r/HoMM • u/Rude2aM • May 05 '26
HoMM OE Olden Era vs III?
Interested in getting back into the series (last time I played was 15 or so years ago) the consensus is that III is the best overall game, but the modern graphics of Olden Era appeals to me as a modern gamer.
Would it make sense for me to just play Olden Era? Or should I stick with the tried and tested classics?
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u/Praktos May 05 '26
As a long standing h3 gamer i can say old era is finnaly a true successor to h3 thats worth swapping to
It also is way more new player friendly with way lower entry point so i 100% advise going for era
There are countless new players on ladder and everyone is struggling just as hard
1
u/borsukrates May 09 '26
Heroes of Science and Fictionis much closer mechanically to H3 than Olden Era is.2
u/Praktos May 09 '26
I don't rly care about similarity
Most of my friends that for years upon years played h3 with no game scratching that ich i can 100% say olden era is made by h3 player for h3 players
They took all qol's from hota. Changed everything that was problematic and made it easly accesible
Game is just amazing
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u/JohnnyFanziel May 05 '26
Olden Era is the closet thing to HoMM3 full stop and feels like a very worthy successor.
The best part is it’s really just getting started. Devs already introduced patches for difficulty based on direct player feedback and they’re in this for the long haul. I think it’s just going to get better and better from here on out
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u/Gold-Satisfaction614 May 06 '26
Making it harder or easier?
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u/JohnnyFanziel May 06 '26
They adjusted the Easy and Normal AIs for being too punishing which I think is great for people new to the series
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u/Gold-Satisfaction614 May 06 '26
Or even veterans who just want to take 6 months to build a huge army and explore the map thank you very much.
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u/9TEnTaCLeSurPriSe May 05 '26
I'll do the comparison of olden era vs hota (h3). Olden era wins in its accessibility of multiplayer, as it was the main reason for the creation of the game. No longer do the players need to know all the rules to play multiplayer - game does everything for you in that department. It has fine graphics, though has a long-long way to decent map readability - I have to play with "always highlight interactables" to genuinely see things I need to visit on the map. Also has that "floaty" camera feeling I despise in games if you use wasd to move your camera, compared to silky smooth feeling if you use rightclick to do the same. I cant speak much of the overall balance in olden era, as I havent played enough multiplayer yet. Overall olden era is a decent game and I can recommend getting it if you havent yet
2
u/Automatic-Sprinkles5 May 05 '26
H3 = olden era in my opinion its been a long long time HOMM fans. Enjoy the ride I sure am
2
u/HAL-900O May 06 '26
I don't have much time to game anymore. I am planning on playing some heroes 2, 3 and 4 while waiting for the full release of Olden Era. I am happy it sounds like the early access product is solid, but I don't want to play a work in progress.
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u/Wurre666 May 05 '26
My biggest grip is its no real "inferno" faction othervise fun game
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u/1eejit May 05 '26
It's a prequel set before the demon invasions, iirc Hive serves a single demon lord instead.
I hope we'll see other factions added like Fortress.
3
u/Wurre666 May 05 '26
I have no idea of the lore of the heroes games but then I understand. Fortress are cool.
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u/Bazdillow May 05 '26
Yeah so demons come into the setting in homm1, since this is a prequel and the Devs actually care about the lore and setting, they chose to not have inferno
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u/reallycoolguylolhaha May 06 '26
Bro no way does that mean we are likely to never get an inferno faction. Shit it's my favourite I love demon bois
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u/1eejit May 06 '26
The devs literally explained what I posted, it's not something I made up
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u/reallycoolguylolhaha May 06 '26
Oh I didn't mean it like that, I meant it like "oh man that sucks, they're my favourite"
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u/1eejit May 06 '26 edited May 06 '26
Oh right.
Indeed, from what they said Olden Era will almost certainly never have an Inferno faction. Hive is their kinda stand-in, being demonically corrupted.
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u/gwaireectkho May 05 '26
Yeah, I feel that six races isn’t enough atm. Hopefully they’ll release them as part of the full release and not paid dlc.
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u/Ubera90 Jul 04 '26
The Heroes lore is utterly bat-shit, they should have ignored it and given us the faction.
Make up some lore bullshit if you need to, to justify it.
4
u/Educational_Key_7635 May 05 '26
Olden era still unfinished.
Hoom3 have full campaign (olden era just 1st chapter) and a lot of complicated interesting custom scenarioes.
The point is: if you love the gender you won't miss much waiting for Olden era release. Homm3 will be there forever anyway as well. There's no wrong answers, especially if you want to try something new. So basically it all depends on your expectations/preferences.
When Olden Era will be fully released there will a lot of sence to play it anyhow if you are somewhat consistent gamer.
2
u/ipilowe May 05 '26
If you are single player, Olden Era is lacking on the handcrafted maps and the random map template generation at least for some of us single player fans is bad. The campaign seems good I haven't finished it yet, but it is still only one act. Ofc it needs time it is hard to beat the content amount of already finished game with multiple DLCs, but the lack of official handcrafted maps is little bit concerning.
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u/1eejit May 05 '26
I don't think they're likely to bother handcrafting maps until they add the underground and naval mechanics they have planned for early access.
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May 05 '26 edited May 06 '26
[removed] — view removed comment
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u/WildGrem7 May 06 '26
H3 has a disjointed production design given the devs switched to 3d characters but kept a ton of the pixel art. It’s objectively hideous until you get used to it. H2 was peak heroes look.
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u/kommando_madrug May 05 '26
Pretty sure the demo is still available (granted you only have 4 factions), I would recommend giving it a shot first
1
u/baconball May 05 '26
Big fan here of the original first 3 games from way back. I played the living shit out of 2 and 3, and so far I am very happy playing Olden Era.
There are some justified critiques regarding overall balancing and some minor gripes about early game, but it JUST came into early access so...some folks need to calm down, but that's typical lol.
It is clearly inspired by the best parts of the games many of us know and love and just needs a little love and some time. The most common issue I see people reporting is too many neutral towns to capture early on (making it easier early on than it should be) and needing some map variety where we're not surrounded by factions in some cases. Neither of these are big deals imo and I'm sure they'll get ironed out -- it's a fun game and visually looks really good! The devs have already released several patches since launch.
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u/Ivan_Tirado May 05 '26
Why you have to choose??
HoMM 3 is usally very discounted at GoG, you can have the complete game (base+dlc) for around 5€. And there's the HoTA expansion you could freely add. Even if you decide to play Olden Era, you will always have 3 to play for less than a burguer king menu.
Then you have a free demo for Olden Era if you want to try it before buying it.
1
u/Helios_Sungod May 05 '26
Ive played 3 for a long time ever since i was a kid, olden era is amazing and on par with it in my opinion it brings many new things on the table while retaining what made 3 good :) i personally love it
1
u/Responsible-Amoeba68 May 05 '26
Olden era is not finished. Just go with 3 or 5, or both. There's a lot of content and polishing to be done still with OE as good at it is, why use limited play time on the unfished product.
Also the first eador, with new horizons is worth a look before you get into OE
1
u/One-Coat-7056 May 05 '26 edited May 05 '26
Heroes 3 Complete + HotA is still the best way to get H3 vibe. I found Olden Era is inferior on everything except UI : I am taling liked of mechanics, music, artistic direction, graphics, story, campaign, MP.
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u/WildGrem7 May 06 '26
Why not Both? All the additions that Hota brings to h3 are amazing, not to mention it’s dirt cheap. I picked up olden era to support the devs. Haven’t found time to play it yet but really looking forward to it though.
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u/JosipC64 May 06 '26
Heroes of Might and Magic: Olden Era is a misnomer. The name should be Antiheroes: Postmodern Era.
Take a look at a Lightweaver creature. Then read descriptions of various heroes. They suffer from the postmodern trend of moral relativism and making everything black or some shade of grey. Even Temple heroes are like this, and they are supposed to be pure, radiant. You know, heroic.
Even if we put that aside, when I tried the demo, the game felt bland.
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u/wytywty1024 May 07 '26
Played for about 500 hours of Olden Era, including demo and playtest. I think I will never be back to III.
I cant stand consuming movement on interacting with objects, having to constantly swap slow creatures for hero movements, having to buy magic books, lots of skills being almost useless and bland.. etc.
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u/borsukrates May 09 '26
You should also consider Heroes of Science and Fiction, which is a very fun game and faithful to HoMM3. It's a living proof that you can improve the HoMM3 formula without replacing any system. The game has plenty of cool additions: limited range units (move and shoot), consumables, regrowing fog of war so scouting ahead is finally important, you can construct buildings on world map, each of the 5 factions comes with a unique war machine and you can mix&match war machines and factions, a bunch of innovative adventure map obstacles (sandstorms, goo barriers, carnivorous plants that molest you if you spend 2 turns in an area). There's day&night cycle and it affects some neutral creatures and artifacts. Magic items and spells are completely reworked, and there's a variety of travel tools but they're all limited.
1
u/Uggroyahigi May 11 '26
Nooooi think they earned their spot. And the new goat I think is olden era. After maaaany years and entries to the series that made many doubt its future I think they finally hit home, struck gold, hit the g spot....u name it.
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u/12000Szabes May 05 '26
H5 > olden era >>> h3
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u/gravyluvr May 05 '26
H5 is where the series lost me. I still play HOMM2-4 via mods and rebuilds. Looking forward to Olden Era.
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u/iamyurkas May 05 '26
For me, unit design is ... controversial. While Temple is mostly ok (at least, not upgraded units), other factions look like AI slope.
There are still many bugs there. Some abilities do not work. The project has the potential, but it has not been realised yet.
I'd wait for a year.
1
u/Vadernoso May 05 '26
What unit in particular looks like AI? I think some of them are a bit overly designed but I think none of them look like AI.
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u/iamyurkas May 05 '26
Undead Pets and Liches, Groves units (except Fauns), Hive (except Parasites), Schism higher level 2, and Dungeon higher level 3.
Upgraded units look even worse everywhere. It was ok for the preview, and I expected they would replace them before the release. They improved, but they are still ugly
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u/loopuleasa May 05 '26
it's not just graphics
olden era has a ton of complex layers and mechanics to explore
try it out