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Bad News for Heroes III fans - but still fun for Newcomers

3 Rating: 3, Useful: 10 / 13
Date: February 07, 2003
Author: Amazon User

Heroes of Might and Magic fans can be as tough to please as Tolkien fans. With three previous games to base their expectations on, Heroes IV had a high bar set for itself. Unfortunately it comes up very short - but for new players it still reaches high enough to be plenty enjoyable.

For those new to the series, Heroes is a turn based strategy game in which your heroes serve as generals, leading mystical and themed troops in battle against other heroes. You manage towns' resources to build improvements, generating advantages, new trooop types, and acquiring wealth to buy troops. Heroes and towns have different flavors - a nature based hero and town will have sprites, elves, and unicorns, while an undead town will generate zombies, vampires, and bone dragons. Managing your resources, moving around your pieces, and using strategy in combat is what the game's all about.

I admit I fall into the category of 'high expectations previous Heroes player'. I anxiously awaited the release date - what new creatures would be added? What glitzy graphics? Like many other Heroes III fans, I was disappointed. Heroes IV abandoned its beautiful, colorful 2d graphic in favor of 3d isometric graphics. Even at low resolutions I find myself squinting at the newly rendered units on the screen because they've become very small, and, in many cases, their modeling makes them look alike. Towns and structures suffer the same fate - the storybook look of your towns has turned into geometric, boxy, dull looking objects. Much of the flavor has been lost. Also, upgraded units have disappeared. I enjoyed the look and bonuses of upgrading from a unicorn to a war unicorn, for example, in Heroes III, but now there is one and only one version of each unit.

In terms of gameplay, the changes are a mix of pros and cons. Combat now involves your heroes as melee pieces - just like any other unit. The con is that they are very easy to kill. The interesting plus is that you can team up multiple heroes in a single army. Another interesting development is that you don't need a hero at all to move an army around - get your hero killed and your strongest unit will take the lead. You are also free to unlease new units from your castle heroless in the same manner. Wandering armies are likely to encounter wandering monsters - another nice change - that hoard of dragons won't let you just skirt by it anymore. Lastly, in terms of new units there are few with this release - if anything, many more of your favorites will have disappeared.

Both the skill and the magic system have been updated. You have more choices, as well as the ability to mix classes or branch off into specialties. I especially like the added flexibility which the updated system has. A few other pros I enjoy are new options like caravans, which let you dispatch armies from one castle to arrive automatically at another a few turns later. It's nice to reduce some of the micromangement while you get on to bigger and better things like conquering the world.

The game's sounds have changed. Put back in (from Heroes II) is the opera singing while in town. Lost, like so much of the rest of the game, is the flavor and distincness of the different town types. Also, the game shipped with a maddening bug which repeated music like a skipping CD - something fixed later with a patch.

To me it feels like a completely different game, like a new bunch of programmers took a stab at creating a Heroes game based on a list of feature bullet points, which is why so many loyal Heroes fans have given it negative reviews. It's not a bad different game; newcomers will enjoy it very much. Those expecting a turn based fantasy strategy game will be delighted - those expecting a sequel to the popular Heroes series will find themselves disappointed and [$$]poorer.

I don't know what the deal is...

4 Rating: 4, Useful: 11 / 16
Date: February 17, 2003
Author: Amazon User

Having played the game and its expansion for several months now, I find it very enjoyable with lots of new features. However, having read the other reviews, I don't understand what the big deal is. Like many others, I have played the previous games extensively. However, I am glad 3DO has changed several aspects and removed several spells.

First and foremost, allowing the hero into the party is the best change. The graphics are good, and there seems to be alot more interaction and depth to your hero or heroine because they acutally interact with the battles. In addition, the 3D isometric point of view is a big improvement.

In addition, they have removed some of the overland movement spells, such as town portal, flight, and dimension door. To tell you the truth, I am glad they did. I found in HofMM 2 and 3 I always tried to get and use these spells. They make the game way too easy and I never had to change my strategies. Now, the only way to move faster on the overland map is to get a hero with advanced pathfinding or seamanship skills, which focuses you on increasing a hero or two in this area. I definitely makes the game more chanllenging in harder scenarios and makes players modify their tactics.

In addition, it takes alot of experience to get grand master ratings in the spheres of magic. Therefore it makes it necessary to have several mages focusing on several spheres to get the high level spells. Gone is the idea of one superpower character, unless you cheat or play in one of the long campaigns.

The only disapointment I found was the removal of siege engines and the town combat. It seemed they could have spruced it up some, perhaps by adding the ability to destroy the walls like in the previous games. All you can do now is bust in the gate and attack from there, or fly over the walls. I thought this was kind of a let down.

The thing I don't get is what did these other folks expect? Did they want HofMM 3 with better graphics? I am glad 3DO tried something different and wish they would do this with their defunct HofMM role playing games.

A lot of nice improvements but still not revolutionary

4 Rating: 4, Useful: 9 / 12
Date: April 05, 2002
Author: Amazon User

Heros of Might And Magic is probably one of the most hyped and delayed games in the past couple years. The wait is finally over. After playing with it for the past few days, I found a lot of nice improvements and new features, but still won't consider it a revolutionary sequal to HOMM3.
1) The graphics is surely nicer and have a good 3d look although it is still just 2d, perfect for slower computers.
2) The heros are more useful these days, you can actually using them in battle. But be very careful since they are easy to get killed in battle, especially in early levels.
3) The map grow much larger, even the first level will take a while to finish.
4) Most creatures are the same, following the same level system. One interesting fact is that level 1 creatures are usually very effective on on level 4 creaters: )
5) Now creatures growth are calculated daily or longer(depending on the creature level).
6) Quick combat will automatically calculate the battle results when you face far inferier opponents.
7) Creatures may not walk to you and attack, so be careful when walking around the map.

Overall, the game become harder. You really need to think about strategy when building up the army and exploring the map.

Heroes Fan

4 Rating: 4, Useful: 9 / 12
Date: May 14, 2002
Author: Amazon User

After waiting for several weeks since you will not ship this game to an APO (WHY everyone else does and its like sending it any where else in the US) I was pleased to say that the game lived up to my expectations. I spent the first night playing about 5 hours hot seat and then the next day trying out a campaign after about 6 hours I was able to finish the first part of the campaign after exploring the whole map. The only thing's that is not pleasing is the combat screen where you hobble around like little stick figures (2D) and it takes you for ever to move across the field of battle that's only a couple inches apart. I surprises me that 3DO didn't work a little more on the graphics since they had 3 years or so since the release of the last Heroes. The game doesn't live up to the old one where a much stronger army can march into someone's castle and defeat them with little or no loose to their army. Why did 3DO change the combat in the castle's since when can a flying creature not fly over walls and attack the occupants of the castle and then fly out with out having to stand in front of the doors/walls while everyone else can attack them back i.e. none flying and creatures on foot.

Okay 3DO output a finished product

3 Rating: 3, Useful: 9 / 12
Date: July 11, 2003
Author: Amazon User

I have never run a game as often as I ran Heroes 3. I have owned every version since the first and I even stuck with it through the constant expansions of Heroes 3. That stops with this version. There are many good qualities to the new version: The graphics look better
The cities look better and structures are in consistant spots
Monsters have more unique abilities like genies casting spells form a list of spells
Added unusual features in maps
Cities have a buy all button
You can send armies out without a leader
You can purchase armies from recruitment centers without troops at the recruitment site
More magic schools and more spell variety

However there are huge steps backwards as well:
No random map generator
Cities produce less monster types
You must choose which type of monsters to produce at upper levels
Heroes of one type are all the same.
Game play is much slower.
The expansions out are all about the maps and campaigns not monsters and new features.
The patch from release to current version is bigger than the original program.

In short they have latched on to a give them the basics, add a few map expansions, add a few feature expansions and then release the whole package. I am just waiting for the release with the map generator and all the features added. I think if we got everyone to do this they might just release a finished product to start with. I ,for one, would have rather paid $$ for all the features III shadows of death offered in IV than buying them at $$ peicemeal for two years.

Now if they wanted ideas for expansions things like:
Modual monsters (add wings, xtra hp's, ranged attack)
City revolts
Chaos map that changes every turn
Many new artifacts
Castle walls must be built around each expansion (if your city is attacked non walled expansions are destroyed.
Armies that stay in place 2 turns may build a temporary citadel
Resource market purchases change going rates for resources
Monster upkeep costs

Now if you put two of any of those in an expansion I might buy it. For now I'll wait till I get new features.

Having actually played the game....

5 Rating: 5, Useful: 7 / 8
Date: April 01, 2002
Author: Amazon User

I bought the game this weekend and while I have only put in about 2 hours of playing time I am EXTREMELY impressed and can't wait for the hours to whither away at work so I can go home and play some more.

If you've played Heroes II or Heroes III get ready for a VERY different game. Although they have lessened the number of monsters available in the game they have significantly raised the quality of the monster in the game. Almost all of the monster's have special abilities or some unique trait, even the lowly peseants.

The playing controls all still seem to be there from the older games however they are moved around the screen some to give more screen to informational things and maps.

Overall it's a VERY cool game and I'm glad I paid the price to play it now instead of waiting 6 months for the price to drop like I usually do.

Bugs undermine an otherwise well constructed game

3 Rating: 3, Useful: 7 / 8
Date: April 04, 2002
Author: Amazon User

HOMMIV continues and improves upon the HOMM franchise. The new additions to the game (hero participation in battles, more individual hero development, army building trees with mutually exclusive choices)substantially enhance the hypnotic effect of the game upon players. The graphics have improved and the music is wonderful.

HOWEVER - the current edition has a serious bug which almost inevitably leads to deterioration of speed and eventual freezes at the conclusion of battles, requiring a reboot of the system before you can return to the game. The game appears to freeze after an average of four battles. This bug and the frustration it causes detracts from what would otherwise be a thoroughly enjoyable gaming experience. Hopefully 3do will come out with a patch to repair this problem before long. In the interim, this game can only be recommended to those with sufficient patience to weather the reboots (and the frequent saves you must make to protect your progress).

A disappointing sequel

3 Rating: 3, Useful: 7 / 8
Date: April 12, 2006
Author: Amazon User

Heroes IV was a much awaited sequel of one of the best strategy games ever, Heroes III. The latter, by the way, is a golden game in terms of gameplay. It's so much fun that it was the primary game I was playing for years.

Heroes IV, though features improved graphics and such, lacks any gameplay fun whatsoever. I gave it 2 stars only because I assume that some people can actually enjoy it, despite my opinion. The AI (computer) is not challenging at all. It simply sits in its castles, rarely attacking you, and your whole game consists in basically exploring the map, fighting the monsters (not the AI) until you have enough forces to break the AI in its castles, where he sits accumulating troops. Not much fun if you know how Heroes III feels, where AI constantly challenges you, is aggressive, attacks your in your own castles, etc.

For me, Heroes IV is much more boring because the AI is simply stupid, and AI was the main thing that made Heroes series so much fun to play. Some may say that graphics was not good in previous titles, but graphics were never an issue, i.e. it was always good enough.

In summary, Heroes IV has improved graphics and many new ideas, but poor gameplay (stupid, as if absent AI) and very few maps. If you enjoy turn-based strategies, buy Heroes III, you'll have fun. Of note, heroes V is coming up, and the main hope is that it will resemble heroes III in terms of gameplay.

This game freaking ...

1 Rating: 1, Useful: 13 / 22
Date: November 30, 2002
Author: Amazon User

I have been a HOMM fan ever since HOMM 2, I loved HOMM 2,
and loved HOMM 3 even more. Man, HOMM 3 is such a great game.
I looked forward to this game, but no, 3DO had to change the
game completely. 3DO manages to successfully taken out
everything that was fun in the HOMM series and give us a
horibble looking and boring game.

no longer we have the beautiful graphics of HOMM 3,
no longer we have the challenge of HOMM 2
no longer we have the serious tactics of HOMM series.

good job 3DO, no wonder you are doing so bad.
get rid of the M&M series and focus on HOMM!!
but I heard they are not going to develope the HOMM
series any more. which is just stupid. how much
did you make off M&M? how much did you make off HOMM?
can you guys do math?

Not at all like the other HOMMs

2 Rating: 2, Useful: 9 / 13
Date: December 22, 2002
Author: Amazon User

My wife and I have played Heroes of Might and Magic since HOMM1 came out. Then, going from HOMM2 back to HOMM1 was like moving to a place with no running water. Somewhere along the line, 3DO bought New World Corporation but kept most of the staff, somehow we knew it wouldn't work. Homm3 came out 1 year past it's due date and it was well worth it, it's 2 expansion packs were also well worth it and any "bugs" were fixed, including spelling errors.

We anxiously awaited the release of HOMM4 and actually purchased it in advance. When it came, boy were we disappointed! There were only 39 single player maps (No Multiplayer though it did finally come in a patch), most of them were small, only 1 was X-Large and any that had an underground had very little of an underground. The map maker no longer made random maps and it has no help file so you have to spend a lot of time figuring out how it works. If you've played the other HOMM's you'll be very bummed if you buy this one, even the campains were very [weak]. We altered a lot of the maps so we can play them but if I had the chance again, I wouldn't buy this game.

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