Age of Heroes VI: Shadow of Immortal

Let’s face it - the image of leaders who ran into battle, swinging their sword and cutting through swathes of enemies without even a scratch is pure fantasy. Most of the time they couldn’t even see an enemy from inside their tent, let alone fight one.

Age of Heroes VI puts you in the boots of one of these cowa…’Heroes’ and tasks you with saving the kingdom by not killing anyone. Well, not directly, that’s for the underlings to deal with.

The quest is pretty straightforward. The king is dying, there’s a magic elixir made from Dragon Blood that will save him, and you (yes, you!) have to find it before he dies.

To be fair, there’s a lot of extra background detail to the story, and in subsequent conversations with the many characters in the world, but it’s completely lost within some absolutely dire translation that seems to be a staple of the series.

You achieve your quest by leading a ragtag bunch of creatures and making them fight for you, occasionally throwing in a magic spell to mix things up and hiring more when they inevitably get killed.

When you stumble into or near a creature on the main map, the game switches into a turn-based battle with each side taking turns to move/fight across a grid littered with obstacles.

If this sounds strangely familiar then you’ve probably played an earlier game in the series, or come from the King’s Bounty/Heroes of Might and Magic camp on the PC. In fact, some of the combat rules from the latter title have been stolen wholesale for AoH, such as the dwarves (or ‘Hirelings’ as they’re called here) getting a 50 per cent chance to block physical attacks.

If you’re one of the billions of people who haven’t played those titles then get ready for a shock, because AoH VI hates you.

There’s practically no guidance on how to play, no explanation of rules (such as the blocking one I just mentioned), no tutorial and no remorse for failure.

Even experienced players will find themselves dying again and again at the hands of the unfair random encounters or the strict time limit and stupidly high gold requirements for some of the quests.

It also doesn’t help that the map, while big and full of quests, is one of the worst in any RPG. Paths through to important screens are hidden behind some very basic graphics, doors to buildings are hard to locate and vital locations are just simply not marked.

Despite all these faults I did find myself willingly retrying again and again, mainly due to the strangely absorbing battles and the decent amount of loot you can equip your hero with over the course of a game.

For newcomers to the series or genre though, Age of Heroes VI is an almost impenetrable game and best steered clear of.