For fans of turn-based strategy:
fheroes2 (based on HOMM2 - but much better 
) has heaps of new features, including high resolution (more map showing at once, battle map fitting "inside" fantasy map/world), garrison and visiting heroes, wait and skip (defend) function in battle and an option to automatically move onto the square you attack - for enemy heroes and attacking towns and castles (not including wandering monsters since they really attack you after you move in range rather than you attacking them 
). Also you can ban certain spells and artifacts from appearing randomly: including the spells Summon Boat, Town Portal and Dimension Door from Mage Guilds, Shrines and Pyramids and useless spells like Haunt; and artifacts such as the Anduran artifacts, which can break a map. Try it out - it is heaps better than H2 (and IMHO base H3 )!
See:
http://sourceforge.net/projects/fheroes2/files/fheroes2/
to download, or
http://sourceforge.net/projects/fheroes2/
to find more about the project!
It's amazing how adding ideas that came after the original game was released can make the game a whole lot cooler.
Coming in the future are maps even bigger than H3's in terms of total squares!
The only files you need from HOMM2 are the files from the DATA subdirectory (either the original game or PoL if you want to use PoL features and maps). The easiest way to get the DATA files is to buy HOMM 2 Gold from GoG.com for US$9.99. It doesn't matter that it's the DOS version of HOMM2, the data files it has work identically with fheroes2 to the ones provided with the original Win95 version of HOMM2: Price of Loyalty.
There are now win32, pocketpc, linux and android versions of fheroes2 (android version is by another author).
Why not try it out? It is playable now in single player and hotseat mode, however internet multiplayer, built-in campaigns and a special fheroes2 Editor (including Campaign Editor) are not available just yet (but are on the list). But the game is improving all the time! HOMM2 was a cool game when it was released, and fheroes2 is lots of fun, having the ability for better balance based on a lot more play-time, and including new features and some from later games. It is my favourite (Aussie spelling ) open source mod project.
Best regards,
Steven.
