Might & Magic Heroes VII Closed Beta 2 Launches
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Right on cue, the team at Ubisoft has announced the launch of their second round of closed beta testing for Might & Magic Heroes VII, which will run until September 2nd. Additionally, the development team at Limbic has taken the opportunity to pen a letter to the community on what to expect from this latest build of the game:
Hello Councilors,
Since Closed Beta 1, our team has been hard at work to finish the game content while integrating your feedback and bug reports from the Closed Beta 1. Thanks again for those who took the plunge and endured the extra delay and the occasional hiccups. The game is now content & feature complete for a month now, and these days we are purely focusing on improving the experience, bug fixing like there is no tomorrow, and polishing the title even more. This is the very last run before the finish line and we throw all our forces into the battle to meet our deadline and a high quality bar. And this is not the end, as we will of course continue to support the game well after its release with tweaks, balancing and a few surprises as well. More on that later on.
This second Closed Beta is the occasion for us to do a last live test before closing curtains and doors to finalize the project. You will be able to experience two new factions, voted by you, the community, to feature in this Second Beta phase, as well as two new beautiful skirmish maps, in additional to the original content of Closed Beta 1. We also included some of your feedbacks from the first beta. For instance:
- We have iterated on the spell acquisition: we have introduced a new Arcane Knowledge system and added new adventure buildings granting spells
- We have completely redesigned and rebalanced the Meta Magic skill
- Battlesites have been added (not all of them, we keep a couple for release just for you)
- Countless changes to the game interface, both big and small. Signs & feedbacks have been greatly improved.
- AI overhaul (still a big topic at Limbic)
- Sim turns!
- Multiple languages support
- Adventure Map camera visibility has been improved, with the dreaded atmospheric fog removed.
- Astmospheric fog has been adjusted in terms of density, whilst the depth of field has been entirely removed.
Of course, you will have to wait the full game release on September 29th to explore the campaigns and the other game modes.
We are eager to read your feedback and comments on the Shadow Council and the Ubisoft forums. Your take on balancing and user experience is priceless and will help us improve the game further on.
We would like also to tackle two topics you might encounter today. Remember this is beta, not the final game, and hence we still have a lot of things to improve. But right now, here are the most pressing at the moment:
- Multiplayer: We have a troubling issue on the Multiplayer side, we have some issues to reproduce entirely: basically, certain combinations of army may lead to a hang during combat. The game is still responsive, but the game logic breaks down. You will be able to exit gently by returning to the main menu. On this one, we would really appreciate if you could share the occurrences on which you encounter this issue. That will really help pinpoint what is going on. Of course, this won't happen each time you try multiplayer, but you may encounter it a couple of times.
- AI: AI in Heroes has been a source of perpetual headache since the series beginning, and this one is no exception. We have made good progress on that front, and we will continue to do until the game release and beyond. But keep in mind we have still a lot of optimization to throw in and the AI turns can be quite long when you play a large map with a lot of AI playing against you. Nothing to report especially on that part, but we prefer to be open on that topic and let you know we are still working on it.
Again thanks for your time and dedication. Your feedback, your comments and your passion during this new Beta will really help us to cross the finish line in the best shape possible.
Waiting for you on the Ashan battlefields!
Your Heroes 7 team.