You know, I wasn’t really too into the Might and Magic series of games. I just don’t like the thing where you have to walk around this two-dimensional land, sometimes running into walls and such and not quite realizing where you are, except with the aid of a two-dimensional map.
However, Heroes of Might and Magic is a very different game. It is named after Might and Magic because it takes some of the heroes in Might and Magic, and makes them more individual, rather than in those travelling bands of four. Sure, it’s another two-dimensional map, but this time it is only from one perspective (no running into walls here). You are always looking at your hero’s place on the map, and there is a mini-version of the same map so you can see what nifty land forms the map makes. Some scenarios are kind of cute in how they shape the land masses into different patterns.
It’s much less real-time than the game it is based on, in fact it hardly is real time at all. And while your heroes all have unique names and faces, it doesn’t really mean much to the game. The game itself is fairly basic but easy to play: start out with a home castle and a hero or two, though sometimes you don’t even have a castle yet, depending on the scenario you choose. Build structures in your castle in order to build troops, or gain knowledge and gold, using precious resources. There are resources lying around for you to pick up, sometimes hiding in wagons or flotsam in the water. There are also artifacts that your heroes can collect that will enhance one of four attributes: attack strength, spell power, intelligence, and defense. These obviously vary with the class you choose (knight, sorcerer, etc.) and be careful of the four or five or so artifacts in the game that have negative effects!
Other things on the map include monsters. The map itself is static, so you can generally avoid monsters if you really wanted to, but then you wouldn’t get the rewards for passing through! Fighting is turn-based, much like older versions of Final Fantasy games. Your troops vary with your class, and also vary with what you have available from your castle. Almost all the monsters you will fight are monsters that are available for use as your own. Some monsters such as genies, medusas, and elementals are not available from production in your castle, but from certain areas in the map, or from casting summon spells (for elementals).
You’ve got to be a die-hard gamer to like this game, because it’s not the prettiest one. The graphics don’t leave much to be desired, and it may not be as interesting as the newer real-time strategy games out there. The sounds are primitive, unless you set it to CD sound with stereo and – get this – OPERA! That’s right, it’s an entire score of very ethereal sounding music with singing. However, this GREATLY reduces game play quality, so I suggest you listen to the tracks on your CD player instead.
Multiplayer games are a little annoying because when it’s not your turn, your screen sits there frozen. You can’t even look around the map at all, or move your mouse cursor, or check out any of your heroes. So the best thing I could say to do during someone else’s turn is go have a snack out of the refrigerator. You do see some action from other players while they are taking their turns, and you sometimes engage in battle, so all is not as boring as it might seem.
Another drawback to the game is that playing the same scenarios get a bit tiresome after a while. There is not much variation in the game’s resources; artifacts and the like are always in the same places, and even if they do change the type of resource that is there, it still doesn’t allow you to change your strategy very much. Also, computer level of play is much higher than it seems – you can easily lose a game to a computer set on Easy.
All in all, I like this game, but I do get tired of it after a while and have to play something else before coming back to it. Incidentally it doesn’t seem to want to run on my computer anymore, due to unknown reasons (but it is probably my computer, and not the game). There is a patch available for earlier versions, but that didn’t help my situation, so I guess I’ll just be listening to the nice opera soundtrack in the meantime.