1.5 million Steam wishlists later, Heroes of Might and Magic: Olden Era publisher says the strategy series "defined our childhoods"

• Copy link
• Facebook
• X
• Pinterest
• Flipboard
• Email

Share this article 0 Join the conversation Follow us Add us as a preferred source on Google Newsletter Sign up to the GamesRadar+ Newsletter

Weekly digests, tales from the communities you love, and more

By submitting your information you agree to the Terms & Conditions and Privacy Policy and are aged 16 or over.

You are now subscribed

Your newsletter sign-up was successful

Want to add more newsletters?

Join the club

Get full access to premium articles, exclusive features and a growing list of member rewards.

Explore An account already exists for this email address, please log in. Subscribe to our newsletter

Heroes of Might and Magic is due for a comeback with the upcoming release of Olden Era, and there's clearly an eager audience ready for the return of the legendary turn-based strategy series. Publisher Hooded Horse has revealed that the game has hit a stunning 1.5 million wishlists on Steam, and is sharing stories of how the original games impacted the people now responsible for the follow-up's release.

"Heroes of Might and Magic: Olden Era has passed 1.5 MILLION wishlists on Steam," the publisher says in a post on Bluesky, adding that developer Unfrozen " has put so much love and dedication into this project. We are humbled and honored to help bring you their take on the Heroes of Might and Magic series." It's currently the ninth-most wishlisted game on Steam, ahead of the likes of Witchbrook and Total War: Warhammer 40,000.

Hooded Horse has quickly made a name for itself as one of the premiere labels for independent strategy games on Steam, having helped incredible games like Against the Storm and Manor Lords find their audience. Clearly, the publisher has an eye for picking winners, and the early response to Heroes of Might and Magic: Olden Era suggests that another hit is on the way.

Article continues below

And the publisher clearly has the bona fides to help shepherd a HoMM revival into the world. "Heroes of Might and Magic III was one of the first games I played as a child (and was actually able to understand, as I lived in rural Poland and did not speak English)" a release manager identified as Aneta Z. says in a message also shared to Bluesky. "The precious CD appeared in our home and was really cherished for years. I played with my siblings and sometimes cousins on the family computer, which was set up in the corner of the kitchen."

Aneta continues, "We had a strict limit of 30 minutes of computer time per day, so the campaigns were taking a loooong time… We would still talk about the game while playing outside, and reenact the battles or the scouting in our backyard. It's been a comfort game for me for years afterwards."

As Hooded Horse itself puts it, "When we say the Heroes of Might and Magic series defined our childhoods, this is what we mean."

Heroes of Might and Magic: Olden Era has already partially proven itself thanks to an excellent, expansive demo that inspired one of our own HoMM-heads to pour hours in. In a press release, the publisher adds that the demo "saw 24,000 concurrent players, making it the 16th most-played Steam demo of all time." Near as I can tell from looking at the SteamDB records, it's actually the 18th most-played Steam demo by concurrent player peak, but it's close enough that I'll let Hooded Horse have this one.

Sign up to the GamesRadar+ Newsletter

Weekly digests, tales from the communities you love, and more

These are the best Heroes Olden Era artefacts to look out for.

CATEGORIES

Dustin BaileyStaff Writer

Dustin Bailey joined the GamesRadar team as a Staff Writer in May 2022, and is currently based in Missouri. He's been covering games (with occasional dalliances in the worlds of anime and pro wrestling) since 2015, first as a freelancer, then as a news writer at PCGamesN for nearly five years. His love for games was sparked somewhere between Metal Gear Solid 2 and Knights of the Old Republic, and these days you can usually find him splitting his entertainment time between retro gaming, the latest big action-adventure title, or a long haul in American Truck Simulator.

View More

You must confirm your public display name before commenting

Please logout and then login again, you will then be prompted to enter your display name.

Logout LATEST ARTICLES

1. 1Over Your Dead Body is an ultra-violent, surprisingly heartwarming gorefest with kills that would make Michael Myers jealous
2. 2Run out of storage? I've price-tracked all our top-rated SSDs, and these are the three you should be investigating this weekend
3. 3How to start the Diablo 4 Lord of Hatred campaign
4. 4Nacon's new headset looks pretty value-packed, but you'll need to buy extra dongles to get its best feature
5. 5I've been a story snob for 15 years, and these are the best RPGs with choices that really matter, which I can't stop recommending