Heretic + Hexen remaster

[Dark Jaguar]

Nightdive did it again, and released a very well done collection of Heretic and Hexen, plus their expansions.  They've also added two new episodes, one for each game.

The music, as with Doom + Doom 2, has been fully remastered as well as having SC-55 recordings available for the authentic experience.  It even has an FM synthesis option.  These games, much like Quake 2, are notable for not being quite as well regarded as their predecessors and having a number of common complaints.  As a result, maps, weapon behavior, and enemy AI have all been tweaked to address the most glaring complaints aimed at the games.  There are options when starting a new game or using level select to turn these adjustments off if one prefers to go in with the authentic experience, but frankly I personally recommend keeping all of them on, just like with Nightdive's Quake 2 remaster adjustments.

Notably, the PS1 version of Hexen's FMVs have been included as well.  I'm not sure if they did an AI upscale or if they did what they did for Quake 2 and completely rebuilt and rerendered the cutscenes from scratch, but based on some of the visuals I see when looking at youtube compilations of the PS1 version, I suspect it's the latter.  Either way, the addition is much appreciated.

Much like Doom + Doom 2, they've added in a gallery of development content to peruse.  They also have full multiplayer options, including split screen, LAN, and their online servers.  Cheat codes are handled in a similar way.  You can permanently "unlock" the cheats in a menu if you remember the old codes, or just flip a switch to toggle all the cheats in the menu as available.  It depends on what you'd rather do.  Some of the cheats no longer work (namely debugging related ones), and some have had their activation codes altered likely for copyright reasons (Rambo got changed to GunsGunsGuns for example, and ponce (which is apparently a slur in some countries) to HealThySelf).  In most cases, you can use either the heretic or hexen version of the code as they both are fully functional.  The level skip code won't unlock anything because there's now simply a level select menu, but the code can still just be input in-game as before.

The full suite of gameplay and graphics options from Nightdive's previous efforts are available, for all kinds of enhancements or purist interpretations.

Heretic and Hexen are notable for implementing vertical aiming.  While it doesn't grant a full 180 degrees of vertical aim, it provides enough to do the job without completely distorting what's being rendered due to the 2.5D nature of the game engine.  It was originally keyboard bound, but this version assigns it to the mouse as with most games since Quake.  To aid in aiming, it also adds in an aiming reticule, but these older games tend to be a lot more forgiving when it comes to aim, so auto targeting should help especially with the vertical axis.  No, port additions like "jumping" aren't present here, as it breaks level design, even with the tweaks this version brings.

All in all, it comes recommended, even if there's clearly still a little work to do as with all Nightdive ports.  I should add that if you own either Heretic or Hexen on either Steam or GOG, you already own this.  Nightdive and Id have been very good about making sure not to double-dip their customer base.  Also, if you still want access to the DOS originals, they are still fully available.  If you bought them before, you can still redownload them, and if you buy the new remaster, you get access to the old versions too.

[A Black Falcon]

In 1995, some friends of mine gave me two then somewhat older PC games as gifts, Hexen and Master of Magic.  It probably was the first FPS that I owned.  I'd played a few shareware games like Wolf 3D and Ken's Labyrinth, but didn't have any.  I liked both games, but Hexen's really hard!  I most definitely didn't finish it; I highly doubt I got out of the first big hub (was that the second hub after a little first one? I forget.).  Figuring out what to do in that large world full of enemies and puzzles is quite challenging.

I did not buy Hexen 2 or Heretic 2 when they released, but I know that Hexen 2 is, again, a complex puzzle-focused title, though I think it's less nonlinear than Hexen 1?  After that, though, Raven clearly made the decision to make their games more linear and straightforward, and that's where you see the simple, action-focused Raven shooters we saw after that, including Heretic 2, the Star Trek Elite Force games, the Star Wars Jedi Knight 2 and Jedi Academy titles, and such.  I have always thought negatively of Raven's simplistic Star Wars games compared to Lucasarts' dramatically better and more complex Jedi Knight 1.  Yes, JK1's still my favorite FPS.  However, I get why Raven went in that direction; I mean, Hexen's really cool, but how many people are going to actually get through that difficult and complex title?  I didn't, and I bet a lot of other people didn't either.  In comparison, Elite Force 1 (to mention my favorite of that later batch of Raven titles) is a game that anyone can finish.  It's a fun thrillride without the depth or complexity of their earlier titles but with plenty of fun moments and action.  Is this a worse game than what Hexen did because of how it aims at a much larger mass audience and was designed for anyone to be able to finish it, instead of being designed only for the truly skilled and dedicated to be able to complete the adventure?  In a way yes, but also it's just a change in philosophy.  Overall I think both games are pretty close in quality, they're both solid B games.  I'd probably give the slight edge to Hexen though.  Their Star Wars games though I think are a lot weaker than that.  Some of that is certainly bias against them because of how huge the downgrade from JK1 is, but I also think they're below average games in general.

Some time after that Raven got attached to the CoD series, and all they do now is be part of the CoD machine.  I don't like or play that series.

As for this release, it's pretty neat that anyone who owned the previous releases gets this free.  I probably would not have bought this on PC, but I don't need to think about it, since I got the Heretic and Hexen series previously now I have this.  I haven't tried it yet but maybe I will.

[Dark Jaguar]

It's horrible what happened to Raven, getting bought up and forced to toil forever in the call of duty mines.  The last few games they made before that were pretty nice.  Raven has always had decent quality games, that while they never QUITE reached the level of iD or the better BUILD engine games, still were doing some interesting things.  Also, I absolutely love the art design of Heretic.

Hexen 2 and Heretic 2 are in an odd place.  Both are using the Quake engine, and both have bizarre licensing issues.  Hexen 2 had a single expansion pack that you'll have poor luck finding, and Heretic 2 just doesn't have a modern digital release.  Heretic 2 is underrated as a result, and I consider it better than Hexen 2.  Sure, they went for third person shooter instead of FPS, but it's got some good run and "gun" design.

But as for this one, they really went a long way towards fixing some of the bigger issues with the game designs of both games.

[A Black Falcon]

I didn't realize that Heretic 2 doesn't have a digital re-release, that's very odd.  I wonder why that is...

As for Hexen 2, the problem I have is that the Quake engine doesn't have a map built in like Doom does, which makes larger, more puzzle-focused design much harder than it is on Doom engine games like Hexen.  That's part of why I didn't buy Hexen 2 back when it released and it's still the first thing I think of when I think about it, where's the map?

[Dark Jaguar]

Heretic 2, and Hexen 2's expansion, as I said, are caught up in copyright issues.  Id would have to resolve those first.  I think at this point, all companies concerned are owned by Microsoft (ugh), but the one positive is that such matters are now resolvable, I suspect.

Not even going to try to defend Hexen 2, as there are a number of criticisms of that game as it is, but I can at least explain why Quake and Quake II didn't have an in-game map.  In Doom, the game is actually 2D in the first place, so it merely needed to render the 2D levels in a standard overhead way like many 2D games already did.  With Quake, they had entered new ground, true 3D with room over room and everything, so they hadn't figured out how to render a map in 3D yet.  Some other games did at the time, but it wasn't until the likes of Metroid Prime that people finally figured out how to render an in-game 3D map WELL with good tools for rotating and floating through said map.  Heck even Ocarina of Time had a very awkward time mapping that 3D dungeon design to an awkward 2D "floor plan".  Fortunately, Id uses a similar Metroid Prime style mapping system in their newest Doom games, so all's well.

Still, I'd have loved to see Nightdive retrofit a proper map display into Quake and Quake II for their remasters.  Quake II in particular would really benefit from one, with it's large interconnected backtracking level design with hubs and all.

It's funny that Build engine games even were capable of maps, but then again thinking back on it, you could never "zoom out" in those in-game maps, and that makes sense with how Build games are rendered, COMPLETELY relationally.  There isn't an overarching 2D map, every single sector is built and defined by how it connects to other sectors.  This means you can make non-Euclidean maps and fake "room over room" illusions, but it also means you can't really render an in-game FULL map, just an overhead that shows the relationally connected areas to your specific area.