Serpent Rider? I Hardly Know Her! (The Heretic & Hexen Games)

[Lemming42]

Playing Hexen 2 again in light of this thread. It's always a lot of fun and feels very nostalgic. I can't remember exactly when I first played it but it takes me right back to the y2k era in the best possible way.

Graphics are absolutely beautiful, it's been said many times but the 1996 - 2000~ era was a wonderful time for 3D graphics. Before the age of visual clutter so everything's very vivid and stands out, and you can really feel the devs' excitement at being able to create these worlds.

The dark fantasy atmosphere in these games taps into a very specific type of feeling that I'm always searching for in RPGs but which is rarely delivered. I think there was a thread about that phenomenon on here a while back.

 

[Spukrian]

I've played Heretic more times than I can count. I like it more than Doom & Doom II.

I've played Hexen & the expansion a few times. I like it, but the last time I played them I turned the dificulty down because I didn't enjoy the combat.

I've played Hexen II once, can't remember much of it. Never played the expansion, maybe I should do that... (I bought a used copy, just so you know)

I've played Heretic II once, can't remember much of it.

The areas you're supposed to put multiple different quest items into are actually separate triggers, meaning you actually need to aim for the one you're putting in.

That's good, right?

Even for the era, it's weird to see three playable characters (each of whom has unique grunts) and all of them are male.

It's the same grunt. It's the fighter's grunt, except they speeded it up for the cleric and speeded it up even more for the mage.

 

[deuxhero]

The areas you're supposed to put multiple different quest items into are actually separate triggers, meaning you actually need to aim for the one you're putting in.

That's good, right?

The triggers are oddly small. It's a bit confusing if you don't realize that's why interacting did nothing. The spiral thing in hub 3 didn't block my progress because I still needed to find extra gems and place them in anyways, but if I had that issue at the end it would have been really weird.

 

[Spukrian]

The triggers are oddly small. It's a bit confusing if you don't realize that's why interacting did nothing. The spiral thing in hub 3 didn't block my progress because I still needed to find extra gems and place them in anyways, but if I had that issue at the end it would have been really weird.

I remember I was confused about this in my first playthrough. Though IIRC there are two of each crystal and it doesn't matter where you put which. (Also triggers are of infinite height in the vertical dimension in the Doom Engine).

 

[F. J. Rothchild III]

Playing Hexen 2 again in light of this thread. It's always a lot of fun and feels very nostalgic. I can't remember exactly when I first played it but it takes me right back to the y2k era in the best possible way.

Graphics are absolutely beautiful, it's been said many times but the 1996 - 2000~ era was a wonderful time for 3D graphics. Before the age of visual clutter so everything's very vivid and stands out, and you can really feel the devs' excitement at being able to create these worlds.

The dark fantasy atmosphere in these games taps into a very specific type of feeling that I'm always searching for in RPGs but which is rarely delivered. I think there was a thread about that phenomenon on here a while back.

My thoughts exactly, which is why Hexen II is my favorite! Another non-RPG with a pitch-perfect dark fantasy aesthetic (well, it's a strategy game with RPG elements) that I feel is right up there with Hexen II's beauty and whose visual style would also be amazing in an RPG is "Disciples II: Dark Prophecy" and its expansions (see below).

 

[deuxhero]

Man, Heretic giving the wand (pistol) its own ammo pool sounds reasonable on paper, giving you an actual reason to use it after getting the claw (chain gun). Unfortunately what it does in practice is encourage the player to slowly plink away at defenseless enemies from a distance every so often, slowing down the game. Using it when you have no particular preference for a Tome of Power recipient helps a bit (since it's fairly general purpose under the effects) helps a little but not much.

edit: Will say the minibosses (or are they degraded bosses?) of the Iron Lich and Maulotaur are way more interesting than Doom's Baron of Hell and Mancubus. Doom's minibosses were spongy for how easy they were to dodge and overly simple in their attack pattern, but Heretic's have multiple ranged attacks that will keep the player on their toes.

 

[Lemming42]

Bargain! Gonna talk to my girlfriend about reallocating the next couple months' rent.

 

[F. J. Rothchild III]

Bargain! Gonna talk to my girlfriend about reallocating the next couple months' rent.

Oh, absolutely worth it! A steal.
I'd NEVER suggest something so untoward of your girlfriend, so perhaps you, yourself, could (during evenings) exhibit and trade your flesh for currency on the streets in order to fund this unquestionably mandatory purchase.
There's no shame in it. Well, actually, there is.
However, when the end reward is a Heretic big box with floppy discs, it will be well worth wearing the scarlet letter in order to become the highest bidder.

 

[Darth Roxor]

I just got to the final episode of Hexen 2, and I can already say that it's very clearly the worst part of the series.

What I dislike is how the level design got a lot more corridory compared to Hexen 1. Hexen 1 also allowed you to do a lot of cool shit like pop wings of wrath and fly above hordes of niggas dropping flechette like you're a tactical bomber, or LARP the toxic avenger and deploy mass gas in the middle of centaur mobs. None of this is an option here, and the enemies are significantly less of a pain, making item use even more unnecessary. I also dislike the tome of power effects on the guns, which just feel super lame for eveything except the basic hammer at least on the crusader. The discs of repulsion and ancient devices are also just patently useless.

And speaking of guns, once you get the sunstaff it's GGWP and you might as well unbind keys 2 and 3 because there's no point whatsoever in using the ice and meteor staves ever again, except for rocket jumping which admittedly the meteor staff is pretty bitchin' at.

The level design is also pretty uneven. Castle and Egypt I thought were cool, but Aztecs was for the most part meh (and the werejaguars are annoying as hell), and Rome was just straight up uninspired and bad.

I also very strongly dislike the bossfights and think they only get progressively worse. With Famine at least you have to make do with shitty guns, so there's some input to it. With Death, at least you get to turn into an x-wing with the ring of flight. But with Pestilence and War you have to activate IDDQD and zap them with your lazor staff until they die, what's even the point. If this shit at the start of the final episode means I'll have to fight them all again, I'll become very angry:

Generally speaking it feels to me like Hexen 2 tried to be more of a standard shooter than Hexen 1, and it suffered for this tremendously, because the mechanics are simply not up for the job.

 

[Lemming42]

Give Portal of Praevus a chance, much tighter level design and the new class is more satisfying in combat than any of the base game's classes IMO. Though I think the base game is great, so take my opinion with an ocean of salt.

 

[Darth Roxor]

Also, stumbling upon an endless torch bug that you can activate by firing the sunstaff and immediately switching to another weapon was pretty good given that I can't see shit more often than not, especially in fukkin Rome.

 

[Darth Roxor]

The fact I started my journey through Hexen 2 with this:

Is pretty funny given that it ended with this:

 

[Cyberarmy]

Love all of them but my favorite is Hexen 2 for some reason.

I also got a pretty fun story about Heretic 2. Back then, while everyone was waiting for Half Life I was waiting for Heretic 2. It was piracy er for Turkey so we had to wait for pirated copies to come to our shops.
I visit that shop everyday, one day the owner (was also a friend of mine, mostly because my knowladge of games and hardware) said that the game I was looking for had arrived, The Motherfucking Heretic 2. I bought it, asked if Half Life got "released" just to get a no. He didn't know when HL will come, because of some password shenanigans.

Better for me, I ran back to house and got ready for install. I was wondering what they printed on its CD, another forgetten art, and opened the CD case............
Half Life was in the CD case... with a really nice print....
I was shocked, furious and happy at the same time. Tried to install it just to see there is password protection. But again, to my suprise, typing only 1 s did the job I was able to install and play it!
I gathered all my friends to play HLs first few hours and sold HL CD back to the shop for double the price

But maaan, bloody Heretic 2 only released in Turkey 3 months later...

 

[F. J. Rothchild III]

Love all of them but my favorite is Hexen 2 for some reason.

I also got a pretty fun story about Heretic 2. Back then, while everyone was waiting for Half Life I was waiting for Heretic 2. It was piracy er for Turkey so we had to wait for pirated copies to come to our shops.
I visit that shop everyday, one day the owner (was also a friend of mine, mostly because my knowladge of games and hardware) said that the game I was looking for had arrived, The Motherfucking Heretic 2. I bought it, asked if Half Life got "released" just to get a no. He didn't know when HL will come, because of some password shenanigans.

Better for me, I ran back to house and got ready for install. I was wondering what they printed on its CD, another forgetten art, and opened the CD case............
Half Life was in the CD case... with a really nice print....
I was shocked, furious and happy at the same time. Tried to install it just to see there is password protection. But again, to my suprise, typing only 1 s did the job I was able to install and play it!
I gathered all my friends to play HLs first few hours and sold HL CD back to the shop for double the price

But maaan, bloody Heretic 2 only released in Turkey 3 months later...

These are the kinds of stories you start a thread hoping for. What a fun anecdote of Turkish CD-ROM misadventures.

I have to ask, though, what about when you finally did get Heretic II? You anticipated it for so long. Did you like it? Is there a story to be told there, too?

 

[Cyberarmy]

I have to ask, though, what about when you finally did get Heretic II? You anticipated it for so long. Did you like it? Is there a story to be told there, too?

Well...


I installed Heretic 2 as soon as I got it but didn't played for a long time.
Getting it so late kinda killed a bit of my previous hype. Because Half Life already captivated me by a lot (nice level design, great AI for it is time and killer soundtrack) and Tribes, Delta Force, Turok 2 was also satisfied my shooter needs mostly. And we started playing TC Rainbow Six and Delta Force online so that was a whole different experience for us. Also being a TPS it kinda dropped down in my playthrough list.

I completly played it in 99's summer I think and I really like it. Mostly thanks to platforming and action paced combat but I think I finished it in 2-3 days, without playing anything else. But it still is the lowest point for the series for me.

On completely another note, boy I had such spare time in my hands back then.

 

[pOcHa]

On completely another note, boy I had such spare time in my hands back then.

 

[Cyberarmy]

On completely another note, boy I had such spare time in my hands back then.

We had it good mate, good games, good times and good company. Can't believe how most things nose dived nowadays, especially on entertainment side.

 

[Tweed]

Hexen 2 was boring, but it had some okay deathmatching.

 

[Lemming42]

Playing the Bitter Heretic mod for Heretic. It's absurdly good, a totally different experience.

Are there any similar mods for Hexen? I only really know of Brutal Hexen. I feel like all of Hexen's problems could be fixed with punchier and more responsive combat (especially if enemies had wounded states and such, like in Bitter Heretic) and slight map redesigns.

 

[Darth Roxor]

Give Portal of Praevus a chance, much tighter level design and the new class is more satisfying in combat than any of the base game's classes IMO. Though I think the base game is great, so take my opinion with an ocean of salt.

Started Portal of Praevus. If it sux I will hold you responsible.

 

[Darth Roxor]

Also, one thing I forgot to mention - the fallen angels are the most retarded enemy I've seen in a game in a very long time.

 

[General Disarray]

Really loved these games growing up. Me and my dad played all of them, still have the boxes at his place. Loved Heretic 1 but Heretic 2 was the best for me. It was just so immersive, especially meeting friendly npcs in this kind of game getting quest to find cure and stuff really made the world believable and yourself involved in a way the other shooters didn't. Goes with out saying that I loved Outcast when it was released a year later.

But I do have an anecdote while playing Hexen 1, or watching dad play, and he had to go and take a phone call or something and left me to keep the character alive. I was like 6 or something. I think it was in some church like building and I was holding a doorway with the mage staring weapon. It was dark, the ominous music, the lightning flashes and had promised dad to keep the character alive I almost had a heart attack every time one of those growling two headed beast with maces approached. But managed to keep the character alive atleast.

 

[F. J. Rothchild III]

Really loved these games growing up. Me and my dad played all of them, still have the boxes at his place. Loved Heretic 1 but Heretic 2 was the best for me. It was just so immersive, especially meeting friendly npcs in this kind of game getting quest to find cure and stuff really made the world believable and yourself involved in a way the other shooters didn't. Goes with out saying that I loved Outcast when it was released a year later.

But I do have an anecdote while playing Hexen 1, or watching dad play, and he had to go and take a phone call or something and left me to keep the character alive. I was like 6 or something. I think it was in some church like building and I was holding a doorway with the mage staring weapon. It was dark, the ominous music, the lightning flashes and had promised dad to keep the character alive I almost had a heart attack every time one of those growling two headed beast with maces approached. But managed to keep the character alive atleast.

This thread (despite the brooding, bloody nature of the macabre, medieval, ominous, and occult games that are its focus) continues to elicit some surprisingly wholesome computer gaming memories and fun looks into others’ experiences with Raven’s series and what it means to them.

 

[mindx2]

Bargain! Gonna talk to my girlfriend about reallocating the next couple months' rent.

Oh, absolutely worth it! A steal.
I'd NEVER suggest something so untoward of your girlfriend, so perhaps you, yourself, could (during evenings) exhibit and trade your flesh for currency on the streets in order to fund this unquestionably mandatory purchase.
There's no shame in it. Well, actually, there is.
However, when the end reward is a Heretic big box with floppy discs, it will be well worth wearing the scarlet letter in order to become the highest bidder.

I have a copy... sealed.

Also, it's still my favorite as I played it right after I played DOOM. What a joyous time to be alive!

 

[F. J. Rothchild III]

Bargain! Gonna talk to my girlfriend about reallocating the next couple months' rent.

Oh, absolutely worth it! A steal.
I'd NEVER suggest something so untoward of your girlfriend, so perhaps you, yourself, could (during evenings) exhibit and trade your flesh for currency on the streets in order to fund this unquestionably mandatory purchase.
There's no shame in it. Well, actually, there is.
However, when the end reward is a Heretic big box with floppy discs, it will be well worth wearing the scarlet letter in order to become the highest bidder.

I have a copy... sealed.

Also, it's still my favorite as I played it right after I played DOOM. What a joyous time to be alive!

Is there a specific reason you keep it sealed? Do you plan on selling it in the future or something? I like being able to take out and look at the old manuals (and occasionally much more) that came inside of big boxes.

End of that last sentence was unintentionally pornographic.