“Catching up with Might & Magic: Heroes VI - DESTRUCTOID” plus 2 more |
- Catching up with Might & Magic: Heroes VI - DESTRUCTOID
- Might & Magic: Clash of Heroes Hands-On - Gamespot News
- Maryland artists bring heroes, villains to life - Maryland Community Newspapers Online
| Catching up with Might & Magic: Heroes VI - DESTRUCTOID Posted: 01 Oct 2010 03:04 AM PDT We caught our first glimpse of Might and Magic Heroes VI at this year's gamescom, but further details since then have been fairly sparse. Fortunately, I was able to sit down with producer Erwan LeBreton at Ubisoft's Digital Day and get a closer look at the game. Although the Might & Magic franchise has grown to encompass multiple different genres over the years, the Heroes series is best known for its unique blend of turn-based strategy and RPG elements. While Heroes VI appears to remain faithful to the series, preserving many of the gameplay mainstays, great effort has been made to implement changes and improvements that fans have been clamoring for.
Might & Magic Heroes VI (PC) Upon sitting down to start the demo, the first and most obvious improvement was the brand-new engine and art direction for this title. Heroes VI is running on Black Hole's own in-house engine and sports a more realistic visual style, as opposed to the "cartoony" look of Heroes V. Models and textures were sharp and detailed, the effective use of color and contrast in overworld exploration was gorgeous, and the attention to detail in the combat animation blew me away. Of course, you might be wondering what type of rig you are going to need to run something like this, but I've been assured that the engine has actually been optimized to run well on laptops! In terms of gameplay, Heroes VI appears to remain true to the series. The classic gameplay loop of building, exploration, resource collection, combat, and character advancement have all been faithfully recreated. Everything appears to have been built from the ground up to be more streamlined and responsive, giving the game a truly "next-gen" feel. Some of the changes will include:
If you are a fan of any of the previous Heroes titles, or even RPG and strategy games, this is definitely one to look forward to!
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| Might & Magic: Clash of Heroes Hands-On - Gamespot News Posted: 30 Sep 2010 10:25 PM PDT Might & Magic: Clash of Heroes came out late last year on the Nintendo DS, receiving excellent reviews all around. The game was a combination of familiar role-playing elements mixed with some strategy and coated with the tried-and-true match-three style gameplay. The result was an incredibly addictive hybrid portable game, wrapped in a delightful package as part of the Heroes of Might and Magic series. At Ubisoft's Digital Day event, we learned that developer Capybara has decided to take its game to Xbox Live Arcade as well as the PlayStation Network to take advantage of online (and offline) play. The game is not just a straight port from the DS version. It keeps the major elements intact, but the art has been completely redone, hand-animated from scratch to give it a fresh new look for HD consoles. Everything from the units and interface to the maps has been redone, and more attention was paid to the multiplayer mode. The DS game had a multiplayer component, but lead writer Dan Vader said that most people likely didn't have the opportunity to play the game with others. He added that now that the game is making its way online, it gives people the perfect opportunity to play with friends online or offline. For the competitive types, leaderboards and ranking have been added as well. The developers scoured the forums for fan feedback, so some tweaks have been made to enhance the overall experience. For example, underpowered units that no one really used have been given new abilities, and the more powerful ones have received a bit of a downgrade for gameplay balance. The main story lets you play as one of the five young heroes, who each have their own campaign, but their stories will cross paths with the others at some point. The core of the game is the battle, which is a turned-based system where players are given three moves each. Instead of lining up jewels like in Puzzle Quest, you're lining up units--horizontally to build a wall or vertically to attack. The screen is split in two, so your opponent is across the way. You can move only the units that are in the back of your army. Through careful planning, by matching multiple units at once, you'll gain a turn back for each chain. You can also delete units, which takes up a turn, but they wind up in your reinforcement pool and can be called back when the time is right. Most of your units will take up one grid, but the more powerful elite and champion units will take up more, so it's a matter of positioning them properly and using their abilities to your advantage. The gameplay can get quite deep, but the general premise of a fight is to line up your units to build walls and attack, until you deplete the health of your opponent. Your units will level as you go, and you can mix and match the kinds of units you want to suit your own play style. Only the multiplayer portion of the game was shown at the event, so there could be other new additions that we haven't seen yet. But from what was shown, the multiplayer mode looks to provide quite a bit of replay value once you've completed the campaign. Might & Magic: Clash of Heroes keeps the anime-like art style from the previous game, but instead of the classic sprites, individual characters on the battlefield are now much more detailed and polished. For more details on the DS game, see our review here. Otherwise, look for the game when it's released on XBLA and PSN sometime in the first quarter of 2011. This entry passed through the Full-Text RSS service — if this is your content and you're reading it on someone else's site, please read our FAQ page at fivefilters.org/content-only/faq.php |
| Maryland artists bring heroes, villains to life - Maryland Community Newspapers Online Posted: 01 Oct 2010 01:45 AM PDT Some work for legendary names like DC Comics and Marvel Comics, others align themselves with studios of like-minded individuals and still others set out on their own with only their vivid imaginations to carry them. They are Maryland's own comic creators, a group of ambitious artists caught in a constant balancing act between their real lives and those they bring to life on the page. Among these, Frank Cho of Elkridge is one of the biggest names, famous for his own "Liberty Meadows" as well as drawing for Marvel's "Mighty Avengers" and "Hulk." Cho, a Beltsville native, once drew the famous X-Men character Wolverine wearing a T-shirt with a "Beltsville" logo. He also won the 2001 National Cartoonists Society's awards for Best Comic Book and Best Book Illustration. But Cho is not all Maryland has to offer in terms of comic talent, as many others fight to hold onto their place in the changing industry. Jose Villarrubia, originally from Spain, does the coloring work for as many as seven comic titles each month, giving the iconic tones to characters such as Batman, Thor and Conan the Barbarian. Villarrubia, a Baltimore resident, also has provided photo-manipulated illustrations for the "Veils" comic, a dark fable written by Pat McGreal. But he is most proud of the illustrations he did for "Watchmen" creator Alan Moore's "The Mirror of Love," a love poem written around a detailed history of homosexuality focused on famous figures in art and literature. Villarrubia is also working on a tarot card set with Moore. Growing up as a huge fan of comics, Villarrubia said one of the true pleasures of being a colorist is getting the chance to work with so many of his favorite artists. As a colorist, he also faces different challenges than most artists, he said, referring to how he must wait for pencil work and inking to be done before he can start his part. He has worked with everything from flat colors to digitally rendered illustrations to digital painting, although he prefers working with the flat colors. "You have to be a good communicator since you need to communicate with the artist, writer and editor," Villarrubia said. "You also can't procrastinate and you have to be versatile, depending on the artwork." Villarrubia stresses these tips and others as chair of illustration for the Maryland Institute College of Art in Baltimore. But he warns of obstacles facing new artists breaking into the industry now, when profit-wary editors are sticking with artists on whom they can already rely. Carla Speed McNeil of Bowie has managed to sidestep this hurdle, as she prepares to launch her "Finder" series through Dark Horse Comics, the publisher known for "Sin City" and "Hellboy." McNeil has self-published her work about an Aborigine detective since 1997, using starter money from her brother. "Finder" will be reissued under its new publisher in March. "It was easier to break in back then. You didn't have to get a distributor just to make money," McNeil said. "Now, distributors are raising the sale limits so you have to sell so many copies or they'll drop you," she added, referring to a common problem for most independent artists who don't work for major titles. Maryland is a good area to get into self-publishing because of its location near major comics distributor Diamond Comic Distributors in Timonium and its annual Small Press Expo in Bethesda, she said. The state also hosts the Baltimore Comic-Con, a convention that began in one hotel room and has expanded to the Baltimore Convention Center. McNeil started "Finder" after filling sketch pad after sketch pad with ideas and realizing she had to put something together if she wanted to learn how to write. Being a science fiction fan, McNeil wanted a project where she could use her "National Geographic" knowledge but still make things up, she said. McNeil tries to put out a 200-page graphic novel each year, amid work for DC and its adult-targeted offshoot, Vertigo Comics. Other artists have sought out lesser-known publishers to establish their names. Michael Bracco of Baltimore got into comics as a child, ditched them in his teens and picked them up again in college. Although he had wanted to illustrate children's books, Bracco was warned by professional friends that he would "really mess up kid's heads," and was steered toward comics. Initially insulted, Bracco eventually tapped into the high art potential of comics and began work in 2000. His alien survival series "Novo" is being released through AlternaComics, an independent publisher that started around the same time as Bracco. "I honestly love being in the indie world and taking advantage of what a book and movie can't be," Bracco said. He added that being in Baltimore has also helped, as "Baltimore is very much about the little guy," with its craft fairs and creative atmosphere. Money is Bracco's persistent challenge, as he works to produce an 88-page book every year while teaching full time and running a T-shirt design company, Spaghetti Kiss. He also has to figure out his place in the digital age of comics, saying sometimes digital devices make his comics hard to read. Bracco's comics are also available through an iPhone app. Mark Wheatley, owner of Insight Studios Group in Westminster, a collection of artists focused on high-quality storytelling, has released his last three graphic novels online first, and then gone to print. Insight Studios, to which Cho also belonged, originally had a physical center but has since spread out to the Internet, where Wheatley believes artists are more productive. "Facebook really opened things up," he said. Wheatley said while the ease of creation is comics' greatest appeal, the trick is keeping up with public interests, as artists start projects years before readers see them. Wheatley's original works include "EZ Street," a tale about a comic artist and filmmaker trying to start their careers. "This is an industry where it's possible for one person to sit down, create a world and become successful," he said. lrobbins@gazette.net This entry passed through the Full-Text RSS service — if this is your content and you're reading it on someone else's site, please read our FAQ page at fivefilters.org/content-only/faq.php |
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