If you are asked to recall some national line of the Russian gaming soul, call the love of “heroes” with confidence. Of course not, Hom&M appreciated all over the world, but it was with us that she gained a special, reverent and even respectful attitude. No wonder the development of the fifth part, which turned out to be one of the best in the series, was entrusted to the domestic company Nival, Caught with his task “excellent”. Well, who, if not us, know the charm of the “tube” atmosphere of home gatherings with friends and unhurried strategic calculations … But the times and customs are changing, and now Hom&M again looms on the horizon – with the mysterious post “Online”.
Canned food with heroes
If we approach the assessment of a series of “heroes” from the perspective of objective, not nostalgic, it turns out that it can be reproached for stagnation and lack of progress. Moreover, among fans it is customary to praise the correspondence of the new games to the Canon: the more freshly baked creations will be similar to the third part, in which the evolution of the series has reached its peak, the better.
In such a situation, any innovations are fraught with fan lynching, and small “upgrades” are immediately regarded as distorting the perfect balance of third “heroes”. Therefore, what developers from the series are going to do with a series Ubisoft Blue Byte, In the eyes of the fans is comparable to the “feat” Herostratus. Most admirers of a cult step -by -step strategy will probably be ready to make a verdict Heroes Online, Hearing only a few words: “free-to-play”, “online”, “browser”.
The area with the comments of this preview is already ready to turn into a battlefield and irrigate the noble blood of true fans of the series. We will not rush with the conclusions: we were lucky to visit visiting “Factories online” -The publisher of the game in Russia-and get acquainted with the “heroes” who moved to the online products. Perhaps F2P will be able to bring something fresh to the series, and new components will be able to dilute the gameplay well?
The heroes returned … or rather, crawled
In general, the idea of transferring Heroes In the “freeathy” measurement literally lay on the surface. The mechanics of the game are ideal for a fashionable business model: ubiquitous “upgrades”, step-by-step mode, countless purchases of warriors and artifacts-all this creates an unlimited field for high-quality monetization.
The first impression of the gameplay is positive: the good old “heroes” returned! Fantasy setting decorates excellent graphic performance, a horse with a rider slowly rides around the area with motionless enemies and NPC, leading us along the plot line. The graphics, despite the browser format of the project, pleasantly surprise with an abundance of colors and the drawing of the area. A convenient castle interface, traditional battles on the “mesh” battlefield and tactical depth remained in place.
However, you soon feel something amiss. The camera is attached to the hero – it will not work to cover the whole card. The course does not end, and there is no dashed strip that marks the number of remaining steps before the end of the day. Ubisoft Blue Byte deprives the “heroes” of the main element of mechanics – step -by -step. All events and processes, whether it is the construction of a building or daily supplies of resources by mines, are now stretched on a scale of calendar, not playing time. All this is somewhat bringing Heroes Online To the Pole RPG: Our hero in real time runs on the map, communicates with characters, selects artifacts, resources and improves his skills.
Moving through the global map is now limited only to the speed of movement of the hero himself, woven rather slowly. Fortunately teleport to the castle – the standard skill of all characters. But there will be another innovation to truly slow down on a single campaign: the heroes have a certain number of battle points that decrease after each battle and recovering over time. That is, after a dozen fights, you will have to relax, because your avatar is “tired”. And the coveted button with a sand clock capable of putting our warrior on his feet, as you know, no longer.
Erystrous monetization
But instead of it, we will find a worthy alternative – an uncomplicated option for buying seals (local analogue of real currency). The generous “Donat” is able to encourage the character and breathe a few hundred kilojoules of energy into it. If you want to get to the final titers of the campaign from one cavalry fiber, you will have to say goodbye to the lion’s lion’s lion’s contents of your wallet. Otherwise, you can begin to stock up on Olympic calm and Spartan endurance.
On the other hand, monetization has a positive moment: it instills a certain discipline. You are forced to play with feeling and really, relishing every moment of the campaign. You need to pay for autobobe, so do not dare to get rid of low blood. The price of each battle is too high to take rash steps, hoping to restart the battle if something goes wrong. It is necessary to carefully plan an attack, as well as reasonably evaluate your chances of success, otherwise you risk losing the hero’s actions and, accordingly, precious time.
Many are able to solve the seals, but not all your problems. Donat is used to accelerate certain processes, but in no way affects the balance and does not compensate for the lack of strategic skills. So, you can speed up the production of troops, increase the speed of the hero’s run on the map, buy him a couple of artifacts that give a small increase in parameters, or purchase missing resources. It is quite possible to do all this without monetary injections – on the “free” passage of the campaign, according to the representative “Factories online”, It will take about fifty hours. Monetization is primarily proposed for those who, after passing, decide to stay in the game and continue their exploits already in clan battles.
The main thing here is not to be mistaken. However, for a thousand seals you will be easily allowed to “retrain” the hero and “retract” the horse.
Sword or magic?
Unfortunately, we did not have the opportunity to evaluate the potential of the online mode of new “heroes”. The developers promise a powerful PVP, clan mechanics and elements of the cooperative. So, before the battle we will be offered to call for help from friends. It seems that solitary passage will still assume the presence of the Sopartians. If at first we perfectly dealt with ghouls and skeletons on our own, then after an hour and a half of wanderings our path ended on a “siege” quest, where it was necessary to destroy the ballista and two towers of the fort.
The advantage of the enemy was huge. The fact is that now on the horse of our hero the whole legion of larch and bone dragons cannot fit. Initially, only a few cells for the troops are opened for us – such an army does not differ in great diversity. But the quantitatively new approach to the staffing of the army will not allow you to accelerate: only a strictly defined number of fighters is placed in the cells available to us. However, we can make up for losses from an unlimited reserve, but a huge armada will not be
able to withdraw on the battlefield. Fifty skeletons on one shoulder and the same zombie on the other – exactly as many “units” you can take with you to battle at the beginning of the game. Each new level slightly increases their maximum number. And when reaching the seventh, you can get an additional cell for warriors.
Such restrictions put a cross on the tactics “wait a week of the next growth – and in battle”. There were two options in our situation: either invite a friend and divide the victory with him, or to run up the surrounding lands on their own and “farm” monsters to the seventh level. Otherwise, the combat system Hom&M She remained the same: the hero does not participate in the battle directly, he cannot be defeated (as it was in the heretical fourth part), but actively helps the troops with spells.
So far, only two fractions are available to choose from – necromancers and alliance. In the future, their number will be increased, but full -fledged single campaigns are developed only for them. The heroes of each faction have six parameters that increase the attack and defense of either “units” or the character himself. Their indicators slightly increase each level randomly.
Heroes can also study active skills that are different for fractions and classes. Add to this eight slots for artifacts, and you will get a rather massive and variable system of “pumping”. We will be allowed to have several characters: each of them will have to be sharpened to certain tasks. One more will fit for a campaign, the other to participate in duels with other players.
What promise to us “Heroes online”? On the one hand – an updated pleasant graphics, many new monsters, heroes, artifacts and missions. On the other hand, the Donat -inhibitory game process. Yes, sit with a friend at the same computer and, drinking the seagulls, it will not be possible to hang in an epic confrontation for half a day. However Heroes Online It is focused on online use with other users, the implementation of which we so far have very vague ideas. Perhaps the developers will be able to create such an unusual and exciting mechanics that it will more than pay off all the disadvantages of the distribution model. One way or another, it is still worth giving the game a chance – perhaps it will indicate a further development vector of development stomping in one place in a series.