Might & Magic Heroes VI Preview

Hooked Gamers has hooked us up with their own preview of Might & Magic Heroes VI, and once again we owe the article’s substance to Ubisoft’s demonstration at last week’s GamesCom.

One such change is the map size. We were shown a map called “The Wolf and the Spider” which appeared to be roughly four times the size of any map I have ever seen in any Heroes of Might & Magic game. Obviously bigger maps mean more territory to defend. Fans of the series will no doubt remember the painstaking business of reconquering resource-producing buildings from troublesome heroes wandering in far off and unprotected areas. Taking a page out of Disciples’ book, developer Black hole are populating each map with Focus Points that control all resource buildings in a given area. Control the Focus Point and you will gain the production of all buildings in the area.

Castles no longer require to be ‘entered’ in order to view and use their buildings and unit production facilities. You will still need to approach the town but can then access existing buildings or create new ones from the overall map without having to endure loading screens. Owned castles do not necessarily reflect their owner’s faction and, once owned, a Haven hero can just as easily hire Inferno units as he would units from his own faction. Upon capturing a new castle, the player is asked if he wants to convert it to his own faction or keep it as it is. Converting, however, does mean the loss of any buildings unique to the original faction.