Heroes of Might & Magic 5

Rating:

When I first heard that Heroes V was coming out, I was a little skeptical. The third installment was so much fun, but the fourth was so disappointing. This is just what I hoped they would have come out with. They got back to the basics of the third installment, and just made it so much better. Not only is it in full 3D, but the scenery of the the towns is AMAZING compared to anything fans have seen before. The creatures and heroes have definitely received a major upgrade. Not only is this a plus, but the battles are also very fun due to the new battle system.


For those of you who complain "It didn't work on my computer, it lags in graphics" deal with it. By a new computer, and stop whining. You are supposed to be leaving a review for the game based on the game, not your computer.

Anyways, the storyline is detailed and about the same length as previous installments. If you don't want to jump into the campaign, you can always jump into the multi-player maps. The only criticism I have for the multi-player maps when playing against AI is the lengthy time it takes between turns.

When it comes to the battles, they are much more exciting visually and strategically. The only problem I found with the battles was during a siege a hero can attack a creature even if there are walls, which doesn't make sense. Also the turns for which creatures can attack jump around often. There is no clear order for which a hero and his/her creatures attack.

I would recommend downloading all the patches from Ubisoft before you play the game, which fixes a lot of minor bugs and things.

Overall this game will keep you interested and entertained for hours and hours at a time. It's very easy to really get into. This game is a must buy. This is the best installment yet, and if there is another one in the works I doubt it will top this one.

Rating:

I have been a big fan of all the Heroes games. I came in at II, LOVED III and thought there were some good improvements with IV....And then came V. I was really hoping for better graphics and it almost looks like a lot of detail was lost in making this a "3D" game. The graphics actually look worse then the previous games. The creatures are less detailed and look more cartoon like. The towns look poor as well. I don't see any improvements in this new version. I only see a big disappointment.

Rating:

As a HUGE fan of Heroes I, II, III and even IV, Heroes V came as a big disapointment to me. For one there is no autosave which was great with the others. The game had great graphics with the factions but I wasn't too thrilled about the creature graphics. I have a big problem about creatures that aren't proportionate. It's ridiculous to have arms and legs that are twice as large as you torso or hands that are bigger than your body. I know this is fantasy but come on. There were also very few maps; hardly enough maps to put out on a game. Overall, I hate the game. If the other Heroes had played like this I would have never have liked them and I've been playing them for 10 years.

Rating:

I'm a long-time fan of HOMM, having thoroughly played all 4 prior versions. It has always been one of my favorite games.

Version 5 stays true to the franchise. As other reviewers noted, it builds off of 3 more than 4, but it definitely adds new elements and higher strategic complication to give it parallels to 4.

The 3D graphics are very cool, but the new system demands can be frustrating. My computer meets the requirements, but the wait time for game saves and loads can be pretty tedious and prolongs and interrupts the time spent playing the game.

I still recommend it, but want others to be forewarned.

Rating:

me:

I started with heroes 2, played a lot heroes 3 + shadow of death, played a lot heroes 4 despite the memory leaks and crashes.



What's good:

New 3D graphics engine, camera controls allowing zoom in, angle change, really COOL town screens (esp. Haven), great combat screens, in general the graphics is great.

Great sound/music.

Interesting new skill/secondary skill system.



What's ok:

gameplay is mostly like heroes 3. story is ok.



What's bad:

demanding on hardware, otherwise graphics gets laggy, most notably on the last Sylvan campaign map. Game crashes after play for several hours, happened to me several times (my installation is fully patched)

lack of replay value, campaign map 5x6 = 30 maps, plus 6 custom maps. No random map generator

Lack of caravans mean you spend a lot of time micromanaging your secondary heroes to funnel troops to the front line and hitting resource-giving-out places.