Might and Magic 9

Customizing your party isnyt half as fun as it was in earlier incarnations of yMight & Magic,y and gives you far fewer options than the last installment in the series y which poses the obvious question: shouldnyt a sequel outdo its forebears? Only four races are available to you (human, elf, dwarf, or half-orc), and the portrait selection is limited to two generic faces per race, and two more per sex. You can customize your characterys voice, but that ultimately boils down to choosing the voiceover that least annoys you. And, of course, you tweak a few stats and traits, but they too are few. Donyt expect the kind of roleplaying youyd get from yIcewind Daley or yMorrowindy here.

When you have assembled your party, the story begins. The game plays essentially the same as previous entries in the series: combat is an optional real-time or turn-based affair, and you visit various provinces and cities seeking quests that can transform your humble fighter into a crusader, or your magician into a lich. Wandering the countryside is somewhat gratifying despite the blocky landscapes, because you often run into things you werenyt expecting, or bump into quests that boost your experience. Unfortunately, monster encounters arenyt very intense, primarily because only two or three different breeds of monsters seem capable of stalking any one given province, and most of them look pretty ridiculous. Combat isnyt very exciting either, since you canyt really even tell when your blows are connecting against your opponent unless you read the scrolling text at the bottom of the screen. Only archery reveals sound cues and splashes of blood (even from skeletons and the like who should obviously not bleed when hit).

The more time you spend with the game, the more it will grow on you, and the more addicted you may even become, but it still feels like youyre playing an early beta of what could have been a far superior game. Outdoor and indoor environments all suffer from a lack of detail that makes them feel mostly generic. This pervading lack of polish makes it very hard to suspend disbelief, since you rarely (if ever) feel like youyre in a living, breathing world. There are graphical glitches to further hamper your adventures, and you can sometimes clip into hills or embankments and become stuck in them. Scenery pop-in often raises its ugly head, and youyll marvel at how an outdoor fog can follow you indoors as well, graying up whatever castle or keep you have entered.

The gameys scripting can also be broken. For example: in a dwarven mine, you are supposed to break through a wall that, for some reason, the dwarves couldnyt penetrate. Behind the wall is a demoness that is freed by your incursion y unless of course you donyt break down every piece of the wall. Break only a section of it, walk into the room, and find that nothing happens until you go back and shatter the rest. Then, and only then, you find yourself in a cut-scene, since youyve only now triggered it. This is why games are playtested rigorously before release, 3DO!

The list of complaints that can be leveled against IX is pretty lengthy indeed. Many of the gameys quests are tepid and tedious and require too much walking across open country that youyve already cleared of foes; the inventory and outfitting screen is unintuitive and not half as interesting as that seen in the previous games (why does my female elven warrior have a male dwarf representing her?); the gameys sound effects are sparse and generally gratingy All of these flaws make IX a hard game to recommend wholeheartedly, even to fans of the franchise, especially in a year that brought with it great RPGs like yIcewind Dale II,y yMorrowind,y and yArx Fatalis.y But to those who absolutely adore the unique style of adventure that only yMight & Magicy offers, this should do, provided you brace for some disappointment. I can only hope that 3DO licenses a new engine next time around, and makes sure to take it time polishing up the game before its release. Despite all of the new additions made to IX, it is inferior to its predecessors in almost every respect. This one has all the signs of a game rushed out the door to meet some dreaded deadline y but if youyre a CRPG addict, and have already run through the yearys best, then itys worth a look (despite the horror stories you may have heard).

Final Score: C


Going down hill fast....   March 21, 2003
 1 out of 5 found this review helpful

I don't know what 3DO is thinking with this line of games. The first six of these games aren't bad and are some of the classics of the genre. However, once seven came along, there were some very dramatic facelifts to the RPG. Baldur's Gate and Torment came out around the same time and really added some needed depth to the RPG. The M&M series is still stuck in that same old rut of level, new spell, new dungeon, new level, etc. etc. So that leads up to the newest installment. They have finally improved over the 2D graphics of five years ago with a 3D model that looks like it should have come out 4 years ago. The characters and voices you can choose from are pure cheese, similar in a way to Wizardry 8 (However on the whole that RPG is much better). Then there is the game itself. Wandering through monotonous realms slashing this and blasting that. Fundamentally the same system of levels and skills are in place in the previous installments. There is no depth to speak of, and I found that I had to force myself to keep playing after awhile due to mounting boredom.
There is nothing new here. And what few improvements that have been made should have been made to the series several years ago.