Sequels, they just keep coming and coming. A lot of sequels are pretty bad, but some sequels actually improve upon the original formula started by its predecessor, or in this game's case, predecessors.

Heroes of Might and Magic III: The Restoration of Erathia's story is set some time after the Succession Wars of Heroes II, and it assumes that Roland won. Queen Catherine, King Roland's wife, is concerned since her father recently got his ticket punched, so she embarks on an epic quest with an army behind her to make sure Erathia's fate is positive.

Unlike Heroes I and II, Heroes III forces the player to play multiple short campaigns as multiple nameless, faceless, Generals for most of the game's factions. All of the classic factions have returned except the Sorceress, and some new ones are introduced. The gameplay is essentially the same as what veterans of the series saw in the past two Heroes games, which was an excellent move in my opinion; "If it ain't broke, don't fix it". There are some minor improvements, but none of them significant enough for me to list them all out.

The new factions, combined with the old ones will provide hours of replayablity as the classic single scenarios from Heroes I and II make their return. Along with these, of course, comes a map editor. Unfortunately, there is no random map generator in the original version of Heroes III, one wasn't added until the first expansion which was a shame.

The visuals of Heroes III take on a much more serious look, which kills some of the charm in my opinion. Character portraits, terrain, castles, you name it; everything is a lot darker, and more realistic. This may appeal to those who thought that the cartoony appearance of the first two games was a little much, but I preferred the old look.

The audio is okay. The voice acting is decent, and the sound effects haven't changed much from the last games. Unfortunately the music has taken a turn for the worse. Most of the music tracks in Heroes III are fairly bland, and generic thus making it (in my opinion) inferior to the beautiful and atmospheric musical score of Heroes II.

Heroes III is a great game, it may be "more of the same", but in the case of the Heroes of Might and Magic series that's not a bad thing. It brings several, however minor, additions to the series, and is a favorite among fans for many good reasons.