Yes please
6 factions are enough
Well, technically, given the context of the game, we can give him a sword or a bow. After all, there're not too many guns in this game.Originally Posted by Rowek77 Go to original post
(I'm sorry, I just... couldn't resist :P). As a massive magic-fanatic, though, I would very much like to see Academy come along.
Who knows, maybe the next installment will be "Might and Magic Cyperpunk Heroes"...Originally Posted by Lasharus Go to original post
I hope not. I kinda like my classic fantasy, thanks. :POriginally Posted by Poppeye21 Go to original post
Mind you, semi-scifi factions don't have to be an issue at all in these settings, but I'll pass on the entire theme switching.
original factions:
knight, barbarian, necromancer, sorceress, warlock, wizard
this has symmetry. one evil faction for 1 good faction. and each has its opposite.
(good -> evil)
wizard -> warlock
knight -> barbarian
sorceress -> necromancer
and each might faction has an opposing might faction, and each magic faction has an opposing magic faction.
new factions:
japanese fish people, inferno
factions in h6:
knight, barbarian?(orc), warlock?(dark elf), japanese fish people, inferno, necromancer
symmetry?
(good -> evil)
knight -> barbarian/orc?
japanese fish people -> ???
??? -> warlock/dark elf?
??? -> inferno
??? -> necromancer
so now we have 2 good factions and 2 evil factions and 2 ambiguous factions (dark elf + orc)
and there are factions for which there isn't a clear, diametrically opposed faction of the same type (might/magic).
the symmetry is totally thrown off.
I guess I could possibly see this as the intended set up for h6:
knight -> ???
barbarian/orc -> inferno
japanese fish people -> necromancer
??? -> warlock/dark elf
this sort-of fits the story as a 1:1 symmetry; but a better fit (story-wise) for h6 would be this:
knight -> inferno, necromancer, barbarian/orc
barbarian/orc -> inferno, necromancer
japanese fish people -> knight, inferno
necromancer -> inferno, knight
warlock/dark elf -> inferno
^and wtf is this ****???^
it is so convoluted. there's no balance or clearly defined roles at all.
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and from a story-telling standpoint, what is the object/point/moral?
there is no structure. it's just a bunch of contrived grievances and no over-arching goal or structure to it. it's just everyone fighting everyone. just a bunch of events tacked together. no clearly defined roles or plan...
once again, let's do a comparison - this time, of the story elements - from 2 games in the heroes series: h2:h6
h2 has clearly defined roles and motives of each of the characters. a clearly laid-out structure to the story. one side, Roland who is good is betrayed by the underhanded and evil Archibald, and Roland has to try to reclaim the throne. wizard, sorceress and knights are good and serve Roland. warlock, necromancers and barbarians are evil and serve Archibald. this is enforced in many ways - both in the story and in the game mechanics itself (remember the good/evil window border that appropriately accompanied each faction as you played them?). It is simple, tidy and lets you play either side. Whether you want to be good or evil, you can do that - and whichever side you choose, you know exactly what you want/need to do, where you're going and where you stand in the grand scheme of things.
h6 has no clearly defined roles and ambivalent/ambiguous/conflicting roles and goals of each faction. the knights fight themselves and attack other faction unprovoked, but there are a few good ones who also fight for good causes and they have angels on their side? and angels are good, right? but apparently they're bad too as a couple of them are helping the demons? (wtf?????) and the necromancers who raise the dead to servitude for their own purposes and are evil are actually helping fight the demons? (why??? wouldn't they get even more benefit from helping the demons as that would result in more dead to raise as servants??) then you have the orcs who are barbaric and blood thirsty but they fight against the demons so ok... the enemy of my enemy is my friend, right? but then they end up fighting against the japanese fish people and the knights as well... and the japanese fish people are good, right? I mean they're all about enlightenment and peace and culturing life and stuff, right? but then they fight against the knights as well and half the time are just off trying to do their own thing and not even get involved in the fighting if they aren't forced into it. ok.. so they'd rather stay off by themselves and watch everything and everyone else burn while the demons invade?? wtf?? hippy pacifists! then the warlock/dark elves - they're kind of .. ?? good? evil? they were elves but then they split off from them because of some kind of falling out or a character flaw on the part of the dark elves and they serve the "dark dragon" malassa... then they end up fighting against the inferno/demons because they represent chaos and that's bad.. ok, but wait a minute - didn't the faceless from the first campaigns of the game also represent themselves as agents of chaos? and the faceless are part of the dark elves' faction.. wtf??
and finally, the wizards. wait, where are the wizards? they were in h5 so we know they exist in the ubisoft heroes universe... what, are they just sitting back in some corner of the world smoking their pipes and twiddling their thumbs??! wth?
and as far as an overarching story, there really isn't one. it's just one open-ended plot point after another, loosely strung together by a seemingly random series of events. it's more like the collective fictional biographies of these different races than an actual story
it's like there were 5 or 6 different writers for this "story" who each sat in different rooms, never communicated with each other, and each wrote their own little stories and then handed them all to yet another different writer who was given the task of weaving them all together... and never quite succeeded.
the story as a whole, and each faction individually are both so all over the place that most of the time we don't know what to feel about each one. Most of the characters feel bland, could be swapped for one another and seem to respond exactly the same way given the same situations.
If it weren't for the redeeming qualities of the art (or most of it), the music, core gameplay mechanics and option for offline multiplayer, I wouldn't even play this game. As it is now, I find myself suffering through each campaign to unlock the different things so I can use them for hot seat matches against family and friends.
And I should mention that I don't even agree with all of the design decisions for the core gameplay mechanics either. I think making spells into skills that you spend skillpoints on after leveling up - was a mistake. Give us back our mage guilds! And there are more specific things, too - like the fact that it costs movement points to cast a teleport.... wtf. What? Does the hero have to ride his horse around in a circle for a half a day to cast a teleport spell??