Heroes of Might and Magic IV Preview on Gamespy

[Comrade Tribune]

http://gamespy.com/previews/january02/homm4/

I look very much forward to this game. I hope it won´t be as disappointing as CivIII.

[yin26]

Thanks for the heads-up. I'm really looking forward to that game. As for Civ3, are you going to the funeral?

[Comrade Tribune]

Too many funerals these days to waste any more time on CivIII... I mean it´s not just bad, it´s bad in a boring, uninnovative way, kind of vanillia-bad... There are more exciting funerals to visit.

[Leonidas]

The only thing that will save Civ3 now will be a decent scenario editor. I have to admit that the units and graphics are very well done, so until this game gets some great scenarios from the mod community, it's pretty well a dead game for me (I deleted it from my hard-drive weeks ago).

I hope H of M&M IV is a good game. I thoroughly enjoyed H of M&M III. The chess-like combat, great units, cities and music make it a pleasure to play.

I hope they learned a lesson from Civ3 - don't rush the darn thing - and don't ruin the game

[General Ludd]

I haven't been following HoMM4, but I am skeptical. I felt that the third was a big step backwards from the second, and I have a feeling that this one will be the same.

Atleast the graphics look a little better this time through.

[Grumbold]

I wouldn't have called HOMM 3 a step backward, but I did feel that all the stuff they added managed to confuse the enemy AI too much. Maps became a massive clutter of specials and resources with barely any plain terrain to be seen.

[Comrade Tribune]

Originally posted by Leonidas
I thoroughly enjoyed H of M&M III. The chess-like combat, great units, cities and music make it a pleasure to play.

Perfectly well said. I´d just add:

-Simple, yet intelligent economic system.
-RPG elements as an extra that adds to the fun.

[Comrade Tribune]

Originally posted by Osweld
I felt that the third was a big step backwards from the second,....

Can´t really agree. Though I admit I missed one thing from #2: The look of the interface (borders) depending on if you played on the side of Good or Evil was cool...

[Pembleton]

Originally posted by Osweld
I haven't been following HoMM4, but I am skeptical. I felt that the third was a big step backwards from the second, and I have a feeling that this one will be the same.

Atleast the graphics look a little better this time through.

Well I wouldn't say it was a big step back. I was disappointed with it, but I wouldn't say it was a bad game. I still spent a lot of time playing it. My biggest problem was the lack of good maps, and the loss of the "charm" that HOMM2. I never used the random map generator because I believe the HOMM series is highly dependent on the quality of the map you play. The generator really sucked anyway.

There was one map on HOMM2 that I must have played at least 15-20 times. Yes, the same map. Yes, I knew where everything was. It didn't matter. It was still fun.

The "charm" of HOMM2 can be characterized by several intangible things like:
1) The wizard town was very Tolikienesque
2) The vampire going "blaah"
3) The squeaky sound the Golem makes when he walks and the sound when he dies.
4) The unraveling of the mummy when it dies.
These are just a few examples. HOMM3 was sterile compared to these little idiosyncrasies.

But Civ2 and HOMM2 are my favorite "IBM-based" PC games of all time. That's a hard standard to live up to.

And what makes you think HOMM4 will be the same? Just a feeling? What features don't you like? I'm not denying that there is the possibility it will be a disappointment, but some of the new features seem quite interesting to me.

[General Ludd]

Originally posted by Pembleton

2) The vampire going "blaah"

Ah yes, I loved that - it was somewhat of a joke between some of my friends and I... 'course it just got alot of odd looks when I said it for someone else.


I didn't like HoMM3, because I felt the map graphics where very... I don't know... just, bad. (the words Bland and Sterile come to mind)

And I thought that the generic castle types really took out the atmosphere and replaced it with an abundance of cheesy units.

[Comrade Tribune]

We´ll soon see. Me thinks the game does look very polished, and the innovations sound interesting: Leaders fight, Units may move without Leaders, Neutral Monsters wander and attack, Minor Artifacts like Potions, choice between two different Unit Generators at levels II, III, IV for each town, vastly increased Character Development for Heroes, ...

I may turn out wrong, but my feeling is the game will be more innovative and generally much better than CivIII. But maybe I´m an incurable optimist ...

[Comrade Tribune]

Btw, do you all know the Celestial Heavens site? It´s the most comprehensive for everything HommIV.

http://www.strategyplanet.com/homm/

[Father Beast]

Originally posted by Pembleton


There was one map on HOMM2 that I must have played at least 15-20 times. Yes, the same map. Yes, I knew where everything was. It didn't matter. It was still fun.

Which map was it? I have beeen playing a lot of HOMM2 lately. I want to go back and play the lost continent again, maybe. that thing was huge!!

incidentally, I chose lost continent becasue it got a good rating on the age of heroes site. or was it astralwizards? I can't remember....

[Juggler]

I have beeen playing a lot of HOMM2 lately.

Still playing HoMM2, eh? Let me know when you start playing HoMM3.

[Pembleton]

Originally posted by Father Beast
Which map was it? I have beeen playing a lot of HOMM2 lately. I want to go back and play the lost continent again, maybe. that thing was huge!!

incidentally, I chose lost continent becasue it got a good rating on the age of heroes site. or was it astralwizards? I can't remember....

I'm pretty sure it was called Dominions, but I'll have to get back to you on that one, after I can verify it. HOMM2 is still installed on my older computer which has W98SE, but not my newer one. I wonder if H2 will run on XP? I also have HOMM1 on that computer.

Lost continent I played at least a few times, but a lot of it was travelling at sea, which is tedious to me, IMO. This is compounded by slow-down of the AI when it takes its turns at sea too.