Heroes of Newerth

Heroes of Newerth
Developer(s)	S2 Games
Engine	K2 Engine
Platform(s)	Windows, Mac OS X, Linux
Release	TBA
Genre(s)	RTS Arena
Mode(s)	multiplayer

Heroes of Newerth is an upcoming DotA Based Game developed by S2 Games.

S2 has announced that the game will be supported on multiple operating systems, including Windows, Linux and Mac OS.

History

Around July 2008, a website with a logo saying "Heroes of Newerth" and the S2 Games logo was found by a forum member and posted at the Savage 2: A Tortured Soul forums. Marc "Maliken" DeForest and other staff members have informally declared on the same forums that S2 Games was indeed developing a third title, and confirmed it is not Savage 3, and will only release further details when the project is near completion. However, it has been confirmed that the game, which is currently in a closed beta, is heavily using the same elements as the Warcraft III scenario Defense of the Ancients, boasting various improvements over the original mod such as, VoIP support, reconnection capabilities as well as better looking graphics and models etc. However, the heroes and items have been, for the most part, imported directly off DotA, and the changelog reflects changes also made in updated newer patches of DotA.

Heroes of Newerth also gave out beta keys to Facebook users.

On August 22, 2009 the pre-sale of Heroes of Newerth began for members of the beta. Pre-sales of the game includes name reservation, gold-colored name and gold shield insignia(in which both will still remain after the beta-testing), in-game taunt ability, as well as additional beta keys (3 for every pre-ordered account).

A maximum of 3 invites can also be sent to people who have not pre-ordered the game. The invitation allows for the creation of a beta account.

The game's Non-disclosure agreement for beta members was lifted on September 08 2009.

Development

Heroes of Newerth is currently in Closed Beta, however more than 30,000 active users can be playing the game, with over 700,000 users registered.

In a questionnaire answered by S2's Idejder on the Beta forums, he states that Heroes of Newerth has been in development for around 34 months. The first 13 months consisted of further developing S2's K2 Engine used by previous projects for Heroes of Newerth, while the remaining time was spent developing maps, items, heroes, and art.

Heroes

S2 games is currently adding old DoTA style heroes who are recognizable from DoTA and completely new heroes who have new capabilities due to not being held down by the old Warcraft 3 engine. All heroes in HoN are unique in their own way; no hero is "obviously" the best, some are better at things than others, but they all are made to stand on equal footing at the beginning of each match.

Game Play

The game comprises two factions that battle against one another in every game. The factions, the Hellbourne and the Legion, offer players a wide variety of unique heroes that the player controls in the game. The heroes of each faction are organized into three categories; strength heroes, intelligence heroes, and agility heroes.

Currently there are a total of fifty-seven heroes consisting of thirty on the Legion side and twenty-nine on the Hellbourne side. Every hero comes with their own unique style of play and their own animations and sounds, much like in DotA. Slots in Heroes of Newerth’s current beta indicate a total of thirty potential heroes for each side. Although many of the heroes were directly transferred from DotA, there are a few new heroes that S2 has added that were not previously part of DotA.

Another feature that S2 has provided is the addition of different maps. Aside from the most popular and standard DotA map (Forest of Caldavar) that most are familiar with, there are two others currently in beta. The first map is called "Darkwood Vale 3v3", a small two lane map which is best suited for team sizes of 1, 2, or 3. The second map is called "Watchtower", another 5v5 map that differs slightly to the original "Forest of Caldavar". In this map lanes run from top to bottom with the main bases being at the top center and the bottom center.

"Creeps" are weak computer controlled units that spawn from the barracks in the bases, usually spawning in groups of five. Creeps move down the lanes (usually 3 but sometimes 1 or 2) on the map that connect the bases together, fighting enemy creeps that they meet on the way. Players controlling the heroes push the lanes with the creeps and players using their hero can kill the opposing faction creeps or other heroes for gold, which they then can use to buy items at their base. Between the lanes players will discover a river, which contains power-up runes, and a forest area, where neutral monsters can be killed for gold by either side's heroes. Also, among the neutral creeps on the map there are creep "bosses". On the maps "Forest of Caldavar" and "Darkwood Vale 3v3," there is a neutral boss creep called Kongor, whereas on the map "Watchtower" Transmutanstein and Zorgath are the bosses. The bosses usually take more than one hero to kill.

Each unique hero has four special abilities that help them with their conquest of the opposing faction's base. They learn and upgrade these abilities one at a time as they gain experience points from killing enemies. All heroes start the game at level one but can eventually reach level twenty-five, depending on how long the game lasts. Each faction has its own base on opposing sides of the map and these bases each contain numerous buildings, with the most important being the barracks, guard towers, and one guardian building. If a team's guardian building is destroyed, the team loses. However, the guardian structure is heavily guarded, and it cannot be attacked until its two guard towers are destroyed. To reach an enemy base, a team must “push” through at least one lane and destroy all 3 towers in that lane. Once all three towers in a lane are destroyed the team has the option of destroying the ranged and melee barracks. If the ranged barracks of the opposing team is destroyed, then the destroying team's ranged creeps (in the lane in which the barracks was destroyed) become substantially stronger. The same occurs for the melee creeps if the melee barracks is destroyed. If all the barracks of one team are destroyed, then the opposing team receives “mega creeps,” which are extremely powerful and usually end the game quickly.

External links

• Official Heroes of Newerth website
• Heroes of Newerth Beta Account website
• Heroes of Newerth at Facebook
• Heroes of Newerth Fan Wiki
• HoN Community Links