Master of Magic

The Good
The Magic system. It's like in Magic: the Gathering. Very quick to learn, and the summonings are handled similiar to the Wizards of the Coast game too! Town managing system was carbon copied to Master of Orion II, because it was so good. Another easy-to-use interface! The battles are also nice, no complaining in them. And the spells! IMHO researching spells instead of tech as in MOO is more... well, fun because you can use them right away, instead of waiting years to the Stellar Converter ship of yours to construct in Master of Orion 2.

The Bad
It's 21th century. If I had played this game 5 years ago, I would have said that graphics are good and sounds are average. Now I must say that graphics do their job, but sounds are terrible! First time I heard Fire Elemental grunt like bear, I laughed. But after 50th time...or Night Stalker move sound is pounding of horse hoofs? Or.. okay, unit sounds are few. And musics? Terrible. First I tried adlib sounds. Worse than midi. Then SB Pro. A bit better, but still below the line. Star Control 2 was released two years before MOM, and it had better, MOD-style musics. Come on SimTex, you can do better (as in MOO 2). Also, diplomacy has no versatility, as in Orion games. Why? Not even in version 1.31. And AI is stupid diplomat in this one. If SimTex had corrected these flaws, Master of Magic would have been the greatest strategy game of 20th Century!

The Bottom Line
Combine the best sides of Civilization and Magic:the Gathering and you have Master of Magic. Strategy-game, that is based on two planes, Arcanus (near to Earth) and Myrror, chaotic plane. Build up your armies and cities, deal with other wizards, these are the Civ elements. Summon horde of fiendish monsters or noble heroes, cast fireballs and life drains, these are the Magic: the Gathering elements. Absolutely worth of trying, because it's nowadays abandonware. You can get it free.