MIGHT AND MAGIC 8

                 Reviewed by Stefan Herber

"Here we go again" was my first impression. 3DO have been heavily
criticised for this game as it uses the same engine as the last
two in this series and the tweaks have been very minor.  Someone
in fact stated they had a nerve to release the same game three
times! I don't think I can go that far though there are times when
it feels that way (but read on)...

I think this is an improvement over M&M7, which didn't seem to me
to have a plot and consisted largely of nothing but combat.  Here
at least there is a central theme - some horrible person has
arrived in town and messed up the elemental planes by creating a
giant crystal, which spells the end of the world. Only you can
save the day. I must pre-empt things by stating that the ending
does not consist of a fight against this person - the game isn't
that predictable. Effectively though you discover that all the
elemental lords have been imprisoned and it's up to you to release
them. As they are on a different plane you can't do this till near
the end. Of course there are dozens of side missions, all manner
of skills to be learnt and beasties of various toughness to
exterminate.

The problem with the recent M&M games has been the difficulty of
combat. I am pleased to say that combat can be turn based which I
much prefer when you have a multi-skilled party; it allows time to
cast spells, heal your members etc. It is nice to have the other
option for dealing with weak opponents, but it takes a good deal
of time before that becomes relevant.  However in MM8 there is a
very sneaky way to get a powerful dragon sidekick early on, which
makes life very easy. Equally if you wish very powerful allies can
also be recruited after succeeding in certain missions; I didn't
take advantage of this and stuck with my first party. I also never
used the invisible spells, which would probably reduce the length
of the game by about a third.

What's new? Well you only create one character and recruit the
rest from your travels or by hiring them in an inn in one of the
main towns. There are a few new categories - dragon and vampire.
The dragon is a fierce fighter and invaluable; from the net it
appeared that the vampire has not been well implemented so I never
tried that. The spells are pretty much what you remember from all
the other incarnations of this series and as usual you develop
skill points by fulfilling missions and carnage.  Trainers are
scattered around the globe to advance you to expert / master /
grandmaster in your chosen fields. Alchemy is more important than
before as you can brew potions that advance your stats by 50
points permanently. But really - yes it is the same game
re-released three times. I enjoyed it but it really is time for
someone to think long and hard about the next instalment.







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