Bug-ridden but still playable! (Might and Magic VII - For Blood and Honor (PS))

Member Name: CaptainD

Product:	Might and Magic VII - For Blood and Honor (PS)
Date:	13/07/06 (1793 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Solid fantasy RPG gaming...

Disadvantages: ... with quite a few negatives

Might and Magic VII: For Blood and Honour is another in the popular 3DO range of RPG games. The storyline starts off quite promisingly, with accounts from both Elves and Goblins of sea people bearing strange devices coming on land. To the leaders of the respective races this seems to be important news, though they don't let on why. Then we are introduced to the Emerald Island contest, which the four heroes in our merry band are entered into. Character creation is the normal choose your class, appearance, a couple of base skills and a few stats. Then onto the game itself, and the plot goes quiet for a long, long time…

This is a role playing game of the real-time 3D variety, though the graphics leave quite a lot to be desired. Still they portray the landscapes reasonably enough. The cut scenes are good quality though. Sound is a tricky thing to rate in this instance because it's very buggy in Windows XP, but more of that later. The character graphics are quite good and I do like the inventory carrying and skills systems. Though levelling up seems quite slow at first, after a while you get into it and there are various different ways to boost your stats, some temporarily and some permanently. You can mould your characters exactly how you want them, though as always in these games it's helpful to have a mix of warrior, healer, aggressive magic attack expert and general odd-bod who does a bit of everything else you might need. There are teachers scattered throughout the land who can give you "Expert", "Master", or "Grandmaster" status at particular skills if you are good enough at them - and have enough money, of course. Extra spells can be learned (or bought) once you've reached a high enough level, and of course there are a myriad of weapons, armours, and items that can be bought, sold, or used as required.

So far so good. The gameplay itself is made up of wandering round finding and completing quests, which are of the normal fetch & carry, destroy or rescue variety. They can be a bit samey but generally were okay. It's a shame that the game sort of ignores the overall plot for many hours of game time, at times it did seem as if playing the game lacked an overall purpose. As you get to grips with the game and gain new skills you can do more interesting things, but at the beginning (or if you're imprudent with your exploring!) you tend to end up dead a lot. Since you're automatically resurrected and put back to your start point when all your characters die it's not too terrible but losing your money is pretty annoying - don't forget to put it in the bank! Less annoying than a complete game over I suppose. Travelling around the environment can be a little too time-consuming, not just because the game map is large (which is a good thing), but also because you sometimes have to wait for coaches to be going where you want to go - or go somewhere else in order to then get where you're going. Since this added a touch of realism it wasn't a great problem, but did get tedious at times.

Which is in fact the main problem with the game. The gameplay is very repetitive at times, and the fact that the plot doesn't move forward for ages doesn't help this. Sub-games like The Arena (where you can face a bunch of monsters of various strengths and get a reward if you win) and Acromage (a card-based tower building game which is very addictive!) help but don't solve the problem completely. Though overall I did enjoy the game, there were times when you felt that there was little point to, or interest in what you were doing. There is a lack of real puzzles in the game though it's good that the few there are can usually be solved a couple of different ways. The game engine itself works fine, the graphics engine is rather buggy (with enemies floating out of the air to meet you - enemies who aren't supposed to be able to fly, that is!), and bits of the scenery going AWOL occasionally.

Problems with XP… well, it probably won't work straight after you install it. This may not be a problem particularly with XP itself, but rather with DirectX. (It doesn't recognise that you have version 6.0 or above - I have 9.1 installed at the moment.) It also doesn't like my 3D card - it recognises that there's one there, but thinks that my 64Mb card has less than 4Mb… Also it doesn't seem to like 3D sound - that is to say, with it selected (using either driver listed), the game simply crashes on boot-up. As it does if you try to use your graphics card. (Incidentally, the game installs a link to 3DO's technical support website - which isn't there anymore so it doesn't help!)

Here's the solution that worked for me, though some systems may require different tweaking:

Right-click on the M&M VII program icon and click "Properties". Click on the "Compatability" tab and change the compatability mode to Windows 95 (or 98, both work). Do the same for the configuration program. Run the configuration program and select software emulation for the graphics, and turn off 3D sound altogether. This was the only way I found to get the game to run, it didn't resolve all the sound problems (though the cut scenes were fine). Music wasn't a problem either but frequently speech and sometimes sound effects didn't play properly - sometimes causing amusing effects, but mostly just annoying (you can turn off voices etc if you want from the in-game menu).

To get the update patch for Might & Magic VII visit: http://www.adrenalinevault.com/pcrl/patches_temp.a sp?patch=mm7

Because it's available on the Sold Out Software label it's a cheap buy (£4.99 or one of 3 games for £10), and for some solid RPG action it's not too bad. With the bugs I'm not recommending it but I'm still giving it 3 stars because I enjoyed it to an extent despite all the negatives and problems. It's probably not as good as Might & Magic VIII: The Day of the Destroyer, but at least it has a better storyline. (How could it not?!?)

At the end of the day, you'll probably like this if you've played others in the series and enjoyed them, but otherwise there's not much to particularly recommend it. For some XP users getting it to run in the first place will be too much hassle!!

Summary: Not recommended unless you've liked other Might & Magic games