Game News Hell is freezing over: Ubisoft's Might & Magic X is actually a blobber

[Visbhume]

I usually like real-time RPGs, but real-time blobbers just don't feel right to me. In older M&M games, there was a special charm in seeing the world evolve through discrete steps.

Many turn-based RPGs have this discordance in the world, in which you move around in real-time and then switch to turn-based in battles. I have always found this "modal" approach jarring. Step-based blobbers (roguelikes, too) offer a pleasant uniformity in this respect.

 

[dibens]

Turn based combat gets tedious really fast. There is nothing more annoying than game stopping every time you meet a single one-hit-kill rat or waste several rounds just waiting for enemy to move around off-screen. More annoying are the stupid hud animations many developers feel the need to put in, so that more time is wasted before every combat. Either give players a real time/fast way to dispose of lowbies, or don't have trash combat in the first place. In this respect later M&Ms did a fine job- turn based combat is optional, but without it you can only deal with weak enemies that are few in number.

 

[IDtenT]

Turn based combat gets tedious really fast. There is nothing more annoying than game stopping every time you meet a single one-hit-kill rat or waste several rounds just waiting for enemy to move around off-screen. More annoying are the stupid hud animations many developers feel the need to put in, so that more time is wasted before every combat. Either give players a real time/fast way to dispose of lowbies, or don't have trash combat in the first place. In this respect later M&Ms did a fine job- turn based combat is optional, but without it you can only deal with weak enemies that are few in number.

I don't see how any of that is a failure of turn-based mechanics. It's a failure in the animation department.

 

[jewboy]

Well it may be one of those things that you can never really explain to someone who hasn't experienced it. I didn't play those games at the time. Maybe if I had had one of those fancy Apple IIs that I used to drool over instead of my cheap Atari 400 I might have played some of those step movement games and have had the same indescribable feelings about it that you guys seem to have.

but it wasn't until around 1990 that I bought my first real computer, a smokin' 486-33 DX with I think 8 MB of RAM IIRC. So I missed all the 80s RPGs. I was able to play some adventures. In fact some of those had step movement. Wizard and the Princess for instance. It didn't strike me as a form of movement that was anything special though. I don't have any fond memories of instantaneously moving in 10' increments. I totally don't get the appeal.

 

[Luzur]

So does the voice in the trailer means Sheltem is back or was that just to hook old fans

to hook old fans i guess, Sheltem was put into space and nuked in the face by Corak at the end of Darkside.

 

[circ]

What is a blobber anyway? Well I know what it is in general. But why call it blobber? What counts as a blobber? Also name.

 

[norolim]

What is a blobber anyway? Well I know what it is in general. But why call it blobber? What counts as a blobber? Also name.

http://www.rpgcodex.net/forums/index.php?threads/why-do-we-call-it-blob-combat.75648/

Also:
Ubi booth at Pax East:

Spoiler

This quality picture was made by Ubi staff. Let's hope they're less useless at making blobbers.

 

[Angelo85]

+ damage numbers are not in the hundreds or thousands

- new engine can handle a maximum of 2 enemies at once on the screen

 

[Hobz]

- new engine can handle a maximum of 2 enemies at once on the screen

Source please ?

PS : You making retarded deduction is not a legit source.

 

[Angelo85]

The key is in the picture

 

[J_C]

- new engine can handle a maximum of 2 enemies at once on the screen

And you figured this out from 1 screenshot?

 

[Angelo85]

You heard it here first folks!

 

[norolim]

The key is in the picture

We're glad you stumbled across this picture, 'cause if you saw the one below first, you'd probably deduce that the engine can only handle one enemy...and a dead one

Spoiler

 

[Roguey]

+ damage numbers are not in the hundreds or thousands

You know that previous M&M games had large numbers right? You used a screenshot from 6, but that game progressed to enemies with hundreds of hitpoints. Q, a secret boss, had the most with 16,000.

 

[Mortmal]

I missed the whole PC thing back in the day because I had a GLORIOUS Amiga 500 (but missed out on lot of other games).

I did have a friend (and his parents were rich) who had a PC so I got to play some of the PC stuff I couldn't on my Amiga. Like when I saw Ultima 7 for the first time and was like HOLY FUCKING SHIT! I ran to my closest Amiga store...... only to find out they never did a port for it.

I remember in 1987 at some department store they had an Amiga with that famous juggler of metal reflective balls video demo playing on the screen(something unheard of back then)and it blew me away. Then they put on Defender of the Crown! I feel lucky to have lived in an era where such technological advances still could give such a reaction.

Someone's got to say it. Step based movement is fucking annoying and it always has been. At the time it wasn't exactly considered a feature worth boasting about. It was done because they couldn't figure out how to do smooth scrolling flight sim like movement.

But why do you lie when we had smooth 3D movement in games like Total Eclipse and other games based on Freespace engine since 1987 complete with 3D representations of enemies? It's not that they couldn't figure it out, just that they had to cater for the fact that most PC's were still XT based. Few people had 286's, never mind 386's! BAK used smooth scrolling in 1993 cause by then most people had more powerful machines. Soon after we had Ravenloft and Menzo which also used smooth movement.

The point is that it was firstly technology that was the limiting factor and later it became clear that there was a clear difference in gameplay style between free movement(even turn based) and step movement as highlighted by the differences between the first five M&M games and those that came after. Many people naturally preferred the step based system and that's why there is such a clamour to go back to that. The benefits are obvious and well touched upon.

Ah first games that blew me away were "la quête de l'osieau du temps" , defender of the rown was already goood looking the c64, populous and above all populous.As for jew boy i hope hes only trolling, its either that or being completely ignorant, step based tile was a design choice, in mainstream magazines turn based , step based rpgs were coexisting with real time ones and both were getting excellent score , there was a technical limitation but that was possible.

According that might and magic 3 had a 1991 release date we had smooth scrolling rpgs , 1990 drakken on amiga :


Had alot of rpgs elements, and unarguably a smooth scrolling as there was shooter phases, dragon's breath :



Also countless , yes countless 3D games like falcon amiga , 1988 :



First one i remember in 1986 , sentinel on c64:

 

[commie]

Mortmal, one mustn't forget DragonStrike! An actual AD&D Dragon 'flight simulator' from 1990. Man that was some game, but hideously hard, could barely finish the first few missions but maybe that's due to the fact that my XT was just too laggy. By Westwood too I think it was.

 

[Mortmal]

Oh yes dragon strike and now you mention it, SSI published also a bunch of real time rpgs, heroes of the lance(1988)and a follow up dragons of flame , you tube is a wonder to find gameplay video, sadly this one is on the inferior ST:






hilsfar 1989 i think :

 

[commie]

Yeah Hillsfar gave me the shits at the time as the step crawler graphics in town were superior to those in POR and Curse of the Azure Bonds, but the game itself was a collection of mostly crude action minigames, like the horse riding and jumping and the arena fights rather than being a proper RPG. Though to be honest it was fun fighting in the arena. And fucking lockpicking! How ironic that the derided 'minigame' had its roots all those years ago.

 

[Lord Andre]

This will be a 3d game like mm9, so:

- no beautifully drawn entrances to dungeons and buildings
- no beautifully drawn weapons, armor, and no (less) beautifully drawn paper doll to equip
- no flavor text for items
- big red health bar above monsters because right-clicking is teh hard
- floating damage numbers because 2013
- small outdoor areas that are actually a bunch of corridors
- flying will be in...NOT
- it will take place in the wonderful, interesting world of Ashan
- mmo color pallete

and we can't forget:

Old school, new rules !

What the fuck does that even mean ? It's black, but it's actually white ?

Thank you Ubisoft for continuing to corpse fuck one of my favourite franchises.

 

[commie]

Ahh the good old days when you could portray Niggers like the brutal white flesh eating savages that they are. I have a feeling we won't be getting black spear chuckers as foes in M&M X.

 

[DakaSha]

old school
new rules

 

[Jaesun]

Where in the hell is ANY info on this game UBISoft? Seriously. Get a new marketing department or something.

 

[catfood]

Where in the hell is ANY info on this game UBISoft? Seriously. Get a new marketing department or something.

It's a low budget game. They don't care.

 

[Jaesun]

MightMagicGame ‏@MightMagicGame3h
Yesterday many fans came to play #mightandmagicX #heroes6 => 100 M&M'ers rewared with an Ultimate Adventurer card! pic.twitter.com/cvZbfg3bZw

MightMagicGame ‏@MightMagicGame2h
Today is a special day at #PAXEast: US VIP fans join us for a commented hands-on and a talk about #mightandmagicX #heroes6 #mightandmagic

That's pretty much the only info they have tweeted so far. I guess they are waiting for the Press to cover this, and then might(?) have more info next week, I'm guessing.

 

[FeelTheRads]

Guys with retarded hats and retarded glasses. This is who plays Heroes and M&M nowadays.

Btw, there's a third poster with some online M&M thing.