Game heroes 7 review. Might & Magic: Heroes VII review

“These guys can take a punch pretty well,” a fleeting thought flashed through when a brigade of four thousand crossbowmen simultaneously fired a hail of arrows at a hundred magical giants, after which only one of them remained standing on his stone legs. At such moments you can’t help but think: when does victory come? With the fall of the last enemy castle, or when you realize that your army no longer has equals?

The story of Heroes of Might and Magic is full of ups and downs. If the even parts followed a dangerous path of experimentation, then the odd ones always returned it to its roots. But is this the kind of return fans of the series were waiting for? The answer is somewhere nearby, in the review of the game “Might and Magic: Heroes VII”.

- My God! Treasure chest! I'm rich!
- Third level, and already considers herself rich. Nubye...
"Theory big bang"(2008)

Astrologers have announced a week of bugs

Productivity is halved.

If you were to ask me what feelings and emotions the seventh “Heroes” evokes, one word would come to mind - fatigue. When one map captivates you for more than three hours, and there’s barely enough time for the entire campaign, you feel like after a grueling day of work, where there was no place for rest.

But instead of internal satisfaction, there is only bewilderment, emptiness and the question “what was that all about?” New part legendary series burns so much time not because game process fascinating, but because everything in it works to delay time, from the insidious opponents with their dozens of heroes dancing in circles in their possessions, to the loading speed and playback of animation in battle.

The effects of the week have become many times greater. Some are funny, and some are extremely useful. Banning ranged attacks or not countering can dramatically affect the outcome of the game.

It's time to remember our review of the sixth "Heroes" expansion and understand that either the experience of past Ubisoft releases did not teach us anything, or possible problems the publisher was aware, but they seemed acceptable to him to launch the third stage of beta testing. No longer due to volunteers, but through the efforts of angry customers who managed to strike back with a series of negative reviews.

You can argue that over time everything will be fixed, the technical side will be improved and the game generally has great potential, but you will never be right. All the problems of the "Seven" will not be solved even by patches made on a quick fix, nor full-scale additions with new factions and campaigns - they are able to bring the patient back to life, but not raise him to the level of the cult “Three” or even the “Six” despised by many.

Bugs of the seventh "Heroes". Note #1. Incorrect lighting operation. In fact, this is a desert and it is far from night.

The root of all evil is artificial intelligence. Yes, he is bad in nine games out of ten, and constantly complaining about this in reviews is already indecent, but this case special. Virtual brains in " Heroes VII“They’re not even bad, they’re... absent. The enemy does not collect resources, does not fight with neutral units, does not attack us - he can easily sit the entire game in his castle without doing anything at all.

In campaigns, such passivity is most noticeable; even scripts cannot help. An enemy hero, at the click of an invisible switch, can run into your city and be killed by an army that is invincible for him, and sometimes he simply gallops nearby, even though he is capable of taking the stronghold. Sometimes the opponent will endlessly respawn with the same army and level until you complete a certain event, which is quite annoying.

There are plenty of picturesque arenas in the game. True, you can never guess the size of the battlefield, which is why the tactic of quickly approaching the shooters risks failure.

Tactical battles are also not without quirks. The computer rarely uses impact magic, does not run away from the battlefield, and often orders a large squad of shooters to take up defensive positions instead of finishing off the fighters blocking them. Sometimes he doesn’t move closer, sending troops parallel to your retinue, and when he runs to all available cells, he substitutes himself for shooters, instead of going only the distance that will allow him to attack in the next round.

The intelligence of allies is at the same level. The system for calculating the outcome of the battle does not work correctly, because magic is not used during automatic battle, and you can lose troops where, in theory, you should kill everyone before they wait for their turn.

Bugs of the seventh "Heroes". Note #2. The Minotaur stood on a square where an enemy squad was partially located. Now he can't be attacked.

With such a track record, the AI ​​manages to think about its moves on the map for a long time, so for now it is better to refrain from trying to play a game in the world maximum size and with a bunch of opponents. But even with a fair amount of patience, you are unlikely to finish it - at some point the game will crash with an error due to a memory leak, and the latest saves will not be able to load for the same reason.

The cost of your playing area and the number of memory sticks have practically no effect on this matter - the enemy will think for a long time in any case, and the game will eat up all the available memory. The latter is already a hallmark of Limbic Entertainment, since its game Might and Magic X: Legacy had a similar problem, but then only users of 32-bit versions of Windows were affected.

For Uplay points you can unlock pixel mode, but this view is hardly pleasant.

There were fewer problems with Uplay this time. The game has been taught to update automatically, like on Steam, there is no longer a strict gradation between the digital and retail versions, as well as a ban on playing with foreigners. The Conflux network service has sunk into oblivion: now there is no need to constantly connect to the network to get full access to game functionality (like weapons in the right hand).

We were only deprived of the choice of language. Wherever you buy the game, you will receive a monolingual Russian version. And even though the voice acting is done at a decent level (although the actors sound too theatrical in places, with overacting, as if children's party), the very fact of such restrictions is frustrating, especially on Steam, where the possibility of reselling cheap versions to the West is completely eliminated.

Who will come to us with a sword...

He'll get sick of the magic.

There is no point in dwelling on the bugs in more detail - the most striking ones that I personally encountered can be found in the illustrations. Otherwise, the game is not as hopeless as it seems: even taking into account the fact that the overall work was done with a C grade, individual elements deserve, if not applause, then at least praise.

The most important argument of the defense is that conceptually these are the same “Heroes”. With exploring the world map, leveling up heroes, collecting resources and rebuilding cities, and, of course, tactical battles, where units take turns beating each other until one of the sides is completely destroyed. In this aspect, the series was more fortunate than Sacred or Command & Conquer, which degenerated into something unclear.

Close-ups in battle are now shown not only when luck is triggered. Their frequency can be adjusted or completely disabled in the settings.

Changes for the better are most noticeable in the skill system. If earlier it was possible to train any hero into anyone, only the racial property and specialization remained unchanged, now we get a wheel of skills, seen in the Heroes of War and Money browser, where ten groups of skills are available, suitable for the style of the hero, three of which can be study up to a master's degree.

Taking into account the fact that advanced skills cost the same as training ones, you can master the highest rank in one of the categories already at the fifth level, which makes short online games more interesting and varied. The only problem is with balance: any mage with a pack of weak gargoyles in a blitzkrieg will throw a warrior hero into the mud if he is lucky with a class spell mass destruction like "chain lightning" or "tsunami".

The skill wheel is a lot of visuals, but I wanted to provide at least one high-ranking section for the player to choose from, so that during online battles there would be something to surprise.

New enchantments are now, as expected, studied in city magic guilds and shrines scattered across the map, provided that the hero is not a complete ignoramus and understands something about the magic of his school. For those who rely on weapons and numbers, battle cries are still available and can be learned as skills, but playing as a fighter is not very comfortable now, especially at first.

There are also relatively peaceful specializations such as diplomat, researcher or economist, so a couple of minor characters are not a luxury, but rather a necessity. While the commander quarters monsters, the logistician follows on his heels, collecting unattended resources and capturing mines, and the philanthropist improves his financial well-being when he becomes the governor of the city.

Bugs of the seventh "Heroes". Note #3. Bunches of resources don’t always bring something, although in theory they should.

The developers carried out a construction reform, for example, mutually exclusive buildings appeared in the “Seven”. You have to choose between the type of dwelling of the legendary creature (hydra or black dragon), an additional mine and source of a rare resource, an altar with a temporary bonus and a protective moat.

There are not just more buildings, some of them open up new opportunities. With the help of the Thieves Guild, you can find out about the number of enemy heroes and the level of its economy. The differences between the factions were also emphasized through the buildings. So, magicians learned to create spell scrolls and disassemble artifacts for resources, and the dark elves began to send spies to rob enemy enterprises.

A lot of bad things have been said about city screens, but this is the last thing critics should be paying attention to right now.

Among the advantages we can add the plot, although indirectly, but continuing the events of the sixth part. It tells the story of the civil war that engulfed the human duchies after the death of the last empress of the Falcon dynasty and the emergence of the Griffins as the ruling family of the Holy Empire.

Starring the cover man with the endlessly tolerant face, Duke Ivan. He gathered a secret council of representatives of different races, and before going to the enemy with a saber drawn, he wants to listen to the arguments of each of the participants. In this elegant way, the game leads us through six main campaigns, of which it is enough to complete two to gain access to the finale. But the more stories the future emperor listens to, the more more possibilities and we will have side missions in two ending missions.

Choosing Ivan's bride is one of the game's few dilemmas. The decision will determine who will help you on the final task.

The story is presented in the form of dialogues familiar from “Six” with portraits of heroes, sometimes interrupted by videos made in the style of hand-drawn slides, which looks very beautiful and atmospheric... especially against the backdrop of dialogues in the council room, where the close-ups storytellers with open mouths in frozen poses. There wasn’t enough time to make the animation or whether it was intended that way, it’s difficult to understand.

The events of the main campaigns take place in different time and in different places, and even within one chapter characters sometimes they change, but their stories are captivating, and despite the predictable endings, it’s always interesting how and how it will all end. The writers did a particularly good job of referencing the plot of the game “Might and Magic X: Legacy” - so far there are no complaints at all about the development of the Ashan universe and the disclosure of this world within the framework of three series (role-playing Might & Magic, “Heroes” and Dark Messiah).

The Force Awakens

Why aren't these the heroes you're looking for?

The love of knights, exploits and valor was instilled in many of us in childhood, but in the seventh “Heroes” we appear not only in the role of readers and listeners. This is the part that cannot be fixed with updates without reworking everything. If artificial intelligence is a kind of step on the path to success, then the design and level of elaboration of the cards is a delicious smack on the asphalt.

Most of the campaign scenarios and maps are played according to the principle “pump up the hero -> gather an army -> take out the enemy -> complete the plot action.” Something original occurs at most once in five games, and even then the incentive to think appears only due to the time limit or the lack of obviousness of how to get to a certain point. As a result, the whole process turned into a routine, sticky and monotonous.

There is too much unused and just empty space on the maps. This results in you running longer from one useful point to another.

Similar symptoms appeared already in “Six,” but there were dynasties, multifaceted in-game achievements, leveling up along the Blood or Tears path, memorable battles with bosses, upgradeable artifacts that motivated even a hero of the maximum level to fight neutral armies. All this is missing from Heroes VII, and the developers haven’t figured out how to fill the void.

At some point in the game, you will simply discover that playing has become no longer interesting, and apart from the desire to find out the outcome of the story, nothing is holding you back. The situation is also aggravated by the low difficulty: even at the “heroic” level, neither neutrals nor enemy heroes pose much of a threat, and the balance of scripted battles, where we fight with fixed armies, is set up so that even a baby can win them.

Sometimes there are puzzles in missions. But they are here to distract you from monotony and routine, and not to challenge your ingenuity.

The game is not capable of captivating with its novelty. Before us are the same “Heroes VI” with limited opportunities, where for a couple of really good ideas there are three unsuccessful ones, or pleasant innovations are too insignificant against the backdrop of current problems.

For example, in battles bonuses to damage now work when attacking from the flank and from the rear, heroes have mastered new marching spells such as land reconnaissance and a temporary increase in mine production, and some creatures began to attack with elemental rather than physical damage. Fighters from a fort in the surrounding lands can be hired directly in the city, and the forts themselves can also be improved so that they immediately give birth to improved versions of creatures. But all these are minor changes that could be added to the same sixth part with a patch.

We won't be allowed into this city. But you've been there before, haven't you?

The connection with predecessors is also expressed in direct borrowings. Some of the portraits, models of creatures, cities and buildings, as well as part of the interface, migrated here straight from the sixth part with minor changes or no changes at all. The armies of the Forest Union and the Academy were practically carbon copies transferred from the “Five”, only some of the creatures were renamed and shuffled between ranks.

But where a big problem creatures - impersonality. In the sixth “Heroes”, every second fighter had some kind of trick like an enhanced attack or spell, but here most of our charges are just shooters and melee fighters, differing in attack, defense and health indicators, and a couple of insignificant passive skills. Even skeletons lost their signature bonus of protection from shooters, and their ghost counterparts, in exchange for resurrecting the undead and the chance to miss, were given ridiculous immunity to attacks from the flank and rear.

The game has a built-in encyclopedia. In the picture, the newcomer to the castle of magicians is the Simurgh, who can to some extent be considered the successor of the phoenix.

Problems also hit those who saw good potential in Heroes VII. network game. There are only eight handcrafted cards, and a random card generator, although available... is not entirely available. It is launched from the editor, and if it does not freeze at the moment of world creation, it will offer territories dotted with narrow paths, where some of the buildings are simply impossible to get to. It is not yet possible to create a map with a mixed landscape - either desert, or forests, or snow: it is always one thing.

Such shortcomings are no longer surprising, because even in campaigns the map design is the worst in the series. The maps are mostly linear, although the developers tried to hide this by dotting them with a network of portals and passages between the surface and the underground, and side quests, opening up alternative routes, are very rare.

Bugs of the seventh "Heroes". Note #3. One day an invisible man crossed Ivan's path. He had no name and, unlike other opponents, left no trophies.

You can never tell whether it is enough to do what is written in the task diary, or whether something else will be thrown at you later. This is especially critical for rare but unpleasant missions with a time limit: you have planned a route, calculated the situation several moves ahead, and then it turns out that this is not the end and you have to start all over again because you did not meet the timer.

Hence another annoying factor: unpredictability. Let's say we pumped one character into attack and another into economy. Then it turns out that strike hero by the will of a plot twist, he goes over to the side of the enemy along with the entire army, and you are left with nothing with a guy who, instead of attack and magic, taught logistics and economics. By loading a save, you can prevent the loss of an army and artifacts, but the very fact of such precedents for a game in the strategy genre is unacceptable.

Five of the most pointless things in the game

Not all sources are equally useful.

Altars and seals of the dragon gods. Often key places are blocked not by a strong army or a hero on the principle of “gather troops and prove your strength to win a reward”, but by seals. Everything reaches the point of absurdity: in order to get what you want, which is very close, you should find and visit an altar (perhaps even more than one), located God knows where in the outskirts of the game space, which provides you with unreasonable running from one edge of the map to the other.

First aid tent. Did you miss her in the sixth “Heroes”? If not, that's fine, because it's hard to find a more useless device in the game. She was never taught how to resurrect the fallen, although this solution has long been suggested, so you will often see how she restores 5-10 units of health to fairies or swordsmen. And even upgrading the “Art of War” skill line will not help: how the crumbs of life were restored, so everything will remain.

Guards in the garrison. Previously, the construction of fortifications increased the weekly growth of creatures, now the walls provide the castle with additional security in case of a siege. Alas, it does more harm than good, because professional soldiers cannot fight off a serious onslaught, and the AI ​​likes to kill small units, since the death of a group now affects the morale of the troops. There are also guards at the outposts, and such a garrison cannot be disbanded as unnecessary, which is annoying when the enemy is constantly repelling a key passage.

“Army and equipment” and “Continue move” buttons. Double clicking a mouse is a wonderful invention of mankind. But neither our compatriots from Nival, nor the Hungarians from Black Hole, nor the Germans from Limbic know about it. You can open the hero’s menu by clicking on his portrait, and to walk around the map, just double-click on any part of it. So why duplicate these options with separate interface buttons? And why is this block on the screen at all, if options can be assigned to hot keys?

The hero hasn't made his move yet! (click1) Dear player, be a hero! (click2) Please note that your hero has not done anything yet this round. (click3) No, I will not give the go-ahead for your last unit to attack this round, reconsider your decision. (click4) You really don't want to be a hero? OK.

Conclusion

For all their shortcomings, there is no feeling of hostility or contempt for the seventh “Heroes”. The attitude towards this part is rather like a child who has misbehaved - you need to scold him and, if something happens, put him in his place, but not out of hatred or righteous anger, but in the hope of making a man out of him. And while this message is unlikely to reach the developers, let it serve as a warning to those interested in the series.

For now, the game should be postponed until patches that correct artificial intelligence, memory leaks and numerous bugs, and for those who have not yet gotten hold of it, it is better to completely postpone the purchase until the release of the Complete Edition with all the fixes and additions. The game is not bad, but it is still far from even the level of the sixth part, and given the lukewarm reception from the players, it is appropriate to ask the question: will it even get better?

Verdict: trying to sell a game with an “indie” soul at the price of a summer blockbuster is a gamble in itself, but returning to the basics on the principle of cutting down opportunities is almost a fatal step.

Rating: 6.7 (“Not bad”).

Vitaly Krasnovid aka Disintegration

We express our gratitude to:

• Ubisoft for providing the key for the game.

• Might & Magic: Heroes VII - Performance Testing
  Summary testing of thirty-one video cards (including the latest products) and forty-five processors in a couple of resolutions and two operating modes.


• Discussion of the game at the conference site.

In the empire of people there are no better times. The throne is empty, and there are too many contenders for it. One of the strongest candidates, Duke Ivan, faces a choice: try to preserve the dynasty or become the head of a huge state himself? To make the most informed decision, the Duke convened six trusted advisers from all existing factions.

As a matter of fact, from this moment the rather non-standard campaign of Might & Magic Heroes 7 begins. Almost all the missions in it are stories told by advisers from the history of their peoples. Only two of them will occur on behalf of Duke Ivan. For example, the angel of Elrath will tell about the heroic adventure of a young knight from the Duchy of Wolf, the mention of which has somehow been lost. The sorceress, in turn, will remember ancient history love and about the times when the orcs rebelled and started a bloody war, destroying everyone who stood in their way. There are six advisors, as well as factions you can play for. These are the Forest Union, Academy, Necropolis, Orc Tribes, Alliance of Light and League of Shadows. Each has its own story, on the basis of which a decision will have to be made about the future fate of the empire.

However, this all just looks intriguing. The stories turned out to be very simple and full of clichés. Small scenes between missions are banal, and the dialogue is meager and pathetic. Even the scenes of betrayal are not surprising.

Before moving on to the game mechanics, it’s worth a little reassurance for those who have already become disappointed. Might & Magic Heroes 7 is still better than its predecessor. Not least thanks to some new products and the return of mechanisms from previous parts. Thus, an attack modifier has now appeared on the battlefield depending on the angle of attack on your soldiers. Now flanking moves and attacks to the rear play a role. If you attack from the back, the damage can increase up to one and a half times, and this is already a significant increase. However, there is also back side medals: frontal attacks against most creatures are now completely ineffective, so you have to break up the formation and reduce the number of defenders of your shooters.

The army compositions have also been updated. The League of Shadows received troglodytes and strange magical golems called "Misfits". Fire-breathing cabirs and huge magical eagles became part of the army of magicians. The lamassu of Necropolis are also interesting - neither living nor dead sphinxes. In general, the game's bestiary has been updated by about a quarter, but Ubisoft promises to add new creatures in additions.

Your warriors are divided into three types: basic, elite and legendary. The difference between them is quite noticeable. The main ones are ordinary meat, which can be crushed in quantity and nothing else. Elite ones basically complement and build on the success of their base. And the legendary creatures bear their name for a reason: they have several times more health than the elite. They can change the outcome of any battle, but are terribly expensive. You will have to spend not only gold on them, but also rare resources.

The armies look quite good. The only problems are with the animation of the creatures: some of them look like wooden blocks.

A system of territorial control appeared. The city now not only serves as the only quiet place on the map, but also spreads its influence around. If you assign a governor to any of your strongholds, then all controlled lands will be covered by certain bonuses that the player will choose during the development of heroes. For example, the morale of all characters will be increased in each battle, or the growth of their experience will simply be accelerated.

Urban planning hasn't changed much. The cities themselves are a drawing with a small number of active elements. This is more suitable for some browser game, and not for a large project.

The development of heroes is carried out using a special skill disk, in each segment of which there are three levels. By upgrading a certain branch, you can unlock stronger abilities. Each hero has a specialization, so some branches will only have two levels of development available. So, it will no longer be possible to develop an omnipotent magician from a warrior. However, just like you can’t turn a magician into a warrior who poses a serious threat.

And all this would be even nice if the game was at least a little more stable. You literally have to wade through mistakes. The game may crash immediately after some important battle. And considering that some of them don't allow automatic results, it's incredibly annoying. It’s good that autosave works every turn. In addition, the game often crashes when trying to start a mission. What prompted Ubisoft to release it so raw is a big question. Players on Steam complain about a huge number of bugs, including the impossibility of launching. In Uplay Might & Magic Heroes 7 behaves more stable.

In the plot Heroes VII it's easy to see the allegory for the game itself. Duke Ivan - just like the developers - faces a difficult choice. He - just like the developers - does not risk making a decision himself and therefore - just like the developers - he surrounds himself with wise advisers who know better than him what is right.

But there is one caveat: Duke Ivan, according to the Ashan legendarium, eventually became emperor, and the Limbic developers simply got confused about everything. They organized discussions on forums, made public polls on various important topics (including, of course, the main one: what pose should a figurine from a collector’s edition take), and pointedly declared that they were striving to arrange everything the way true connoisseurs wanted.

But practice has once again shown that the opinion of the mythical multitude of “true connoisseurs” is not enough to make a full-fledged game. Firstly, this multitude itself does not know what it wants. Secondly, something else is needed.

Six tales, one Ivan

The format of the story about Ivan is the most interesting thing in the campaign Heroes VII. To help the Duke, each of the six advisers tells his story with some high morality, and each story goes deeper into Ashan's past. But these stories themselves are extremely simple. They just fill up the space and give a reason to play for each of the six factions.

In the end, many people stopped playing “Heroes” for the sake of the plot since the second part. This series is loved for strategic maneuvers on the global map, for the interesting development of cities, for measured turn-based skirmishes and strange, unlike anything else: when you collect one pile of resources after another and are glad that no one else will ever get them.

So, a forty-hour campaign is probably the worst way to get to know all this. The value of planning in story missions is negated from time to time by far-fetched victory conditions like “Find n small specific units in the middle of huge maps that are completely unreadable to the naked eye.” Story missions are full of restrictions, including all the old conventions like the ban on losing in battles. This has been surprising since the days of New World Computing: why on earth should I Always juggle my commanders and protect them from risky battles, although I still have well-defended cities and tons of resources? Heroes has - has had - an escape mechanic from the very beginning. So why does it only work in story missions in the fourth part? By itself, the ban on escaping does not give the game anything other than annoying situations with instant defeat simply for the sake of another reason to load the autosave.

Sometimes cards look decent, but are completely unreadable without highlighting active objects.

But the AI ​​opponents are having a great time: they jump around in circles, ignoring resources and artifacts, and attack when such an idea or, occasionally, a script comes into their head. They are here for furniture, they are part of some diabolical production. The game sadly wraps up the gameplay drama, forcing, for example, to participate in battles that, according to the script, you still cannot win - as in the first mission for the Necropolis. You can't miss them with a car, be patient. Otherwise, you won’t get the necessary tear, you know?

Something good

When Heroes VII is freed from the plot and nothing interferes with the gameplay, you begin to notice: in general, Limbic did the basics well. For example, I tidied up the role-playing system, which was very crooked in the sixth part. Among the skills there are many old ones, but they are put into a more harmonious form: the development trees were placed in a visual wheel, and spells were separated from skills, and now they are again learned primarily in cities with a magic guild.

They tried to develop the theme of non-combat heroic managers who increase the efficiency of the economy and moved many related skills into a separate viceroy system: if you register the right hero in a city, he will, say, increase the growth of vampires or allow you to build buildings twice per turn.

The cities themselves do not live up to what they were in HoMM V after the additions, but they are still well drawn, there are again a lot of buildings, and the progress is simply pleasant to watch. There are more active objects on the maps, even if they are still difficult to read without highlighting the contours (don’t forget Always hold down the Alt key).

In tactical battles, the idea of ​​increased damage when attacking from the flank came into place, although it would not hurt to bring it to mind: because of it, any skirmish in close combat turns into an erotic leapfrog, in which fighters take turns going around each other from behind to strike. But in conjunction, for example, with the racial skills of the dark elves, this creates interesting combinations.

After the ugly pseudo-3D castles of the original version Heroes VI The drawn cities of the seventh part are still pleasing.

At the top of the skill wheel are always racial skills. Around there is a set of disciplines depending on the hero. You definitely won’t be able to learn everything.

Limbic abandoned the reputation system from the sixth part (still, many ended up choosing not according to conscience, but based on prizes given for adherence to “blood” or “tears”), forced online (serve it right) and dynastic weapons that improved with you (it still didn’t make the game much smarter).

There are again seven resources, not four, so hypothetically you can try to cut off the enemy from some specific element that he needs to grow. Caravans have returned that transport troops from one city to another - not critical, but appropriate and helps get rid of some of the “postal” heroes.

In mechanics, many things fell into place. And although there are still a lot of questions about the balance (if you look hard enough, finding cheat combinations is not at all difficult), these “Heroes” play like “Heroes” - adjusted for the fact that you know how to play them, since there is nothing like there is no training here. Some military leaders lead troops with them, others conduct reconnaissance, others collect resources and bring reinforcements from castles so that nothing prevents the advanced ones from moving forward. Having relearned all the rules and established logistics, you begin to feel how to.

Until another nasty bug covers everything.

Significant weeks are back in place, but they are here more often for beauty and stupid Easter eggs - gameplay effects such as an additional increase in conditional troglodytes are activated quite rarely.

But it doesn't work

One big problem with non-story modes is the enemies. The AI ​​does not know how to handle troops, does not know how to balance its strength, and does not know how to play. Sometimes he misses resources, sometimes he forgets to make a move altogether. He likes to spend a round finishing off two skeletons when he could have halved the vampire squad with one blow. If you trust the computer to fight boring battles and use fast-paced combat, it will make the same mistakes.

Of course, you can always argue that such games are not played against the computer, but even after patches, online multiplayer continues to spoil games with desynchronization errors. All that remains is the hotseat, which, fortunately, is available.

There are no readability problems on the combat screen. There is another problem: up close and in motion the fighters look quite sad.

Technically, start Heroes VII- a complete disaster, and we're not just talking about minor mistakes. Once I completed the tasks assigned in the mission, apparently in the wrong order (although how can the order be “wrong” if you just have a random list of tasks in front of you?), an item necessary for the plot broke, and the mission became impassable. Another time, a similar thing happened on the first map of the campaign for the Academy: the altar, which was supposed to remove a field that was hindering progress, simply did not work.

More than once the game froze in battle after an attack by one of my units: neither I nor the enemy could do anything. It happened that the gold counter went into minus. In the third mission for the necromancers, I took my hero to a shelter, and after loading the save, he simply disappeared from the map. After all this, I postponed the game until the patch.

After downloading patch 1.1, the game stopped loading saves and loading altogether.

One of the few mechanics of the sixth part that was still retained is influence zones. You can’t just take a mine away from the enemy; you first need to take over the fort closest to it.

Limbic brings the game into order with varying degrees of success. With patch 1.3, it crashes a little less often, opponents began to move almost instantly (previously, the AI’s turn lasted minutes even on small maps), multiplayer is still problematic, but some games can already be completed. Not everything works as it should, but you can finally play.

But was it even worth releasing the game in this form?

* * *

The main problem with all the latest “Heroes” is not that they refuse to follow the canons (to hell with the canons, for that matter), but that they spent much less time on them than they should have. Maybe they would have loved the sixth part if it didn’t work through the cracks. Maybe the seventh would not seem like a monster made of cigarette butts and sticks if Limbic had its own clear vision and the ability to properly distribute limited resources.

Why does the game have such a long campaign if it suffers from the same problems until the very end? Why is it completely unsuitable for global strategies Unreal Engine 3, if in the story scenes there are motionless models with open mouths, and the maps look worse than in the sixth part, although they use half the same materials? Judging by the city decorations and promotional images, Limbic has good artists, so why not make small but concentrated and stylish two-dimensional “Heroes” in the spirit of UbiArt games?

It’s difficult to make a continuation of a cult series, because players’ expectations from the developer are too high. If we rely on the opinion of the community, then the new Heroes in general it should be fabulous and realistic; simple and very, very complex; variable and linear; Moreover, the combat system should be hexal, but with cells. After its release, the disparate tastes of the audience united in a single, much more modest request: at least let the game work.

Model session.

“I’m tired of war,” the griffin’s high-ranking son, Duke Ivan, laments to his advisors. This is understandable: numerous skirmishes have weakened the once powerful eastern lands, turning them into scorched ruins. The generous Seamus, in opposition to whom the protracted conflict is taking place, offers a good option: to put him on the throne, and to marry Ivan his daughter. In the opinion of the cunning man, the match should be good - and the child is settled, and the griffin will retain some title, Archduke. However, our Vanya is not like that! Instead, he decides to simply “go home,” leaving Seamus to rule the ruins. But this is not why the highest representatives of the six nations gathered in the Council Hall to dutifully listen to Ivanovo’s complaints. Everyone is ready to tell the Duke an intelligible story - and then, lo and behold, he will change his mind.

The council meeting appears before the player in a strange setting: a virtual operator flies around static three-dimensional figures, which sometimes have a rather comical appearance. Let's chalk up the demonstration of sculptures to the director's idea, because the hackwork in final product there's enough already. Even before Might & Magic Heroes VII will shower the player with a pleasant breeze of bugs, he will be offered a sextet of story campaigns: Alliance of Light, Academy, Necropolis, Defiant Tribes, Forest Union and League of Shadows. Ivan’s fate can be decided immediately after completing any two of the six. “Maybe” - because with a very high probability the player will encounter an impassable system obstacle on his way. It could be a dead quest trigger, progress not being saved, or the game simply dropping dead - there are a lot of options.

Take a look at the world.

If you try to ignore the shortcomings, you can enjoy the revival of classical mechanics. The seven types of resources lost in the sixth part and the search for the Holy Grail have returned to the game. The authors worked on an interesting system of quests that were supposed to overtake the user directly on the adventure map, but were forced to abandon it - nothing more complicated than an order to visit a designated place or kill a certain army is not going to happen. But astrologers Heroes VII, announcing the onset of the next weeks, are now not working in vain - instead of the usual increase in creatures, they often meet beneficial features seven days: cheap buildings in cities, double resource production or the same experience multiplier.

Bugs. With experience, however, a snag emerged in terms of the plot narrative: the hero’s levelcap is limited to level 30, and almost all campaigns have 4 maps. So it turns out that the character reaches the maximum level of the scenario just a few minutes after it starts, and spends the remaining hours of passage defeating enemy armies for his own pleasure, without a hint of promotion. A new map means a new 20 minutes of development and new hours of observing experience flowing into nowhere.

Some elements of the global map came from Heroes fans' sweetest dreams. The system of influence of cities, borrowed from back in , remains in place - no childish pulling of mines by low-level troops. Do you want resources? Be kind enough to plunder the mine, losing all movement points, or conquer the city to which the mine belongs. An even more modern idea is the growth of static troops in captured fortifications and settlements. A low-level rogue hero will no longer seize your lands simply by walking nearby: every week security units appear in them, whose sole purpose is defense. It won’t be possible to take them under the banner of a mobile army, but you can use them to repel an attack on a settlement.

Bugs. The idea of ​​forts also deserves a nod. Having captured a strategic structure on the global map, the hero can call a courier from the capital to it. Did you order fresh troops by express delivery? Get it. A mule promptly running with luggage, coupled with spells of teleportation to the city and summoning troops to the hero, eliminates the age-old problem Heroes– the need to create caravan heroes. There were some fatal errors on the global map. Turn points appear and disappear, characters teleport while running and do not want to interact with plot objects. That wouldn't be bad.

As before, the hero development system is based on three levels of proficiency in a particular skill - student, expert, master. But now the number of talent branches for each developing person is limited to a dozen pieces, but each level of craft studied allows you to unlock the skills that accompany it. Three branches for any standard bearer are considered core and provide access to a super-mega skill: the number of movement points increases by 20%, controlled units deal two hits or with great probability make two moves - the hero’s class character works to its fullest. Each part of the series has its own view on the role of the character in battle, and Might & Magic Heroes VII took the golden mean. The hero is free to strike or cast a spell, albeit once per turn, but at any time.

Lots of bugs. The battlefields themselves look very ascetic. Poor in design details, they offer only a few obstacles on the ground. But from now on, these obstacles make sense: rifle squads have a serious attack penalty against targets hidden behind the ceiling. In turn, units that attack the enemy from behind receive a significant bonus. Add to the numerous damage modifiers a dynamic morale system and the high mortality rate of absolutely all troops, and you get a tactical system never seen before. Nominally. Despite modern instruments turn-based combat, battles Might & Magic Heroes VII get bored pretty quickly. Well, of course, it’s flavored with a good bunch of bugs. Spells that don't trigger in an area are not so bad. The real “why are you completely crazy” is the disappearance of troops before the start of the battle.

This is my village.

The general style of the universe has undergone major changes, adjusted to the notorious realism. Faded filters make the picture gloomy, leaving no trace of its former beauty. Whether this is good or bad is everyone’s personal matter. But it is quite difficult to divide opinions regarding a two-dimensional picture of a populated area. Many people have already fallen in love with the types of settlements with three-dimensional objects, but instead I decided to produce simple drawings. Against the background of static three-dimensional faces in the videos, this decision does not look so strange, but it still entails the worst windows of the city in the entire history of the series.

Bugs. To their credit, the developers decided not to mess around with the housing development. The construction model is based on a level system - the older the city, the better buildings can be erected in it. An increase in level also threatens an increase in the growth of defensive troops. There was also room for variability. Do you want a quarry? Then there will be no specialized resource mine. Do you want to increase the weekly fertility of some creatures? Make do with the low birth rates of others. What you can’t do without is a local set of technical glitches. Buildings are not erected, even if all the conditions for this are created, menu items overlap each other, and contextual hints are glitchy. With windows in Might & Magic Heroes VII In general, some kind of trouble: either the wrong page of the bestiary will open instead of the requested one, or the window of the wrong hero that we would like. In general, it is difficult to find a game element that does not contain an unpleasant surprise in the form of a bug.

Despite the controversial visual style, Might & Magic Heroes VII showed serious hope. Just a year ago, the developers dreamed of non-linear quests, various tasks and conditions for victory in tactical battles... It is clear that no one will blame them for the fact that none of this made it to release: it is difficult to blame the game for what it has she doesn't. But no rod is enough to punish for what exists - bugs. Bugs of all sorts ooze from every pixel, and if you managed to complete the story campaign, you may have played some other Might & Magic Heroes VII. The project contains successful ideas that could deserve attention, if not for one “but”: at the time of release, the game is still very far from being ready in terms of readiness.

Today we will talk about the game “Heroes-7”, a review of which will be given below. Let's start with the fact that the first part of the series appeared almost 20 years ago. In total, more than twenty projects related to this virtual universe have been created.

Manufacturer

Ubisoft has prepared the game “Heroes-7 (beta)” for all fans of the series. We will not do a separate review for the test version, since the full version was released very soon after its release.

Development

We already know who created the Heroes-7 project. The review of the game should begin with a description of its development process. The seventh part of the series was worked on by studio employees from Germany - Limbic Entertainment. Prior to this, the specified team worked on official additions. This time, the developers carefully studied many critical comments from fans and tried to correct the shortcomings. On the official forum of the game before its launch, a special section, where everyone could express their views on the future of the famous series. The company also conducted a number of important surveys, reworking some areas during the creation process. It was thanks to fans of the series that the dark elves became the sixth faction in the plot, although initially this place was supposed to be taken by Inferno. Devils have also returned to the Heroes universe. However, later - in a special add-on for the game “Heroes of Might and Magic-7”. An overview of the plot can be boiled down to the fact that it covers the time period between parts 4 and 5. We’ll talk more about the development of events later.

Plot

Empress Meeve died. The Falcon Empire has weakened greatly, it is literally falling apart. The main building was built around young Ivan story line games "Heroes-7". Let's continue the review brief information about him. It's about about the Duke of the Griffin family. He is not yet sure whether to take part in the struggle for the throne. However, the Shadow Council, with the participation of all allied factions, decides to support Ivan. Thus, he becomes the new head of the Alliance of Light. From this moment on, the struggle begins, during which the Duke will have to become a real strong and wise ruler. The plot is divided into 7 campaigns. Each one tells about the best hero one of the factions. The main character of the seventh story is Ivan himself.

"Heroes 7": gameplay review

Several factions await us. Each has its own skills, abilities and capabilities. Initially there are six of them. The Alliance of Light is represented by people whose leader is Ivan. Powerful sorcerers rule everything at the Academy of Magic. Rebellious tribes appear in the form of fearless orcs. As for the ancient race of undead, it is here called Necropolis. The Forest Union includes elves. The Dark Elves created the League of Shadows. As the story progresses, new factions come into play. Each race will have its own heroes, as well as unique units. Let's say a few words about their composition. The units of each faction include 3 basic characters, 3 elite fighters, and two champions. Various combat vehicles known to us from the third and fifth parts of the game will appear again.

Surprises

When traveling on the map, you can customize the interface based on your own preferences. It is now possible to move menu items to customize the game window as much as possible. Creatures in each city will be added locally. They can be transferred via caravans, but the process will require a certain number resources. In total, we have 12 schools of skills for heroes. Levels are also provided. Three schools allow you to achieve the title of “master”.

The project introduced restrictions regarding construction within one city. You cannot organize a couple of structures in the castle to attract champions. The same applies to some other buildings that provide significant benefits. The game is based on Unreal 3. The player has the opportunity to assign the most popular spells and skills to the cells, thereby ensuring fast access to them.

The number of characters strictly depends on the city where they are hired. The hero's ability and skill wheel has been redesigned. The hero receives points that he can spend on choosing a skill or ability, or gaining access to levels or schools.

The game was announced in August 2014 during the international exhibition of electronic entertainment. The official website was opened immediately after the described event.

The elf faction was added to the game based on the results of a user vote, in which it prevailed over the Northern clans. Another poll was conducted in which the dark elves defeated the demons.

The official release was scheduled for September 2015. The game could be pre-ordered ten days before its official unveiling. In turn, Ubisoft distributed the product key on the appointed day of the presentation. Soon the new product appeared on Steam. Now you know everything about the game “Heroes-7”, a review of which we presented today.