The easiest way to describe The Legend is that it's sort of like a blend of Heroes of Might & Magic with Master of Magic, with an art design that will remind you a bit of WarCraft. This is a sort of adventure strategy game where you guide a hero and army around a map, and they encounter hostile armies which they do battle with. King's Bounty has a few twists on this formula, though...
The first is that the adventure phase, which involves wandering around a map, is done in real-time rather than turns. This makes it more like an old school Final Fantasy game in a way, only you can see enemy armies and encounters on the map..[while] The Legend's combat system...is a turn-based mode that's not unlike the one found in Heroes of Might & Magic.
There are special attacks that you can call upon, such as spirits. These are basically elemental spirits that can carve a swathe on the battlefield, such as the spirits of rage that manifest some demons that can attack multiple units simultaneously...Should you be victorious after a battle you'll amass experience that may be enough to level up your hero. Then you can usually select an upgrade, such as improving the hero's leadership ability or giving him a boost in a certain statistic.
--I agree after the MOO3 mess I've pretty much lost hope on that game ever being equaled--shame, because with just a few updates it would play with anything out there now.