I've been a long time fan of the series and was wondering if this new one was any good. Or if anyone else even cared about the series, still.

The reviews I've seen on Steam are "Mixed", but a lot of them seem to be just complaining about the fact that it uses UPlay, so it's hard to tell.

"Has UPlay UGH" for 4 paragraphs.

I mean it's a Heroes game so it's probably good, but waiting on someone to actually buy it and tell me. Go go magic @arbitrarywater

I really don't like the art and UI direction they've been going with with VII and VI. HoMM V is to me the pinnacle of the series and one of the best strategy games I've ever played. It pains me so much that they decided to stray away from the animated city screens because those were literally the coolest shit.

It's nice to see them rethink the dumb decision to only have 1 special resource, and the hero development system looks really good (I actully liked VI in that regard). Overall it looks like an attempt to get back to the roots, but unfortunately it's lost its incredible charm and atmosphere for me.

I'd consider myself a pretty big fan of the series but I thought Heroes VI was pretty underwhelming. I'm going to have to give it a look once it's on sale (the Heroes fan community will say that it's crap regardless "because Uplay", so they're not an especially accurate barometer), but there's no way I'm paying full price again.

EDIT: I should probably also mention that it's apparently a technical mess right now, which doesn't bode well for my computer that barely scratches past the minimum requirements.

@arbitrarywater: I figured that at the very least I'd wait until the game gets a few patches in before checking it out. Wait to see if/when they iron out the biggest issues. Like Drew said on the Bombcast whenever they talked about Witcher 3 patches, "Man, this game is gonna be AWESOME when I play it a year from now!"

@imsh_pl:Yeah, V was cool as hell but I never even really tried VI because of its reputation.

It's nice to see that there are some other fans of the series here :D

TotalBiscuit tried it and he's pretty down on it.

I used to love the Might and Magic series, two is by far my favorite. It had so much charm and a great art style with a nice sound track to go with it but I found the series going downhill after that, V was okay for what it was but the series started to loose its personality and charm with each iteration.

Heroes of Might of Magic used to be such a big thing back in the day and now out of nowhere HOMM 7 releases with no promotion or word and then it turns out it's practically unfinished and plagued with seems to be placeholder interfaces.

I have no idea why it's a trend all of the sudden to ruin beloved franchises but is sure makes me sad.

@imsh_pl: Also the best menu screen of all time, what a game. Just loved sitting on those city screens listening to the music.

HOMM3 is probably my favorite game of all time, so it pains me to see UbiSoft continually send the series into the toilet. The whole "release a broken product with no promotion and probably no ongoing support to fix the problems" has kind of been Ubi's M.O. with this series for awhile and it sounds like the trend has continued with VII. I'd rather they just let the series die with dignity rather than putting out crappy games every few years.

I think a big part of the problem with the more recent titles has been the utter lack of the charm that pervaded the older games. I remember 3 as being high-fantasy with *just* the right amount of winking silliness. Like how entrances to the underground were in the shape of skulls, or how big stacks of enemies would be labeled "Zounds! . . . Imps." Or the hand painted quality of the town screens.

None of that is present in the more recent games. It's just totally self-serious generic fantasy land (assuming they even bother to put things like town screens in at all - I'm looking at you HOMMVI). V probably got the closest to III, but even that was kind of a poor-quality substitute in a lot of ways.

V remains one of the most boringly competent games I've ever played and I thought VI was pretty good after a while and a couple of patches. Both don't got shit on III, though. Is this made by someone else again?

That's totally my opinion on this as well. All of the factions and units in the past 2 games feel so generic and sterile, like they are patchwork created by a middle school kid who reads fantasy a lot. Wow great, the undead guys are also the spider guys, because spiders mean death, get it. The human guys look a lot like knights oh and they also have knights and clerics and angels because middle ages. And don't even get me started on HoMMVI's faction of 'the most generic Japanese mythical creatures with extra samurais and water'.

VII seems to continue this trend with your ability to command armies comprised of fearsome units such as Skeleton, Druid and Assassin!

"The Dark Elf Assassin is like the shadow of Malassa. Moving between shadows, Assassins have mastered the art of plunging a blade between their target’s shoulders. Usually wearing black clothes, the Assassin's favourite weapons are a pair of sharp and serrated daggers."

Black clothes, daggers and shadows? That's an assassin alright!

Dude I spent so much time rooting for the guy dodging the Archdevil's swings.

Well 6 was a massive bummer for me as a big fan of the series, so far from all I have seen this seems about on that level.

I've dug deep into 6 and made some hefty breakdowns of it, but really can't be arsed to do the same for this, Ubisoft has really slid this series down the drain and is just farming it out on the cheap. Holy shit the world looks ugly. For a series that has always prided itself on looking pretty, this is just hideous. So many reused assets too. At least they went back to having magic guilds, having more resources, and no town control zones that were the abomination of homm6, hero leveling seems closer to og Heroes and 5 then to the skill tree of 6 that made me barf, so there s that.

Will probably give it a look somewhere down the line after a bunch of patches, an expansion or two and maybe a sale. Considering TB had performance issues with his monster setup, I will stay away until it at least runs properly.

We have had a tradition with my dad and brother where we have played hotseat HoMM3 during our New Years vacation and I've recently got them to switch to HoMM5 finally, just gotta figure out how to put limits on mind control, its a bit of a fun ruiner. :P

If you haven't tried it yet I'd highly recommend Age of wonders III that came out a while ago instead of any of the recent heroes games, way way WAY better.

@tennmuerti: Yeah, when I saw a stream of the game I thought 'is this still in beta? Why does this look like V?'

After watching some gameplay over the last few days and reading a little bit about VII, I think I'll just go back and play V again at some point when I really feel like it.

Also...yikes.

HOMM really lost its charm to me after 3. I still go back to 2 and 3 on occasion.

Saddening that the newer ones really haven't clicked with me at all because I actually liked the King's Bounty reboots. And I still go "wtf!?!" whenever I remember they changed it from "heroes of might and magic" to "might and magic heroes."

New World Computing, RIP

I can second this. Age of Wonders III is fantastic and more people should play it. That's a really good example of a game that has been greatly improved by post-launch support with patches and expansions.

Heroes VII is made by Limbic, the same studio that did clean-up duty on Heroes VI (which was originally developed by a different studio) and Might and Magic X (which I actually liked quite a bit)

I'll still be the guy who defends Heroes V though. I think that game is on the same level as 2 and 3 with the Tribes of the East expansion (Vanilla Heroes V is too close to III), though I'm also someone who will say nice things about Heroes IV. Really, the only Heroes game I won't say nice things about is VI, which as previously discussed, isn't very good.

@arbitrarywater: I freaking loved IV, never really understood the hate it got, I guess it's because most of the heroes fanbase are a bunch of rabid idiots that can't accept change at all...

I really liked the fact that the heroes themselves where usable units in battle (which was one of the most hated additions if I remember correctly), I mean you could cast spells and all plus fuck shit up with your dude or lady, I don't understand why would anyone prefer a static figure that stands out of battle...

also the fucking Preserve town music

God I loved the soundtrack on IV.

@onarum: I also really liked 4. I remember taking a bus as a kid for the first time just to get this game. I played the shit out of it.

If I remember correctly, the reason for the criticism on heroes as units was that it was too overpowered. I remember wiping armies with just a single hero. It was really fun actually, but I can understand the problem some people had with it.

@toastman: @onarum:Given how much IV started moving away from a lot of established elements of the series (new setting, each campaign was self-contained, creatures generated every day rather than at the beginning of the week, simultaneous counter-attacks, etc.), it was probably not a great time to experiment with a lot of other systems like they did. To be fair, a lot of ideas the devs had were pretty neat, but they were for the most part badly executed, which made it really hard to like the game.

For example, it was cool to have heroes as units, but as @toastman stated, the power curve was way off. They went from completely fragile to army killing easy mode way too quickly.

The magic system was another good example. I mean, it was a neat concept to have each school of magic be a separate skill, but the system made it way to difficult to make an effective mage hero, since it meant the RNG had to pop enough spell schools to be effective. It was a particular problem because like 85% of the damage spells were stuck in the Chaos school and a most of the other spells were kind of "meh."

And speaking for myself, I really hated the town screens in IV. III's looked cool and painterly, with the buildings really well worked into the background art. IV's just looked like cheap plastic toys that got stuck down wherever without any rhyme or reason. I distinctly remember that being a turn off for me.

@lawgamer: It's probably telling that Heroes IV has long stopped being the black sheep among the fanbase, which has spent the last 6 or 7 years being mad at Ubisoft. A lot of the more blatant balance issues in Heroes IV are somewhat addressed in the Equilibris mod, which does things like make heroes less steamroller-y at higher levels, tweaks the AI to be less incompetent, and makes some of the creature tiers more of an actual choice instead of "Always pick Cyclops over Ogre Magi".

Personally, I still maintain that game has a lot of neat ideas, even if some of them don't work out. Given how safe video game sequels are now, it's kind of nuts seeing how different Heroes IV is from the 3 games that came before it and I think if 3DO hadn't gone under New World Computing would've made something interesting with their Heroes V. That said, I can't defend the way it looks. It didn't look good in 2002 and it still doesn't look good now.

@arbitrarywater: @lawgamer: @toastman: I see, so there were way more gameplay changes then I thought, I actually hadn't played 3 before 4 came out, played a bunch of 2 though, but it was a long time in between so maybe that was why I didn't have any problems with 4 at all, really really loved it.

I believe if people went in considering it it's own thing instead of painstakingly comparing every aspect of it with it's predecessor they'd appreciated it a little more though, it was still a homm game after all, the changes were for the most part trifles from what you say imo, the main gameplay loop was still there, but then again I appreciate these games a lot and all but I don't consider myself a super fan so who am I to say.

But seriously we can all agree that the soundtrack is fucking amazing right? I mean just listen to that thing.

sorry didn't meant to turn this into a homm 4 discussion heh.

Heroes 4 was alot of fun but the best ones will always be 3 and 2.

I mean, as far as operatic town themes go, nothing beats Heroes II in my mind, but yeah, Heroes IV is pretty good too.

This thread makes me long for more high fantasy games with operatic music in it. It was definitely the music that keeps HOMM3 fresh in my mind. Just the quick clip that pops up when the new week starts. Makes me feel like I'm on an awesome adventure.

Since this topic has long since stopped being about HoMMVII (or should I say, MM:HVII), I have a confession to make.

I don't know that I like 3 all that much.

I can clearly see how it's a standout favorite for so many people. It's the game that introduced MANY of the mechanics that I love in later games. But it's a time and place situation. I played a TON of 2 as a kid, fell off of the series for a while, then rediscovered my love for it when I played 4 at a friend's house, and played a ton of 4 and 5. 3 was never a game that I played at the time. The fact that it's the first entry into "3D" doesn't help, as early polygonal stuff almost always looks like garbage compared to late pixel stuff.

2 is still a nice looking game, all things considered, but is kind of bare bones mechanically (compared to later games). This is a fact I overlook because of nostalgia.

4 has more of the modern mechanics and systems I'd gotten used to having with 5, but still had a lot of rough looking early 3D models. This is a fact I overlook because of nostalgia.

I went to 3 for the first time a few months ago and it felt like 4 with fewer features (although in some cases this is a good thing) and worse graphics. But with 3, I don't have the rose tinted glasses of nostalgia to look back at it with. I feel like it's some kind of heresy, like saying "Assassin's Creed 2 and Revelations were good, and AC3 RULED, but Brotherhood didn't do it for me"

All that and the fact that the Nosferatu style vampires looked dumb to me.

@bbalpert: 3 is definitely a butt ugly game today (whereas 2 looks pretty nice), but aside from that it's just Heroes; not all that different from other Heroes games other than the progression system is a little more intelligent and there's a fuckload more of the game to play.