Heroes of Might and Magic: Olden Era – Exclusive Hands-On Preview

The reveal of Heroes: Olden Era at Gamescom in 2024 had a mixed reception. We were given a mere 40-second trailer interspersed with animated scenes that had nothing to do with the game. The great and anticipated return of the Heroes of Might and Magic series was reduced to just a dozen seconds of gameplay (with no interface shown). We’ve seen hundreds of comments around the web about the graphic style chosen by Unfrozen – mostly complaints that it looks like a mobile game. It was mainly the impressions of journalists, who had the opportunity to see extended gameplay and exchange a few words with the developers, that inspired optimism.

As we've clearly seen there is a huge potential in Olden Era, we prepared an “all we know about Heroes: Olden Era” article, gathering all the details scattered across the internet. Meanwhile, to our great surprise, Unfrozen Studio has visited Poland and CD-Action was invited to a closed presentation of Heroes of Might and Magic: Olden Era – we were able to spend a few hours to test new Heroes. And from this place I can assure you that while I had some doubts about the latest production of Unfrozen before the aforementioned meeting, I have now almost completely gotten rid of them.

Heroes: Olden Era

Apart from the two of us, there were also some other people associated with the local Heroes community, such as streamer kesZu, with whom we jointly organized the Polish Heroes 3 Cup in 2023. We had a limited number of devices with the game already installed at our disposal and naturally, we did not have enough freedom to freely check all aspects of the game as there were many other special guests, who wanted to give the game a shot. Still, we had a lot of time to check Olden Era (usually game previews are wrapped in 30-60 minutes hands-on sessions) and at the same time, the gathering of fans in one place allowed us to share lots of thoughts and comments about literally everything.

Heroes: Olden Era

Of course, we couldn’t check every mode in the game, as some of them were simply not ready yet, but we were given a classic scenario with a computer opponent and an arena allowing us to face another player in the 1 vs 1 battle. So, how does Heroes of Might and Magic: Olden Era present itself during the actual game?

So let's start with the Arena, a mode that left a really positive impression on me. This is a remix of a fan-made template from Heroes 3 and 5, where we don't bother with building and exploring the map. Within a minute we gather an army, artifacts, a handful of skills and spells to fight the only one and final battle. However, in the version from the third and fifth installments we still had to drive the hero through a narrow corridor to collect the items, units etc., meanwhile Unfrozen has shortened this process to the bare minimum. Right after selecting Arena, we have a menu with a chain of choices – picking our units, spells, artifacts and hero skills.

An interesting fact is that we are not limited to units from one faction. The game draws sets of creatures from different factions of the same level, and we simply incorporate them into the army. Similarly, we select spells, skills and artifacts from a pool drawn by the game. And I must say I’m a huge fan of this solution!

In Olden Era, everything is clear and fast, allowing you to jump straight into a fight – this is where the new Heroes really shine. I absolutely love how diverse the units are, which is largely due to their special abilities. Each unit has a few of them, so you won't find groups that simply deal damage and that's it. I admit, at first I felt a bit overwhelmed by the number of new perks, but it didn't stop me from wanting to learn them and find the most interesting ways of using them. After a while, most of the skills became very intuitive for me, opening up a whole new range of exciting possibilities.

Heroes: Olden Era

Take for example the Vampire Scholars and their ability to detonate corpses. A stack of allied skeletons died and there are some units nearby? Great! You can blow up the remains to not only deal damage to neighboring enemies, but also heal your units. And this isn’t the only ability that Vampires possess, which forced me to think more about what to do with a given unit. On the bigger picture, even if we’re talking about the low level unit, their skill combined with the rest of the army becomes really useful.

There were many more surprises during the fight. Summoning elementals, which could... summon more elementals. Area attacks, boosts, additional attacks. Thanks to this, each round of the battle was somewhat unpredictable, providing many more tactical options than the good old Heroes 3 or 5. I consider this a huge advantage of Heroes of Might and Magic: Olden Era. The battles are far more complex, and if we add to this a whole range of spells (and not merely offensive ones!), I can easily say that each major battle can be played in several different ways, and every way will provide just as much excitement. 

The heart of each part of Heroes of Might and Magic are the factions, and things are no different in Olden Era. Although I did not have the opportunity to test all the towns in battle, I managed to play a bit with Necropolis and Sylvan, as well as see how the Hive and the unannounced sixth faction work (but I have to keep quiet about it for now). To put my impressions in a nutshell – it’s a combination of something traditional and familiar with a pinch of freshness and novelty. It makes me feel like I'm entering my room after a renovation - the walls are repainted, the furniture is replaced, but everything is in its place and I know that it's still the same room that I like to be in.

Heroes: Olden Era

I’ve experienced this feeling while playing Sylvan; a faction traditionally focused on the forest folk, is now home to satyrs, forest spirits, and magical creatures based on different elements. Or the hellish town of the Swarm, which houses various insectoids instead of demons. It's very refreshing in the context of the entire series. I also really like the ability to upgrade our units in two ways (like in Heroes 5). Unfortunately, the devs do not allow us to reveal the exact skills yet, but after what I saw, I can assure you that a given faction can be played in several completely different ways.

As for Necropolis, whose units I chose to duel in the arena, I felt the necromantic spirit in the game the whole time. Units heal and resurrect themselves endlessly, extending the battle for a few more turns. Some of them can even steal the opponents' statistics, which made me feel at one point that I actually had a chance to win Arena match. Unfortunately, my opponent was better, but it wasn’t hard for me to imagine a situation where such clever use of skills decides the fate of the fight and the satisfaction would be enormous.

Long, dense fights are a very important element for Heroes of Might and Magic series - after all, more turns equals more spells cast, which are crucial for battle. I had the pleasure of playing a character specializing in the spell that resurrects units, thanks to which I felt pure satisfaction from constantly bringing my Vampire Lords back to “unlife”, at least until the entire stack was massacred in one turn... Yeah, in Necropolis everything works as it should.

Heroes: Olden Era

As for the Hive units, our editor-in-chief, Barnaba Siegel, who was also present at the presentation, wanted to add a few words: "The first thought about this faction is that it feels a bit like the Zerg race from StarCraft. The Hive, just as swarms in nature, consists of disgusting bugs, although I admit that I had some trouble remembering and distinguishing some of the lower-level units I had at my disposal - they are a bit too similar to each other. At the same time, I was very impressed by the list of tactical options offered by their special skills. Unfrozen is still working on these and at this stage we can't go into details yet, but I’ll leave one example. The possibility of using a double attack or jumping on a nearby corpse, consuming its corpse and performing an additional attack with boosted statistics (like Olgoi-Khorkhoi from the Factory in the main Heroes 3: Horn of the Abyss mod) was a really cool showcase for me, teasing really interesting direction for the whole game. Because of course these weren't the only surprising skills I could test". 

Regrettably I was not able to play long enough to see all the factions in action (and I cannot share my impressions of the faction that has not yet been revealed), but what I have seen is enough to say that Unfrozen understands the most important aspects of Heroes of Might and Magic and units mechanics with faction design are the strongest assets of Olden Era.

It is also worth taking a closer look at the graphic side of Heroes of Might and Magic: Olden Era, which stirred up so much discussion after the Gamescom announcement. I admit, I was not a big fan of it myself, but after seeing how it looks during the actual gameplay, I changed my mind a bit. The fairy-tale, slightly exaggerated style fits this game perfectly and I do not feel like this is an attempt to push a cheap, mobile-like art-style. On the contrary, I appreciate more and more interesting designs of unit models or buildings. I also have to praise the battlefield levels. After watching the first few presentations, I had the impression that it would be difficult to distinguish some units from each other, or see the thin lines separating hexes, but after playing these few hours I feel like I have nothing to fear. Everything is clearly visible, and the units are so unique that there is no way to confuse them (well, maybe apart from some exceptions in Hive).

Heroes: Olden Era

For me animations are the controversial element at the moment. They are unnecessarily long-winded, which unnecessarily prolongs the battle itself. Of course, the first or second time it will be nice to watch them, but during this one session with Heroes: Olden Era I was not the only one who felt that they lasted too long. Fortunately, the devs confirmed that we will be able to change their speed during the game.

I really like a certain interface solution, which is a bar at the bottom of the screen, showing the hero, his statistics and the state of our army. This allows, for example, to divide troops into smaller groups from the adventure map level, so we don't have to open the hero's equipment every time, which is simply more convenient. This option existed in Heroes 3, but disappeared in the subsequent parts, so it's good that Unfrozen is returning to a proven solution.

Heroes: Olden Era

But in general, while there is no problem with noticing specific elements on the battlefield, the interface or some elements of the adventure map or interface need some improvements. Of course, we saw an early version of the game, which naturally involves some stuff being a work in progress. Unfrozen emphasized in a conversation with us that they are very open to players' suggestions as those will have an impact on the final look of the game.

The resource bar at the top of the screen could also undergo some changes. It is too small in my opinion, and sometimes I had trouble seeing how many resources I own. The same issue is with item or hero descriptions, the font is simply too small. Fortunately, these are rather minor issues that Unfrozen will most likely solve by the time Olden Era debuts in Early Access.

I won't hide the fact that I am very excited about the upcoming release of Heroes of Might and Magic: Olden Era. Sure, there were some technical flaws in the version of the game I played, but it should be remembered that this is still a fairly early version of Heroes, and these flaws (apart from the feeling of being a bit lost on the map, although this may simply be a matter of playing for a longer time and simply getting to know the game) are small enough to fix them before the production is released to a wider audience. However, I see that the developers have perfectly captured the spirit of the series and have shown that they understand the strength of Heroes of Might and Magic, which for me is a key aspect that tips the scales in favor of a positive assessment of Olden Era.