New Master of Magic, anyone?

fable · #1 (**permalink**) 10-02-2004, 04:48 PM

About 18 months ago, I spoke with the owner of Stardock, the people who make a variety of Windows utilities and some interesting, somewhat retro strategy games. (Their latest success was Galactic Civilizations.) He spoke of being approached by one of the big companies to do a successor to Master of Magic--which, IMO, was one of the best things to come out of Microprose. A mix of magical fantasy, with huge books of varying spells, and Civ-like growth/exploration/battle, it was a huge success during its day.

Stardock recently published the following:

"Right now Galactic Civilizations II is in development. But we are also in pre-production of a certain "Master" fantasy strategy game."

This is really an open kinda secret, since speculation has been rife for some time about the new MoM. Still, it's nice to have confirmation of it from the top.

Xandax · #2 (**permalink**) 10-03-2004, 01:49 AM

Well - I played MoM extensively in the old days (have lost my discs now), so I'd be very interested if something more was released about this

fable · #3 (**permalink**) 10-03-2004, 06:43 AM

I think it's going to be quite a while before they'll talk, but still--given the AI in Galactic Civilizations, I'd say it's a promising development. My only concern is that they'll remove some of the complexities of the original game, to make their job easier. But at this point, we should just wait and see.

Xandax · #4 (**permalink**) 10-03-2004, 07:16 AM

Well - MoM is one of the games I'm very nostalgic about, so if they change to much (for the worse

) of the concept, I'll most likely not play it out of fear of destroying the feel I had for the original.

Was a very fun mixture of Civilization and Magic.

fable · #5 (**permalink**) 10-03-2004, 07:48 AM

The sheer openendedness of it got to me. The mix of so many distinctive races, buildings, spellbooks (each from its own discipline), opponents, heroes and randomly generated maps made for a truly challenging experience. I just wish the AI hadn't been so quirky. But that team (who also did Master of Orion II) were never noted for the finest AI.

AI is precisely what Stardock receives accolades for. They have the advantage of far more powerful CPUs, more RAM, and thinking in realtime to make their opponents more savvy. If you haven't tried a demo of Galactic Civilizations, it's probably worth a shot. I find the game lacking too lacking in diplomatic options to really hold my interest, but it's still well done.

Noober · #6 (**permalink**) 10-07-2004, 03:47 AM

Master of Magic sounds familiar, could somebody please remind me what it's about?

fable · #7 (**permalink**) 10-07-2004, 07:49 AM

You select a race, each with its advantages and drawbacks. You also choose a wizard, allocating up to 8 spellbooks from 5 different colors, each of which specializes in a kind of magic. The more you concentrate on 1 color, the more in-depth the spells from that color you learn, but the less you have in the way of other spells.

As in Civ, you build cities over turns, choosing what to concentrate on. You expand in much the same way, or by sending troops to take over neutral or other opponents' cities. From time to time, heroes pop up for potential hire, each with their own abilities. Some of these can cast their own spells, in a minor way. You also need to control elemental mana generator squares--which, unfortunately, are initially occupied by fairly strong elementals of an appropriate type, who don't like visitors.

There were no ultimate alliances in MoM. You could temporarily help a fellow wizard, but in the end, only one could prevail. There were also two different universes, joined in a few spots where you could cross over: earth, and a separate dimension where magic was stronger.

That's the gist of it. As you can see, Age of Wonders was a shameless steal from MoM; though AoW created an even poorer AI than MoM, and dumbed down the number of buildings you could use to tailor each individual city.

fable · #8 (**permalink**) 11-06-2004, 11:14 PM

Stardock has now confirmed on their website that they're working on Master of Magic 2.

Galuf the Dwarf · #9 (**permalink**) 11-07-2004, 11:57 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by fable

Stardock has now confirmed on their website that they're working on Master of Magic 2.

It's about durned time.

Now, if Firaxis could only get to the X-COM games, then maybe we Microprose game fans may get some respite at last.

fable · #10 (**permalink**) 11-08-2004, 12:37 AM

Heh. And how about an updated Darklands, too? That's the other title I find amazingly hasn't been redone over the years.

But at least, this is a start. The nice thing about Stardock is those folks do great AI. If they resist the temptation to dumb down the complexity and cheap-up the graphics--and I think they'll keep at least the first--then it could be a sensational title.