A new Dark Messiah Of Might & Magic patch has been released, version 1.02 adds 'Hardcore' difficulty mode as well as tonnes of fixes (listed below).

The patch for the Steam version of the game should auto download the next time you start Steam.

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SP Patch 1.02 changes and bug fixes
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- Combat Difficulty in "Hard" mode is now harder.
PLEASE NOTE: This fix will not take effect in any game saved prior to this patch.

- Added a new "Hardcore" difficulty mode (1 more step beyond "Hard").

- Re-balanced NPC's strength & health on the second half of the game for all difficulty modes.
PLEASE NOTE: This fix will not take effect in any game saved prior to this patch.

- Added an intermediary "Texture" setting between "Medium" and "High". ("High" could create an overload with some video card memory: so, to offer more scalability, it has been renamed to "Very High" and the "High" option now offers "Medium" textures for the scenery, but "High" textures for the NPCs.)

- No more crashes when NPCs are beheaded (occurred with the "head_link" error message)

- Fixed the black Bink playback problem with GeForce FX video cards

- Fixed FPS drops with GeForce 6800

- No more graphical glitches on GeForce FX cards when player is under water

- No more graphical glitches on GeForce FX cards when player is being hit or is almost dead.

- No more graphical glitches on GeForce FX cards when equipping a Magic Weapon. If you still have trouble, please set GFX Detail to "Low"

- Fixed additional stuttering problems, linked to Expression files being read when they should not be

- Fixed random crashes due to a memory patch in the decal system

- Fixed a crash that could appear very rarely on the Tutorial Map if Phenrig plays his base animation

- Fixed crash on Telekinesis used on a NPC after having frozen and then kicked him

- Fixed a crash at the end of chapter 07 if you equipped telekinesis when the mage was talking to you

- Fixed a showstopper bug with Percy in Chapter 09

- Saved Game system changed to the new Async System to prevent excessive stuttering when the game is auto saving (if you’re still experiencing problems, you may want to disable the Auto Save feature in the "Gameplay" options menu)

- GFX Option is now properly saved

- Variable mat_forcemanagedtextureintohardware is now correctly handled, based on individual PC specs

- Prevent Rope Bow from disappearing under the world surface before getting to it.

- Fixed inconsistency with the way Xana behaves during "City of Flames" chapter events depending on player’s choices

- Fixed a bug where the giant spider was not spawned at all.

- Fixed a bug with some potions being destroyed on map spawn in the "Temple of the Spider" chapter

- GFX Detail level option is now properly translated in the French version

- Avoid user being stuck in the walls while using the Rope Bow

- Final Boss has been re-balanced

- Removed some dev button that could be found behind some walls in the Epilogue

- Fixed the way some objectives were badly managed with the Pao Kai in the last chapter

- Removed an improper "use" flagging on some wooden beams in "Gleam of a Cold Knife"

- NPCs immune to Telekinesis can't be grabbed using Telekinesis Spell when they are in ragdoll behavior

- Arrows that are out of the Game world are now removed properly to prevent framerate from decreasing to zero

- Max number of potions/food you can stack in your inventory is now properly configured

- Prevent the Ghoul script from being broken in some cases (if player used the bow to attack the creature) in "Dead Man's Trail"

- Remove small memory leak on the Particle System (about 100Kb was lost on each load/restart/map change)

- Remove small memory leak on clear value

- Better memory management with BINK playback

- Disabled two auto save points just before change level that could lead to corrupted saved game in Chapter 05

- Prevent a specific mana potion from disappearing from player inventory during Chapter 05

- Spells cast against the player now deal the correct amount of damage based on difficulty mode

- Vampire Knights will now always correctly play their stun animation

- Arantir's health has been increased

- Game will not auto save twice when triggering the final events in the Epilogue

- Added missing precache on Undead spawned by Necromancer Lord

- Fixed excessive virtual memory fragmentation, which led to occasional program crashes.