Heroes II was my personal favorite
Same. It was more polished than 3. Love everything about 2.
VCMI: Open-Source Engine for Heroes of Might and Magic III
61–70 of 90 posts
Re: VCMI: Open-Source Engine for Heroes of Might and Magic III
#62Earlier quoted context omitted.
never played 4 or 5, but from reviews at the time it sounded like 4 and 5 were just lower effort games coasting on the reputation of 2 and 3
Actually 4 was supposed to be a better game than 3, but there was a huge backlash against the introduction of a technologically based faction. They scrapped this idea and the game was rushed out. 3d0 went bankrupt right after.
I had never known they were planning a technology faction for HOMM4, that's interesting to hear.
Might and Magic is a fun setting because it's secretly SciFi and you would never know it from the Heroes games as far as I've ever seen.
But a bunch of the Might and Magic RPG games start with sword and sorcery and end with laser guns.
Re: VCMI: Open-Source Engine for Heroes of Might and Magic III
#63[dead]
Re: VCMI: Open-Source Engine for Heroes of Might and Magic III
#64Well it’s open source. But is it free though?
VCMI engine is free and open source software licensed under GPLv2. Original game assets (music, sprites) are proprietary and you have to buy them in order to play. There actually Heroes 3 Mac demo that can be legally used as alternative source of Heroes 3 game data, but it missing some towns.
Thanks for the clarification. Nifty thinking with the demo assets!
Re: VCMI: Open-Source Engine for Heroes of Might and Magic III
#65Test
Re: VCMI: Open-Source Engine for Heroes of Might and Magic III
#66It must feel great to devote yourself to a passion project and it turns out to actually work and people use it. I assume this is a passion project because I can't imagine getting funds for a project like this, specially when it might conflict with upstream licenses. In any case congratulations to the developers.
VCMI dont conflict with licenses because it's not reverse engineering effort, but engine created from scratch and licensed under GPL. Pretty much like OpenMW, OpenRA and other purely open source projects. Of course to play it you need to buy proprietary assets.
Are there plans to create new free assets?
Re: VCMI: Open-Source Engine for Heroes of Might and Magic III
#67Earlier quoted context omitted.
Actually 4 was supposed to be a better game than 3, but there was a huge backlash against the introduction of a technologically based faction. They scrapped this idea and the game was rushed out. 3d0 went bankrupt right after.
I had never known they were planning a technology faction for HOMM4, that's interesting to hear. Might and Magic is a fun setting because it's secretly SciFi and you would never know it from the Heroes games as far as I've ever seen. But a bunch of the Might and Magic RPG games start with sword and sorcery and end with laser guns.
Looks like I had my games confused. The Forge was supposed to be a faction for Armageddon's Blade, but was cancelled.
3do did rush heroes 4 though, and one of the biggest complaints about it is how bland and lifeless it feels compared to 3.
If you haven't already, you should try the Horn of the Abyss mod for Heroes 3. It's great! Adds tons of qol stuff and has a new campaign and faction.
Re: VCMI: Open-Source Engine for Heroes of Might and Magic III
#68Earlier quoted context omitted.
I think you are a little bit biased here. Heroes® of Might & Magic® III - HD Edition from ubisoft has one major issue, it's lacking expansions. But the graphics itself is imo better than in hd mod. https://www.gamersgate.com/media/products/product/14687141/s... https://i.imgur.com/i1DNqNp.png The second one is a pic from hd mod. The first one is hd edition.
The texture complaint is specifically around the character portraits if I recall correctly. The lack of expansions is the real killer imo, so many “basic” things were actually added in expansions.
What basic things are you referring to? I've only ever played the original and didn't even know there were expansions.
Re: VCMI: Open-Source Engine for Heroes of Might and Magic III
#69I still spend inordinate amounts of time playing Heroes 3. It’s been a strong procrastination feeder over the decades, but it also gave me a lot of fun! I mostly play HotA in HD Mod these days, but I had used VCMI on Android (with SoD). It’s been a bit rough – the client-server thing that it does would have connection issues, the mechanics differed in subtle ways, etc. But I’m also super grateful that it exists.
Try Songs of Conquest. It captures the original feel 100% for me, and is a game I really enjoy.
Re: VCMI: Open-Source Engine for Heroes of Might and Magic III
#70Was more excited until I read the "Heroes of" part :D I know that HOMM 3 (and 5) are absolute classics, but I'd really love for a new interpretation of the original Corak/Sheltem Quintology. Might & Magic X's engine was pretty alright actually, if something like that exists as open source, that would be awesome.