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After lying fallow for over a decade, Heroes of Might and Magic is enjoying a bit of a renaissance. Earlier this year, Heroes of Might and Magic: Olden Era launched into early access and will hit 1.0 in 2027. And now it’s going to be joined by an old friend with a new look. The series’ golden child, Heroes of Might and Magic 3, is back. Again.
HoMM 3 Remake is actually the third version of the third game in the series, which was remastered back in 2015. At a glance, however, you could be forgiven for assuming that it’s a brand new entry, as it boasts a new art style along with a few more tweaks. But this is still absolutely HoMM 3.
I took it for a spin over a couple of hours ahead of its Gamescom reveal, playing the simple campaign prologue and the Arrogance scenario—a popular map first introduced in HoMM 3: The Shadow of Death. It’s a compact, well-paced adventure that I remember being a good place to start when you wanted to delve into multiplayer (or if you just wanted a fun comp stomp).
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This remains true in the remake. It’s a four-player deal, and each starting position is close to a second town of the same faction, rapidly expanding your ability to recruit big unit stacks and making it easier to support multiple heroes early on. With entrances to the underworld close by, and nearby shipyards letting you cross the tiny ocean, it gives you the full HoMM 3 experience extremely quickly.
I confess, however, that I did embarrass myself a little bit. It’s been a while since I’ve played HoMM 3, but I’ve been playing Olden Era in early access, so I expected to crush the AI. Unfortunately, I spent too much time just mucking around and fiddling with my army composition, so by the end I’d been outpaced by my computer opponents. I’m still convinced I could have clawed my way back, but we’ll never know.
So this is largely the game you’ll remember, but with some convenient quality-of-life improvements. Of particular note is the ability to see movement ranges for enemy troops, letting you identify which of your units might be at risk on the enemy turn—something that exists in the later HoMMs, but not HoMM 3 or its 2015 HD remaster.
If you don’t remember because you never played the original, here’s the skinny: you command heroes and their armies as they scoot off on grand adventures, hassling monsters, conquering towns and gobbling up resources. Inside those conquered towns, you can construct a plethora of buildings—most of which can be upgraded—allowing you to recruit more units and heroes, as well as unlocking new spells.
Each day lets your heroes travel a specific distance, and as time moves inexorably forward, your recruitment pool and treasury will expand, allowing you to field larger armies and more heroes. You’ll eventually have hordes of dragons, giants, angels and demons ready to smite your foes in grid-based battles.
The hallmark of the series—and 3 in particular—is how easy it is to get to grips with, which belies its impressive depth. There’s an accessible lightness to the proceedings, accentuated by a frequently whimsical tone, that eases you into a level of complexity that would otherwise be daunting. There are so many layers to juggle—economic management, big-picture strategy, tactical combat, RPG systems, and then the literal layers, as you try to conquer both the overground and underground regions.
HoMM 3 was exceptional in 1999, and age has not tarnished it.
The most obvious change in the remake is the art style, and this is something I’m a bit more ambivalent about. It’s vividly colourful, fantastical fare, with units that are considerably more detailed than its predecessor’s. The combat animations are cracking, too, making each attack more dramatic and weighty. The quality is there, then, but I fear the soul might be lacking.
OG HoMM 3 simply had a bit more character, with big, bold monster designs. It veered towards the cartoonish, certainly, but these goofy-looking units had a lot of rizz. The remake may have smoothed out the edges too much, aiming for fidelity over personality. And this is more obvious because we have another modern HoMM with which we can compare it.
HoMM: Olden Era’s mere existence makes this remake pretty unusual. Olden Era is a completely new entry in the series, but it’s obviously a spiritual successor to HoMM 3, both mechanically and aesthetically. It feels like a natural evolution. So it does feel bizarre to see it now sharing the limelight with a remake. There’s just a heck of a lot of overlap.
Still, after waiting over a decade for more HoMM, I’m not going to turn my nose up at two coming along at the same time. HoMM 3 Remake launches next year, and Olden Era should be leaving early access then, so tactics nerds will have plenty to keep them occupied.
