Heroes of Might and Magic V

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I downloaded the Homm5 demo today and tried it out. I like the game until now. The interface is quite intuitive, I managed to figure out how to do everything within seconds. It's very different from Homm3 (my personal favorite), but I'm quite impressed they managed to make it so easy to navigate. The only thing I don't like (at all) is that you need to use the right mouse button to rotate the view around... and you need to rotate a LOT, especially in battle, to get a good grip on what's going on. It's annoying.

That said, graphics are very good, and occasionally stunning. I was literally stunned when I entered my first city and got the camera slowly flying around the various buildings. Battles are a LOT of fun, with "dramatic" closeups of Marksmen shooting or Griffins dying. The nice thing is that you can turn off all the effects if they get on your nerves. The interface customization in this respect is good. It's a variation on Heroes 3 style battles: the hero isn't a "real" unit, but you can attack with him: he'll just hit an enemy for a small amount of damage (well, he is level 3 only) but he won't even move from where he is (and he doesn't get retaliated against, which is very nice). In addition to spells there's now something called special abilities. Basically you use them like spells (one of them for example gives a bonus morale for everyone), but they don't take any mana, and you learn them on level up. Level up by the way is a nightmare now, you've got to pick a new skill, update an old skill, OR a special ability! Choices choices.

The music is simply stunning. I have no idea who they hired, but I take my hat off to him or her. It fits the game so well, it creates the mood almost all by itself. It's all opera in the towns of course (of COURSE! Nothing else will do since Homm2!) but the rest of the music is just as good.

Pacing is better than Homm4, but still feels slow compared to Homm3. But that may be because I haven't fully mastered the interface yet. I do find the 3D thing to be the only annoying point in the game until now, even though I admit the graphics are very pretty.

Anyone else tried the demo?

 

I have heard mixed reports of the demo so far, some hate the same things that others love. Unfortunately I do not have the time to test the demo out at the moment. I will try it sooner or later though.

 

The first time I didn't quite get the mission and lost, and the second time a huge army with lots of devils and stuff came and killed me . At least it looks and feels a lot better than IV, but I can't see how it could compare to II or III. 3D is also still ugly.

 

Well, it basically is Homm3 in 3D. Same towns with the same units (oh sure, they've renamed the Castle to "Haven" but it's still the same damn thing). Spells and skills are different, but I quite like the new skill system actually. I have to say the 3D is quite ugly (the graphics do look better if you turn up the detail level), but the 3D interface in itself is cumbersome and annoying.

Oh and I checked the music composition. They hired Rob King to do it (same guy who did all the other Homm games, plus M&M 6-9, and other things), and the music is very good IMO. Not very surprising considering it's Rob King

I don't think the final game will be as addictive as Homm 2 or 3, but it will probably still be a very good game, which is about as much as I'll ask of recent games.

 

YES!!!!!

 

Soon we will get our greedy paws on the commercial release!

 

Tried the demo. It looks better than HoMM4, but still not as good as HoMM3.
I just prefer the olde 2D screen!

 

Yesterday had quick look at HoMM5. Yea, music is very good. And I love how detailed mills and other structures are.
I have not played HoMM series for few years, so there will be things to rememmber.

 

How are the names? Idiotic imaginationless stuff like in HoMM IV expansions or something real like in HoMM III?

 

The names? Who cares about the names?

I got this the other day, it's a bit boring to be honest. Just like HOMM4.

Bring back HOMM3!!

 

Well, the game has been officially released but I have not played it yet. I thought I could get it faster from Ubi Soft - Man, was I wrong. First, they sent me a conformation on the 23rd saying that they had shipped it; then when it failed to arrive after a few days, I called them and they told me that there was a problem at the shipping location and none of the Fedex tracking codes worked. The customer service guy told me "not to worry, that it would arrive the next day." That was 3 days ago, and still no Heroes V. So much for their "free two day shipping."

Normally, I don't order online, because I don't like using my credit cards for this kind of purchase, but I should have ordered it through Amazon and SP instead. And that's my advice to anyone else here as well.

[ May 29, 2006, 03:50: Message edited by: Chandos the Red ]

 

my computer is too crappy to play it

 

Jesus, you must have one hell of a fossil. If mine can run it, I assumed everyones could!

 

It finally arrived this afternoon and I have been playing it since. I have to say it is really a good game. Great graphics and sound. So far, it's very much like an evolved Heroes III (with similiar storyline), and better than IV. I like it. Just don't order it directly from Ubisoft.

 

I'm up to Campaign 4 now, and the game is really good so far, it needs a lot more polishing though, and have some balance issues.

 

I got the game last week. been playing it Hot-Seat with a friend alot. And I must say the game is way better than the sucky heroes4, but not even close to the 3rd one. Certain things in it are just too lame, and the 3d graphics does more bad than good I think. The elves and the witches you can recruit for your army looks like some damn manga\world of warcraft thingys. Meaning that someone had babies with a rabbit, and you get to recruit the offsprings into your army. that put me off bigtime. the 3d interface slows things down, due to the fact that you have to rotate the camera alot in order to find all the resources. Another thing I noticed is that the Knight heroes, when they attack enemy units, do a ride-by attack. This is no problem, but for a small idiotic situation that occors often. When attacking an enemy castle, the hero still does the ride-by attack, even when attacking units protected by the castle wall. So does the the hero ride straight through the walls or what?

The positives are the spellcaster units, wich have their own spellbook and stuff. It really makes them alot more powerfull (wich they should be) than in the other games. All in all I would give this game a 5 out of 10. A mediocre game that didn`t improve anything in the series. But it did climb up abit from the horrible heroes4.

PS : check if you can`t find a screenshot of the Dendroid\ent units.....They look horrible. A stickman with a completely round head, stuck on a stick of a neck. Made me think of Pinochio abit hehe.

 

Well...I guess I'm a noob when it comes to HoMM, because HoMM IV was my first experence with the game. And let me just say, when I played it at my friend's house at an all night/all day/4 hours of sleep/rest of the night "hot seat" LAN party, I was hooked. I was a little ticked off that the developers released the game before it was actually ready...and the patches just to get multi-player was BS... Anyway, the one thing I *never* liked was the opera. When ever I heard the deep voiced opera singer starting going "Laaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa" I would turn my speakers off.

Point aside, is HoMM V going to be rushed to the shelves, uncompleted? If not, I might have to go out and buy it. I haven't had a taste of HoMM ever since my fiance locked it in her mom's safe. (It wasn't uncommon for me to play for 8 hours at a time... )

 

Second campaign going on ATM and thus far it has been okay. When compared to my favorite game of this genre, Disciples 2, HoMM5 is still about having the biggest dick (army) and mowing your enemy with it. That's pretty much all winning requires, although there is some strategy in skills and spells. The AI still seems to know everything and the story is just plain horrible, but the graphics are cute and a few of the music-tracks pretty good.

I'm sure the HoMM5 fans like of it and many others can also play it for hours. Personally, I'll stay in-line in wait for Disciples 3.

 

Finally got the game, and am enjoying it so far...

Only major gripe: why did they get rid of the hexagonal grid in favour of a square grid on the tactical screen?!? Oh and certain creatures like peasants and zombies are far too fast. They used to move 2 hexes, now it's 4. It's not like the battlefield is twice as big. In addition, where are the goblins/orcs/trolls/cyclops? (I'm guessing expansion probably)

 

I have the game and the expansion, disappointed in the lack of non-campaign games, especially compared to my fav HoMM3. Hate the camera angles, and get annoyed at how easy it can be to miss things.

I'm on the Necropolis campaign at the moment, my only gripes so far about these are:

1. The last Infernal campaign where Agrael goes to meet Tieru, I had to inject myself with caffeine to stay awake and almost lost the will to live. Please there has to be a shortcut from going round in a bloody big spiral to get from A to B

2. And no matter how high my spell power is I don't seem to do a lot of damage with my spells

Other than that I've enjoyed but HoMM3 is still the best for me.