A Worthy Successor – Might And Magic Heroes VII Review

<p>Four years after a rather disappointing attempt at a reboot to the <em>Heroes Of Might And Magic <&sol;em>&lpar;Now&comma; annoyingly&comma; known as <em>Might And Magic&colon; Heroes<&sol;em>&rpar; series&comma; Ubisoft and Limbic Entertainment have come back with the seventh addition to the cult turn-based strategy&bsol;RPG franchise&period; As previously stated in my<a href&equals;"https&colon;&sol;&sol;bagogames&period;com&sol;the-magic-is-reborn-might-and-magic-heroes-vii-beta-preview&sol;"> preview<&sol;a> of the game&&num;8217&semi;s beta&comma; I honestly think that <em>Might And Magic&colon; Heroes VII<&sol;em> is a worthy successor to the likes of <em>Heroes V<&sol;em> and possibly even the original trilogy &lpar;though&comma; those games are sacred&rpar;&period; Where the sixth title was boring&comma; uninspired&comma; and loaded with bugs&comma; <em>Heroes VII<&sol;em> is full of life&comma; content&comma; and brings back the imaginative feeling and identity of the older games&comma; which I feel was partially lost with the previous two titles&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>The campaign&lpar;s&rpar; in <em>Heroes VII<&sol;em> are what I was most looking forward to&comma; since they weren&&num;8217&semi;t available in the beta&period; The campaigns themselves are decently entertaining&comma; but I was a bit disappointed with the plot setup and initial campaign menu &lpar;as odd as that sounds&rpar;&comma; as they&&num;8217&semi;re both incredibly vague&period; There&&num;8217&semi;s very little explanation for what&&num;8217&semi;s going on in the game&&num;8217&semi;s opening cutscene or the campaign&&num;8217&semi;s opening cutscene&period; From what I can gather&comma; the Empress of Ashan &lpar;the world in which our game takes place&rpar; has been assassinated&comma; and a war for succession is under way&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<figure style&equals;"width&colon; 1339px" class&equals;"wp-caption aligncenter"><img src&equals;"https&colon;&sol;&sol;i&period;gyazo&period;com&sol;2f3220950b0eee986c9bde04ac403310&period;jpg" alt&equals;"" width&equals;"1339" height&equals;"752" &sol;><figcaption class&equals;"wp-caption-text">The campaign map is a nice touch&comma; though I&&num;8217&semi;m confused as to its purpose &lpar;Might And Magic Heroes VII&comma; Ubisoft&rpar;<&sol;figcaption><&sol;figure>&NewLine;<p>Our main character&comma; Duke Ivan&comma; has called a council to decide if he should take the crown for himself&comma; or allow his enemies to declare themselves rulers in order to resolve the conflict peacefully&period; Each council member &lpar;representing each of the six factions in the game&rpar; offers to tell Ivan a story in an attempt to broaden his horizons and ensure he makes the proper choice&period; Each of these six &&num;8220&semi;stories&&num;8221&semi; serves as a campaign&comma; with Ivan&&num;8217&semi;s own story being the final campaign&period; The game is comprised of twenty-seven missions across every campaign&period; Most campaigns consist of four missions with Ivan and Anastasya&&num;8217&semi;s campaigns being the only exception&comma; consisting of two and five missions respectively&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>When I say that the campaign menu is vague and confusing&comma; you may be scratching your head as to how a <em>menu<&sol;em> could be confusing&period; The issue lies in the fact that you have two ways of choosing your campaigns&period; You can click on each council member&comma; or click on the map lying on the council table and choose your campaign from there&period; This completely confused me initially&comma; as I thought there was a difference between the map and clicking each character individually&comma; but as far as I can tell&comma; there isn&&num;8217&semi;t&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>This isn&&num;8217&semi;t helped by the fact that you&&num;8217&semi;re given different titles for each campaign depending on which method you choose&period; I believe clicking on a character gives you the campaign name&comma; and selecting a mission on the map gives you the actual mission&&num;8217&semi;s name&comma; but I didn&&num;8217&semi;t know this&period; I spent around 15 minutes trying to figure this out before I finally knew that both options gave me the same conclusion&period; I don&&num;8217&semi;t really understand the thought process behind this&semi; what benefit do you get by looking at the map over just clicking on a character and diving straight into their campaign&quest; Is it just for looks&quest; If so&comma; why not just have one over the other&quest; I feel as though I&&num;8217&semi;m missing something with this system&comma; but heck if I can figure out what it is&period; It seems like a very minor criticism&comma; but it proved to be a very irritating way to start things off&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<figure style&equals;"width&colon; 1336px" class&equals;"wp-caption aligncenter"><img src&equals;"https&colon;&sol;&sol;i&period;gyazo&period;com&sol;bf9b305f78d3a507575d5f245df3941a&period;jpg" alt&equals;"" width&equals;"1336" height&equals;"751" &sol;><figcaption class&equals;"wp-caption-text">The overworlds are wonderfully detailed &lpar;Might And Magic Heroes VII&comma; Ubisoft&rpar;<&sol;figcaption><&sol;figure>&NewLine;<p>The gameplay in <em>Heroes 7 <&sol;em>consists of conquering towns and mines&comma; recruiting armies and heroes to lead those armies&comma; and defeating your enemies in grid based combat sequences&period; The <em>Heroes<&sol;em> games have always been some of my favorite turn based strategy titles for their easy-to-learn but hard to master gameplay&comma; and <em>Heroes 7<&sol;em> is no stranger to that&period; Gameplay is easy to comprehend quickly&comma; even without a bunch of tutorials holding your hand the entire time&period;  My biggest issue with the overall gameplay in <em>Heroes 7 <&sol;em>is that it seems a bit too easy on the normal difficulty&period; It&&num;8217&semi;s easy to quickly build a massive army that can absolutely crush any opponent&semi; This qualm is minor&comma; however&comma; as it can be fixed with a change of the difficulty setting&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>As I stated in the <em>Heroes 7 <&sol;em>Beta preview&comma; the visuals in the game are stunning&period; The overworlds&comma; combat maps&comma; and units are all very nicely detailed and colorful &&num;8212&semi; But the crown jewel in my eyes has to be the city screens&period; Theses screens are 100&percnt; gorgeous and give me a nostalgic <em>Heroes 2 &amp&semi; 3 <&sol;em>feel&period; The detailed artwork is simply magnificent to behold&comma; especially when you&&num;8217&semi;ve fully upgraded your city&period; While it&&num;8217&semi;s not as large scale as the massive 3D city screens in <em>Heroes 5<&sol;em>&comma; which I would&&num;8217&semi;ve liked to have seen return&comma; the cities in <em>Heroes 7<&sol;em> have their own wondrous charm to them that I just love&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>Another great part about the cities is simply how many buildings you can have per city type&period; While <em>Heroes 5 &amp&semi; 6 <&sol;em>had few buildings per city type&comma; <em>Heroes 7<&sol;em> has around 30 different buildings for each kind of city&period; You&&num;8217&semi;re also given choices between certain buildings&semi; You can build a structure that increases your marksman production or a structure that increases wolf production&comma; but you cannot have both in one city&period; This allows for strategy and an incentive to capture more cities to fully reap the rewards of different structures&period; This is&comma; apparently&comma; a feature that was present in <i>Heroes 4&comma;<&sol;i> but I wasn&&num;8217&semi;t aware of this until recently&period; Regardless of its origins&comma; it&&num;8217&semi;s a great concept that I hope to see more of in future titles&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<figure style&equals;"width&colon; 5000px" class&equals;"wp-caption aligncenter"><img src&equals;"http&colon;&sol;&sol;media1&period;gameinformer&period;com&sol;imagefeed&sol;screenshots&sol;MightMagicHeroesVII&sol;Haven&lowbar;Tonwscreen&lowbar;1432225500&period;png" alt&equals;"" width&equals;"5000" height&equals;"2813" &sol;><figcaption class&equals;"wp-caption-text">City screens look magnificent and have a strong Heroes 2&sol;3 vibe &lpar;Might And Magic Heroes VII&comma; Ubisoft&rpar;<&sol;figcaption><&sol;figure>&NewLine;<p>I quickly encountered bugs and issues during the beta period of <em>Heroes 7&comma; <&sol;em>and I&&num;8217&semi;m glad to report that most if not all are gone&period; The game will no longer force you to deploy only one unit to battle on semi-rare occasions&comma; ranged units don&&num;8217&semi;t play the wrong animations when dying&comma; the game isn&&num;8217&semi;t constantly zooming in at weird angles during combat&comma; and &lpar;most importantly&rpar; the game&&num;8217&semi;s performance doesn&&num;8217&semi;t grind to a screeching halt when waiting for enemies to take their turns&period; This was something I was terrified of seeing in the full release of <em>Heroes 7 <&sol;em>because it seriously detracted from the experience&period; Playing a scenario with 8 players had me waiting anywhere from 5 to 8 minutes for just one turn cycle&period; Thankfully&comma; AI players take their turns almost instantaneously now&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>Combat is still the biggest draw of <em>Heroes<&sol;em>&comma; and <em>Heroes 7<&sol;em> does combat fairly well&period; As I said before&comma; I feel that on lower difficulties the game is a bit too easy&comma; but that&&num;8217&semi;s not to say combat can&&num;8217&semi;t be challenging at all&period; The variety of units and abilities at your disposal makes combat a truly entertaining experience&period; Heroes don&&num;8217&semi;t just learn skills randomly anymore &&num;8212&semi; instead&comma; you&&num;8217&semi;re given an entire skill tree &lpar;well&comma; in this case it&&num;8217&semi;s a skill wheel&rpar; with a plethora of skills to teach your heroes&period; This allows for you to specifically shape a hero to certain tasks&period; Want a hero to serve as a scout who explores the map and captures mines&bsol;resources&quest; Develop their Exploration skill&period; Want a hero that can inspire his or her troops to fight harder&quest; Develop Leadership skills that will give your troops huge defense and moral boosts&period; The possibilities are endless&period; The one big disappointment with combat is the animations&period; I said in the beta article that the attack animations in <em>Heroes 7<&sol;em> felt very rigid and incomplete&comma; and sadly there has been no change with the full release&period; It&&num;8217&semi;s nothing experience-killing&comma; but battles would be so much more interesting if the unit animations had a bit more oomph to them&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<figure style&equals;"width&colon; 1920px" class&equals;"wp-caption aligncenter"><img src&equals;"http&colon;&sol;&sol;cdn&period;akamai&period;steamstatic&period;com&sol;steam&sol;apps&sol;321960&sol;ss&lowbar;37b642d1a4bbcafb545ff1684b797aa5f531e0ea&period;jpg&quest;t&equals;1443552498" alt&equals;"" width&equals;"1920" height&equals;"1080" &sol;><figcaption class&equals;"wp-caption-text">Combat is actually fun again &lpar;Might And Magic Heroes VII&comma; Ubisoft&rpar;<&sol;figcaption><&sol;figure>&NewLine;<p>In conclusion&comma; I&&num;8217&semi;d say <i>Might And Magic Heroes VII<&sol;i> is a worthy entry into the series&period; I&&num;8217&semi;d even go as far to say that it&&num;8217&semi;s better than <i>Heroes 5<&sol;i>&comma; which is a fantastic game in its own right&comma; but felt shallow&period; Coming from the lackluster <em>Heroes 6&comma; Heroes 7<&sol;em> refreshes my hope in the franchise&comma; and I hope that the games will be released more regularly and with quality similar or better than that of <em>Heroes 7<&sol;em>&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<hr &sol;>&NewLine;<p style&equals;"text-align&colon; center&semi;"><strong><em>A PC code for Might And Magic Heroes VII was provided by Ubisoft for the purpose of this review<&sol;em><&sol;strong><&sol;p>&NewLine;

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