map (⇧J) shows all of it, with north at the top, and opens zoomed in on wherever you are standing.

Day and night. Everyone in a world shares one clock: ten minutes of day, a short dusk, ten minutes of moonlit night with the fog drawn in, and a short dawn, so a full day takes about twenty-one minutes. People keep to it. Walt fishes from dawn till midnight, the family at the estate comes home at nightfall, and the dragon Níðhöggr only flies at night.

Weather. There is no rain. Now and then a rainbow arcs over the world, and there is a pot of gold at the end of it for whoever finds it first; it turns you briefly into a random creature. Lightning on the rainbow bridge means Thor is coming down.

Where you start

Everyone arrives in the same place, a meadow at the foot of Mount Drive. Three simple cars are parked close by, and a yellow school bus stands about 46 metres away. About 40 metres from the start is the Hall of Records, where Hollis the archivist keeps every leaderboard; walk in and the boards open around you. Rabbits, deer, boar, foxes and three bears live in the countryside nearby.

Mount Drive is the smooth, drivable mountain right in front of you, 55 metres high with switchbacks to the top. Its top is the logbook landmark called the Summit, and the Yeti guards it, along with the hoverboard parked there. Goats climb its slopes. Floating about 78 metres above the plain beyond the hall is the Sky Island, a cloud with an angel on it. You will need to fly to reach it, and the angel gives wings to those who do.

The south: the lake, the forest, Stonehenge and the savanna

The Big Lake

About 175 metres from the start, on the right-hand side of the map, the Big Lake is 116 metres across and eight deep, and you can swim it. A Wave-Jet waits in the middle. A shark patrols the deep water and bites swimmers, so the jet ski is the better way across. Ducks and foxes live on the shore.

The tunnel, the cave and the Crucible

A road tunnel runs through a ridge about 170 metres from the start, and a dark cave mouth sits beyond the lake on the right of the map. Both are worth looking inside. Beside the cave stands a black gate: the Crucible, a fighting world described on the weapons page.

Stonehenge, the rocket and the temple

About 300 metres from the start, toward the bottom left of the map and hidden behind a grove of pines, is Stonehenge: five rune stones inside a ring of twelve sarsens. Work out the order to strike the runes in and a space rocket parked nearby opens for you. Cows graze the meadow, and every so often a silver saucer drops out of the sky and takes one. In a clearing in the mountains behind the stones stands the Sun-Chief's temple, a Mayan step pyramid where the Sun-Chief asks riddles and grants his blessing.

The Great Tree

A redwood 160 metres tall stands about 370 metres from the start, hidden from the meadow behind Mount Drive. Birds circle and nest in it. Old Gunnar the lumberjack has been trying to fell it for thirty years. He works until midnight by lantern light and stops for lunch on a root to tell stories, while his husky Birch spends the day chasing squirrels round the trunk.

The Deep Forest

A dense forest of three hundred pines, 260 metres across, about 420 metres from the start toward the bottom right of the map. Bigfoot roams it on and off, and when he does the world hears heavy footsteps in the pines and the golden tree glows: touch it then and you turn to solid gold for 25 seconds. A waterfall hides in the forest too, a flying saucer lands among the trees now and then, and a unicorn sometimes steps out of them. The road to Bruce's estate runs through the forest, and Bigfoot leaves the road alone.

The savanna

The savanna is a flat, open plain 300 metres across, about 450 metres from the start on the left-hand side of the map, kept flat so you can spot a giraffe from a long way off. In the middle is a waterhole 124 metres across where the herds come to drink and the hippos and crocodiles live. A rope swing under an acacia faces the water, so you can sit and watch. The elephants, giraffes, rhinos and zebras are spread across the plain, and the animals page describes each one.

Near the waterhole rises the World Tree, a vast spreading tree whose crown is twice as wide as the tree is tall. You can climb its trunk, once you have the Wanderer's climbing gear, and at the crown waits the Rootcaller power. On the plain's rim, about 70 metres from the World Tree, is a den in the rocks with vultures circling over it. That is where the lion lies up when he is not out on the plain.

The Alps and the Summit

The Alps are the one mountain range in the world you can walk into, 460 metres across and about 570 metres from the start on the right-hand side of the map. Their animals are spread by height: marmots in the low meadows, the snow leopard on the middle slopes, the ibex on the highest crags, with chamois, hares, red stags and yaks around the range. Three tarns sit in its low corners.

The Summit, the very tall one, rises to about 157 metres, and you cross the Alps to reach it. On foot you can climb about sixty metres of it. Above that is ice and rock too steep for anyone without the Wanderer's climbing gear. At the top are a cairn, a flag carrying the names of everyone who answered the Wanderer's riddles, a telescope that zooms in on ten landmarks across the world, a mountain bike, and a parachute launch for gliding back down on the wind.

The north: the circuit, the paddock and the bridge

North of the dividing ridge, the land opens into dry rolling ground built around the race circuit. The suspension bridge, about 315 metres long, carries you from the southern bowl over the water and over the racing line itself, with lights and a footway for people on foot. After dark a crowd walks it.

The Circuit is a loop of about two kilometres inspired by the great German circuits: a long main straight, a climbing sweeper, esses and a chicane, a tight hairpin and a technical infield, with 17 checkpoints and five boost pads. Press R at the start line to call a race. Beside the main straight is the Paddock, eight pit boxes and a race-control office where a pit-stop crew performs on a loop, and next to it the Garage, with fast cars in its bays. The drag strip is a separate 300-metre straight with two lanes. All of it is covered on the vehicles page.

In the circuit's infield, where the bridge lands, is the yard of Bruce's Mod Shop. Further on are Kaléa's Park, a domed skate park with a MegaRamp, a bowl, a street plaza, a mini ramp, a pump track and a beginners' area, and Walt's Pond, where an old fisherman sits from dawn till midnight. Wick the Bootwright's bench is by the race start, and the Riddle Stone, whose inscription starts the hunt for the Sundered Star, stands in the north too. Wolves, stray cats, horses and sheep with their working dogs live up here.

At the northern foot of the Alps, about 635 metres from the start, is Tao-Shan's Yard: a shed, a hard-standing and a 344-metre dirt course looping into the hills with two real climbs and three big-air ramps.

Bruce's estate

The estate lies in a valley in the mountains at the bottom right of the map, about 710 metres from the start, at the end of a tree-lined road that runs out through the Deep Forest and over a saddle in the range. The valley floor is flat around the house and the mountains stand all round it. There is a house with four bedrooms, a four-bay garage, a swimming pool, stables, a paddock with eight horses, a chicken yard and a big tree with a swing, and goats on the mountainsides. A backhoe loader works on the valley floor.

It is home to Bruce, Reneé and Kaléa, with a golden retriever puppy. They are out all day and come home at nightfall for the evening: dishes, television, chasing the puppy, cooking. Visitors are welcome then ("Door's open. Mind the dog."). At bedtime Bruce walks you out, and if you creep upstairs while they sleep he wakes up and puts you off the estate at the gate.

The Hollow and the Bifröst

Deep in the south, about 570 metres from the start, the Hollow is a maze in a sunken vale: thirteen cells by thirteen, 104 metres across, with walls thirteen metres high and a single way in. Its floor has shallow black pools to wade through. Its creatures get tougher the deeper you go, two Wardens guard the chamber at its heart, and the Hollow King sits on the plinth of the Leviathan Axe. Nothing heals inside. The weapons page has the fight in full.

The way to its door is the Bifröst, a rainbow causeway 90 metres long over a flooded plain. As you cross it the colour drains out of the world and the fog and dark close in, so you arrive in the Hollow's own palette. Now and then Thor rides a bolt of lightning down onto it, throws Mjölnir three times, and goes back the way he came. Behind the maze, in the trees, is the Survivor's Camp, where a Survival SUV with a flame torch is parked among the Hollow's creatures, and its owner never came back for it.

The Rift, the Arena and the Crucible

Three places sit outside the ordinary world. The Rift holds two realms: the Sky-Realm, drifting islands in a starfield, and the Underworld, a glowing cavern beneath the lake. Inside, there is no flying and no healing, you get a triple jump instead, and a fall is fatal. The way in is something you will have to find.

The Arena opens through a glowing door that appears somewhere on the map every eight to twenty minutes and stays open for two minutes; it pulses on the map while it is open. The Crucible is the black gate by the cave, with a solo gauntlet of nightmare waves and a free-for-all pit. Both are described on the weapons page.

The fifteen landmarks

Every landmark you reach is written into your logbook (J), pays credits, and counts towards your level.

Some of them are drawn on the map from the start. Others appear only as a symbol until you have found them, and one does not appear at all.

The people