Heroes of Newerth Beta hands-on

A lot has changed since the dawn of the gaming genre know as “Real-Time Strategy” I remember the days of Command & Conquer, Age Of Empires, Empire Earth etc….. but I specifically remember spending hours upon hours on StarCraft now that was my “Real-Time Strategy” of choice.

RTS + RPG hybrids

As time passed slowly the “RTS (Real-Time Strategy)” genre developed and evolved and the build your army to destroy your enemies army and obliterate his/her base of command started to change, it started focusing more on the development of one character and the use of a smaller army WarCraft III lead this arena well concentrating on the building and use of main characters like Arthas and labeled them as “Heroes” the “RTS” started to slowly mix characteristics of “RPGs (Role Playing Games)” where your “Hero” would gain experience and gain levels as the “Hero” leveled it gain access to specific spells and its base stats such as Strength, Stamina etc… increased as it level you were also able to equip items to your “Hero” which benefited it in different ways, and you would be doing all of this while controlling a small contingent of units like how you would in the classic “RTS” days.

Born from a Warcraft III Mod

With the introduction of that programmers and fans of WarCraft III took the game to a different level creating a MOD for WarCraft III creating several unique Heroes more accurately a multitude of Heroes with their own look, class and abilities and completely eliminated the aspect of controlling the supporting army and left that in the hands of the computer so that one could focus on solely developing their “Hero” of choice and thus the WarCraft III MOD “DOTA (Defence Of The Ancients)” was born. DOTA is a “Hero” versus “Hero” warfare with the objective usually being the destruction of your opponents base or for some to drive people crazy by constantly killing them when they ventured out of their safe zone (protection of your towers) or perhaps even more frustrated when you are killed within your safe zone, but being being a MOD there were several limitations to DOTA and thus the creators decided to bring DOTA to life as its own game and that was the birth of Heroes Of Newerth so to all those who loved DOTA and still play DOTA and for God only knows reason that you do not know of HoN now you do HoN takes what we all loved about DOTA and adds to it things such as improved graphics, new heroes (as well as some of the old) they make look slightly different but the gameplay is very similar if not the same, they also added new items etc….

HoN is currently in its beta stages and for now it is only offers online play offering up to 10 Heroes against each other in teams of two, five on each side offline play is suppose to be available when it is officially released. So being one of the new age of “RTS” HoN offers a selection of a wide variety of Heroes on the both the side of light and dark both sides have the various Heroes divided into categories of Strength, Agility and Intellect each category has its own main stats, advantages, disadvantages etc…. and additional items acquired in game will make your Hero that much better, just like DOTA your army (Creep) are controlled by the computer and they will automatically attack the opposing side when they come in contact with them whether it be an opposing Hero, creep or structures. So overall its a similar game to “Demigod” for those who are familiar with the title which is also another new age “RTS” and if you get bored or you are seeking a bit of a challenge their are several modes to choose from such as “Deathmatch” when the goal is no longer to destroy your opponent base but it is to kill the opposing Hero with the addition of other modes and other gaming mechanism HoN is an overall fun game and a welcome addition to the “RTS” universe.

Also for the competitive lot of you out there which I’m sure they are quite a few HoN has a ratings system, similar to the one in “Warhammer 40,000 Dawn Of War” for those familiar with that title, you the actual player have a profile which increase in level as you play you gain experience from match participation and or accomplishments and from that a PSR (Public Skill Rating) is given to you , your stats of your Kills, Deaths, etc…. are all on your profile so for those people who love to spend hours looking at and or boasting on their kill, death ratio or to laugh at others who have lower ones if not pathetic ones (like the one I currently have).

Heroes of Newerth Official website