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As the common business sense goes, a good deal is the one where both
parties profit. Trying to rip off the other is always considered bad
for business, as the victim may decide not to deal with you anymore.
3DO, however, seems to have forgotten this rule. It is not the first
time: their Heroes Chronicles were vastly inferior products for
their full price, and their Army Men series is by now considered to
be a dead cow, still giving out a little milk. However, this time
they have tried it with their flagship product, Heroes of Might and
Magic. While the first expansion of Heroes of Might and Magic IV,
named The Gathering Storm, is way above average, compared with other
expansions, the limited amount of changes and new additions and the
rather limited replay value do not justify the price of $29.99.
The past and present
The Heroes of Might and Magic series was
born in 1990, when New World Computing, best known for its Might and
Magic games by that time, published a small game called King's
Bounty. The game has became a legend since; its lasting value was so
great that 3DO could re-release this old title on Playstation 2
under the name Heroes of Might and Magic: Quest for the Dragonbone
Staff. In this game, your single hero had to conquer a number of
castles on four continents and recover a series of artifacts, in
order to complete a map of the hidden treasure. To do so, he was
able to recruit units, their number and skill depending on the
hero's level.
The game was followed by the first Heroes of Might and Magic title
in 1995. The game now introduced new concepts. You could develop
your towns, adding new buildings that either improved the economy or
produced new, better units. To do so, you had to collect seven
different resources, either freely laying on the ground or provided
by different types of mines. There were other adventure objects as
well - artifacts, creature dwellings, power-ups and more. Due to a
larger number of spells available and the multitude of creatures,
the combat became more complex. The only drawbacks were the rather
amateurish graphics and a color scheme that was too bright for this
kind of a game. Heroes of Might and Magic II was released a year
later and became an instant hit.
The graphics were less flat, more detailed, yet smaller, in order to
allow for a much larger gaming world and more units. The main change
in gameplay, however, was the inclusion of campaigns and the
possibility to upgrade buildings, in order to get better units. The
main campaign consisted of an unprecedented 40 maps, and offered
multiple paths. It took me months to finish it. Just as I did, the
first Heroes expansion was released, The Price of Loyalty. The
expansion added events, new heroes, artifacts, a multitude of maps
and a few adventure objects, such as the mage eyes, which are used
until now. 1999 and 2000 marked Heroes of Might and Magic III and
its two expansions, Armageddon Blade and Shadow of Death. The
series, as originally created, has reached its pinnacle here. There
were more units, more different towns and more spells, but the basic
concept remained the same.
Armageddon Blade, which introduced a whole new town with a set of
creatures and heroes became one of the greatest expansions I have
ever seen. Heroes of Might and Magic IV came with a whole new
concept. Old fans either loved or hated the game, and new fans were
slow in coming, mainly due to a blunder at 3DO's part, which decided
to sell the game for $50, but to include all materials on a CD like
in a budget release. The game was not as much about strategy as the
previous games; character development became much more important.
Heroes now participated in combat, and so they needed to develop
their skills (each one can have up to 20 of them at 4 different
experience levels), and acquire powerful artifacts. Questing became
a major issue as well, and so the game became more a top-down
role-playing game with strong strategy elements than a pure
turn-based strategy game.
The Gathering Storm
The expansion has brought several new
campaigns, a dozen or so of new maps, a couple of new adventure
objects, artifacts and monsters. Campaigns and maps. The game
offers a total of six new campaigns, five of which are accessible
immediately, the sixth one being unlocked when you finish the five.
According to the new intro movie, a new wizard, named Hexis, is
threatening to destroy the world. Five heroes go their separate ways
to build up their skill and to gather the artifacts necessary to
destroy the evil Hexis.
The first campaign puts you in the role of an archmage, on the
search of five magical artifacts. The campaign starts out fairly
easy, giving you a second hero to help him. As you progress, you
will find that the mage himself will be able to defeat entire
armies. The second campaign is much shorter, but the character is
similar: a chaos mage. I found this campaign to be the most
reminiscent of Heroes of Might and Magic II: a lot of strategy and
luck, with the hero being more in the background. The third campaign
thrusts you in the role of a female bard, also looking for a few
artifacts. This was a very novel campaign, where a lot depended on
the main character's stealth, instead of any strategic thinking.
This campaign proved the power of the new concept. In the fourth
campaign, you become a barbarian who needs to defeat three mad
brothers in order to gain certain artifacts. I always found the
barbarians a little challenging, and the maps even more so,
especially after a timed event stripped me of almost all my towns in
yet another display of the power of the new game engine.
 The fifth campaign puts you in the role of a female necromancer. I
never really liked the necromancers, but I must admit that they have
the most powerful creatures, which made this campaign a little
easier than the designers intended. In the last campaign, the heroes
unite in order to defeat the evil Hexis. Considering that all your
heroes will be at around level 30 now, additional armies will be
hardly necessary. I was able to call up 8 dragons, for example,
before the enemy got to move at all. In addition, the game provides
plenty of new maps to keep you entertained for a few days. I must
admit that the maps were the strong point in the game. No matter how
terrible the A.I. has become, 3DO found someone to create highly
playable maps, both for the original game and for the expansion (and
possibly the same people for the otherwise terrible Might and Magic
IX). Fully aware that the computer tries to cheat, using the fog of
war (basically move just beyond your visible field in order to get
behind you), most maps are very linear, allowing you to deal with
opponents one by one. In addition, many maps have complex timed
events, challenging quests or mazes that require lots of planning
ahead.
Artifacts, creatures and structures
The game offers 16 new
artifacts, which can be combined into five more powerful artifacts.
These items do not add much to the strategy; in fact, I found that
some of them were inferior to some older artifacts I found during my
quests. However, most of them present a nice, refreshing touch to
the game. There are four new high-level monsters: a goblin knight,
evil sorceress, gargantuan and dark champion. Those four units don't
add much to the balance of the game; I got the impression that 3DO
included them only to be able to claim the addition of new, powerful
enemies. The monsters seem a little out of place, considering they
never appeared in the Might and Magic world before.
The 11 new buildings are a mixed bag. Four of the buildings are
generators for the four new monsters. Since the monsters don't
improve the game balance, I would assume that they would not be used
to a larger extent in other maps, especially those created by fans.
Five buildings represent the five schools of magic. Here, you can
buy the appropriate spells. In campaigns, these buildings are
useless, as your characters will have plenty of opportunity to learn
all spells from the mage guilds. On single maps, your characters
will have a very hard time to attain a high enough level to be able
to learn the high-level spells. Either case, these buildings are
rather useless. The only two buildings that actually serve a
purpose, namely fun, are two arenas. In these arenas, your hero will
fight alone, one of two kinds of dragons. Victory means another
level. These arenas are actually fun to play, when all you have is
your hero. Other improvements The most heralded improvement
is a multiplayer patch, allowing you to play the game on-line. The
original game had a multiplayer option, but when you clicked on it,
you got a message that this feature would be patched later. This
caused an outrage among fans, and created a precedent: for the first
time that I know of, a retail release admitted that it was
incomplete. This patch, however, is also available at the 3DO Web
site for free. The other addition was a new music track. However, no
matter how much I played the game, I could never find it.
What was not improved?
Probably the worst problem is the A.I.,
which is beyond terrible. Due to the fact that it can't sneak behind
you anymore, the enemy tends to sit in its castle, waiting for you
to come and attack. This makes map management a much easier job for
you, and with enough patience, you can wear the enemy down without
ever employing your main hero. On high difficulty levels, the enemy
heroes tend to attack monsters that are too strong for them and get
slaughtered even before you get to face them. In fact, the most
challenging game, as someone said on the 3DO boards, is one of low
difficulty where you throw away all your resources and money at the
beginning. The other thing that was not implemented, even though 3DO
promised it would include it in this expansion, was a random map
generator. This has caused yet another outrage by the most devout
fans, and greatly decreased the replay value of the game.
Rating Gameplay - 5
The new map design improves the
gameplay a lot from the original series, but the terrible A.I. takes
away all the fun from anybody but the neophyte players. I personally
liked it, as I am the kind of a player who likes to build up as much
as possible before attacking, but people who like to rush their
opponents found it way too easy. In fact, the few times when I had
to find an artifact before the enemy did, I managed to destroy the
enemy before seriously trying to find the artifact. What really
brought the score down, however, is one of the worst gameplay bugs I
have ever seen: the player is able to transfer units between towns
instantly, without activating the cheat mode, which completely
destroys any notion of fair play in multiplayer games.
Graphics - 8
The graphics have experienced no change at all.
While they are not as fancy as in other games, they get their job
done, and they do it right. The graphics allow for great orientation
in the game, and with three levels of layout (each for a different
monitor resolution) accommodate most players.
Audio - 9
3DO has one of the best audio staffs in the
business. Ever since Might and Magic VI, their soundtracks were
superb, and this is not an exception. While all audio is copied from
the original game, it did not age at all, and has yet to grow old on
me.
Replay - 6
In the previous Heroes games, you could replay the
maps over and over again, always applying a different strategy. That
is not possible in Heroes of Might and Magic IV, however. Because
the map handles and feels more like a role-playing map, your options
are fairly limited, and after playing it twice, you loose interest.
In fact, I got bored quickly when playing the campaigns for the
second time. Because of that, a random map generator is absolutely
essential. Without it, I was entertained with the game for only one
week.
Final verdict - 7
The expansion is a fine piece of work, but
a little hastily put together, in my opinion. Its main value lies in
new maps and campaigns. The new items and monsters, while
interesting, are of a very limited value, considering the dire state
of the fan scene. Half a year after the original game was released,
there are less than a dozen new maps, and the trend may not change.
The multiplayer patch is available for free on the 3DO site, so it
should not count to the final rating at all. Due to the lack of a
random map generator and due to the limited replay value of the
maps, the most you can get from the expansion is a week of playing.
For $30, that's too little, considering that some budget games (Moonbase
Commander and the older Monopoly Tycoon, for example) provide much
more entertainment for $20. Unless you are a serious Heroes fan,
wait for the complete bundle, which should arrive in a year or so.
The second expansion is being produced right now, and if 3DO follows
its trend, a complete edition should not be far off. Meanwhile, go
get the Heroes of Might and Magic Platinum, which for the same price
is enough to keep you entertained for the next several months.
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