Warning: incoming wall of text.
DaveO said:
The massive problem with the non-DOS Might & Magic games is that aside from the ending cinematic nobody recognizes that you've done anything different.
Did anyone ever reconize anything in any of the previous M&M games? I doubt it. Honestly though, I never saw any point in continuing to play past the endgame in any game that allows you to do it, except in Morrowind where you got a whole bunch of new quests (and all of them involved killing people too!). Well in WOX too, but that's because you HAD to load the endgame save to continue after Clouds, and then again to continue onto the special WOX sequence after completing both Clouds and Darkside.
For Might & Magic 8, the game can be enjoyable if you don't use the Dragon in your party. Even without the Dragon, you could recruit a level 50 character very quickly and there are other areas of broken design.
2 level 50 chars can be recruited pretty easily. Cauri's is TOO easy to get (just run through Murmurwoods to where you are specifically told she is...), and once you have her getting Blazen becomes a joke. Which is hilarious because you get Blazen's daughter AFTER you already rescued him, and she's like 30 levels weaker. Also it's entirely possible to race through the MQ to the point where ALL level 50 chars become available (namely after you sink the pirate fleet). At this point your own char can easily be as low as 20 (less maybe). Anyway some of the l50 chars completely break the game - Vetrinus is GM in all elemental skills, and getting the GM trainers by itself is supposed to be very tough, but you never need to. As for dragons even the level 5 one is game-breaking, and let's not even talk about the l50 one...
Zomg said:
I'd like to see a Wiz/MM/BT-like that had you moving characters in and out of the party constantly, sending out multiple parties for simultaneous goal, etc.
Wiz3 had this. IIRC you had to alternate between the Good and the Evil party to get things done. Nice idea, a little annoying. But MM2's "no [race]" areas were a complete waste of time. The class quests were an interesting idea, but then all of them except for the Cleric's and Sorcerer's were "go kil lthis guy/gal". Waste of time.
II was messed up on a lot of other levels though so it's not really in the running for best all-around. I think maybe III would be the best of the ones I've played (not 6+) if it had Xeen's inventory improvements, but it doesn't.
2 messed up in too many things. Combat encounters are fucking awful, with a large number of "255 of X". Square Lake Cavern is possibly one of the worst final dungeons to ever grace a CRPG. Entire MQ is padding after padding after padding. Overworld isn't as intersting or diverse any of the DOS games, and is also the only one IIRC to have the very, very stupid wrapping around at edges (completely contradicting one of the very plot elements of the game too...). All in all I easily classify it as the worst of the DOS games, and down there with 9 if you consider the entire series.
dr. one said:
hm, i´d say they were of reasonable size. on the other hand, the ones in MM6 were way, way too large given how little variety of content each of them offered
Gharik's Forge, Temple of Baa (all of them), Tomb of VARN, Castle Darkmoor (
), Castle Kriegspire... I'd say they were pretty memorable in design. I have very vivid memories of MM6 dungeons and almost none of MM7 ones, even though I played 7 more often and more recently. 7's were just too short to establish any kind of atmosphere or feeling of exploration.
you´re missing the third, imo the THEst attraction - building your party. and that´s aspect where MM7 is definitely superior to MM6.
That was never an attraction of M&M, at least not before 6. But yes, I've already said 7 did this way better - in fact I'd say 7 is the best one in the entires series at this, followed closely by 3. It's definitely a big attraction in 7 because it's so carefully balanced. Unfortunately the game being much easier than 6 diminishes from the impact of carefully building a party.
reaven said:
Im playing m&m 6 for the first time, and Im getting raped by hordes of goblins
MM6 is by far the hardest of the 3D ones. You'll have to take it slowly, go back and use the wells in New Sorpigal as much as possible, rest when the wells run out, and generally take your time. Combat gets easier in the mid-game, then gets harder again once you hit spellcasters that can insta-kill you (and unlike MM7 Prot from Magic will NOT make you immune to insta-death).
SkeleTony said:
False all around. I mean I guess you could say "War and Peace" is too short as well and that would be your opinion and that is fine but let's be clear here...
Are you seriously comparing MM7's 5-room dungeons to fucking War and Peace? Seriously?
A better analogy: it's like claiming Modern Warfare 2's SP campaign is too short.
Also "bigger" does not = "better". I can barely slow through many of the 'large' dungeons of earlier M&Ms because they are boring but that is just me I guess. M&M 7 was just about perfect in regards to size vs. quality in dungeon design.
Which earlier MMs? 6's were the largest in the entire series. 3-5? 5's were pretty large, but in most cases the size was perfect. 3-4's were very average (in size; in design, 3 had some great ones). If you thought these were large dungeons I can understand you'd fine 6's impossibly huge, but then I'd advise you to run away at the mere mention of Bard's Tale or Wizardry, or hell even Ultima.
8 also did that stupid 'Race = class' thing and allowed you to play all sorts of inappropriate monsters and shit didn't it?
I thought the race=class thing was a nice idea IN THEORY, as well as being pretty unique, but it didn't turn out so hot when it came to execution and its effect on gameplay.
Care to elaborate?
I will grant you that the "hoops" could have been better designed and less of a chore and also that the world itself could have been bigger, but that last is due solely to the fact that the game was so fantastic it left you wanting more.
The problem isn't just with the world being small, it's also with its design not making any sense as one world. Look at 6, at how each area connects to the next, how each area spills onto the next, at how the whole thing feels continuous and organic. Now compare to 7 (and 8), where each area exists in its own little vacuum and has absolutely nothing to do with any of the other areas. 6 is one coherent world split in a 3x5 grid. 7 is discreet areas that could've easily been connected to each other in any combination without anyone noticing something was off. And to add insult to injury, 3 of the areas cannot be accessed without going through dungeon-crawling hoops and a 4th one is a tutorial area that you can never go back to. Oh and did I mention that 2 of the towns are inaccessible for no clear reason until 2/3rd into the game? This is a fucking M&M game we're talking about! this is the series that CREATED first-person open gameworlds!
But fuck i THINK I am greatly understating things to say there are FAR worse dungeons(in other games) that are far more popular than the tunnels to Nighon.
Of course there are. MM7 dungeons are still good to excellent. The fact that they are not
as good as 6's (or 3's or 5's) is a testament to how great dungeon design can get in the series, NOT an indication that MM7 is a bad game.
Waitaminute...you think this is a GOOD thing? I am the biggest advocate for non-linear freedom in CRPGs there is but being able to get to the final dungeon from the starting position when you cannot possibly accomplish anything but your death is no more non-linear freedom than being forced along a rail from 'A' to 'B' to...
The game HAS been completed by level 1 parties, so you CAN accomplish enough to finish the game (not by running straight for the final dungeon of course... you can't get the proper ending without having the Ritual of the Void). And do I think it's a good thing? As I said above THIS is what DEFINED Might and Magic: the ability to go anywhere and, as long as you could survive, do what you want, whenever you want. You may dislike it, but whether you like it or not this is what the series was built on. Some of the games strayed from this, namely 4 (though it was only linear in parts) and 7, but all the other games stayed true to this freedom. 6 did it particularly well in that it was as open-ended as 1 - and going back to the roots in this particular instance was a big, big thing for us old-time fans, much more so than the little references ("New" Sorpigal, Irongist, Lord Kilburn, etc)
Nah...in 7 you have freedom to go where you want in as much as anyone will want to or could. being able to walk into a megadragon's lair at level one is not freedom.
7 does not give you freedom to go where you want, see detailed explanation above.
Being able to walk in a megadragon's lair at level 1 IS freedom. Have I mentioned people HAVE done level 1 runs of MM6?
You are prevented from going there in all meaningful ways just as if they designed the game preventing you from being able to go there. I mean in 7 you have the freedom to kill your party right after you start if that is what turns you on so I don't see your point here.
Neither of these statements make any sense. Please elaborate/explain.
Nope...7 was better in these areas as well. Just better all around.
I've offered arguments why 6 was better. Care to offer arguments why 7 was?
Agreed. Aside from the bugs within the arcomage game it was worth the price of admission by itself! I wish I could get it working on my current PC
I don't remember any real bugs with Arcomage. As for the stand-alone game, it works on XP, never tried it on Vista/7. And yeah, I almost bought it at the time, but then didn't and ended up downloading it a few years ago. The game was fucking addictive!
