News
- by Pol
CelestialHeavens wish you all Merry Christmas, vigor and peace. Just enjoy your time with your family & friends. 
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- by Pol
This is the last chance to get Heroes of Might & Magic III: The Board Game with all of its Stretch Goals! The first shipments start in December, and if you place an order now, you will most likely receive it in
the first quarter of 2024!
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- by Pol
Create the story of your dreams!
We’re excited to announce a contest. Your task is to create the best campaign you can. We’re teaming up with mod.io, our fantastic partners who have provided a home for our wonderful community-created maps.
The winner of this exciting endeavor will receive a cash prize of $700, and the runner-up will receive $300. Additionally, there will be some great Steam keys from our friends at Coffee Stain for those who come close to securing those coveted positions.
Now let’s delve into the specifics:
- No copyright infringement. We cannot endorse the use of other developers' intellectual property, so please rely on your own imagination or draw inspiration from stories that are public domain.
- Create at least two maps with a connected story.
Upload your campaign to mod.io and tag it with the contest tag. (Campaign Maps Contest)- We encourage you to create custom wielders and stories.
- Do not build upon the official campaigns, instead think outside the box and simply use the map editor as a tool for telling a great story.
- The winner will be chosen based on creativity, playability, visuals, and overall compatibility with our game.
- You will have nearly three months to create your masterpiece; the last day to submit your contributions is the 31st of January.
Remember that to submit you have to have an account on Mod.io which is a straightforward process requiring just a few clicks. Here’s the link to get you started!
If you haven’t created any maps yet but are curious to begin, we offer a series of beginner-level tutorials on our YouTube channel. We also highly recommend joining our helpful and amazing Discord Community.
So what are you waiting for? We can’t wait to see the fantastic results of your work.
If you have any questions, don’t hesitate to leave a comment below or reach out to us on Discord or through social media.So good luck out there, cartographers and storytellers!
Sincerely, The Lavapotion Team
https://www.songsofconquest.com/modding
Twitter | Discord | Youtube | Instagram | Facebook | Original Message
- by Pol
And for something a bit unusual, a cooking show with Dave Mullich where he talks about Heroes III and his other game..
The Geek Recipe is back for an exciting Season 2, and this time, it's a mouth-watering journey through the Italian kitchen of Slitherine's very own CMO, Marco Minoli.
Join us as we introduce legendary game designer David Mullich, known for his work on titles like Heroes of Might and Magic III and Vampire: The Masquerade - Bloodlines, to the sensory delights of our Italian cuisine.
In this episode, we prepare a prime vegetarian dish: Parmigiana di Melanzane. It's a delicious recipe featuring sliced, baked eggplant with layers of cheese and tomato sauce. Get ready to satisfy your gaming and culinary cravings!
David Mullich shares his insights on game design, his journey through the gaming industry, and his experiences working on iconic titles. From early text-based adventures to the universally acclaimed Heroes of Might and Magic III, he reveals the secrets behind great game development.
The Geek Recipe is all about sharing the connection between entertainment and gastronomy. We invite renowned game developers, writers, creators, and directors to our kitchen, where they share the ingredients that make both great food and great entertainment.
Thanks AS ;)
- by Pol
And there come new friendly batch of decomissioning online servers for Ubisoft games. If you played Heroes VI, it's in.
Decommissioning of online services for older Ubisoft games (January 2024)
Heroes of Might and Magic VI
You will be unable to play multiplayer, link Ubisoft accounts in-game or use online features.
Additionally, the Ubisoft Connect rewards will be unavailable.
This is last strike after Dynasty system was disabled. There should be true, that you get some of its reward by default now, as they were very handy to speed up your progress and enriched your experience.
Such is a fate of games, which rely not only on online Ubisoft dependat multiplayer but also on online experience enriching system.
Sayonara Heroes VI 
Thanks to Crazy-AK47 for the alert. ;)
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- by Pol
In following days there will be a change in our domain provider, hopefully everything will come out smooth.
If in any case would not, it's merely question of spreading new DNS, which is matter of 4-72 hours, depending on your location worldwide. Europe will come first, China and Australia last.
Stay with us and don't panic!
PS As of now (22.10.2023) all is done, transfer was successfully completed. There's no change for you.
- by Pol
VCMI 1.3 was released
- Scalable user Interface
- Touchscreen improvements
- RMG
- Improved Adventure AI
- Fixed Campaigns
- HoTA Maps Support
Heroes5.5(18d) were released
New patch, this patch is more than a critical hotfix, but less than a usual bigger patch, more like some important stuff got done much faster than expected.
Heroes Orchestra
2x Big Free Live Concerts today. Enjoy! Heroes II - IV.
NEXT CONCERT? 19.08 Lublin!
Fanstratics Letter #36
Halberdier - H3 Source Code - Ubisoft
H4ResourceEditor
Fixed replacing/adding sounds
fheroes2 - Free Heroes of Might and Magic II Resurrection
https://github.com/ihhub/fheroes2/releases/tag/1.0.6
- Significantly Updated Adventure Map AI
- New option to lower the campaign difficulty during playthroug
Silence of the Siren - Base UI
Capturing and upgrading your bases is crucial for your economy, but it must always be balanced with other elements to ensure victory. Never underestimate the need to explore. Good usage of all advantages the map gives you can be just as important, but that is something we will show you more about in the future
Our "Xeen Team" ranked #5 in Creature Quest :D
& I'm out for vacations on following two weeks
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- by Pol
"Might & Magic: Clash of Heroes" is back in "Definitive Edition" as of 20th July.
Peeking through reviews at Steam:
- Everyone is happy for ressurection of the game.
- Online mode is back!
- Game code is old and it seems that is essentially still the same, ppl still complain about some old bugs at Steam.
- Check Dotemu pages for overview of a new CoH DE
- Or you can jump to our older news, what is the new content summarized.
Resume line: "If you played the original game and are not in need of playing it online, Definitive edition brings you mostly only the new Campaign and no other significant improvements."
From Dotemu announcement:
Originally developed by Capybara Games, Might & Magic: Clash of Heroes is getting a Definitive Edition including its DLC, refreshed character portraits, many quality-of-life improvements and an expanded, fully reworked and re-balanced online mode!.
The game is available for PC, Nintendo Switch and PS.
Xbox was omitted which is a grave mistake in my view. To see Nintendo Switch impressions, look at the reviews at nintendolife.com
Happy Gaming!
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- by Pol
This month I have four topics concerning the Toadish Intruder, Game AI, HoMM3 gameplay, and a new ‘HoMM3 Recollection’ about HoMM2 Gold.
CH Note: "This is a bit abbreviated version of Greg's letter, if you wish to see original, check here."
Fanstratics Troop: Toadish Intruder
Toadish Intruders are a difficult Troop to engage under any circumstance. Wielding a long, heavy rapier, doused with toxins derived from their wart-covered skin, the Toadish Intruder specializes not in killing, but in applying poisonous debilitation. If they are unable to pierce their targets and administer their contaminants, their own thick hide has a chance to apply a pollutant to any Troop brave enough to Assault them. As expected, this Troop is immune to the very contagions it produces.
Justin asked if he could conceptualize and render this Troop on his Twitch stream. I said, “Sure.” This put us on an accelerated timeline as Justin had the last two weeks of the month scheduled for other things. Considering how this Troop turned out, perhaps we should ‘rush’ more often. Another favorite.
For those who want to see Justin create the drawing, there are two VOD’s from his Twitch stream. First is a conceptualization, with the second being the final render.
Toadish Intruder - Colorized by CH
Fanstratics Question: I really like HoMM III and HoMM V (as it close to third part), but I have one major problem with both of them. Mainly we play with my wife in hotseat mode with teams (humans vs AI). And at some level of our skills it becomes quite boring to play against AI (especially in HoMMV). AI becomes predictable or even stupid (for example, AI heroes run back and forth until the end of movement points). So, did you consider such a problem? As I understand, today machine learning can dramatically change the situation.
Regarding the AI, I can only speak to HoMM3. Overall, for something programmed in 1999, I believe it does what it is supposed to do, and I think it does its job quite well. Is there room for improvement? I believe ‘yes’.
Where Fanstratics is concerned, I suspect we will take a traditional approach when building our AI. Still, if time and budget permit, I would like to add additional 'AI profiles' at a later date. This is where machine learning could possibly play a role. We'll see what happens. AI is quickly becoming the newest frontier in game and technology development.
Read on: Fanstratics Newsletters #35
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- by Pol
Ok, folks, this is definitively not Babylon V. 
But they hopefully will be bearing the same level of coolness. We might be witnessing turning Master of Magic into Steampunk game. More to be seen after DLC Rise of The Soultrapped, which will be on at 28th August (2023).
Read full annoucement at Steam.
Don't forget that even MoM is discounted now.
Fourteen words to make someone fall in love with you forever. Seven words to make them go without pain. How to say good-bye to a friend who is dying. How to be poor. How to be rich. How to rediscover dreams when the world has stolen them. That is why we are going away—to preserve that knowledge.
~Babylon V
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