The Big Preview for Heroes of Might and Magic: Olden Era – Exclusive dev access and hands-on with the strategy RPG revival

Heroes of Might and Magic: Olden Era is a "great pleasure" and a "great responsibility" for its superfan CEO, and he's governed by one guiding principle: "Heroes is for everyone": How did Unfrozen come to revive the strategy RPG series that's now been under Ubisoft's umbrella for many years? It's no small thing, and the developer knows it.

Heroes of Might and Magic: Olden Era's huge demo feels like Early-Early Access because its strategy champion devs are constantly working off your feedback: "The philosophy here is transparency": Unusually, the demo that dropped during Steam Next Fest is still active and being updated ahead of the Early Access launch. We ask Unfrozen about the approach ahead of their release plans.

As Heroes of Might and Magic: Olden Era soars, Hooded Horse boss Tim Bender says passion-publishing trumps chasing money: "Why would anyone want to work with you if not for total lack of choice?": When players can be so passionate about their favorite game series, shouldn't development be approached much the same? That's what drives Hooded Horse according to Bender and, so far, it's working well.

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": So full of content is the demo, that players basically have an endless amount of game to play across different faction combinations and map templates.

I've been waiting 10 years for Heroes of Might and Magic: Olden Era, so here's the five biggest updates I'm already loving, and the development choices behind them: With many hours spent playing the latest Heroes already, we detail what we're loving the most, while also asking game director Leonid Parmenov about each one!

I'm usually a Dungeon disciple in Heroes of Might and Magic: Olden Era, but after 2 hours with the latest build, I'm feeling oddly fond of insects: We jump into a new build of the game to try out the campaign, more map templates, and expanded factions across quickplay and Arena, including the Hive and Sylvan factions, meaning we've now gone hands-on with all the towns that'll be available at launch.

Revisiting Heroes 3 after 20 years has made me realize that Heroes of Might and Magic: Olden Era may have already surpassed it: How much of an upgrade is Unfrozen's upcoming entry compared to the classics? Turns out, a lot! While we still enjoy revisiting the classics, it's only when playing them side-by-side that all of Olden Era's improvements really become clear. We've got a new favorite on our hands.