Map and Areas Overview

This overview explains how the game's published world structure and the community map research fit together. It does not claim official completion status for any route.

The Published Opening Structure

GameRant's walkthrough describes four routes from the Crossroads:

Direction	Opening area
North	The Hearty Heroes of Hauling
East	The Mirror Isles
South	Skipping Stones to Lonely Homes
West	Vault of the Beamcasters

The same source lists separate walkthrough groups for Heroes 2, Heroes 3, each of the other opening worlds, and the northeast HxM Gold Room. That breakdown is useful because it treats the game as a network of related puzzle families rather than a single linear corridor.

What The Community Snapshot Records

An independently collected Release_v1 map snapshot groups the game into 58 named map groups in our map areas database. The snapshot records 920 puzzle locations and 106 matching routes. It also notes that not every location has a solution and that 104 routes retain Demo-era community-engine replay evidence.

Those numbers are best read as a research index. They can help you see which mechanics have many examples, but they do not establish official puzzle names, completion requirements, or whether every community route still matches the current release build.

Gold Rooms Are A Second Layer

The available guide material identifies Gold Rooms as a second puzzle layer connected to additional areas. The HxM Gold Room is one documented example, linked in the source material to Heroes and Water and Heroes and Mirrors puzzles. Treat specific room-opening conditions as route-specific research rather than a universal rule.

How To Use The Area Index

Start with the broad world that matches the mechanic you want to study. For example, the map groups include heroes and mirrors, mirrors and stones, beams and stones, underworld combinations, and Worlds Collide. Then compare the count of locations with the count of documented routes. A large gap often means the group has more recorded locations than available public solutions.

For current-release play, verify what you see in game before relying on a route. For research, preserve the source version and route label so corrections can be traced back to the right snapshot.