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Heroes of Might and Magic II is an absolute classic right? Released back in 1996, it lives on thanks to fheroes2.

fheroes2 is a free and open source game engine reimplementation. Think like OpenMW for Morrowind and openXcom for the original UFO/X-COM game. You need a copy of the data from the original to work with fheroes2, which you can find up on GOG.com.

"Lord Ironfist is dead and the Kingdom is plunged into a vicious civil war by his feuding sons. At stake is the ultimate prize: control of the land and succession of the royal throne. Will you support the villainous usurper and lead the armies of evil or be loyal to the righteous prince and deliver the people from tyranny." — Heroes of Might and Magic II synopsis.

The project still sees plenty of activity, with a new release going up earlier this month with these changes:

  • Add support for all official languages, including French, Polish, German and Russian
  • Add exchange buttons in hero meeting dialog
  • Extend The Succession Wars campaign support
  • Fix many places with hero drawings on World map
  • Fix multiple places with logic in battle
  • Over 80 bugs fixed since 0.9.2 release

See a video of it running below:

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Check it out on GitHub and remember to grab the data from GOG.com.

Article taken from GamingOnLinux.com.
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Rooster May 20, 2021
Quoting: Cyril
Quoting: Rooster
Quoting: KetilThe HD mod for heroes 3 is great on windows so I don't think non-linux users have the same incentive to work on vcmi. I believe it should work in wine, but haven't tried for a while.

It works perfectly.

Am I the only who play Heroes III without the HD mode?

I use it, but not to have HD resolution, but because it also includes some small quality of life improvements, especially when moving armies between heroes.
Cyril May 20, 2021
Quoting: RoosterI use it, but not to have HD resolution, but because it also includes some small quality of life improvements, especially when moving armies between heroes.

What do you mean by "small quality of life improvements"? This game is perfect period.
No seriously, you mean like move all troops in one click? I play mostly with only one hero so...
fheroes2 May 20, 2021
Quoting: CyrilWhat do you mean by "small quality of life improvements"? This game is perfect period.
No seriously, you mean like move all troops in one click? I play mostly with only one hero so...

There're dozens of places, where fans improved gameplay, making it more comfortable and enjoyable. (I'm talking about mostly UI)
Also, each game always has some flaws after release and can be improved in some gameplay aspects. Original HoMM game has them too, and I'm 100% sure you're abusing them. ) I'm not against fixing them and making game as it was supposed to be.


Last edited by fheroes2 on 20 May 2021 at 9:00 pm UTC
Rooster May 20, 2021
Quoting: Cyril
Quoting: RoosterI use it, but not to have HD resolution, but because it also includes some small quality of life improvements, especially when moving armies between heroes.

What do you mean by "small quality of life improvements"? This game is perfect period.
No seriously, you mean like move all troops in one click? I play mostly with only one hero so...

From the top of my head:

Move all troops in one click,
Move all artifacts in one click,
Being able to auto result a battle,
Being able to actually quit/load the game during battle


Last edited by Rooster on 20 May 2021 at 9:19 pm UTC
Cyril May 20, 2021
Quoting: Rooster
Quoting: Cyril
Quoting: RoosterI use it, but not to have HD resolution, but because it also includes some small quality of life improvements, especially when moving armies between heroes.

What do you mean by "small quality of life improvements"? This game is perfect period.
No seriously, you mean like move all troops in one click? I play mostly with only one hero so...

From the top of my head:

Move all troops in one click,
Move all artifacts in one click,
Being able to auto result a battle,
Being able to actually quit/load the game during battle

OK the 4th is nice, the rest I can live without, I rarely transfers things between heroes and I never wanted to auto result battles so I'm fine.
NoSt May 21, 2021
HoMM 2 was the first game in the series I ever played, and I loved it.
Being an old school gamer I'm genuinely happy that there are so many open source projects keeping these classic games alive today.
Cyril May 21, 2021
Quoting: NoStHoMM 2 was the first game in the series I ever played, and I loved it.
Being an old school gamer I'm genuinely happy that there are so many open source projects keeping these classic games alive today.

I started with Heroes III on my side. But yesterday I seriously tried Heroes II with fheroes2, big map, hard mode, it run very well! Graphically it's another world, but after a while you get used to it, and even old it's still charming.
It's very interesting to see the differences between the two games thought, some things are bad, some are better.

For me, after only some hours in-game, the worst is the hero's inventory that is so tiny, and didn't find a way to sell them after discovered the majority of the map and multiple towns. But in fact, you don't have an inventory with some active artifacts and some disabled, all you carry is active.
The possibility to buy all creatures from a building in one click is nice, curious they removed it in the III.
Magic spells seems a lot easier to me as apparently there isn't Magic elements Skills, so no specialization to get powerful spells like slow down all enemies troops etc, no there it's just different spells that everybody can learn.
Some things are very strange to me, like towns are not equal at all. In terms of upgrades, cost and power of creatures...
Like Necromancers have Bone dragons without upgrades, and the other town have Green, Red and Black dragons which are far better (300HP...), and of the other side the most powerful unit of the human town is the Crusaders with only 65HP, very curious.
There is also one thing that bother me, the lack of information's special skills of creatures, you don't if one can resist magic, curse another or regenerate etc.
Another thing is that towns can recruit 6 different creatures but your hero (and town) have only 5 slots, I clearly don't understand why.
fheroes2 May 22, 2021
Quoting: CyrilI started with Heroes III on my side. But yesterday I seriously tried Heroes II with fheroes2, big map, hard mode, it run very well! Graphically it's another world, but after a while you get used to it, and even old it's still charming.
It's very interesting to see the differences between the two games thought, some things are bad, some are better.

Heroes of Might and Magic II is balanced in not obvious way, comparing to Heroes 3, where it was implemented mostly through creatures. In Heroes 2 there's an essential differences in movement speed of faction. (Also, I should note here, that heroes move not so fast over world map, comparing to H3, so movement distance is very important)
Also, Primary attributes have a greater influence on troops, so strength-specialized fractions can deal much more physical damage, over weak wizards.
Also, regarding special abilities of creatures... With the help of our open engine we will add description to every creature in game. Just give us some time to polish our engine.


Last edited by fheroes2 on 22 May 2021 at 10:42 am UTC
Cyril May 22, 2021
Quoting: freeheroes2
Quoting: CyrilI started with Heroes III on my side. But yesterday I seriously tried Heroes II with fheroes2, big map, hard mode, it run very well! Graphically it's another world, but after a while you get used to it, and even old it's still charming.
It's very interesting to see the differences between the two games thought, some things are bad, some are better.

Heroes of Might and Magic II is balanced in not obvious way, comparing to Heroes 3, where it was implemented mostly through creatures. In Heroes 2 there's an essential differences in movement speed of faction. (Also, I should note here, that heroes move not so fast over world map, comparing to H3, so movement distance is very important)

Yeah but you have that spell "Dimension Door" that you can use multiple times and cost only 10 SP... ^^

Quoting: freeheroes2Also, Primary attributes have a greater influence on troops, so strength-specialized fractions can deal much more physical damage, over weak wizards.

I don't know. But I find that Primary attributes seems less "broken", not high as in Heroes III or it's harder to get them high. For example in my current game my hero (necromancer) is : level 26, bag full of artifacts, and Primary attributes are only at 17/14/16/19.

But again I'm discovering the game.

Quoting: freeheroes2Also, regarding special abilities of creatures... With the help of our open engine we will add description to every creature in game. Just give us some time to polish our engine.

Oh that's great!
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