Posts from What is your opinion about Heroes IV?

The fourth installment was the second game in the series after the third. However, what I like most about the fourth game is that you can create real quest chains, and you can make many of them. And there are no standard victory conditions; you just write them and then create the victory yourself! Also, maps like "Jester's Revenge," "Dragon's Head," "Eye of the Tiger," and "Midnight Nightmare" are impressive, with their well-designed maps tailored for monsters. The last one is my favorite.

...The AI is indeed as dumb as a cork, but playing against a human player becomes truly interesting.

I would clarify – the AI as a player is as dumb as a cork, but the monster bands at high difficulty levels don't always behave stupidly – sometimes you get the feeling that the monsters also gain experience and try not to repeat the same mistakes.

In my opinion, Heroes of Might and Magic IV is the best in the entire series!!!

A very interesting and unique game. I liked the skill system, the division of magic by race, and the music the most. Building castles, the participation of heroes in battles, and the overall appearance of the map – not so much.

I've been playing the entire series since its inception. I only play on easy difficulty settings (knight - rook). Purely for intellectual, moral, and aesthetic pleasure and satisfaction.
The first and second Heroes games have been played through and through. I consider the second one to be a model, a standard for the series and the genre in general (along with Age of Wonders 2 and, perhaps, Third Warlords).
The third Heroes... well, I agree with many previous commenters that the universal love for the third game contains something of a "noob" element, the delight of first acquaintance. The third game was made on the principle of "MORE than the second" in every nook and cranny: more factions, creatures, upgrades, colorful bushes, and little houses... and WOG turns all of this into some kind of farce. No, I'm not denying it, I played the third game, and I played it a lot, but I NEVER finished a single Campaign to the end (excluding the First one from the Chronicles). The third game is boring, like a Persian carpet - ornate, all decorated, with a curl here and a flourish there, but in essence - it's just a rag (the second game was a rag, and it didn't shy away from it). Yes, there are bright moments, but the main feeling is DEADLY BOREDOM from this salad that they are trying to stuff into your mouth... and into your brain.

The fourth game is a completely different matter... It's an attempt to repeat the second game on a different level (not higher, not lower - just on a different one).
1) Development branches instead of a stupid (essentially mandatory) upgrade - brilliant. Having two castles of the same faction, you get all the creatures. Not having them - you take risks and act strategically. Upgrading skeletons... :smile32: what nonsense...
2) The hero (and partially the creatures) is independent - brilliant. Heroes become full-fledged HEROES, and not just a box for storing units.
3) Reducing the number of factions and organizing them - correct. To hell with all these gorgons, pit lords, and other guest workers. Yes, not everything is smooth in the fourth game with creatures and their alignment, but it's still better than the third game's mishmash.
4) Music - brilliant.
5) Global map - a little chaotic, but ALIVE thanks to the sounds and various small visual details.
6) Battle map - excellent, sieges - excellent.
7) Skill system - excellent. Back to the second game, to the hero-template. Development according to your own preferences instead of the prerequisites of the third game - excellent. "Prestige classes" - excellent.

That's it, in short. In summary - for connoisseurs and fans of the series ONLY. Although newbies are not hopeless. As long as they don't play the fifth, sixth, ... twentieth games.
3DO sang its swan song on a high note... And the fact that the schoolchildren didn't appreciate it and didn't buy it, and ruined it - well, they weren't the only ones who suffered in the early 2000s, when game development finally became a "game industry"... Unfortunately.

Mostly, what was said about the fourth game is correct, but it just gets incredibly BORING when, on Champion difficulty, you clear the map with a well-developed hero – right punch, left punch, pick up what’s left of the enemy, then repeat all of this with the next enemy – and so on, day after day. Compared to the fourth game, the third game is less complex and more well-thought-out, i.e., everything is neatly organized – I think this explains its popularity. Compared to the third game, the second and especially the first are much less popular – probably because they also cause DEADLY BOREDOM. But the lower popularity of the fourth game is really a shame for such a good game.

I like Heroes of Might and Magic IV, and I even played it quite well when it first came out. Then I stopped playing it for a few years, and now I just can't get into it – the battles are too difficult. In general, I don't have enough patience, and I end up turning it off. =)
Hero development, especially subclasses, is the best part.

Mostly, what was said about the fourth game is correct, but it gets incredibly boring when, on Champion difficulty, you clear the map with a leveled-up hero – right hook, left hook, pick up what's left of the enemy, then repeat all of this with the next enemy – and so on, day after day. Compared to the fourth game, the third game is less complex and more well-thought-out, i.e., everything is neatly organized – I think this explains its popularity. Compared to the third game, the second and especially the first are much less popular – apparently, they also cause deadly boredom. But the lower popularity of the fourth game is really a pity for such a good game.

Yes, in the third game, everything is neatly organized, but all the shelves are the same. All the factions, for example, are very similar – not in terms of the pictures, but in terms of the gameplay itself. There are differences, but they are minimal. Everyone has two types of heroes, everyone has flying units, archers, and tanks, etc. The entire gameplay process for any city becomes routine: build everything you can, upgrade everyone, bash-bash... This is where the deadly boredom comes from.
That's why the fourth game reminds me of the second – complexity and beauty that arise not from QUANTITY, but from QUALITY. In chess, there are only 6 types of pieces, but the possibilities are endless (by the way, in the second game, there are also 6 castles with 6 types of creatures, and in the fourth game, there are 6 castles).

It's a shame the poll is closed. Since the topic is pinned at the top, the poll should ideally be permanent.
My choice: a revolution in the series.

In my opinion, it's the best since the first part. I like the fact that the hero is directly involved in the battle and can be killed like any other unit. I don't like that Ubisoft went back to the third installment; now, only the graphics carry the game, although Ubisoft doesn't know how to make games any other way. And there was a real revolution there – they changed everything that players knew before, but Ubisoft ruined it all. It's a pity that the rights went to them; the fans would have done a better job.

Added 5 minutes later
:smile39: :smile05: Jartur, you have no idea how right you are...

The fourth installment is the best after the third.

It seems like all the advantages and good aspects of the fourth installment have already been mentioned here. I'll just add that I like it more than the other parts because it offers a wider range of strategies. And the game itself is more complex than the previous installments. It's a good continuation of the second installment...

The fourth installment is the best after the third.

Do you think so?

I really like the fourth game: its combat is very realistic.

Great game, I started my Heroes series with it and played it for 4 years, then 7 more. And when I got Heroes 5, it was a completely different game.

It wasn't a revolution, but rather a clear evolution, an example of quantity turning into quality, and quality turning into a new quality. It was the development of the original idea about powerful heroes leading entire armies into battle. The game was initially called "Heroes," not "Warlords of the Sword and Magic." In the first part, they implemented it as best they could, and in the second, they refined the ideas from the first. The further refinement in the form of the third part (in my humble opinion) didn't quite succeed, as it felt monotonous. And that's when the qualitative leap occurred in the form of the fourth part. But firstly, they didn't have enough resources (they needed a continuation to refine all of this), and secondly, most players weren't able to make that same step. The immense popularity of the third part, despite its relative simplicity in its core mechanics, also played a cruel trick. (There's no need to talk about serious, complex games with 10-minute turns, because turn-based gameplay is a "flaw in the mechanics," not a "feature.") It became a tombstone for the series for me. Because "focusing on the third part" is a death sentence, confining the series to rigid boundaries. While other TBS games continue to evolve, the "Heroes" series, burdened by this constraint, revolves around a cult that cannot be abandoned (opinion), but also cannot be surpassed (nostalgia).