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| Thread: Silence of the Siren (HoMM like scifi game) |  This thread is pages long: 1 2 · «PREV |
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JollyJoker
Honorable
Undefeatable Hero
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posted February 04, 2024 07:43 PM |
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There are consumables like in HoMM 4. We have "abilities" like in HoMM V. You need "Energy" instead of Mana, which reminds me (plus the setting) of AoW Planetfall. The Academy thing is pretty cool with the 4 different "schools" of abilities.
Sure, it's HoMM 3 - but sufficiently far away from it.
Now, the real test for me is this: HoMM 3's biggest selling point was the massive number of factions (that has been further increased by the community). 4 factions won't be enough in the middle and long run. 6 will be ok in the middle run, but I feel that a game that close to HoMM 3 will need at least options to have 8 factions - and a random map generator, which may not come.
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LordCameron
Known Hero
Veteran of the Succession Wars
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posted February 05, 2024 02:37 AM |
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Their roadmap has mod support listed, so if they follow through more factions might be on the horizon even if they can't make them themselves.
That said, they'll need fans to make maps/factions for them in the first place.
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What are Homm Songs based on?
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yogi
Promising
Famous Hero
of picnics
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posted February 05, 2024 07:40 AM |
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JollyJoker said:
reminds me (plus the setting) of AoW Planetfall. The Academy thing is pretty cool with the 4 different "schools" of abilities.
never played planetfall, did it add more interesting adventure map locations to visit
the academy is a cool cross between mage guild and tech tree.
JollyJoker said:
and a random map generator, which may not come.
agree on the rmg at the very least, ideally a map maker.
thx J
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yogi - class: monk | status: healthy
"Lol we are HC'ers.. The same tribe.. Guy!" ~Ghost
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JollyJoker
Honorable
Undefeatable Hero
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posted February 05, 2024 08:56 AM |
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Tactical combat is very range-centered in Planetfall (which also means, that the hand-to-hand units are pretty awesome, since they have to be able to survive the ranged onslaught). The cool thing there is, that the combat maps "live". There are explodables (like old fuel tanks or power plants, generators or something like that) - or bio hazards, so some cover on those maps aren't actually cover, but death traps. 
There ARE interesting adventure map locations, each with their own map, but we had that in AoW3 already.
The game is pretty awesome, all in all, if you can live with the setting, and it has an Empire mode that is without equal, anywhere.
Since the game is done, grabbing PF complete in a sale is no mistake.
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yogi
Promising
Famous Hero
of picnics
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posted February 05, 2024 09:40 AM |
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Edited by yogi at 12:21, 05 Feb 2024.
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JollyJoker said:
There ARE interesting adventure map locations, each with their own map, but we had that in AoW3 already.
i should have been more specific, i mean locations that give "heroes" travels across the map less of a wargame and more of an adventure quest feel?
JollyJoker said:
it has an Empire mode that is without equal, anywhere.
just googled,  VERY intriguing... this might sell me
thx again mate, your opinion carries weight!
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yogi - class: monk | status: healthy
"Lol we are HC'ers.. The same tribe.. Guy!" ~Ghost
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JollyJoker
Honorable
Undefeatable Hero
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posted February 05, 2024 06:45 PM |
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Well, the thing with Planetfall is, that there is a backstory you can uncover via the campaigns.
Planetfall (as well as AoW 4) has a generic quest system that gives you "quests" to fulfill - mostly to beat something or other somewhere on the map, but the PF campaign maps are more or less completely quest driven by specific quests.
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yogi
Promising
Famous Hero
of picnics
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posted February 05, 2024 08:58 PM |
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JollyJoker
Honorable
Undefeatable Hero
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posted February 05, 2024 10:41 PM |
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Blake00
Known Hero
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posted May 31, 2024 01:21 PM |
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bluecamel
Adventuring Hero
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posted July 03, 2024 08:14 AM |
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Very, very impressed/inspired by this game.
Play the demo asap if you haven't.
I did enjoy Songs of Conquest for a while, it is definitely worth your time (and I love their active devs). But even what little we've seen here I can already say that Silence of the Sirens is just a better game in every way.
The game design is just so good (the balance they've struck between innovating yet keeping a ton of the core HoMM features is perfect. They know exactly what and what not to mess with)
Combat units are very interesting and have crazy abilities that we haven't seen before in HoMM games. I think some of them might end up getting nerfed (the upgraded hammerite's special ability is reeeally strong) but better that than Songs where it seemed like they were scared to give the units interesting abilities. Oh and shoutout to the shield battery which is a much more interesting version of ballista/first aid tent.
Adventure map is wild, with a lot of innovations. Way too many to name, but they all seem fun and add depth. The biggest change is being able to build your own tiny buildings on the map that cost resources. A small watch tower to watch key areas, or a well-placed turret that you might put at a choke to make it so that scouts can't get into your area without having an actual army. But these things do cost resources and can be pretty easily destroyed, so there's a cost/risk there and you probably won't be spamming these things.
The way you build your heroes feels pretty well-balanced and you have some tough choices. Your primary attributes are essentially (in HoMM terms) spell power, attack/defense, and logistics, and you can only choose to level one of those per level up, along with choosing a secondary skill. So it's not nearly as easy as it is in HoMM to make a hero that's just good at everything (expert logistics, expert earth magic, expert offense, 25 of every primary skill, etc.). Because of this and because they've made the choice to not allow hero chaining (troops have their own movement points) I think it will really encourage splitting armies between heroes and strategic play rather than just chaining the mega army around everywhere. But time will tell.
Graphics are good and have a lot of charm, and thank god it's not pixel art which can be great for some games but isn't a good choice for this kind of game because it gets too hard to read. Speaking of which, they stole the feature from AARPGS where if you hold alt it highlights interactable objects. So even if a map is really busy you can make sure you're seeing everything. Nice little addition.
Music is very good. I wasn't expecting anything great but it's actually top tier. If they make 8-10 more tracks like this then you couldn't ask for more unless they hired Romero himself. Fits the space theme very well.
My scalding hot take is by the end of it, if they keep the current trajectory, this will actually be a better game than Heroes 3 (and I think a lot of the HoMM vets will be swapping to this game once it's done). I know, this is heresy to say (especially on a HoMM forum), and they still have a long ways to go. But man their design choices are so good it hurts. And this really is a Heroes game at heart, in every sense of the word, but also with way more depth.
My small nitpick so far is that in the battles it can sometimes be a bit finnicky to get the mouse to do the exact move you want (i.e. do I want to attack this guy from center left or from top left).
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Blake00
Known Hero
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posted July 07, 2024 10:50 AM |
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LordCameron
Known Hero
Veteran of the Succession Wars
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posted July 11, 2024 01:00 AM |
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The second demo has actually made me like the game less than the first demo and I don't think this is passing or even approaching homm3 any time soon.
1. It doesn't learn enough from Homm3. The movement stat is interesting, but it still has skills like tactics, which slow the game down to a crawl when you take them.
2. It is less user friendly to play. Lot more clicks to do every action and pop ups appear at the bottom of the screen rather than the centre, requiring more mouse movements.
3. Less user friendly to understand. The stats aren't immediately obvious as to what they do and are harder to differentiate.
3. Graphically this user friendly problem continues. The UI is hard to parse at a glance, whereas a brand new player can sit down and play Heroes 2,3, or 7 just fine.
4. Graphics are hard to parse in general. Where do units begin in end, what am I supposed to be looking at? Why should I care about a grey blob instead of an orange blob.
5. No grounded in the shared mythos of humanity. This is a big one. Mole men and rat men and weird clunky machinery don't inspire the imagination as quickly as a dragon or a harpy. Further, it is a much higher cognitive load to understand what they do. Harpies fly and dragons breath fire, but what do robotic moles do? Can they dig? Are they machines? Why do they look like people?
5. B. Same goes for the map and resources. What is that weird box or pile of resources or tree looking thing? If you want to build a well you go looking for some rocks and maybe a shovel, but how do a build a thigomizer using watchamacalit crystals? I can't remember the name of any of the structures in the game a few seconds after playing it.
6. Finally (for now), the game runs wayyyyy worse than homm3. I was getting so many stutters and lag, and it doesn't feel nice to play. Even the slight delay on things moving or popping up and how it is 10% more difficult to navigate the overworld map. I've got RSI so I am extra sensitive to that kind of thing. I can play homm3 on basically all of my worst days, but I struggle to play this on my best day.
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What are Homm Songs based on?
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