After reading everyone reminisce about the glory days of Master of Magic (1995), I decided to pony up the $5.99 at GOG.com and give it a try. Until this week, I had never played MoM. Heresy! I know. Back then I was playing the crap out of Final Fantasy I and II (US) and loving them. Computers weren't on my list of fun until '97 or '98 (Diablo/Civ 2) and certainly not in 1995.
Therefore, I find myself today playing a game in DOS markedly similar, in ways. to every other 4x or TBS game I've played in the last 10 years. In many ways FE seems, in beta 1, close to MoM with all the faults everyone cries about. Hero stack of doom? I had one before the first 200 turns:
(I got that Dragon as the first Hero to recruit and never looked back; I made that ring for ~1500 MP)
This unstoppable stack trounced every AI Wizard's (and neutral) city when I felt like it; which was often. The AI is also pretty ineffective on normal and hard, remind anyone of anything? The only thing this stack couldn't destroy was 2 Sky Drakes and 8 Phantom Warriors guarding a Sorcery Pool on Myrror. Regular units only really feel particularly useful to guard cities and in the early game. Once this stack is leveled and fully enchanted it can pretty much do anything. (They all have awesome items/artifacts I made and have flight/eldritch weapon/holy armor cast.)
Furthermore, there is just as much "city spam" in this game as there is in any other game:
(Most of my cities are on Myrror, which I didn't feel like taking a pic of because it is a pain to get in and out of DOSbox everytime.)
What I do like about this game is Heroes coming to you because of your fame or not coming because of your lack of it. Said fame influencing the quality of said Heroes. The all inclusive cities. The monster lair/magic nodes exploration. The item/artifact creation mechanic, which is arguably the best thing about the game. It is a satisfying payoff when you have to wait 10-20 turns just to get a custom designed ring you made for your Hero and even more so when you see your enemies driven before you.
Overall, yes, this game is worth the $5 I paid for it but not much more. I've played and won several games already and they don't feel all that unique on subsequent playthroughs. I make a custom Wizard and take the best traits, why play with an inferior one? The magic system is pretty unique but it also feels similar to FE, in ways. In fact, a lot of this game does.
Just as I do with many video games from my "early days," I let nostalgia and novelty cloud reality. I think this is also happening when, often, people draw parallels to MoM and FE. Ultimately, to each their own.
I completely disagree with your assesment, EviliroN : I first played XCOM, Master of Orion 1, Master of Magic, and Darklands between 2005 and today, and I found all of them great. That had nothing to do with having no better game at the time, as I found them superior to anything made before...
So the only conclusion you can come to is that you would have found the game sucked back in 1995 too. Deducing from your lack of enjoyment of the game that people like it because of nostalgia is just a sign of faulty logic.
The AI sucked indeed, but winning on impossible (why play only as hard and complain the game is too easy anyway?), without reloading whenever you lose an important battle is not as easy as you may it sound. Saying that MoM seems better than FE only because of nostalgia is a lazy analysis at best. There are many things that worked way better.
The pacing of the game was much better. There were several overpowered strategies indeed. Note the emphasis on several...
As seanw3 pointed out, the game made you really feel like a wizzard in his tower, which FE still does not manage to do for me(it must be the need to rediscover spears that breaks immersion for me). Magic was much more varied (there were many potent spells in each school, and you had to shape your strategy accordingly).
If you don't like the game, good for you, but don't try to belittle other's opinions because of that, thanks.
Please note that I am not saying FE is better. I didn't think I was condescending to anyone in my OP nor in my replies. All I am saying is: "I don't get it." I don't get what is so good about the game, that's all. I didn't feel like a wizard in my tower, I didn't use magic all that much, I played it like I would have any other civ-like, that's all. I did also give some caveats that I thought the game had going for it. Finally, if you read my last sentence or two, you would have noticed I was not trying to belittle nor admonish anyone because I said "Ultimately, to each their own."
Your post was quite reasonable Eviliron.
However many people (myself included) have picked up MoM from GoG and elsewhere and played it again in the last year or two. The evidence that many of us still think MoM is a fun game suggests that your hypothesis that MoM love is largely nostalgia doesn't quite stack up. It was still a good hypothesis to put forward, but the evidence suggests nostalgia is a relatively minor factor.
If I may?
There are a few mechanics from other games that really ought be in FE. For one, creation of a unique item/artifact would be rather amazing to have. It was in Age of Wonders: Shadow Magic and was a great way to go about building a personalized hero. Perhaps make the artifact only buildable at, say, tier 4 or 5 cities, and require an investment in mana until finished? Limit the actual creation possibilities, so that the strongest items in the game aren't Sovereign made but are literal artifacts from the ancient civilizations.
Next, on a less-suggestion basis, whenever I play a TBS there are two types of battles for me: skirmishes and epics. Skirmishes are quick, between a few soldiers on either side, or just a mop-up of an insignificant enemy. Epics are battles that involve armies on both sides, sieges...to follow with Age of Wonders, these are the battles where my heroes and strongest units would duke it out over a walled, heavily defended city, or when I would meet an opposing army in the field.
Skirmishes must be short. They shouldn't last long. But for an epic battle, it must be something that is worthy of being called epic. SOME battles should take longer than a few minutes. These should be few and far between, rare enough that they are juicy and savored and leave us craving more, but common enough that they occur in game and aren't a surprise.
Next, I think that FE could benefit from letting us train some more active abilities, or specific passive ones. Let us teach our swordsmen to Parry, which gives a defensive boost on the first attack against them. Let our scouts get True Sight to be able to avoid illusions, and let our rangers get Concealment to cloak themselves in the woods. Let us train archers with Barrage, to rain down damage in an area, and our two-handers to learn Flourish, striking everyone nearby. The benefits now are nice for adding stats, but there really isn't a ton to affect them or make them really stand out. To continue comparisons, I am drawn again to Age of Wonders. Specifically, the Orc Warlords, heavily armored and with the power to attack every single person around them. They were unique - it was a rare ability - and it gave them a unique role. Instead of fighting one on one, they were meant to be in the middle of the enemies, swinging wildly.
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