Might and Magic III: Isles of Terra

"A sad port of an excellent game."

Most Pc RPG players will recognize the words ''Might and Magic'', and anybody who's played old school pc games will remember how good this series used to be. These games were neither beautiful to look at, or wonderful to listen to, but boy were they ever fun to play. Super fast gameplay that was mostly exploration based, you'd be searching foreign lands for quests, money, and of course stuff to kill mixed with a story that usually was just good enough to get you through the game. Now what was a dynamite series on pc seems to have gone sour on console, if any of you played Might and Magic on Playstation...well uh..lets not go there, but here we have Might and Magic 3 arguably the best of the seires, and while it was unbeliveable on pc, its a rather pale shadow of itself on the snes.

Graphics: 6/10
One of the few areas (maybe only) I think I see an improvement, while this is hardly a graphical masterpiece, neither was the orginal. The backrounds look pretty much the same but it seems most, if not all, of the enemies have been redrawn, a little more detailed, and nicer looking than thier pc counterparts

Sound: 4/10
Backround tunes that were never that great in the first place, are the same on the on the snes, they are well and truly forgetable. They repeat a little to much for my liking and get a rather grateing after awhile. Luckily tho, the gameplay makes it so you pay very little attention to the soundtrack. The sound effects, what few there are, are nothing more than a few bleeps, boops and grunts. whoopie..

Control: 5/10
Heres were the Pc ver destroys the snes, the menu system, walking around the countryside, and combat all were faster, easier and more enjoyable on the pc. The menu system is the biggest disapointment on this port, with it being incrediably slow and clumsy, if it were just becuse of the snes controller I could accept this but its not the only problem. First of all there is no easy way to trade items amongst your party, you have to go into the discard command say no then it gives you the choice to give it to another party member, now this may not sound like much but a) I cant tell you how many items I droped never to see again cause I got impatient waiting and b) when your switching around numerous items (which is not to rare in M&M) it takes a loooooong time. Every time you go from one screen to another it slowly fades to black and the painfuly fades back in, making the whole process even longer. Walking is another chore, in the pc rev you literly fly acorss the country side, in snes land it seems like the game loads every step of the way, kinda funny on a cart game.

Gameplay: 7/10
While it's pretty much the same, there are some major issues, to name a few, all stat increasing crystals for the personality trait didnt increase anything (very bad if you have clerics in your party) breakable walls mysteriously seem to get rebuilt after you knock them down, and when you see enemies sometimes theres a delayed reaction in thier movements and suddenly when the game catches up, you become completely surrounded. These are just a few of the bugs in this game, ah yes bugs in a console release when the pc counter part was bug free, I can feel the irony from here.

Story: 5/10
While there is eventualy a main story, the game sort of just thrusts you into the world and lets you sink or swim. While some people prefer a more structered approach I didn't mind this change form the norm, its a very open game. Eventually a main story takes center stage near the end but throughout most of the game,its just explore find quest, explore, if thats good or bad is up to you.

Fun: 7/10
As hard as this developer may have tried it couldn't kill what made this game so cool, the gameplay, while its much slower paced its still prety fun, the exploration factor is still there with lots of towns, dungeons and other assorted fantasy realms to explore, with side quests galore.

While it may seem Im a little harsh on this port its just because I loved the original so much. If you have the Pc ver of this game don't even bother with this port, it's not even in the same hemisphere as its Pc brother, and while I can understand there might be some short comings in a port like this (most old pc ports to console usually stank) the dearth of quality in this rev makes it seem like they TRIED to kill this game. Now having said that if you've never tried this game and wana give it a whirl and this is the only way you can, what you'll get is an above average snes rpg with a slow pace and some anoying bugs, if you have the patience you could very well find a rewarding exprience, and wonder what the heck I was babbing about. Just don't ever play the Pc version tho, cause then you'll never touch the snes port again.....

Reviewer's Score: 6/10, Originally Posted: 10/26/01, Updated 10/26/01