Heroes of Might and Magic: Olden Era fans have already spent over 200 hours in the free Steam demo because there's an "unlimited amount of replayability"

If you're unfamiliar with the franchise, Heroes of Might and Magic: Olden Era is shaping up to be the perfect entry point. Aside from how it captures many qualities from throughout the property, there’s a demo you can sink literally hundreds of hours into, if you fancy.

That's according to Denis Fedorov, the CEO of the game's developer, Unfrozen, who revealed to us that there are people who've clocked upwards of 200 hours just in the trial so far. "It's amazing, and that's because the random map generator gives you an incredible, probably unlimited amount of replayability," he tells GamesRadar+.

"You can spend tens of hundreds of hours playing on different templates and you don't get bored," he continues. "So our multiplayer is also built around this randomly generated map." When the RNG is so good, even the demo seems bottomless, is definitely a flex.

YouTube

Watch On

It's the kind of thing that'll appeal to old fans while attracting newbies as well. This iteration of the strategy-RPG falls back on many elements that have kept it popular over the years, having you guide a custom-made hero, harking from one of six houses, across mystic land, recruiting an army of mythological monsters and growing in strength and stature.

Coming out 30 years after the first Heroes of Might and Magic game, Olden Era is the first installment in a decade, and the first to be published by Hooded Horse, marking something of a new era for the fantasy property. However long it takes for the next one to arrive, we can be safe in the knowledge there’ll still be map combos to discover.

"You cannot satisfy everyone": Heroes of Might and Magic leads are treating Early Access like a "full release," but "don't expect that everything works like a charm."