Posts from Heroes VII

I finally launched it. The interface is awful. At first, everything opens in a tiny window, but you can fix it... The settings window is a separate oddity (see the screenshot). These green circles are something else. And yes, do you know how to switch the game to FullScreen? Click on the FullScreen checkbox – it turns off. That is, by disabling full-screen mode, we suddenly enable it. And no other way. Solution – 10/10. To be continued...

I gave it a try too. The interface is awful. At first, everything opens in a tiny window, but you can fix it... The settings window is a separate joke (see screenshot). These green circles are something else. And yes, do you know how to switch the game to FullScreen? Click on the FullScreen checkbox – it says "off." So, by turning off full-screen mode, we suddenly turn it on. And there's no other way. Solution – 10/10
To be continued...

Ubi-Nox said that this GUI is not final yet and is still under development... so there is hope that in the release, the GUI will have an intuitive and understandable appearance! :rolleyes:

After restarting the game, the "Off" button was suddenly replaced with an "On" button. When did they update it? Never mind.
In the game creation window, the hero selection is terrible. It's just a list of icons and names. There's no special ability information, or even affinity. But there are some good ideas: you can change the victory conditions in the game being created (maps have default victory conditions; you can make it, for example, "defeat all"). You can also customize the teams (this was sorely lacking in the fifth game, and probably everywhere else). There are also a couple of other settings, like trading with allies. Overall, the multiplayer options are promising.
In the game: well, the interface is still annoying. It's as clunky as it was in that video. An interesting detail: in the description of the Hall of Heroes building, it says that it allows you to hire and (!) resurrect heroes. I wonder how that's implemented.
And yes. I looked at the window for the hero I hired. I took Turis, expecting her to be a specialist in cavalry, like in the third game. But it turns out... she's not a specialist at all. In the sense that I don't see where the heroes' specializations are, or if they even exist. If the heroes don't have specializations, that's extremely disappointing.
---------
Ha-ha, but no, the heroes do have specializations. And the specializations are displayed in the hero hiring window in the tavern. In particular, Turis has an increased growth rate for cavalry and cuirassiers (presumably, an upgrade). Well, at least that's something.

Some information about the skills of the non-playable factions:
https://vk.com/pubhomm?w=wall-53800143_18091

Yes, I must say, they really did a great job with the skills. They look very, very interesting.

Video of the beta gameplay:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9TvUdQ6buEY&feature=youtu.be

I don't quite understand how the siege engines work. I bought them, but only the catapult appeared during the castle siege. And there are no ballistae or sorceresses against neutral factions...

At first, I thought, "When did they manage to create a new installment?" But then I watched the video and realized that "installments like this" could be released every year. I'm speechless. Even my curses can't find the right words because there aren't enough expletives to express the full range of emotions I'm feeling after seeing this.

This disgrace clearly echoes the sixth installment. But at the same time, the castle's appearance has been completely ruined by some Lilliputian graphics. The icons for buildings in the tech tree are depressingly bland and now feel completely secondary. I'm not quite grasping the hero's skill tree yet, but it looks like they're once again putting obstacles in our way and forcing us to level up things we don't need. The way army sizes are displayed in battle is just ridiculous. The problem of efficiently allocating space on the maps hasn't been solved, which means that the playable area on the map will again be small, no matter how gigantic the map is.

Of the positive innovations, I've only noticed one so far: more types of resources. And even then, I don't yet understand the principle by which the mines work. If it's like in the sixth installment, where they're located on controlled territory, then they can just forget about it. If there aren't more civilizations than in the sixth installment, then they can forget about it again (there are only 2 in the beta – I'm already fed up). And I don't seem to have noticed any artifacts.

In general, from what I've seen, I've come to a clear conclusion: Ubisoft needs to be buried in holy fire so that it never releases such garbage again.

Quite unexpectedly, I started to enjoy the gameplay, and it even became a bit addictive. After playing the sixth installment, I had almost forgotten the classic mechanics, which are somewhat present here. But the city screens are simply awful; the comparison with "Happy Farm" is very appropriate. Asking for at least one and a half thousand for this game is outrageous. Considering the amount of reused material and the quality of the new content, the price should be three to four times lower. Therefore,

Ubisoft should be buried in righteous fire.

Added 7 minutes later
And yes. The vocalization in the main menu reminded me of this.

Beta - introductory information:
http://mmh7.ubi.com/en/blog/post/view/beta-readme

More detailed description of the racial skills of the Necropolis and Dungeon factions, according to information from PubHoMM:

Necromancy:
https://vk.com/pubhomm?w=wall-53800143_18120

Malassa's Shroud:
https://vk.com/pubhomm?w=wall-53800143_18133

Well, the seventh installment has its share of problems, but to be fair, it's not all that bad.
1) Resemblance to H6. Well, how should I put it... M&M X was basically a copy of the sixth game. But what about Heroes 7? Is it because of the 3D landscape? Should it be flat? The models, heroes, and units look completely different; the overall atmosphere is different. There are no silly blur effects or other nonsense. They tried to import vampires and liches from the previous game, but the fans revolted and stopped them, so it didn't happen. So, honestly, I don't see any copies.
2) Decent castles... I'll say this: it can't be worse than in the sixth game, IMHO. Here, the global map is quite atmospheric. The town screen... well, it could be better, yes. But that's just a problem with the 2D screen, which doesn't quite harmonize with a full-fledged 3D game by default. Still, you can see that they tried to make the most of it...
3) Well, the icons are dull, yes. As I've said several times, they have problems with the interface...
4) Nothing is hindering us. Yes, there are certain limitations on leveling up, but there's no randomness, and the variability is quite high.
5) I didn't notice. Maybe. Still, it's the interface... It seems like there's a separate department responsible for the interface, and it's the least productive )
6) Compare the maps from the sixth and seventh games and see that there are no such huge empty spaces in the seventh. Here, the distribution of objects on the map is more like the fifth game (although the density is perhaps higher in the third).
7) There are various tricky governor skills that raise morale in territories near the castle. But there are no controlled territories a-la 7, if I'm not mistaken. That is, it's now a tactical bonus, not a strategic one; mines are controlled by whoever captures them.
8) Well, it's more about quality than quantity. In the sixth game, it wasn't about the fact that there were only 5 factions, but about the fact that it was only interesting to play with one or two. Plus, the factions often had overlapping tactics (remember that terrible healing spell? In the end, the tactic for any faction was to learn healing and go punish the neutrals without losses, which killed the gameplay).
9) Well, I partially agree with the statement about Ubisoft. They only depend on a certain part of the development, of course, but they are far from the best publisher for the series. They are careless about their work. Maybe they consider the series a second-rate direction; I don't know. But let's see. It's important that they sometimes manage to find a good developer (for example, Nival. Or the guys who made CoH). And the developer is, in my humble opinion, more important than the publisher...
-----
The pricing policy is correct, of course... But to be fair, everyone is doing this now. Just think about the latest space-themed Civilization, or Pillars of Eternity with its "Long live the nineties!" graphics, priced at $45 (I don't remember how much it is in rubles). It's just the way things are now

But this is simply a problem with the 2D screen, which doesn't quite harmonize with a full-fledged 3D game.

I wouldn't say so. If you initially create all objects in 3D and then convert them to 2D, as was done in the third and fourth games, the result will be good. Here, they simply hired very, very bad artists who created screens from their drawings, diluted with extremely poor effects. Just look at the streams in the Academy. There's no need to even talk about shadows, proportions, and the correctness of lines.

It resembles Heroes of Might and Magic VI. Well, it's hard to say... Might and Magic X was a direct copy of the sixth game. But why is Heroes 7 like that? Is it because of the 3D landscape? What kind of landscape should it be, a flat one? The models, heroes, and units look completely different; the overall atmosphere is different. There are no silly blur effects or other nonsense. They tried to import vampires and liches from the previous game, but the fans revolted and stopped them, so it didn't happen. So, honestly, I don't see any copies.

For Humans: the pikeman, crossbowman, cavalier, angel, sister, and catapult are based on old models; only the textures are completely new.
For Mages: the djinn is made from a water elemental.
For Necromancers: the skeleton, ghost, lamassu, and dragon are similar to the situation with the Humans. The reaper was made from a hero.
Neutrals: elementals and griffins have, of course, changed significantly.
Objects on the adventure map: forges, stables, crystals, portals, passages to dungeons. Maybe something else.
A lot of icons taken from the sixth game.
The structure of the interface in some windows is again a copy of the sixth game, with only minor changes.
There are too many borrowings for a price point of 1600 rubles.

Video of Haven (the Holy Empire) and some screenshots:
https://mmh7.ubi.com/en/blog/post/view/haven-video-some-screenshots

even though Pillars of Eternity has graphics that look like they're from the 90s, it costs $45.

Let's not talk about the graphics; PoE has a very pleasant isometric view. For many, this is a huge plus. By the way, it cost 800 rubles here. And it promised to be of higher quality than the seventh installment; on the same Kickstarter, it was listed as one of the most successful projects. And the developer has a good reputation, unlike Ubisoft, which offered a lazy re-release of the vanilla third game for the same price. However, I think that PoE is also overpriced.

Hmm... Okay, I agree. In general, borrowing elements is a problem. I was really surprised when I heard music in Heroes 7 during a battle that was also used in CoH (and later successfully transferred to Heroes 6, where it plays in almost all battles for the Knights). The music is good, but it's too much.
Ples, I didn't say the graphics were bad. Rather, I was referring to the point you wrote in white font. It's just hard to believe that so much effort was put into it, considering the price of the game. With Divinity: Original Sin, which also uses partially borrowed music and models, it's the same.
Regarding the partial 3D a-la Heroes 3... Well, yes, it could have worked. But then they could have made it fully 3D. It's 2015, so it shouldn't be a problem, I don't believe it.