Heroes VII vs. Heroes III

[ivra]

I have read a lot of negative criticism about Heroes VII, but often fairly vague. Like the game is bad or worse than its predecessors. What is it specifically that makes this game so bad? I am enjoying it a lot and think it is a huge improvement compared to Heroes III HD (the only version I can play on Window 10). For this discussion, let's forget the bad release of the game and the remaining bugs, and focus on game-play mechanics.

I'll start with what I feel are improvements over Heroes III, and then continue with what I feel are setbacks compared to Heroes III:

Improvement-1) Tooltips in battles. Heroes III does not have any tooltip or help when you are about to attack another unit. Heroes VII does. This prevents a lot of save-before-battle-and-see-how-it-goes-oops-reload-and-try-again moments which are necessary in Heroes III.

Improvement-2) The area of control introduced in Heroes VI is in my opinion a huge improvement. It prevent resource sites to change sides individually, thus you can focus on defending your towns and not all the individual resource sites.

Improvement-3) In Heroes III what skill you get to pick from is random. I like to be able to plan out the advancements of my heroes and thus like the predictable skill wheel much better. Heroes VII has an option to make skill picks random (haven't tried it yet) so it seems to me that it covers both preferences and that is a good thing.

Improvement-4) The new battle mechanic with flanking is nice. It makes moving around a little bit more interesting since you will like to try to flank your enemy while not being flanked yourself.

Setback-1) The number of spells per school in Heroes VII is too low. There is almost no need to build magic guilds in more than two or max three towns. This might be improved in future DLCs or expansions of the game.

I'll stop here and let you guys continue.

[FoxMan]

I don't know what people have with window 10 and not working games, I guess some of them just want to announce that they've downloaded the new version becouse all of my games - even those old ones work.

Ad1 - The action tooltip was first introduced in Heroes IV or even Heroes 3 hd mod and was present through every M&M game later on, so... not a huge thing for all of this... Limbic

Ad2 - I don't get this point BLACKHOLE did it NOT-LIMBIC as even you said it yourself, go play Heroes VI - much better!

Ad3 - Randomness for Heroes VII sucks, I tryed it and It's nothing like it should be - it feels like this thing just doesn't belong there and was slapdashed just as many other strange things in this game - yet again Heroes VI was supreme pioner in skill system mechanic

Ad4 - it was "inspirated" by M&M online so there should be no credits Heroes VII devs

setback; It won't be - trust me

There's literally nothing new in this game, get over it - we allowed to fool ourselves yet again...

And one more thing - I know that Heroes VII is just blank compared to Heroes VI, but this kind of comparison would be much more reasonable than comparing a game from 2015 [theoretical at least] and Heroes III from 1999 - obviously 16 years of difference will make a difference, but Limbic drained 99,9% of this progress from prievious games wasting some [a lot] of the progress itself.

[[^.^] Wo0olfgaNg™]

Originally posted by FoxMan:

And one more thing - I know that Heroes VII is just blank compared to Heroes VI, but this kind of comparison would be much more reasonable than comparing a game from 2015 [theoretical at least] and Heroes III from 1999 - obviously 16 years of difference will make a difference, but Limbic drained 99,9% of this progress from prievious games wasting some [a lot] of the progress itself.

Touche

[Steven SeBoomBoom]

Ad1: I played homm3 alot and it seriously very rarely occurs that I have to reload since I misjudged.Im not counting if the AI/oponent hero shows up with a Hero that is far better than mine, talking about neutral creeps etc.
Ad2: could go either way about this, yes its more comfortable but also makes the game easier in my opinion.
Ad3:This is the one thing Im genuinely not sure about, because no matter if homm3 or homm7 there are just skills(and heros) that are simply better than others. so where in Random you have to hope to get the skills you want OR work with it if you get ♥♥♥♥♥♥ ones, if you can simply pick and choose you will have 2-3 builds that are far superior to other builds and you will always stick with those in my opinion.Only exceptions is maybe if you need some navigation or something like that.
Ad4: yes okay, adds a new mechanic and is okay I think
I would add alot more setbacks tho: the game itself is alot slower, like turns take more time generally, the only aid there is the autocombat once you leveled high enough and can fight through it without losing anything or just 1 unit maybe because you wouldnt lose anything if you battle yourself.The AI is generally pretty stupid, its not very good in Homm3 either, but for sure better(or cheats more) in homm3, unless they fixed this in the last patch which I dont really believe tbh.

In general I think its not a bad game, but its alot easier and not as deep imo.

[ivra]

So to summarize so far:

Improvement-1) Tooltips is still an improvement from Heroes III HD, but it was introduced already in Heroes IV. With practice you will eventually become an expert and know how much damage units deal and receive so much so that you do not need the tooltip. Still I consider it a great addition to the game.

Improvement-2) The area of control is also generally speaking an improvement over Heroes III HD, and it was introduced in Heroes VI, although not everyone will consider this to be an improvement.

Improvement-3) The skill system of Heroes VII is arguably better than that of Heroes III HD. Some skills are far better than others and by being able to pick skills you often end up with a few hero builds that are used over and over. On the other hand Heroes III HD also suffered from some skills being better than others. To get the optimal build in Heroes III HD you need luck or a lot of save and reload. I still think it is a better solution to remove the luck/Save-reload aspect of leveling up. Heroes VI also had all skill visible from start and you could create your hero as you wanted. I agree that it is a good system but it suffered from mixing spells and might abilities. There were some very potent builds that mixed the two. I like both systems and have no preferences for one over the other.

Improvement-4) Flanking is considered as an improvement, even if the idea is not new.

Setback-1) The statement that the game has too few spells seems to be agreed upon.


New improvements and setbacks:

Improvement-5) Auto-combat is a nice feature that allows you to skip a battle and let the computer do it for you. Unfortunately, it often results in unacceptable losses which reduces its usefulness.

Setback-2) The game is slower, both between turns and in combat. It takes a while for the AI to figure out what to do when it is about to move one of its units in a battle.

Setback-3) The AI is still not performing so well. Both on the map and in combat it makes questionable choices. Not sure if it is a setback, though, compared to Heroes III HD as a lot of the games in the series had "weak" AIs, or at least predictable AI behavior that could be exploited.


And to answer why I compared it to Heroes III HD and not VI: It's because of lots of the complaints I have read about Heroes VII says that it is worse than Heroes III and even Heroes II. Don't get me wrong, Heroes II was a great game, so was III, but I think the world has moved forward since then and a lot of improvements have been introduced to these games since then.

[Galehot]

Please note, Heroes III HD is NOT Heroes III.

[ivra]

It's not? I thought it was exactly the same, except that it contained none of the expansions. What is the difference?

[bloodraven43]

Originally posted by Choikom:

Please note, Heroes III HD is NOT Heroes III.

lmfao...heroes of might and magic 3 hd is the 1st homm3 that came out way back then with better drawn assets/sprites. what are you talking about??? plus h3hd has better visuals then any moded homm3 original out there...some folks talk out there a-- for sure....so if the game isnt the homm3 complete edition, its no good huh??? hilarious for sure.

so much hate over a child`s toy, its hilarious...get over it...heroes 7 is a fun game.

[Valery]

I think you don't know about HoTa expansion, or Succession wars mod, or simply about what made Heroes 3 graphics so special and appealing. HD mod (the UBI one because there IS a genial HD mod made by fans) is just over filtering graphics so now they look like cut with a saw. And of course, Heroes 3 ROE, as it came out as HD, is totally outdated today. Not only AB and SoD added so many new and needed things, but also they are the base modding platform on which WoG offers today over 150 clean mods.

[bloodraven43]

Originally posted by Salamandre:

I think you don't know about HoTa expansion, or Succession wars mod, or simply about what made Heroes 3 graphics so special and appealing. HD mod (the UBI one because there IS a genial HD mod made by fans) is just over filtering graphics so now they look like cut with a saw. And of course, Heroes 3 ROE, as it came out as HD, is totally outdated today. Not only AB and SoD added so many new and needed things, but also they are the base modding platform on which WoG offers today over 150 clean mods.

yeah i understand that and have played them all but homm3 is 20 yrs old. homm7 is brand new...homm3 roe was released just like the h3hd one was released...i dont get some folks...maybe in a couple of years there will be more...give me a break...did anyone even see the new announcement or are you too busy hating to read it...lol

[Galehot]

Originally posted by bloodraven43:

heroes 7 is a fun game.

I wish it was.

[Antalyan]

I wonder how can some people like 2D H3 more than 3D H7...

And there is also the fact that H7 offers the best singleplayer campaign in heroes series.

[Valery]

@bloodraven43,

Old? So what, Mozart music is 400 years old and I still listen it. The "old" argument is a nonsense, that game is quality, thats all, + is now backed by hundred of mods changing experience with each game. And yes I tried H7, it took 80 seconds the game to start, 60 seconds to reload every save from large maps. This is indecent lack of optimization, I don't even want to start talk about a game where, instead of playing, you stare most of time at loading screen.

@Antalyan ,

Another nonsensical argument, 2D vs 3D. Is like saying people should now read only online books, because paper is obsolete. And campaigns were never what we focus in Heroes. Heroes is a game for online competition. It always was. This is what ensure his survivability, once you finished the campaign. If campaigns are nice, this is a plus, but not the ultimate argument.

[RamboRusina]

@Antalyan I'd heavily disagree on h7 having best campaigns. I think h4 had by far the best written and presented stories despite all the controversy it created from mechanics.

As for 2d vs 3d, it's really matter of preference. Heroes isn't at least to me about having the flashiest explosions and prettiest faces, it's about having depth in the strategy side(though I realize h6 and h7 failed that). As long as I can clearly tell what I'm looking at and it doesn't look ridiculous it's well made in my eyes. H7 had the worst 3d graphics so far in the series, both h5 and h6 looked much better.

[bloodraven43]

Originally posted by Salamandre:

@bloodraven43,

Old? So what, Mozart music is 400 years old and I still listen it. The "old" argument is a nonsense, that game is quality, thats all, + is now backed by hundred of mods changing experience with each game. And yes I tried H7, it took 80 seconds the game to start, 60 seconds to reload every save from large maps. This is indecent lack of optimization, I don't even want to start talk about a game where, instead of playing, you stare most of time at loading screen.

@Antalyan ,

Another nonsensical argument, 2D vs 3D. Is like saying people should now read only online books, because paper is obsolete. And campaigns were never what we focus in Heroes. Heroes is a game for online competition. It always was. This is what ensure his survivability, once you finished the campaign. If campaigns are nice, this is a plus, but not the ultimate argument.

maybe its an indication your pc needs to be upgraded too...and mozart entered thee discussion...lmfao

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wo4pdhKL4b4

you cant expect a game will have as many features as a 20 yr old game that has been modded the crap out of for 20 yrs and has expansions to add more features...come on man, lets be real....the problem is folks complain and hate, in turn- try to kill the series, instead of make it better....childish for sure....but then again what is a video game??? ,,,lol

[Valery]

Don't know why "hate and try kill the series" come into discussion. There was nothing of that kind in my post. And buying a new computer each time a Heroes game is out, you must be kidding.

Then each map is >60 Mo btw, while in H5/6 the biggest map was 1 Mo. 60 times bigger, this is what you call game optimized? Which website will agree to host 60-200 Mo maps? Are you aware of what keeps an Heroes game alive? Seems not.