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Heroes of Might and Magic has always embraced change — not only in the captivating blend of tactics, strategy, and economy, but also in its visuals. From the hand-painted charm of Heroes II to the high-fidelity realism of later titles, each entry introduced a new artistic direction that helped to define the tone, mood, and identity of the series’ universes.

《魔法门之英雄无敌》系列一直以来都勇于变革——不仅体现在引人入胜的战术、策略和经济体系的融合上，也体现在其视觉风格上。从 《英雄无敌二》 的手绘风格到后续作品的高保真写实画面，每一部作品都引入了全新的艺术方向，从而塑造了系列世界观的基调、氛围和独特个性。

With Olden Era, we are continuing that tradition. While building on the legacy of the series, we are introducing our own identity and ideas to the players — one rooted in the vivid, magical style that first drew many of us to the world of Enroth.

在 《上古纪元》 中，我们将延续这一传统。在传承系列精髓的同时，我们也向玩家们融入了我们独特的风格和理念——这种风格根植于最初吸引我们许多人进入恩洛斯世界的生动奇幻风格。

This devlog explores the artistic choices behind Olden Era and offers a behind-the-scenes look at how we approached key design decisions.

这篇开发日志探讨了上古纪元背后的艺术选择，并提供了我们如何处理关键设计决策的幕后视角。

倾听社区的声音 - Listening to the Community

As we were working on the game, we reached out to the Heroes community across multiple platforms and conducted over 20 interviews with opinion leaders — including pro gamers, YouTubers, Heroes streamers, modders and map makers — to better understand what matters to players today.

在开发这款游戏的过程中，我们通过多个平台与 《英雄无敌》 社区进行了沟通，并对 20 多位意见领袖（包括职业玩家、YouTube 用户、 《英雄无敌》 主播、模组制作者和地图制作者）进行了采访，以更好地了解如今玩家最关心的是什么。

Here is what we heard loud and clear:

我们清楚地听到了以下内容：

• The game must run smoothly and be accessible.
• 游戏必须运行流畅且易于上手。
• Visual clarity is essential — everything must be easy to read.
• 视觉清晰度至关重要——所有内容都必须易于阅读。
• Familiar gameplay is key, but it should be modernised.
• 熟悉的游戏玩法是关键，但应该进行现代化改造。
• The legacy matters, but players also want something new to explore.
• 传承固然重要，但玩家也渴望探索新事物。

These insights aligned closely with our own vision and became foundational pillars in the development of Olden Era.

这些见解与我们自己的愿景非常契合，并成为上古纪元发展的基础支柱。

并非重制——全新篇章 - Not a Remake — a New Chapter

One of the most frequent questions we continue to receive is: Where does Olden Era stand as a Heroes of Might and Magic game?

我们经常收到的问题之一是： 《魔法门之英雄无敌》 系列游戏中， 《上古纪元》 处于什么地位？

The answer is clear and important: Olden Era is not a remake of any previous chapters. It is a brand-new, official entry in the franchise — built from the ground up. While we have deep appreciation for the earlier Heroes games, our intention has always been to create something original and fresh for people to enjoy.

答案清晰且至关重要：《上古纪元》并非任何前作的重制版 ，而是该系列全新推出的官方作品——从零开始打造。我们对之前的 《英雄无敌》 系列游戏充满敬意，但我们的初衷始终是为玩家创造原创且耳目一新的体验。

We have preserved the core mechanics that define Heroes, but we are also evolving the formula with new features, quality-of-life improvements, a distinctive tone, and a unique visual style. A fresh artistic vision is central to that evolution. While we drew inspiration from earlier games — especially Heroes II — we reimagined those ideas to suit modern computers, development tools, expectations, and our own creative goals.

我们保留了 《英雄无敌》 系列的核心机制，同时也在不断革新，加入了新功能、提升游戏体验、独特的基调和视觉风格。全新的艺术理念是这一革新的核心。虽然我们从之前的作品——尤其是《英雄无敌二》——中汲取了灵感，但我们对这些理念进行了重新构思，使其更符合现代计算机、开发工具、玩家预期以及我们自身的创作目标。

从系列剧的过往经历中汲取教训 - Lessons from the Series’ Past

Heroes of Might and Magic is a series with a long history that you can learn a lot from. Each game brought something new to the table. Not only did mechanics vary, but also the visual style changed drastically. We studied them all — both gameplay and art — to understand what worked, what didn’t, why certain choices were less successful than others, and how we could do our best to choose the right direction.

《魔法门之英雄无敌》系列历史悠久，值得我们学习。每一部作品都带来了新的元素。不仅游戏机制各不相同，视觉风格也发生了翻天覆地的变化。我们研究了所有作品——包括游戏玩法和美术——以了解哪些有效，哪些无效，为什么某些选择不如其他选择成功，以及如何才能尽最大努力选择正确的方向。

英雄无敌一和二：化繁为简的魔法
Heroes I & II: Magic in Simplicity

Following in the footsteps of their spiritual predecessor King’s Bounty by the same lead designer Jon Van Caneghem these games embraced bold colours, charm, and fairy-tale aesthetics. Their visuals were immediately readable and emotionally resonant — an approach that inspired us deeply.

秉承其精神前作《国王的恩赐》的风格，由同一位首席设计师 Jon Van Caneghem 操刀，这些游戏采用了大胆的色彩、迷人的魅力和童话般的审美。它们的画面清晰易懂，情感饱满——这种设计理念深深地启发了我们。

This visual style and its vibrant, intense colours are what drew people in and earned the game’s spot as a memorable classic. As a group of fans who grew up with these games, we chose to honour this legacy and embrace it whilst working on Olden Era.

这种视觉风格及其鲜艳浓烈的色彩正是吸引玩家并使其成为经典之作的关键所在。作为一群伴随这些游戏成长起来的粉丝，我们在开发《上古纪元》时，选择传承并发扬这一传统。

英雄无敌三：游戏玩法至上 - Heroes III: Gameplay Reigns

While legendary Heroes III shifted drastically toward a more realistic visual style, abandoning the cosy hand-drawn animations of the former title in favour of 3D models rendered as 2D sequences. However, this new direction initially reduced the readability of the global map in comparison to earlier titles.

《英雄无敌三》虽然风格大变，采用了更加写实的视觉风格，摒弃了前作温馨的手绘动画，转而使用 3D 模型渲染成 2D 序列。然而，这种新方向最初降低了世界地图的可读性，使其不如前作。

At the time of its release, the change from a fairy-tale artstyle to baroque-inspired aesthetic was met with a wide range of responses. But in the end, what truly mattered was that its core gameplay loop had been solidified and became the standard for nearly all games released later. That mechanical brilliance remains a cornerstone of Olden Era.

游戏发售之初，从童话般的美术风格转向巴洛克风格的转变引发了褒贬不一的评价。但最终，真正重要的是其核心玩法循环得以完善，并成为之后几乎所有游戏的标杆。这种机制上的精妙之处至今仍是《上古纪元》的基石。

英雄无敌四：实验的代价
Heroes IV: The Cost of Experimentation

Creative and ambitious, Heroes IV took an unexpected turn toward the isometric 3D trend that was popular at the time. In doing so, it sacrificed clarity and cohesion — its combat maps remain a reminder that visual style should never compromise usability.

《英雄无敌四》创意十足且雄心勃勃，出人意料地采用了当时流行的等距 3D 视角。然而，这样做却牺牲了清晰度和连贯性，其战斗地图至今仍提醒我们，视觉风格绝不应以牺牲易用性为代价。

At the same time, its approach to the core gameplay taught many that straying too far from the familiar gameplay can be a risk of losing more veteran players than attracting new ones into the community.

与此同时，它对核心玩法的处理方式让许多人明白，偏离熟悉的玩法太远可能会导致失去更多老玩家，而不是吸引新玩家加入社区。

Despite these missteps, Heroes IV is a game we respect deeply for its creative push, and we believe it was unfairly underrated at its time.

尽管存在这些失误，但我们非常尊重《英雄无敌四》这款游戏的创新精神，并认为它在当时被低估了。

Heroes of Might and Magic IV and Heroes of Might and Magic: Olden Era battlefields side by side

《魔法门之英雄无敌四》和《魔法门之英雄无敌：古代纪元》的战场并排显示

《英雄无敌五—六》：全面 3D 化的潜在陷阱
Heroes V–VII: Potential Pitfalls of Full 3D Transition

Heroes V, developed by Nival Interactive, introduced another major revolution by fully transitioning to 3D. The shift brought stunning town screens and a dramatic visual overhaul that gave the game a unique presence. This bold leap left a lasting impression on players and remains a memorable chapter for all the players of the franchise.

由 Nival Interactive 开发的《英雄无敌五》通过全面转型为 3D，带来了又一次重大革新。这一转变带来了令人惊艳的城镇画面和彻底的视觉效果提升，赋予了游戏独一无二的魅力。这一大胆的飞跃给玩家留下了深刻的印象，至今仍是该系列所有玩家心中难忘的一章。

However, like any innovation, it came with challenges.

然而，任何创新都伴随着挑战。

Creating realistic proportions for characters and landscape in a fully 3D environment was not easy without negatively affecting readability essential in a strategy game. To keep the clarity, visual indicators, such as bright circles, were added to make the heroes and units stand out on the map.

在全 3D 环境中创建逼真的人物和场景比例并非易事，尤其是在不影响策略游戏至关重要的可读性的前提下。为了保持清晰度，我们添加了诸如亮圈之类的视觉指示器，使英雄和单位在地图上更加醒目。

In addition, the richness of animated 3D objects, while visually impressive, also came with higher performance demands. While with the development of gaming hardware it was not a problem for some, the games became less accessible for those who had older and less powerful computers.

此外，虽然动画 3D 物体的丰富性带来了令人惊艳的视觉效果，但也对性能提出了更高的要求。随着游戏硬件的发展，这对于一些用户来说不成问题，但对于那些使用老旧低端电脑的用户来说，这些游戏就变得难以运行了。

In Olden Era, we tried to focus both on optimization and a lasting look, suitable for a strategy game.

在《上古纪元》中，我们力求兼顾优化和持久的视觉效果，使其适合策略游戏。

The developers of Heroes VI and VII explored a similar stylistic path by blending realistic 3D landscapes with more static, flat visuals for the faction towns. This approach moved away from the Heroes V designs — which had drawn some comparisons from the community to Warhammer Fantasy Battles — in favour of more unified, monochromatic heraldries.

《英雄无敌六》 和《英雄无敌七》 的开发者探索了类似的风格路线，将写实的 3D 场景与阵营城镇的静态平面视觉效果相结合。这种做法摒弃了《 英雄无敌五》的设计——后者曾被玩家社区拿来与《战锤幻想战役》相比较——转而采用更加统一的单色纹章。

While this was a deliberate and interesting stylistic solution, some players still judged the new style for reducing the readability of the units within one faction.

虽然这是一个刻意而有趣的风格解决方案，但一些玩家仍然认为这种新风格降低了同一阵营内单位的可读性。

Might and Magic: Heroes VI global map and Might and Magic: Heroes VII battlefield

《魔法门：英雄无敌六》冒险地图和《魔法门：英雄无敌七》战场

其他灵感来源： 《国王的恩赐：传奇》
Other Inspirations: King’s Bounty: the Legend

King’s Bounty: the Legend (2008) was both a commercial and artistic success thanks to its lush, whimsical visuals. This approach earned the game a lasting love of the players, that resulted in multiple expansions, and its place among the fans of turn-based strategies. Even to this day the game has aged gracefully thanks to its artstyle choice.

《国王的恩赐：传奇》（2008）凭借其华丽而奇幻的画面，在商业和艺术上都取得了巨大成功。这种风格赢得了玩家的持久喜爱，催生了多个资料片，并使其在回合制策略游戏爱好者中占据了一席之地。时至今日，这款游戏依然魅力不减，这得益于其独特的艺术风格。

In contrast, Disciples III — a darker, more ‘realistic’ fantasy title, released about a year later — highlighted how easy it is to lose readability and system performance when aiming for gritty photorealism, especially in 3D-strategy games. Despite that, the raw brutality of the chosen artstyle evoked strong emotions among the game’s audience.

相比之下，大约一年后推出的《信徒3》——一款风格更为黑暗、更“写实”的奇幻游戏——则凸显了在追求极致写实效果时，尤其是在 3D 策略游戏中，画面清晰度和系统性能很容易受到影响。尽管如此，其所采用的粗犷残酷的艺术风格依然激起了玩家强烈的共鸣。

From both, we gained a valuable lesson: artistic cohesion matters, however, in this genre readability matters even more.

从这两部作品中，我们都学到了一个宝贵的教训：艺术上的连贯性固然重要，但在这个类型中，可读性更为重要。

To sum up everything we have learnt from the visual history of Heroes and other genre-defining games:

总结我们从 《英雄无敌》 和其他定义游戏类型的视觉历史中学到的一切：

• Visual changes were always present throughout the Heroes series.
• 《英雄无敌》系列游戏中一直都存在视觉上的变化。
• Our personal preference in style draws from the nostalgic looks of Heroes II and King’s Bounty.
• 我们个人的风格偏好借鉴了《英雄无敌二》和《国王的恩赐》的怀旧风格。
• Although changes and progress are inevitable, they must be done with care.
• 虽然变革和进步不可避免，但必须谨慎进行。
• Readability and performance have always been and probably will stay crucial for the genre.
• 可读性和表现力一直以来都是，而且可能将来也会是该类型作品的关键要素。
• Factions should have their leading colour palette, but it shouldn’t dictate everything within it.
• 各个阵营应该有自己的主色调，但主色调不应该决定阵营内的一切。
• Stylisation is one of the keys to success that also prolongs the life of the art style and a game in general.
• 风格化是成功的关键之一，它还能延长艺术风格乃至整个游戏的寿命。

视觉开发：从原型到量产
Visual Development: From Prototype to Production

With all of this in mind, we explored many directions during prototyping — tweaking saturation, contrast, silhouettes, scale, background detail, and more. Every iteration brought us closer to a visual style that blends personality, clarity, and performance.

考虑到所有这些因素，我们在原型制作过程中探索了许多方向——调整饱和度、对比度、轮廓、比例、背景细节等等。每一次迭代都让我们更接近一种兼具个性、清晰度和性能的视觉风格。

Very early concept of the visuals, showing how Art Team experimented with lighting, shadows and saturation

视觉效果的早期概念图，展示了美术团队如何尝试运用光照、阴影和饱和度。

Early stage prototype. Objects are easier to see and have a clearer shape, colours are not as intense as before

早期原型。物体更容易辨认，形状更清晰，颜色不如以前鲜艳。

Next prototype. Adjusted saturation, objects and decorations are closer to a unified style. Some purchased models are used here as placeholders

下一个原型。调整了饱和度，物体和装饰更接近统一的风格。这里使用了一些购买的模型作为占位符。

What we’ve landed on so far is a cohesive, hand-crafted visual identity — one that balances the key qualities important for the Heroes experience: nostalgic visuals recreating the feeling of familiar universe, and easy readability, so important for a turn-based strategy.

我们目前所采用的是一种连贯的、手工打造的视觉识别系统——它平衡了《英雄无敌》体验中重要的关键品质：怀旧的视觉效果重现了熟悉的世界感，以及易于阅读的特性，这对于回合制策略游戏来说至关重要。

As we approach Early Access, we continue working on the game visuals, improving them based both on our own vision and your feedback, which helps us see your perspective!

随着抢先体验版的临近，我们将继续改进游戏画面，根据我们自己的愿景和你们的反馈不断改进，这有助于我们了解你们的观点！

The current development build. The artstyle for both objects and decorations forms a unified blend of familiar and brand new visuals

当前开发版本。物品和装饰的艺术风格融合了熟悉的元素和全新的视觉效果，形成统一的视觉风格。

性能和视觉优先级 - Performance and Visual Priorities

Aiming to avoid any major problems with performance we have designed Olden Era to run smoothly, with lower system requirements than the current Steam median, so that as many people as possible can get to enjoy Olden Era.

为了避免出现任何重大性能问题，我们设计了上古纪元，使其运行流畅， 系统要求低于当前 Steam 的平均水平，以便尽可能多的人能够享受上古纪元。

A large-scale 160×160 Jebus Cross map can contain tens of thousands of animated and effect-laden objects, and millions and millions of polygons on the screen at the same time, which can severely impact performance. We handle this by efficiently backloading assets into RAM or GPU’s VRAM, keeping gameplay seamless and responsive.

一张 160×160 的大型 Jebus Cross 地图可以同时包含数万个动画和特效物体，以及屏幕上数百万个多边形，这会严重影响性能。我们通过将资源高效地回载到内存或显存中来解决这个问题， 从而保持游戏的流畅性和响应速度 。

We strongly recommend using an SSD for optimal performance, especially to minimise load times. This is the hardware cost of optimization that allows for as few interruptions as possible.

我们强烈建议使用固态硬盘以获得最佳性能 ，尤其是在最大程度缩短加载时间方面。这是优化性能的硬件成本，旨在尽可能减少中断。

Our other goal is for the only loading screen you ever see to be when starting or continuing a game — not when entering towns or battles.

我们的另一个目标是，只在开始或继续游戏时才会出现加载画面，而不是在进入城镇或战斗时出现加载画面。

精明预算，专注努力 - Smart Budgeting, Focused Effort

Even as we build a fantasy world, we face the practical reality of game development. As previously mentioned, we are developing Olden Era independently using our own funds.

即使我们构建的是一个奇幻世界，我们也必须面对游戏开发的现实问题。正如之前提到的，我们正在使用自有资金独立开发《上古纪元》 。

All development — both technical and artistic — is done by our internal teams, with almost no outsourcing. This ensures full creative control and consistency in vision during development.

所有开发工作——包括技术和艺术方面——均由我们的内部团队完成，几乎没有外包。这确保了我们在开发过程中拥有完全的创作控制权，并保证了愿景的一致性。

Even if we found ourselves in the middle of an AI-revolution, our direction for Olden Era was set years before it began. Therefore, we made a firm decision not to use AI to generate any assets. It means that every model, texture, and animation you see in the game is hand-crafted by our artists.

即便我们身处人工智能革命的浪潮之中，上古纪元的发展方向早在革命开始数年前就已确定。因此，我们坚决决定不使用人工智能生成任何素材。这意味着游戏中你看到的每一个模型、纹理和动画都是由我们的美术师手工打造的。

This topic has created a huge discussion in the game development industry, sparking lots of thoughts but also outrage. Our philosophy and stance remains that we will not use Generative AI whatsoever during development and that decision will not change at any point — it would be disrespectful to the hard work our Art Team has done as well as to you, our community. We are further supported in that by our publisher Hooded Horse, whose CEO Tim Bender said the following in a recent interview that you can check here:

这个话题在游戏开发行业引发了广泛的讨论，激起了人们的诸多思考，同时也招致了不少争议。我们的理念和立场始终如一：在开发过程中绝不使用任何形式的生成式人工智能，这一决定绝不会改变——这不仅是对我们美术团队辛勤工作的不尊重，也是对我们社区的不尊重。我们的发行商 Hooded Horse 也支持我们的这一决定，其首席执行官 Tim Bender 在最近的一次采访中表示（点击此处查看采访内容）：

“I f*king hate gen AI art. It has made my life more difficult in many ways…suddenly it infests sh*t in a way it shouldn't," Bender said. "It is now written into our contracts if we're publishing the game, 'no f*king AI assets'.”

“我他妈最讨厌 AI 生成的素材了。它在很多方面都让我的工作变得更难……它突然间就以不该有的方式泛滥成灾，”本德说道。“现在，如果我们要发行这款游戏，合同里都会写明‘禁止使用 AI 素材’。”

Part of this decision involved showing off our talented artists’ work, some of which you can check here

这项决定的一部分内容是展示我们才华横溢的艺术家们的作品，您可以在这里查看部分作品。

Concept art created by our artist Dzikawa

由我们的艺术家 Dzikawa 创作的概念艺术图

All of this means we must plan carefully what we can work on, and prioritise what matters most: gameplay, content, and long-term support. In fact, we are proud to say that Olden Era will launch with more content than any previous Heroes game at release — thanks in large part to our art style choice and efficient planning. This allowed us to implement more content without sacrificing other important features such as map editor, maximum map size, templates, and readability of the global map.

这一切都意味着我们必须仔细规划工作内容，并优先考虑最重要的方面：游戏性、内容和长期支持。事实上，我们很自豪地宣布，《上古纪元》在发售时将拥有比以往任何一款《英雄无敌》游戏都更丰富的内容——这主要归功于我们选择的美术风格和高效的规划。这使我们能够在不牺牲其他重要功能（例如地图编辑器、最大地图尺寸、模板和全局地图的可读性）的情况下，实现更多内容。

To support this claim, we have analysed the most popular Heroes titles in terms of content:

为了佐证这一观点，我们从内容方面分析了最受欢迎的《英雄无敌》系列作品：

项目 / 版本	H2	H3	H5	H6	H7	OE (EA)
DLC 数量
资料片/DLC	1	2	2	1 (+2)	1	TBD
阵营生物
基础	57	116	84	84	114	127
DLC	0	10	84	14	19	TBD
中立生物
基础	9	6	6	11	20	18
DLC	0	13	3	1	5	TBD
宝物
基础	82	125	71	109	153	148
DLC	17	14	22	31	23	TBD
地图建筑	62	171	131	~100	87	190
英雄/每阵营	9	16	10	~10 + 自定义	~13	18
首发法术数量	45	70	44	60	79	74
冒险地图法术	17	10	4	2	9	17
英雄技能数量	14	28	17 (+152)	46	24 (+168)	30 (+180)

面向未来的视觉效果 - Future-Proof Visuals

One of our primary goals behind the art style choice has been to ensure that the visuals remain appealing for years to come. Technology evolves quickly, however stylised visuals, when designed with care, retain their charm and legibility for years.

我们选择这种艺术风格的主要目标之一是确保视觉效果在未来数年内保持吸引力。技术日新月异，但精心设计的风格化视觉效果却能长久保持其魅力和清晰度。

Although nobody can deny Heroes III being the high point of the series, we personally believe that it was Heroes II — with its timeless visuals — that caused the franchise to become so well-known in the first place. That’s the kind of longevity we aim for.

虽然没人能否认《英雄无敌三》是系列巅峰之作，但我们个人认为，正是《英雄无敌二》凭借其永恒的画面，才让这个系列一举成名。这正是我们所追求的持久生命力。

Our visual direction is trying to blend the best of Heroes I through III, with touches from King’s Bounty, presented in a clean, almost isometric presentation that highlights the charm.

我们的视觉方向力求融合《英雄无敌一》到《英雄无敌三》的精华，并融入《国王的恩赐》的元素，以简洁、近乎等距的视角呈现，凸显其魅力。

In the end, it’s not just about nostalgia, we want to ensure that Olden Era has its own identity, and even a decade from now players can return to it and still find it beautiful.

归根结底，这不仅仅是怀旧的问题，我们希望确保上古纪元拥有自己的独特风格，即使十年后玩家们可以重返上古纪元，仍然会觉得它很美。

那么，为什么是 3D 而不是 2D 呢？
So why 3D and not 2D?

At first glance, 2D graphics seemed ideal for our goals. They evoke fantasy worlds, carry hand-crafted charm, and tend to be less demanding on hardware. However, working with 2D comes with a lot of hidden challenges.

乍一看，2D 图形似乎非常符合我们的目标。它们能营造奇幻世界，充满手工质感，而且对硬件要求不高。然而，使用 2D 图形也存在许多隐藏的挑战。

并非如此简单 - Not Really Simple

Many people love 2D animation for its “simplicity and warmth”, but in reality creating high-quality 2D animation is anything but simple. Every object must be drawn by hand, and every angle or rotation — animated separately. It’s a slow and labour-intensive process.

许多人喜欢二维动画，因为它“简洁而温馨”，但实际上，制作高质量的二维动画绝非易事。每个物体都必须手工绘制，每个角度或旋转都需要单独制作动画。这是一个缓慢而耗费人力的过程。

Imagine a unit that can move not only left and right but diagonally. In 2D, diagonal movement requires an entirely new set of assets. Add in attack and defence animations, and the workload multiplies fast.

想象一下，一个单位不仅可以左右移动，还可以斜向移动。在二维游戏中，斜向移动需要一套全新的资源。再加上攻击和防御动画，工作量会迅速成倍增长。

Then there’s the matter of volume. To make an object feel three-dimentional in 2D, light and shadow have to be painted directly onto it. These highlights, however, will remain static — rotating the unit or moving a light source won’t change them.

其次是体积问题。为了让二维物体看起来有三维立体感，必须直接在物体上绘制光影。然而，这些高光是固定的——旋转物体或移动光源都不会改变它们。

In Hollow Knight, for example, highlights are painted right onto the beetle sprite and stay the same no matter how it moves

例如，在《空洞骑士》中，高光直接绘制在甲虫的图像上，无论它如何移动，高光都保持不变。

This limitation is why many games with “flat”, cartoon-like visuals are actually 3D under the hood — a style often called 2.5D.

正是由于这种限制，许多画面“扁平”的卡通风格游戏实际上在底层是 3D 的，这种风格通常被称为 2.5D。

The Banner Saga is a great example of 2.5D game with turn-based combat

《旗帜的传说》是 2.5D 回合制战斗游戏的优秀范例。

Ori and the Blind Forest uses similar techniques, blending 3D technology with a painterly style

《奥日与黑暗森林》也采用了类似的技术，将 3D 技术与绘画风格融合在一起。

In 3D, dynamic lighting is built-in. A 3D model is made of polygons, and the engine can calculate light rays hitting each surface, adjust shading based on position and movement. This eliminates many of the manual steps required in 2D.

在 3D 建模中，动态光照是内置的。3D 模型由多边形构成，引擎可以计算照射到每个表面的光线，并根据位置和运动调整阴影。这省去了 2D 建模中许多手动操作步骤。

模型动画 - Animating the Models

We learned these limitations first-hand while working on Iratus: Lord of the Dead. Creating that game was… let’s just say, a learning experience. The thing is, when it comes to 2D animation, there are really only two main approaches:

我们在开发《伊拉图斯：亡灵之主》时亲身经历了这些局限性。制作这款游戏​​……这么说吧，是一次宝贵的学习经历。事实上，就二维动画而言，主要方法只有两种：

#1: Skeletal animation (aka Spine animation). Moves parts of a flat image like a puppet. It fakes depth but cannot truly rotate, often looking stiff and “marionette-like”. It is still a ton of work, for the result that does not always feel great: Because this technique was often used in older browser games, it also carries that visual association for many players.

#1： 骨骼动画（又称脊椎动画）。它像操控木偶一样移动平面图像的某些部分。它能模拟深度，但无法真正旋转，因此看起来往往僵硬而“像提线木偶”。制作这种动画仍然非常耗时，而且效果也并非总是令人满意：由于这项技术常用于早期的浏览器游戏，因此许多玩家对它的视觉印象也与此类似。

Iratus, our previous game, was built with this animation style in mind

我们之前的游戏《伊拉图斯》在设计之初就考虑到了这种动画风格。

#2: Full frame-by-frame animation (classic Disney™ style). Every single frame is drawn by hand. It can look amazing, but costs in time, finances, and labour are enormous. Disney™ films were made by hundreds — sometimes thousands — of artists, working frame by frame. And what if you want to change anything in the finished animation? Welcome back to the drawing desk to re-do every single frame again! Doing this for over 140 creatures, each with multiple animations, would be unrealistic.

#2： 逐帧动画（经典的迪士尼风格）。每一帧都是手工绘制的。虽然效果惊艳，但耗时、耗资和人工成本都非常巨大。迪士尼电影是由数百甚至数千名艺术家逐帧制作完成的。如果想要修改已完成的动画怎么办？那就得回到绘图桌前，重新绘制每一帧！要为超过 140 个角色，每个角色又有多段动画，这样做是不现实的。

A standout example of the modern games that used this approach is Cuphead, whose creators spent at least 7 full years hand-drawing, scanning, and colouring tens of thousands frames. Apart from time consumption, the reality is that nowadays skilled 2D animators are scarce (roughly one for every 20–30 experienced 3D artists).

现代游戏中运用这种方法的一个杰出例子是《茶杯头》，其创作者至少花费了整整 7 年时间，手工绘制、扫描并上色了数万帧画面。除了耗时之外，现实情况是，如今熟练的二维动画师非常稀缺（大约每 20-30 位经验丰富的三维艺术家才有一位二维动画师）。

To sum up: 3D is just much more suitable when it comes to budgeting and longevity of the game’s life-span. In simple terms: a lot of the work that has to be manually applied in 2D on a case-by-case basis, is automatically handled by 3D engines’ various features.

总而言之，就游戏预算和生命周期而言，3D 显然更胜一筹。简单来说，2D 游戏中许多需要逐个手动完成的工作，在 3D 引擎的各种功能下都能自动完成。

以全新视角重振经典作品 - Reviving Legacy Material with a New Vision

By setting Olden Era centuries before the events of the RPG game Might and Magic VIII, we have gained creative freedom to explore the early days of Jadame — a continent of the world of Enroth, not explored in the Heroes series before. That meant we could create multiple new factions, creatures and heroes, with their own stories and personalities. Of course everything that is added has to be in accordance with Branding Team’s vision of the world and its inner structure.

通过将 “上古纪元” 设定在角色扮演游戏《魔法门八》事件发生数个世纪之前，我们获得了创作上的自由，得以探索贾达姆大陆的早期历史——这片大陆是恩洛斯世界的一部分，此前在《英雄无敌》系列中从未出现过。这意味着我们可以创造多个全新的阵营、生物和英雄，赋予他们各自的故事和个性。当然，所有新增内容都必须符合品牌团队对世界及其内部结构的构想。

One of our main goals (and challenges!) was to create a perfectly balanced mix of old and new — a game in which characters familiar to many of us since childhood would head out on new adventures across the new continent, fighting monsters not seen before and living through the stories before untold.

我们的主要目标（也是挑战！）是创造一个新旧完美平衡的游戏——在这个游戏中，我们许多人从小就熟悉的角色将在新的大陆上展开新的冒险，与以前从未见过的怪物战斗，并经历以前从未讲述过的故事。

This meant:

这意味着：

标志性生物和英雄的全新设计
New designs for iconic creatures and heroes

Unicorn in Heroes II vs Unicorn in Olden Era

《英雄无敌二》中的独角兽 vs 《上古纪元》的独角兽

Pixie in Heroes II vs Pixie in Olden Era

《英雄无敌二》中的妖精 vs 《上古纪元》中的花妖

Vatawna in Heroes II vs Vatawna in Olden Era

《英雄无敌二》中的瓦塔娜 vs 《上古纪元》的瓦塔娜

Ethric the Mad in RPG Might and Magic VI vs Ethric the Mad in Olden Era

《魔法门六》中的疯狂埃斯里克 vs 《上古纪元》的疯狂埃斯里克

Not known to many, the world of Enroth is going through technological decline the closer we get to the events of the RPG Might and Magic VIII.

鲜为人知的是，随着我们越来越接近角色扮演游戏《魔法门八》的剧情，恩洛斯的世界正在经历技术衰退。

“TERMINATOR” Drone in RPG Might and Magic VI vs Worldwatcher in Olden Era

《魔法门六》中的“终结者”无人机对阵古代世界观察者

Couatl in RPG Might and Magic VIII vs Couatl in Olden Era

《魔法门八》角色扮演游戏中的羽蛇 vs 《上古纪元》的羽蛇

Artorius Veritas in RPG Might and Magic VIII vs Artorius Veritas in Olden Era

《魔法门八》角色扮演游戏中的阿托利斯·维里塔斯 vs 《上古纪元》的阿托利斯·维里塔斯

将经典人物“年轻化”并拓展他们的故事
‘Aging down’ classic figures and expanding their stories

As we wish to relive the nostalgia of seeing a hero we’ve grown to know as a child, we decided to also bring back a few familiar faces, as well as units from the other Heroes of Might and Magic games, especially in cases where the lore allowed us to do so!

为了重温儿时熟悉的英雄带来的怀旧之情，我们决定也带回一些熟悉的面孔，以及其他《魔法门之英雄无敌》游戏中的单位，尤其是在剧情允许的情况下！

Old Vesper in Heroes II vs Young Vesper in Olden Era

《英雄无敌二》中的老维斯珀 vs 《上古纪元》中的年轻维斯珀

Even when the only material available was a blurry sprite or a low-res portrait, we worked to reimagine it faithfully. The result was a visual blend of the old and the new that honours the franchise’s roots while pushing forward.

即使只有模糊的像素图或低分辨率的肖像，我们也努力忠实地还原原作。最终呈现出的视觉效果融合了新旧元素，既尊重了系列的根源，又向前迈进了一步。

您的反馈正在发挥作用 - Your Feedback in Action

Although we have our own vision, we are carefully listening to the feedback of our community, implementing the most interesting ideas and suggestions as well as tuning the game to appeal to most of you.

虽然我们有自己的愿景，但我们正在认真听取社区的反馈，采纳最有趣的想法和建议，并调整游戏以吸引你们中的大多数人。

Following a lot of the feedback we received over the last few months we decided to come up with quite a few changes to the readability of Olden Era’s both combat map and adventure map. Here are some of the ones we’ve already shared with you as well as a few fresh reveals.

根据过去几个月收到的大量反馈，我们决定对《上古纪元》的战斗地图和冒险地图的易读性进行一些改进。以下是我们之前已经分享过的一些改动，以及一些最新公布的内容。

扩展战场 - Expanded Battleground

One of the key pieces of feedback we have received from you was that the battleground isn’t large enough. We expanded it and adjusted most units’ statistics to accommodate for that.

我们收到的主要反馈之一是战场面积不够大。为此，我们扩大了战场面积，并调整了大多数单位的属性。

视觉设置 - Visual Settings

新的可读性设置 - New Readability Settings

As you shared your feedback with us whilst playing the demo, it was made clear that you would like more readability options. This is why we created a separate readability tab that allows you to adjust various options to your liking. We’ll go over these options below.

您在试玩演示版时向我们反馈的意见表明，您希望获得更多可读性辅助选项。因此，我们专门创建了一个可读性辅助选项卡，方便您根据个人喜好调整各项设置。以下我们将详细介绍这些选项。

可自定义的高亮设置 - Customisable highlight settings

We added various options for the highlight feature, allowing you to change its colour, the way the highlight pops up (be it by pressing ALT, hovering over objects or to be permanently on) as well as adjust the highlight colours based on what you’re interacting, such as heroes, guards, visited objects and so on.

我们为高亮功能添加了各种选项，允许您更改其颜色、高亮弹出方式（无论是按 ALT 键、将鼠标悬停在对象上还是永久显示），以及根据您正在交互的内容（例如英雄、守卫、访问过的对象等）调整高亮颜色。

可自定义颜色配置文件 - Customisable colour profiles

Colour profiles can be used to make the image more vibrant, turn the game darker or keep the middle ground between the two. Depending on what you choose, you will either lower or further increase the saturation of the game.

色彩配置文件可用于增强图像鲜艳度、降低游戏亮度或保持两者之间的平衡。根据您的选择，您可以降低或进一步提高游戏的饱和度。

Default colour / Saturated colour / Dark colour

默认颜色 / 饱和色彩 /深色系

Apart from that we added the options so everyone can adjust the visuals of the game to their liking:

除此之外，我们还添加了各种选项，让每个人都可以根据自己的喜好调整游戏画面：

• Option to toggle outlines:
• 可选择是否显示轮廓：
  • Keep them on as they are
  • 保持原样即可
  • Keep the outlines on interactive objects only
  • 仅保留交互式对象的轮廓
  • Turn them off completely
  • 完全关闭它们
• Combat map highlights for active units
• 战斗地图上活跃单位的亮点
• Player-coloured spaces beneath units
• 单位下方玩家颜色区域
• Full UI toggle for clean screenshots
• 启用完整用户界面切换，即可截取清晰屏幕截图
• Toggle the cloud shadows
• 切换云层阴影
• Option to fully desaturate background on the global map, leaving the interactable objects clearly visible (see the images below)
• 可选择完全降低全球地图背景的饱和度，使可交互对象清晰可见（见下图）。

No desaturation, 50% desaturation and 100% desaturation

无脱饱和度、50%脱饱和度和100%脱饱和度

更新后的用户界面 - Updated User Interface

Since our first reveal, your constant feedback was that our UI could use a little bit more love. We updated it to be more immersive and reminiscent of the older games. We believe that it’s in a good place between old, nostalgic UI and a new, modern approach to the interface. We will continue to read your feedback and use it to improve the UI in Early Access.

自游戏首次亮相以来，大家一直反馈我们的用户界面需要改进。我们对其进行了更新，使其更具沉浸感，并更贴近老游戏的风格。我们相信，目前的界面设计恰到好处，既保留了复古怀旧的元素，又兼具现代感。我们将继续关注大家的反馈，并在抢先体验阶段不断改进用户界面。

更新后的模型 - Updated Models

Many of you voiced your concern when it comes to certain models in the game. We

很多玩家都对游戏中的某些模型表示担忧。

also want our units to be as aesthetically and visually pleasing as they can be, so we look closely at what the community wants and all the ways we can improve upon them! While many models already received some changes, we are constantly listening to more and more feedback from our players, and here we would like to show you some of the most recent changes we made according to that! In addition to that, we also added a way to rotate, zoom in on and view models in the unit preview screen.

我们也希望我们的单位在美观和视觉效果上都能达到最佳状态，因此我们会密切关注社区的需求，并思考如何才能做得更好！虽然许多模型已经进行了一些改动，但我们仍在不断倾听玩家的反馈，并在此向大家展示我们根据这些反馈做出的一些最新改动！此外，我们还在单位预览界面中添加了旋转、缩放和查看模型的功能。

The model viewer lets you fully rotate the units and zoom in on them

模型查看器允许您完全旋转模型并放大查看。

天使 - The Angels

Angel models were redesigned for clarity and visual impact, but at the same time they kept their unique look.

天使系列模型经过重新设计，更加清晰醒目，同时又保留了其独特的外观。

However, you’ve let us know that the Archangels would look much better if they had a different hue so we updated them according to your feedback!

不过，您告诉我们，如果大天使们换一种颜色会更好看，所以我们根据您的反馈对它们进行了更新！

天使（Angel）	大天使（Archangel）	极天使（Apotheosis）

骑兵（Cavalry）	贵族骑兵	阳矛骑兵

恐惧骑士 - The Dread Knights

We’ve heard your feedback about the old Dread Knight model and so we decided to replace them with a new one that is more in line with the nostalgic look they were known for in Heroes III and IV.

我们收到了大家对旧版恐惧骑士模型的反馈，因此我们决定用一个更符合《英雄无敌三》和《英雄无敌四》中那种怀旧外观的新模型来替换它们。

恐怖骑士（Dread Knight）	战争化身（Avatar of War）	空洞死神 Hollow Reaper

水螈 - The Aqualotls

You’ve let us know that aqualotls from Mexican mythology were difficult to distinguish in combat and that you would like to see more humanoid creatures in the Grove’s lineup. We removed them and added the greek Naiads, who kept a bit of the aqualotl in their visual design.

您曾告诉我们，墨西哥神话中的水怪在战斗中难以区分，并且您希望在林地中看到更多的人形生物。我们移除了水螈，并加入了希腊水仙女，她们的视觉设计保留了一些水怪的特征。

水螈（Aqualotl）	Blooming Aqualotl	Polar Aqualotl
水灵（Naiad）	春水灵​​（Vernal Naiad）	冬水灵（Brumal Naiad）

虫巢 - The Hive

Hive units are retextured to stand out more, gaining a more distinct and insect-like colour scheme. They have also had their Gnats and Mantes replaced with more distinguishable Parasites and Scorpions.

虫巢单元的纹理经过重新设计，更加醒目，采用了更鲜明、更具昆虫特征的配色方案。此外，虫巢中的蚋和螳螂也被替换成了更容易辨认的寄生虫和蝎子。

腐蝇（Gnat）	Warden Gnat	Ravager Gnat
寄体（Parasite）	卫寄体	乱寄体​

螳螂（Mantis）	Vermilion Mantis	Royal Mantis​
甲蝎（Scorpion）	火山甲蝎​	洞穴甲蝎​

Thank you for all of the feedback you have provided so far — we appreciate your passionate approach to our work and will continue implementing changes as we push forward towards the Early Access release!

感谢您迄今为止提供的所有反馈——我们非常感谢您对我们工作的热情，并将继续进行改进，以推进抢先体验版的发布！

未来模组支持 - Future Modding Support

We know how much the Heroes community values modding, and that it’s one of the key elements that helped the series live such a long life. That’s why Olden Era is being built with high modability in mind. Once the game is fully released, we are intending to give you the chance to swap or adjust visuals or create new content of your own. We believe players should be able to shape the game they love.

我们深知《英雄无敌》社区对 MOD 的重视，它也正是该系列能够长盛不衰的关键因素之一。因此，《上古纪元》在设计之初就充分考虑了 MOD 的可玩性。 游戏正式发布后，我们将提供修改或调整画面效果，以及创建全新内容的平台。我们相信，玩家应该能够参与塑造自己喜爱的游戏。

结论：一款经久不衰的游戏
Conclusion: A Game Built to Last

We are building Olden Era not just for launch, but for the years ahead. We believe this game carries forward the legacy of Heroes, but also stands on its own. We want the game and — by extension — the franchise to become more accessible to new players while remaining engaging to the veterans alike. We want Olden Era to be a new chapter in the series’ journey through the years with its own stories and unique design.

我们打造《上古纪元》并非仅仅为了游戏发售，更着眼于未来的发展。我们相信这款游戏不仅传承了《英雄无敌》系列的精髓，更拥有其独特的魅力。我们希望这款游戏，乃至整个系列，能够更容易地吸引新玩家，同时也能保持老玩家的沉浸感。我们希望《上古纪元》能够成为该系列发展历程中的全新篇章，拥有其独特的故事和设计。

Thank you for being on this journey with us so far and stay tuned!

感谢您一路陪伴我们，敬请期待！

bilibili，youtube