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Interview RPG Codex Interview: Might & Magic X - Legacy

Crooked Bee

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Tags: Julien Pirou; Limbic Entertainment; Might & Magic X: Legacy; Stephan Winter; Ubisoft

Just a couple of weeks ago at PAX East, Ubisoft announced Might & Magic X - Legacy, a new entry in the legendary Might & Magic RPG series. Described by Ubisoft as "a first-person RPG that has pledged to respect the tried-and-tested tradition of its illustrious ancestors, as it leads you to epic adventure and quests while exploring the wild peninsula of Agyn," Might & Magic X is scheduled for release later this year.

Surprisingly enough, in these days of "reboots" and "reimaginings" (Fallout 3, Tomb Raider and Thief being the most prominent examples), Might & Magic X continues to be inspired by World of Xeen rather than something like Skyrim, and features turn-, party- and grid-based gameplay. To find out more about the game, as well as why Ubisoft even decided to make it in the first place -- so far, they are the first and only major publisher to announce an "old school" title -- we sent some questions over to Ubisoft and had them answered collectively by Stephan Winter, CEO of Limbic (the company that develops the game for Ubisoft), Julien Pirou (Writer & Designer), and Gary Paulini (Producer). Have a snippet from the resulting interview:

To you, what are the essential features of a Might & Magic game that you aim to preserve in Legacy? What about the series attracts you personally, and which of the Might & Magic games influence the new game the most?

To us, Might & Magic RPGs are about a party of adventurers exploring a large world in first-person view, meeting a variety of characters, visiting cities, and of course exploring dungeons and fighting monsters in turn-based combat. The specifics may vary from one game to the next (for instance Might & Magic 6 introduced free movement while the earlier games were grid-based), but these basic ingredients were always there and they are still at the core of Might & Magic X - Legacy.

Since there have been several "eras" as far as the gameplay of the series is concerned, we had to think hard about the kind of game we wanted to make. Several pitches were made, more or less faithful to the original games, but we finally decided to go for a gameplay similar to the World of Xeen episodes. We still kept some ideas of the later games, notably our skill system is similar (though not identical) to the skill system featured in Might & Magic 6-7.

Might & Magic games have always been open-world and not just corridor-based, which distinguished them from other first person RPGs such as Wizardry or The Bard's Tale. How open-world will Legacy be compared to the previous titles, and how big will the world itself be? Will the game have level scaling of any sort, i.e., will it scale the power or number of enemies in an area to your level (like Might & Magic II did)?

Might & Magic X starts with a smaller area. This is the "tutorial" area, which we call "Act I". Here you’ll explore your first town, get your first quests, complete your first dungeons, learning how to play along the way. When Act I is over, the rest of the world opens and what you do next is really up to you. If you want to go to that mountain over there despite the fact it’s notoriously full of angry Cyclopes, nothing will stop you.

There will be no scaling of the monsters depending on your level. We feel it’s one of the great pleasures in RPGs to become a demi-god and then return to those Cyclopes and teach them a lesson. However as you progress through the main story some new creatures and monsters may appear in some areas.

While it’s too early to talk the specifics of the game’s world, we can already say it’s bigger than the world of Clouds of Xeen for instance.

Could you elaborate on how training for skills is going to work in Might & Magic X? When will you need to look for a trainer and when will you not?

While, as mentioned earlier, you don’t have to train just to level-up and gain your skill points, we did keep the idea of teachers that can allow you to reach the next tier for your skills.

You start as a Novice, and then you can become Expert, Master and finally Grandmaster by locating the appropriate teacher. Of course Expert teachers are fairly common, while there’s only one Grandmaster teacher per skill and they can be pretty hard to find. And when you do find them, you never know what they’re going to ask you to do before they grant you the title. : )​

The interview also discusses the game's class, race and skill system, the question of "accessibility" vs. "simplification", the size of enemy groups, the attractiveness of "niche" video game markets, the absence of any "always online" elements in M&M X and the presence of UPlay (which is unfortunately required, but only for one-time activation).

Be sure to read the interview in full: RPG Codex Interview: Might & Magic X - Legacy
 

Cyberarmy

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Fuck this shit, I cannot take this anymore ... I can only bitch about Uplay which is a minor thing since it works offline.
I will nuke them from orbit if they fail after hyping us this much,
 

Bulba

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sounds awesome in every department apart from drm. I might buy the game and just play pirate afterwards.... but then should I support nasty drm policy?
 

Achiman

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Ahhh, the old find the arsehole trainer hiding away on top of a mountain,behind a house, up a chimney etc....
 

Zeriel

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Some really great answers in there. The only part I don't like is not having to go to town to level up, and I can admit that's just pointless nostalgia on my part. Uh, and classes seemingly only having one upgrade path. Unlike some people, I actually like the idea of the races each having unique classes with different distributions of skills and powers. Really can't wait for this, I want to get my grubby hands on it, unplug the ethernet cable, and get to work.
 

Zeriel

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Also, quoting Emerson offhand in response to an interview question is something that should be done to IGN all day.
 

J_C

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Oh men, there is so much incline in this, it surpasses some Kickstarter oldschool games.
 
Repressed Homosexual
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The one thing I am worried about is that it will lose the art, Monty Python kind of nerd humor, and charm of the games made by JVC, all to be replaced by utterly generic stuff.
 

Zeriel

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Well, it seems confirmed that the monster models will basically just be a straight copy of stuff from Heroes 6. I'm mostly okay with that, since the art was the one thing I thought was very well done about Heroes 6. It's also nice that they sprang for 2D art for the portraits.
 

DalekFlay

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I have to buy this day one to send a message, if for no other reason. This is exactly what I have been screaming at publishers to do since the Xbox launched... diversify, make smaller budget games for smaller dedicated audiences in addition to your blockbusters.

Shame about the DRM but whatever, can't stop the :incline:
 

Hobo Elf

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Pleasantly surprised at the amount of incline this project is bringing in. Newfags will be able to try some real TB combat for once without bitching about the game having "shit grafix" and thus is unplayable to them. Maybe publishers are finally realizing that trying to get the CoD audience with one game is a bad idea and that downsizing budgets and creating more niche projects is better for everyone? Or maybe this is just a freak accident. We'll see.
 
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:incline:

And bros (and gals) that worked on this interview, thx! It's great and contains all the questions I wanted to know! :love:

P.S. I just hope we start seeing more :incline: and :obviously: games from publishers, as there proves to be enough audience for such games. That in turn will educate kids and make them appreciate :obviously: games more, as they will be used to them, and maybe start thinking that some games are too simplified and popamoled, and it could change the nature of the industry. :) I wish. :(
 

mindx2

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WOW, pleasantly surprised at the amount of :incline:* in that interview.... not to mention that Ubisoft actually agreed to a Codex interview!!!! :eek:


*been using this emoticon quite a bit lately which is in itself... :incline:.
 

Mortmal

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Uplay been cracked all the time, i dont know why they bother with that still , you can find all their latest assassin creeds on pirate bay if you want to (I bought them), it just one needless registration step and waste of time for their pyaing customers. If someone want to get it for free, nothing will prevent them except their own moral standards.
I dont think it will bring the COD crowd , as good the graphics are for us, its probably not enough for them , they are extremely demanding on the eye candy. Newfags wont try turn based combat with that, they will go to the steam forums , read opinions then flee to the hills as its not like skyrim. They will get it if its very cheap like grimrock, play it 30 min and throw it away.

How was born your addiction to computer rpgs ? I am pretty sure most of us if not all of us started with pen and paper.thats thecrowd they should cater to, it will never attract mainstream gamers.
 

Zeriel

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Uplay been cracked all the time, i dont know why they bother with that still , you can find all their latest assassin creeds on pirate bay if you want to (I bought them), it just one needless registration step and waste of time for their pyaing customers. If someone want to get it for free, nothing will prevent them except their own moral standards.
I dont think it will bring the COD crowd , as good the graphics are for us, its probably not enough for them , they are extemely demanding on the eye candy. Newfags wont try turn based combat with that, they will go to the steam forums , read opinions then flee to the hills as its not like skyrim. They will get it if its very cheap like grimrock, play it 30 min and throw it away.

How was born your addiction to computer rpgs ? I am pretty sure most of us if not all of us started with pen and paper.thats thecrowd they should cater to, it will never attract mainstream gamers.

I'm honestly not sure on that account, earliest games I remember playing were stuff like original Prince of Persia and choplifter, I kind of just drifted into RPGs in the very early days of the internet when shareware was such a big deal. Once I was exposed to them I really liked them, but I never came from the tabletop direction (though I loved a lot of D&D CRPGs I played, and derivatives like Aethra Chronicles).
 

Infinitron

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I am pretty sure most of us if not all of us started with pen and paper.

No.
How did you discover your first (turn based) computer rpg ?

I got into RPGs back in the mid-90s because I was frustrated with the decline of the adventure genre and I saw RPGs as providing a story-driven experience, but with more freedom and flexibility. I never made a big deal out of the real-time/turn-based distinction. Didn't seem like a huge deal to me back at the time. Still doesn't.
 

Crooked Bee

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sounds awesome in every department apart from drm. I might buy the game and just play pirate afterwards.... but then should I support nasty drm policy?

If the game does turn out to be good, I'd say you should buy it if only to see M&M XI made.

Also one-time activation on UPlay isn't any worse than what Steam does. So if you can tolerate Steam, chances are you won't mind UPlay either.

EDIT: Edited to avoid derail.
 

duchU

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Hello.
Guys, you should have asked if Acromage be there, especially the game itself is going to be rather short/medium in length.
 

Zeriel

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Arcomage was never a series staple, it was just a cute thing they did later on. No reason to expect it.
 

CormagMacD

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Arcomage FTW.

Not quite sure how I feel about no level trainers, I always liked the balance in Xeen between managing funds in the Bank and spending $$$ on spells and training. 6 & 7 did away with this by not having the banks pay interest on your deposits. Plowing through as much of Clouds and the early portions of Darkside (Castleview, and it's immediate environs) for the cash to build a nest egg, and leveling as little as possible was always a fun challenge. By the time I usually get around to Newcastle, I usually had a few hundred grand sitting around for power-leveling just from the interest paid on those early deposits. :D

Overall, fuck yeah. Please more M&M
 

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