Disciples III - Russian Release, First Reviews

Noooo had great hope fore this one, a bad review from one site don’t matter, but it is disturbing to se that the user also only give it 47% (982 votes).

By the way, Merry Crismas :)
 
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Trust me, the review is accurate. Campaign is the only SP mode, multiplayer isn't included at all, bugs are crawling everywhere. To add an insult to an injury, the campaigns aren't even good: maps are almost completely linear and make the HoM&M V campaign look like a sandbox.
 
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Sad. And this game has been in development for years and years. I've been getting a bad feeling about it as it's missed all it's release deadlines over here.
 
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Pity

:(
 
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hopefully by the time they release it in the US it'll be patched enough so bugs are not an issue. Since I don't care about multiplayer at all, it'd still be a buy, unless the AI really really sucks
 
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Trust me, the review is accurate. Campaign is the only SP mode, multiplayer isn't included at all, bugs are crawling everywhere. To add an insult to an injury, the campaigns aren't even good: maps are almost completely linear and make the HoM&M V campaign look like a sandbox.

I don't mind linearity and bugs can be squashed... I still have some hoe for this game, although this news has made the waiting more bearable...
 
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Bugger :( Hope they can fix the bugs before any english speaking version, I don't think I'd find linearity too much of an issue for a disciples type game.
 
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Bugger :( Hope they can fix the bugs before any english speaking version, I don't think I'd find linearity too much of an issue for a disciples type game.
Likewise, bugs can be fixed, 'linearity' is not a problem for me at all, but stupid AI and boring/bad gameplay is what would kill it for me.
 
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Oh boo! I was really, really looking forward to this. I'll be crossing fingers that the bugs will be fixed and that many of the complaints were done by multiplayer fans. I always play these in SP anyway.

I'll probably still get the game, but my enthusiuasm has sadly crashed now. *sobs* :(
 
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Just to clarify, by "linearity" I meant that maps literally resemble a corridor connecting your capital with the enemy's, not that the story doesn't branch (it doesn't, but it's not an issue in a strategy game). Essentially, it's a strategy game without strategy. You just keep moving forward without having to look out for surprise attacks in the rear.
 
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Just to clarify, by "linearity" I meant that maps literally resemble a corridor connecting your capital with the enemy's, not that the story doesn't branch (it doesn't, but it's not an issue in a strategy game). Essentially, it's a strategy game without strategy. You just keep moving forward without having to look out for surprise attacks in the rear.

Have you even played the game? I've been playing the RUS version since release, and i admit its a bit linear for campaign, but there ARE surprise attacks and even hidden treasures, but these mostly revolve only around the Story Hero (the default one which is given at start) tho you can also play with your custom hero and export him/her (thank god) to later SP and MP games.
The game is pretty good despite the bugs which makes it almost unplayable. The ai is very tricky and the fights (even movement on the global map) forces you to think and plan ahead for victory. Units are perfect, and the voiceover is fantastic. My only problems are the non-fitting music (can be cured by replacing ogg files) and the skill system (which allows you to get all the skills)
MP, SP maps, and Editor and lot of other features will be added with expanson.
Also there will be 3 kinds of collectors edition with a T-shirt, a figurine, an artbook and a poster available on international release.
Cheer up and be on the move becouse once its fixed, it will be greater than D2 was.
 
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aah, the musics are cool too, just seemed non-fitting at first
 
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Review

Don’t get me wrong I’m not saying it is the best game ever, and there are no bugs, and the review was garbage, but I think it was a little misleading, and that Disciples III, has a lot of potential.
I played the game and I faced a few bugs, but not more than any other game and nothing that was critical. Balance problems, I don’t see any; the units all have their advantages and disadvantages, and are fun to play. The cover mechanic is implemented, which gives bonuses to units on certain tiles and allows guarding depending on what units are adjacent to each other and their initiative.
The only problem I have with Disciples III is the difficulty of the game, I have played the previous installments and died a few times early on before I got the hang of things, with this incarnation it seems impossible not to die, they even have a feature to replay the last battle, I suspect because it happens so much. I don’t know how the AI gets so much money to pump out heroes and units as well as upgrade its castle, I suspect the AI cheats or the starting resources are not equal to what you receive. This part feels unfair and a little frustrating from all the restarts.
It feels reminiscent of another beta, I was participating in and the computer AI was unforgiving, but at release they changed the AI difficulty considerably, even hard was no were near as challenging as the single player normal AI used in beta. The game has been patched, but even with the latest patch it feels to challenging to keep my attention -- mind you if they reduce the challenge in future release I will come back to it. If the international version comes out definitely download the demo to try for yourself, because story, graphics, and music are good, and I may not be as savvy as you.
 
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Translation from russian unoficial review

Hi guys,
I've tried to find any up to date review on English and didn't find it. So I've thought of translating Russian review from www.lurkmore.ru for you. This is (unofficial) review of Russian /b/tards. Sometimes they too critical (that's Russian trait I think) but not biased.
I'm not good at English so I'm sorry for awful translation, but I think it's better than nothing.
And yeah I didn't play the game since I'm in the US now. Hope it's not so bad.


Dimed present time
Disciples III: Renaissance. It nevertheless has been failed, because at first development was performed by Russian company, at second release date has been postponed over 9000 times, at third they’ve lost original combat system, resources system and genius design of previous art director P. Lambert that was substituted with helpless eclectics, and at fourth two uberneat races were thrown away: gnomes and undead.
The development was rather mementoes, perhaps due to two phenomenon: official forum with tons of spam, and theirs community manager with mature troll skills (now dismissed) who’s on his own contest hates original D1 and D2.
Apparently, just as we thought, all this resulted in game being silly $&*#. Monochrome, but extremely detailed maps were changed to silly aquarelle pictures with like sticked-on game objects. The map structure itself became labyrinth-like, the action is taking place in extreme narrowness. Combats fell to copying of Heroes of Might & Magic: monumental figures of warriors for the sake of spectacular level-upping of those players have been farming are gone now. Certainly, you can feast your eyes upon level-upped warior on the army screen (like in Heroes), but in combat everything changed into heap of small grey models messing in similar arenas. Yes-yes, warriors are now running around the map covered with hexagonal net. Like you all know where… At the same time warriors are now have been given a bunch of attributes like endurance/agility that somehow influence on something, but it’s definitely not appealing to study on what and how. To make it short, the primitive but clear like in chess combat system of DII is no more. On a top of that some abilities doesn’t work (even after lots of patches).
Also there is no multiplayer AT ALL, single player, editor and hotseat (probably not gonna happen). Even only for this fans will hate developers. And the last mentioned promise to release all this with next expansion (before selling they told “at spring” the “at fall” now they’re silent), besides they gonna add undead race.
Technical aspect of the game hits imagination causing tears of used to neat graphics players. Developers imply that their engine supports all modern features and they are not used only to allow Russian players with low-end specs enjoy the game [lol]. At the moment the game is stable at throwing to desktop every <40 minutes. Patches are adding new bugs like game loading for 40-60 seconds on 1.05HF rather than 1-2 on 1.04HF, broken skill tables and so on. Also AI is extremely dumb and for all claims developers answer with advices to play on highest difficulty level (which just increases attributes of enemies and have not been balanced at all). Besides guys are excel at rarest lack of responsibility towards players (well, you’ll not surprise anyone now). Bug reports section appeared not so long ago (and there is no essential tech support). Talk with that support comes down to questions of genuinity (of the game and Windows) and advices to reinstall those. To any links on reviews besides ones that have been bought guys are making stone faces and getting pissed off. It seems they really believe that they’ve made a masterpiece. —omitted—

But the most important is that instead of dark gothic atmosphere there is tons of pathos in style of Final Fantasy and Lineage. Awful soundtracks (something appealing is only on the main menu of the game) and voiceover immersed with that pathos, silly humor in units descriptions. As a conclusion: don’t give a famous brand to %#$&*#^@.

Anyway, some anonymous think that the game is playable. And after dozen of patches one can even enjoy playing. Because many ideas came from the second part (if not take into account atrophied strategy elements) and the new ones don’t make the game too ugly. Even cloned HoMM battle system will do. But the fact that once again after numerous postpones homeland[Russian] developers have thrown out unfinished game turns off from waiting until D3 will be developed to presentable state.
 
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That was an awesome and very flavorful translation, anonymous poster. I enjoyed it very much. It helped me visualize the game and I thank you for taking the time to post it.

I have to agree, after all the promises followed by postponement after postponement, the changing of developers over the years, etc, I don't find this a very surprising result. Disappointing, though.
 
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