InnoGames Product Manager Interview discusses Heroes of History release, development, events, and more

Heroes of History: Epic Empire is the latest release in the city-building simulator genre, which is now in the soft launch phase. One of the interesting aspects of the title is how you will get to see notable historical names being featured as characters, adding to a lot of fun. Curious to know behind the process, we at GamingonPhone sat with Lukas Offerhaus, the Product Manager at InnoGames for an Interview to discuss various aspects of the latest release, the development process, the events that are part of Heroes of History and more interesting topics, which we will discuss in this article.

1. Could you please introduce yourself to our readers?

My name is Lukas Offerhaus, and I lead the team working on Heroes of History here at InnoGames. I joined the company as a Product Manager in 2020 and have worked with several of our teams since then, focusing on topics such as live operations, game economy, and product strategy.

2. From Medusa to Lincoln, having historically significant names as heroes that battle. A fascinating idea, tell us about it.

The basic idea of Heroes of History was to introduce an additional gameplay layer to our classic city-building approach. We were looking to break up the predictability and relatively slow pacing that is inherent to the city-building genre with a bit more excitement, variance, and active gameplay. Assembling a team of well-known historic characters from across time to fight for your growing empire not only fit that bill perfectly but also sounded exciting and fun.

3. Can you give us an overview of how the development process for Heroes of History: Epic Empire went?

We started building Heroes of History early last year. We decided to use another InnoGames game, Rise of Cultures, as the basis, rework some of the systems, and add our new features on top – essentially creating a fresh take on Rise of Cultures with a different focus, one that emphasizes heroes, battles, and story. Because of this approach, players who played Rise of Cultures will find a lot of familiar things in Heroes of History.

4. I’ve noticed that InnoGames often emphasizes the journey from scratch to building an empire. Is this a theme that you and the players find particularly enjoyable?

Definitely! In these games, there’s constant growth and progress. As a player, it’s fun to see my empire develop, especially knowing the humble beginnings that it came from. In a way, my empire serves as a reminder – a trophy even – for my achievements in the game.

5. What features have been implemented to make Heroes of History: Epic Empire unique compared to other titles in the city-building genre?

The most obvious one is our historic hero collection feature. I’m not aware of any city-building games with such deep character progression systems or a comparably deep battle mode. We think players will enjoy this new aspect very much.

6. How do you see the story-telling aspect as an important part of a game of this genre, since there are characters based on history?

Previously, we’ve been very careful to maintain a certain level of historical believability in our historic city-building games like Forge of Empires or Rise of Cultures. With Heroes of History, we’ve taken some more liberties. Our light-hearted time travel plot provides important context and motivation for why we’re building our empire. It also makes it possible for characters like Lincoln, Einstein, and Cleopatra to fight side by side.

7. Again, digging on the hero part. Will the skills of heroes, say Einstein, for example, reflect what they were famous in history for in the game?

Absolutely! We tried to capture some of the real-world achievements and life events of our heroes in both the story and gameplay mechanics. For example, Einstein’s ability is called “Everything is Relative” and creates a dangerous black hole on the battlefield.

8. I’m curious about the mention of “ancient cultures” in the game. Will we be getting to see historic buildings and civilizations as we progress?

Yes! I’m personally very excited about this part of the game. There will be weekly Culture Events. In these events, players build up separate, themed cities. We’ll have Egypt (think Cheops Pyramid or Sphynx) and China (think Terracotta Army or Great Wall) to start with, but we have plans to add many more in future updates.

9. What’s the strategy behind monetization? Will we see pay-to-play players getting an edge over the free-to-play ones?

Like all our other games, Heroes of History will operate under the free-to-play model. There’s no exclusive pay content, so all content in the game is available to players free of charge. That said, players can spend money on optional in-game purchases to accelerate their progress.

10. Might be an early ask, but is there any particular roadmap of updates planned, or will be based on the feedback you receive from the players?

Right now, we are mostly focused on getting the game ready for launch. We have started preparing the first few updates, including additions to our hero roster and some new events. Of course, we have lots of exciting ideas to extend the game beyond this initial scope, but we want to hear what players think before we make any decisions. Many of the best ideas for our games come from our community.

11. A few words for the players before the global launch?

We’re very excited to finally show this game to all of you, so make sure to check it out when Heroes of History launches in your region. We can’t wait to see the creative strategies, city designs, and hero combinations you come up with!

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