Marzhin and Penin Twitching in May

[King Imp]

I'm hoping someone saw it before it was taken down. Not this Twitch video, but there was another Haven video posted that has since been blocked by Ubisoft.



Anyway, in it they showed a combat between the user's Haven army and a group of Apprentices. In the Haven army they had the healing Sister and a Catapult on screen. I tried asking about this elsewhere, but unless you are posting a Master's thesis on the game's lore you get ignored, but I digress.



This battle did not take place with any castles involved, so I don't know why the Catapult was even on screen. When it came time for it's turn, it would just skip it, but still it shouldn't have even been there to begin with.



Anyone else see this?

[Galaad]

But also I know that Heroes series had some tournaments over a decade, there are guys being champions, guys knowing the games (H2-H3-H4-H5) so it would be natural for Ubi to hire them as consultants, for testing and game play advices.

This exactly.

Anyone else see this?

No but I've noticed the "rush now, think later" motto doesn't apply to Stronghold only.

[mr.hackcrag]

No but I've noticed the "rush now, think later" motto doesn't apply to Stronghold only.

EDIT

The title of that article "HoMM7 is a slave to its conservative-fans" actually should have been "slave to ubisoft & co" because I don't think this franchise will ever be a top tier gaming experience as long as they have their tentacles wrapped around it. I'm worried by the time that ever happens (if at all) I'll be so old and wrinkly it won't matter. And I'm already old, so now I'm just waiting for wrinkles.

[hellegennes]

@Salamandre:



Well, I like beethoven. He is not on my list of favourite composers of his time, but I like him. However I hate the 9th symphony for the reasons I explained. I don't care that it's considered a masterpiece and symbolize everything beethoven is, it's just not a work of art (in my opinion) which has any soul.



However your point is more valid about H3, because it so happened that it was the most complete experience in the franchise, given that H4 was underdone and that H2 had less material. It is nonetheless circumstancial that this happened. H3 is not the reference point of the series because it had everything we associate with the franchise, it simply is the reference point because it had: the best sales, the largest audience and the most material without being unfinished and plagued by bugs and bad AI.



Then your point about anyone not liking H3 very much doesn't hold much water, because H3 is considered the reference point by happenstance. One could very well take as a reference point H2, which had a much less balanced faction system, and by far the best soundtrack. Or one might think of H4 as the most unique experience, since it dared change so much while still retaining all the good elements and being complex enough that it was super enjoyable. Never before the fan-made maps were so brilliant and that's partly because of the exquisite map editor.



Why would somebody necessarily love the one sequel that simply rehashed its predecessor, while at the same time failed to be as bug-free and moved several steps back in terms of music?

[Salamandre]

That's ok bro, Beethoven 9th symphony isn't accessible to everyone, this is refinement, profound musical education, and so on.



And about h3 vs h4, I won't continue useless arguing. H3 evolved and changed over years, h4 is still where it was, not even Equilibris complete. Today h3 has mapmaking and scripting possibilities h4 never had and never will have, and this is what matters to me. I love both games but h3 is more flexible now.

[markkur]

I didn't get the warm-fuzzies after reading this thread, I got the "cold-matteds"

[hellegennes]

Profound musical education and refinement cannot equal dull, unimaginative music. But anyway...



H3 added almost nothing new. It was a rehash of H2. The other stuff you mention have absolutely nothing to do with the game itself. It's a community thing.

[Salamandre]

I think that H3 added exactly what was needed to H2 to become multiplayer interesting. Then the editor had much more options too.

The "wait" button in battle is very important addition, then the speed advantage H2 had, where with a phoenix you could clear the map, was countered by several features: speed artifacts and shackles. There is more of everything, exactly what people wanted so the transition from H2 to H3 was almost instant.

I recall playing in Isle tournament for H2 for 1 year then H3 came out, the week after we were all signed at ToH where Vesuvius started what became the biggest ever Heroes tournament (already 14 years old and still alive).

When H4 came out, I was in ToH and playing almost everyday, and I can guarantee you almost nobody, after trying the game, moved on. So was H4 for new players? Maybe. Anyway, the H3 fans didn't like it and that's all. There is not much to add.

About community thing, well, I disagree. H4 also has a community but things didn't go similar. You need a solid and flexible basis to start digging into a game mechanics, then create language. I recall Slava Salnikov started to compile H4 hex editing, he even tried to create a random map generator, but gave up after not much time spent. Don't know the reasons, maybe he thought the game won't have enough fans so not worth the work, maybe this, maybe that, the result is Slava, which wrote the wog code for H3 so he was some genius, didn't achieve the same for H4,, despite a promising starting.

As for Beethoven 9th being dull, unimaginative, as you say, I was only taking the humorous approach, because I can't take you seriously on that. People think that on Internet they can write any enormity then it is "their opinion" so it can stay untouched. When you write dumb things, someone might answer you like you deserve.

However, as the deep meaning of this masterwork was to unite all men as brothers, let it once again remove our divergences, so I let you meditate while Karajan and Berliner Philarmoniker gently reveal the secret