Might and Magic Heroes 6 (demo)

It's not so common fashion these days to release a game demo before the actual game. Luckily, the new Heroes of Might and Magic game did just that. Releasing in October, the demo is already available. Not sure why they messed up the title though... they don't like the word "of"? Apparently, it will continue with the storyline of "Heroes of Might and Magic 5". Well, sort of, as it's a prequel.
As most PC gamers older than 20, I used to like HoMM 3 a lot. 4th game wasn't all that popular, so HoMM 5 tried to be just like the 3rd. I tried hard to like it but for me, it wasn't anything special, although the "town screens" were really cool. HoMM... sorry, MaMH 6 looks to be just more of the same, eventhough the developers are now hungarians (Black Hole Entertainment) instead of Russia-based Nival. The good old core game is there but the whole process is way more streamlined and full of little unchallenging annoying battles on every corner (same problem as in "King's Bounty"). I played Black Hole's first game "Armies of Exigo" way back in 2004 and while the graphics were really nice, the game itself was a lame "Warcraft 3" clone.  Their next game, "Warhammer: Mark of Chaos" also didn't get that a very warm welcome, but both of these games had amazing opening cinematics.

Now let me reveal one of the greatest secrets of gaming industry - usually the cinematic trailers are not made by the same people who make the games. So if a trailer is really good, it doesn't say anything about the game itself. What's more - buying a good CGI trailer means less money for the game development, so the alarming trend is to dedicate funds to trailers (as it makes for good marketing) and develop crappy games. There are exceptions, of course, such as Blizzard.
As for Might and Magic Heroes 6, I think I'll try the final version but I wouldn't get my hopes up.

Saiko