Role-playing games have changed a lot over the last decade. Obviously, today's RPGs are far more impressive visually than the titles that appeared on older systems, and they usually feature complex, emotional, mature storylines as opposed to the typical 'warrior rescues the princess' plot that was so common a few years ago. On the other hand, they are typically quite linear in their game play, while 8-bit titles like Ultima Exodus allowed you to explore their expansive worlds at your leisure. I've really enjoyed most of the role-playing games that have appeared for the PSX, particularly Grandia and Star Ocean: The Second Story. However, as good as they are, they basically follow a very typical pattern: journey from town to maze to another town to another maze.. until you finally meet up with the final boss and complete your mission. Thanks to the superb plots and character development featured in these titles, I'm usually quite satisfied with them, but I can't help but occasionally yearn for the days when role-playing games allowed you to actually immerse yourself in a fantasy world and discover secrets by conducting your own independent exploration. Might and Magic III - Isles of Terra is one such RPG that grants you complete freedom to roam its world in whatever way that you desire, instead of dragging you along a pre-determined sequence of events. Be warned, however, that Isles of Terra will present you with an incredibly daunting challenge, one that players who have grown accustomed to the linear style of PSX titles will likely find tedious and overwhelming. Your adventure will begin in the town of Fountain Head; from there, it's completely up to you to figure out where to go and what to do. As a matter of fact, upon starting the game you'll be totally oblivious to what your ultimate goal in Might and Magic III will actually be. Suffice it to say that there is a big bad villain wrecking havoc in the world - but you won't have to concern yourself with him for a very long time. Terra consists of five main islands, and scattered about on these islands are towns, castles, caverns, dungeons, and pyramids. While there are many secrets to be discovered as you tread through Terra's overworld, it won't take too long for you to realize that this fantasy world is absolutely enormous, and that other methods of travel besides walking must be found if you are to advance through the game. Thankfully, there are a few ways that you can get your party from one place to another in this land, among them being the mirrors that can be found in each town. There is a particular password that pertains to each town; should you discover the password and announce it while facing one of these mirrors, you will be transported to that particular town. Entering these passwords with the Turbografx control pad can get to be a nuisance, but believe me, it beats walking any time. Might and Magic III is played from a first-person perspective. At the very bottom of the screen are portraits of the six characters that your party is comprised of. Each character will make certain facial expressions that denote their current condition. Beneath each portrait are the characters' life meters. Rather than gradually being depleted, these meters will change color as your characters' health declines. The only way to determine exactly how many hit points each character has is by bringing up a menu screen. While a portion of the right side of your screen will usually contain a map that fills in as you travel, you can replace the map with an options menu whenever you so desire to. Options are aplenty when determining what types of characters your party will be made up of at the beginning of the game. Might and Magic III offers you a solid group of pre-set warriors that you can use should you wish to jump right into the adventure, but for the more advanced players the game allows you to create your own characters. There are five races to choose from when creating a character: Humans, Elves, Dwarves, Half-Orcs and Gnomes. Each race is marked by specific strengths and weaknesses; for instance, dwarves are wonderful in hand-to-hand combat and have the unique ability to tell when danger is looming, but they have no absolutely no talent when it comes to the art of magic. Along with race, you can decide what class each of your characters will belong to. There are ten different classes to choose from: Archers, Paladins, Rangers, Druids, Clerics, Sorcerors, Barbarians, Knights, Ninjas and Robbers. It is imperative that you create a party that is well-balanced; prudent gamers will put together a group that is led by strong, skilled fighters, along with clever sorcerors and a wily thief who will contribute their unique abilities during the quest. There are dozens upon dozens of items that can discovered in Isles of Terra, and certain items can only be used by particular classes. Outfitting my party was quite enjoyable; there's such a wide selection of items to choose from that experimentation is really the only way to determine which equipment works optimally for which characters. Besides the fact that it is continually necessary to wade through menu after menu, I had plenty of fun trading weapons and items among the members of my party and turning them all into fearsome fighting machines. You won't be limited to just using the six warriors that you choose at the beginning of the game; you can also hire up to two hirelings at the inns in each town, meaning that your party can consist of up to eight members at any one time. Hirelings will demand pay for their services, however, and as they become more powerful, their asking price will go up. However, you never have the opportunity to witness any interaction between the members of your party. Considering that most of the people you come across in the game are rather strange and only look out for themselves, Might and Magic III can feel very lonely at times. It would have been nice to get to know the folks that make up your little fellowship, but instead, the game focuses solely on their quest. This is one game that takes itself very seriously, which is rather unfortunate, because it is sorely lacking in feeling and emotion. Besides the inn, there are a number of different institutions that you can pay a visit to while you're exploring a town. There are the standard weapon shops that pop up in most every town in any RPG, except that the guys who run these shops aren't your typical bumbling fools who repeat the same line every time you speak with them. You can actually ask these helpful little folks to examine items that you may have discovered and have them determine if the items in question have any special, hidden powers. For the magic-users in your party, there are guilds which you can visit and purchase spells from. You will have to earn membership to each guild before they will sell to you, however. You can also have a few drinks and overhear a few secrets at the taverns, heal yourself at the temples, or store some surplus cash in the banks. Unlike most role-playing games, however, the towns in Might and Magic III are usually full of evildoers that must be demolished before you can really feel at ease while strolling about the cities. Along with the towns, there are huge, impressive castles that you can visit. Three of the castles are run by kings who ask a specific favor of you: they all desire that you bring them the Power Orbs that can be found scattered throughout the land. Each king belongs to a different alignment, and naturally, they all oppose one another. It's up to you to decide which king you wish to help. Bear in mind, however, that you must give one of the kings at least ten Orbs before you will be able to complete your quest. The mazes and dungeons in Might and Magic III are terribly difficult affairs that typically require you to either solve a riddle, perform a certain task, or fight off some incredibly powerful opponents. The rewards that can be discovered in these dark, dank corridors are well worth the effort that it takes to attain them, but you had better make sure that the members of your party are already in possession of adequate weaponry and have garnered a great deal of experience points prior to entering the game's dungeons. The riddles are abstract and ridiculously difficult; as much as I hate cheating, I have to confess that I'm quite happy that NEC decided to include many of the answers to these puzzles in the game's instruction manual. Even if you aren't asked to solve some type of brain teaser, you'll be forced to fight the elite members of the enemy's forces, among which are Cyclopes, Liches, Minotaurs, and all sorts of other frightening monstrosities. Before you take on some of the more difficult challenges that the game has to offer, you'd be wise to obtain numerous special skills for the members of your party. Some characters will already possess a few skills as soon as you begin the game, but others will need to acquire skills along the way. Among the skills that you can obtain are map-making, swimming, and path finding. Skills can not only come in handy for traveling and navigation, but some of them are also crucial to solving particular puzzles that arise during the adventure. The key to the game lies in the mysterious pyramids that can be spotted at certain locations throughout the adventure. Enter these buildings to discover the greatest challenges that Might and Magic III has to offer - along with its most crucial secrets. Without giving too much away, when entering a pyramid you had better be prepared to face advanced types of machinery and weaponry that would seem quite out of place in any of the game's other environs. Combat is quite interesting in this game, in that you can attack your enemies from a distance (as can they attack you). In most first-person RPGs, it can seem as if you have plenty of wide open space ahead of you, only for an enemy to suddenly appear out of no where. That won't happen in this game; you can spot your enemies from far away, and should you possess the appropriate weaponry or magic spells, you can kill them off before they even come close to you. The graphics in Might and Magic III are fairly decent; the enemies are animated and contain a healthy amount of detail. The music is excellent, thanks in part to powerful, throbbing drums. The sound effects are not only bad, however, but they can also be downright odd at times. There are sure to be a few instances where you hear a strange sound and think to yourself, 'What in the world was that?' One major reason why many people aren't too fond of the Might and Magic games is that there is simply too much to keep track of during the course of the adventures, and nothing at all comes easy. For instance, acquiring experience points isn't enough to move up a level; you'll have to pay a visit to the training grounds that can be found in each town and give up some hard-earned gold before the game will give in and allow your characters to advance in levels. Also, you'll need to constantly keep an eye on your party's food supply, an element that is typically left out of RPGs because it is such a nuisance. And if you didn't have enough problems already, the game keeps track of your characters' ages, and it's possible to die of old age. Never mind the fact that your characters are prone to getting drunk, going insane, and even falling in love. This is obviously one very complex video game. There are really only two types of people whom I would recommend Might and Magic III to: those who fondly recall the days of non-linear RPGs like Ultima Exodus, and those who feel that they've mastered the current crop of role-playing games and are looking for a new challenge. If you fall into one of those two categories, there's a very good chance that you'll love this game (like me). If not, then you'd probably be better off sticking with PSX games. Overall: 8 out of 10
