The DWheretic Club plays: Heretic

[xX_Lol6_Xx]

So, my computer freaked up, and I had to reset it. So sadly I won't be able to finish Heretic :(

 

+++FreeDoom Phase 1

+++FreeDoom Phase 2

[Walter confetti]

Ah, too bad!

[Capellan]

Alas, Doom Zero's "particular focus on platforming and switch puzzles" does not sound like my jam. 

 

+++either Freedoom phase

[LadyMistDragon]

I don't have time for the club today, however, I would like to submit +++Base Ganymede  for your consideration for 2 reasons 1) Utterly selfish ones that are basically wanting to avoid wads with maps that take more than 15-20 minutes to complete when you know what you're doing 2) I really need an excuse to finish it because I seem to put off completing wads that are episodic in nature, and Episode 1 shows speed maps in UD format can work and be fun.

 

For another vote , guess I could go with   +++Freedoom Phase 1.

[continuum.mid]

8 hours ago, northivanastan said:

+++ Doom Zero. I want to play this and just need a good opportunity.

 

+++ Doom 64 for Doom II. I also want to play this.

 

+++ Perdition's Gate. I'm surprised that we haven't played the Wraith Corp WADs yet, so I'll keep nominating this.

Can I change my vote? I think instead of D64D2 I'll go +++ Freedoom Phase 1, since I wasn't expecting so many others to vote for it.

 

Although that raises some interesting questions. Which version will we go for (0.12.1 or latest autobuild)? Will Double Impact be included, seeing that it's just another WAD but vanillafied?

 

Edited April 26, 2021 by northivanastan

[Capellan]

 

[TheOrganGrinder]

E3M7: The Chasm

 

We're back here in the realm of "maps named after features that don't actually play much of a role in the map," with the titular chasm appearing only at the very end of the level where it's briskly traversed by players so inclined; the meat of the map lies instead in the dungeon complex that occupies about the northern two-thirds of the playing area.  It all feels a bit less consistent and coherent than the preceding map, with a fair amount of backtracking as opposed to the cleverly unfolding layout and compact footprint of E3M6; similarly, in those spots where this map is tougher and more able to bleed your health and armour away, it achieves that mostly through environmental awkwardness.  The Iron Liches and even the Maulotaur have very much been demoted to the role of bullet sponges at this point, crammed into small rooms that the player is compelled to traverse just to slow their passage and soak up their ammunition.  I don't know if I would say that this map and E3M6 ought to have swapped slots - certainly The Chasm is larger, grander in scope, and delivers more in the way of spectacle - but from the heights that Heretic has reached in previous maps, there's certainly a sense of something lesser, something missing here.

[LadyMistDragon]

Halls of Fear.

 

The default track is E1M2 which is kinda cool. On the other hand, Jimmy's action-packed "Legions" certainly fits this map tome just as well if not better. While you can snipe many of the Gargoyles who comes flooding in from the outside with the Elvenwand, that's boring, so just drop down into the moat on the right? side, run into the passage walking away from the moat and pick up the crossbow, dispatch any nearby foes, then pick up the crystal vials you're probably happy to see. Honestly, the vined-walls add some ambience. Because right after you pick up the yellow key in the same room, a monster closet opens up with an Iron Lich guarding the Dragon's Claw. Because I hate side-strafing in such a small area, I died twice. You'll probably be hurt quite badly after this, so don't hesitate to pick up the crystal vials in the moat.

 

Incidentally, I'll just say a few words about halls with little walls sticking out at regular intervals. I never like features like this because it seems they impede movement for what reason that could possibly increase the fun? Ammo isn't quite as generous as in previous maps, and you'll only have a Crossbow and Dragon's Claw for much of it, even though you can find a Hellstaff in a secret somewhat earlier. And if you like maps where previous areas connect to each other other, the Halls of Fear has that in spades. One case of this is a switch in the titular halls which lowers the platform with the green key at the end of the walk from the starting area. Unfortunately, I didn't spot this until I'd found basically all the secrets it's possible to access at that point. The Iron Lich ambush that occurs when you pick up the blue key is easy to escape, which might be good because I'd only found one Tome of Power by this point. Curiously, there's only an Ophidian guarding the exit.

 

This was a map that I feared playing from a wand start because of the Maulotaur, however, due the relatively generous way you'll probably pick up powerups/weapons beforehand, it's not actually too bad.

[FistMarine]

Hello everyone! I am new here! I have joined the forums last year but haven't got around posting because of various real life issues and the fact I started having problems with browsing the forums as of lately (mostly on my PC, while on my laptop and mobile the forum loads up fine).

 

I have been lurking on the forums since 2015-2016 or so and although I wanted to participate to the club in past, this is my first time joining the DWmegawad club. And what better time than to start with Heretic, one of my childhood games! Kinda wish I joined the club earlier this month but aside from forum issues, this has been a busy month for work. Now that I got some days off, I will finally join the club. I will be catching up quickly, I promise!

 

Introduction: Ah, Heretic. One of my favorite childhood games. Remember playing it at like 3-4 years old back in 1998-1999, after watching my father playing it. The first time I saw killing those gargoyles and mummies, especially with the gauntlets! Oh man! I remember playing the shareware version first (on one of those Top 101 Games shareware CDs) and after seeing the ordering screen and imagining what episodes 2 & 3 are like, few years later I discovered I actually had the full registered version with 3 episodes, on another CD with games called PC Mania '96 (that also had a pirated Doom 2 v1.666 and a full version of Hexen 1.0, along others). Yeah, I admit we had quite a couple of these "games CDs" and few of them happened to have full versions of games. Don't worry, I did eventually buy original CDs from eBay many years later!

 

Back to Heretic, although the first episode impressed me back then, I was even more impressed by episodes 2 & 3 when playing them first time in early to mid 2000s. Don't remember exactly when but I'm going to guess around 2004-2005? I remember getting stuck somewhere halfway in episode 2 and in third level of episode 3. I was playing on one of easier skills (skill 2 I guess) and I didn't have problem with dealing with the enemies, it was more like the levels felt a bit confusing back then for me, although Hexen was overall much more confusing. I admit even E1M6 felt quite confusing to me back then because I spent ages finding a way to progress. I don't think I managed to finish the second and third episode until I found out about cheats in 2006 which is what spoiled my Heretic and even Hexen playthrough. I got another chance later to finish Heretic SOTSR & Hexen when playing on Skulltag servers in 2009-2010 but there was a glitch that set the game's difficulty to the easiest and it felt too easy, plus there would be times many players would join and the levels ended up quickly. There was also a game breaking bug at end of fourth episode with the final sector teleporting you to the start of the level.

 

In mid 2010s, I did manage to finish Heretic & Hexen by myself without cheating, after acquiring original CDs from eBay and deciding to replay them and their expansions in DOSBox. Last time I replayed Heretic & Hexen was last summer, I guess. So I should feel right at home.

I guess it's time to start replaying HERETIC once again. Time to put the original Heretic CD to good use!

Heretic (Registered v1.0), DOSBox 0.74-3, Smite-Meister difficulty, 100% everything, Continuous with saves, Keyboard controls only (arrow keys and such)

Since I joined late, I will post each episode daily, on days 26, 27 and 28. Don't worry, I'm catching up quickly! I hope to be more active on the next month! And sorry for my bad English at times, I try my best to explain and detail the levels.

 

Episode 1: The City of the Damned - Overview

Spoiler

E1M1: The Docks
A nice opener. Here you fight the gargoyles and the mummies for the first time, as well as an undead warrior as sort of the miniboss at end of the level. You will find the gauntlets and the crossbow, although the crossbow can be easy to miss if you don't pay attention to secret areas.
Secret areas are mostly easy to find and will reward you with a silver shield (a much needed armor pickup, since the Heretic armor is much stronger than Doom armor) and a bag of holding, which doubles the ammo capacity.
You will also find the Tome of Power (which enhances all your weapons for 40 seconds) and the common Quartz Flask, which allows you to heal whenever you need it. Strangely, the flask is absent on the hardest skills, which is a bit strange since I think this item should have been available on all skills on this level but that's fine, not gonna nitpick over that, since Heretic in general feels pretty easy.

Fun fact: Certain projectiles are affected by the water currents, such as the two small arrows fired from the Crossbow and the green axes thrown by the undead warriors.

 

E1M2: The Dungeons
The second level introduces more tricks, including a nasty slow crusher that can get you if you are not careful. The crusher guards the Dragon Claw, which is the last weapon you will get in the shareware episode. It is the game's chaingun equivalent, which I will admit it makes a nice sound.
The standout of the level is the trap that activates as soon as you grab the blue key, the lights turn off and everything is dark, while mummies and warriors get unleashed. If you don't know what to do or where to go, you can get easily killed. Thankfully, it is easy to deal with this situation, either run back to the door and wait for enemies outside (automap will help you on your way) or just use the torch you found earlier, although I personally prefer to keep items in inventory (except for multiples that should be used because you are only allowed to have 1 of each item at the start of next level)
New items include the Timebomb of the ancients that will spawn a bomb in front of you, very useful for setting up traps and luring enemies into them. Press enter and then run, don't stay there or you will suffer massive damage, possibly even killing you if you have little or no armor at all!
The pods are also introduced which are the equivalent of this game's barrels. Some of them infinitely respawn, as you will be seeing in later levels.
And finally, you can find a map scroll that reveals the entire map, so you can find the rest secrets without any problem, the shadowsphere that makes you invisible and immune to certain attacks and the wings of wrath that allow you to fly for a minute. There is also a ring of invincibility, which makes you immune to all attacks for 30 seconds! It is inside one of the secret areas, however the item doesn't appear on higher skills just like the flasks in first level.

E1M3: The Guardhouse
The third level introduces even more tricks, including new variants for the gargoyles. They have more health and throw small fireballs at you. The gargoyles' projectiles deal between 1 and 8 damage. Oh and there is also a ghost version of the undead warrior at end of level. The ghost versions of the enemies are not only a bit harder to see (obviously) but also certain attacks go through them, meaning you will have to choose wisely what weapon to use against them. The ghost warrior also will always throw red axes at you, which are pretty damaging. Thankfully you can use the Shadowsphere in some tricky situations, which makes you immune to certain attacks like the axes, as they will go through you.
There are quite a couple of traps that can get you if you rush but thankfully to me I have memorized almost the whole episode, so I know what to expect, where the secrets are, etc.
If you missed getting the Dragon Claw previously, you can find it in this level as well. You have to drop down into a well, after accessing the secret area at the start of the level.
The new item introduced in this level is the Morph Ovum! This infamous item launches 5 projectiles which will turn your enemies into chickens! It works best against groups of enemies so you can make use of all your eggs, although it is recommended to save the item for the next level.

Fun fact: The shareware version shows a demo of this level and the shadowsphere in action. If you look carefully, the player tries to show that the axes will go through a ghost player. It's not too long before the player dies, though.

E1M4: The Guard Tower
The fourth level, which introduces the nitrogolems (ghost versions of them will start appearing from next level) that shoot homing skulls that deal quite a bit of damage but thankfully not as much as a Revenant's rocket in Doom 2. The other enemies introduced are the disciples, which are found at the end of the level. They can do quite a bit of damage with their projectiles, as they fire 3 of them at same time and each deals up to 24 damage. They are not too bad in open spaces where you can avoid the projectiles.
There is a crushing ceiling that will drop upon picking up the yellow key, so make sure to just run to get it.

A nice level!

E1M5: The Citadel
The fifth level. This is the first level which contains a large number of enemies in open spaces. At the start, you will be surrounded from many directions, although Heretic is much tamer when compared to the many custom Doom/Doom 2 wads that feature fighting many enemies in open ended spaces. The reason for that is that Heretic doesn't contain hitscanners, thankfully. So you just end up running from one place to another while avoiding projectiles and potentially making some monsters infight. The level isn't that difficult, you just have to be careful. During the current run, I managed to make some monsters infight and witnessed a golem finishing off the warrior before I opened fire.
The only new item introduced is the Ring of Invincibility if playing on the hardest skills, which as mentioned previously, makes you immune to all attacks for 30 seconds! It's very useful for tricky parts, especially the last level of each episode, so make sure you save at least one for each level! It will be worth it!
I will admit to this day, this level still makes me occasionally miss an item or two, so I have to wander around the level until finding that missed item. The wizards also have a rare chance to drop a Tome of Power, which means in vanilla Heretic, it can inflate the item count and end up with a higher amount of items at end of level, like how Archviles in Doom 2 resurrect enemies and allow you to score more than 100% kills. So if that happens, I need to remember that I have to get an extra item when viewing the level stats at end. Always save your game and using multiple slots!

Fun fact: There are two wings available in the level, which means it is possible to keep the Wings from the inventory as long as you have one in use. First, make sure to collect everything before leaving the level. Activate the wings, collect every item in last room that you need, then quickly exit the level while still having wings in use. If done correctly, you get to keep the wings from the inventory that are normally gone in the next level. This trick only works in vanilla (and chocolate/crispy I guess).

E1M6: The Cathedral
The sixth level, which is quite large and can be confusing to someone's first time playing. Remember getting stuck often as a kid until I found that secret required for progression. Here you can also find the secret exit that leads to E1M9! And it is actually easy to find. However the real challenge is 100%'ing the level. Because if you use the wings blindly, you will not be able to reach those secret areas at the start of the level! Make sure you also touch the ground to register the secret(s) as well!

Fun fact #1: The shareware version shows a demo of this level and how to reach the crossbow quickly while having a chance to fight back. The player doesn't last too long, however.
Fun fact #2: There are three armor pickups in the level, so it's easy to end up with full armor at end of the level.

E1M9: The Graveyard
The secret level is very interesting to say at least. Obviously there are many ghost monsters waiting outside, the first of which are the ghost warriors. Use a shadowsphere if you want to have an easy time or if not and you prefer challenges, then don't use it and just switch to your Dragon Claw and blast away! The crossbow is less effective against ghosts because only the main projectile will affect them. While fighting the ghost warriors, be sure to dodge the projectiles or you will quickly find yourself in a grave (heh).
After clearing the outside area, you need to find the yellow key. After you get it (and clear monsters along the way), you will get to a large room with more ghost Nitrogolems (I forgot to mention there are four variants of the golems, you have the regular Golem, ghost Golem, regular Nitrogolem and ghost Nitrogolem). They are situated on those lowering & raising platforms, which makes them tricky to take out and they are quite a number of them! After clearing the room, get the green key and go to the green door. You will find yourself in a large and dark room. After clearing the room, be sure to collect all the items in the area and find a rather hidden switch and then you can go get the blue key. Just be careful of the ambush with the ghosts, so if you saved the shadowsphere (and/or just found another one in the large room), use it here! Couple it with a tome of power to have a much easier time. Once the room is cleared, collect the stuff (and even a ring of invincibility) and kill the remaining ghosts in the last area before exiting.

Fun fact: The shareware version shows a demo of this level and how to get the yellow key quickly and then dying quickly I guess.

E1M7: The Crypts
The seventh level is also fairly interesting in terms of design and traps.
The level is fairly populated with monsters and it features both types of crushers (a fast crusher in middle of room inside the building and a row of four slow crushers when entering the blue door). To get through slow crushers safely, time it correctly so you just run them as soon as they are raising. Don't wait too long or else you will get crushed. Have the ring of invincibility selected in inventory just in case something goes wrong, since there is no other way to survive the crusher once caught.
The rest of the level is quite challenging since it is heavily populated with monsters and there are some nasty ambushes that can make you lose some health/armor quickly. Always be alert for walls lowering when approaching certain rooms! The funniest part was telefragging an undead warrior and then when opening the green door, there were like 20 or so monsters all gathered there and mostly stuck in the doorway. It was satisfying to clear them all with the tomed crossbow!

E1M8: Hell's Maw
The eighth level which is the boss level. Features the infinitely respawning pods and your first battle with the iron liches. I never actually found them scary as a kid, unlike other people when reading comments on various sites.
You start on a platform surrounded by lava, you will notice many undead warriors on the opposite platform and some gargoyles will wake up. Kill the enemies at start and grab all those flasks down there even if that means having to walk through lava and sacrifice a bit of your health and armor because jumping didn't exist back in Heretic, so you are relying a bit on RNG because it is possible to walk through lava without taking damage but it is rare. The level has plenty of quartz flasks, so many that you can't collect them all unless you try to use them occasionally, as you can only carry a maximum of 16 items of each type. So it takes a bit of effort to 100% this level when compared to others, although there is no way to see the level stats in vanilla Heretic. This also means you can potentially miss the 4 hidden secrets in the corners of the room with the pods (and they contain much needed goodies!).
Once you press the switch and grab the items, teleport to starting area and you will notice the door opened that was previously locked.
To get through the pods safely, don't shoot them yet and if you do, DON'T STAND TOO CLOSE TO THEM as their explosion might kill you. Just run towards that switch and press it quickly. Alternatively, destroy the pods first to make space and then before the room gets filled with them, press the switch! And before fighting the iron liches, try killing those ghost nitrogolems that get unleashed behind you. The iron liches are initially with their backs turned at you, so focus on the golems which will also alert the liches, so try killing them quickly or just run to the start of the level and kill them from that side. After clearing the rooms and grabbing everything, try destroying those pods inside the two separate rooms as they don't respawn, only the ones situated in main room. After grabbing everything, then you can fight the iron liches.
Best weapons to use against the Iron Liches are the unpowered Dragon Claw, the powered Crossbow and even the powered Elven Wand. DON'T use the powered Dragon Claw as they seem to be immune to the ripper effect, so you waste your ammo for nothing. I did that once years ago and wondered why nothing happened.
After you kill them, the final room opens and it is recommended to use another ring of invincibility and a tome of power to quickly clean the last wave of monsters (ghost nitrogolems and disciples) because if you wait too long, they will get outside and it's much harder to kill them in open areas when they are spread out.
The good thing is the level contains 3 rings of invincibility (and if you saved one from the previous levels, it's even better) and you shouldn't worry about dying (unless you are unlucky), although one of them is located inside one of those secret areas, one is placed before entering the last room and another one is given right at end on platform in front of exit, probably to allow you to backtrack. The lava still slows you down in vanilla even when invincible because it seems to stun the player (like with getting hit by a maulotaur dash attack or powered phoenix rod by another player), so the player is slowed down constantly.
Getting all the flasks in the level is quite a challenge. If playing in a port with level stats on, you should have a much easier time tracking down how many items and secrets you have gotten. If playing in vanilla (like in my case), try using the flasks as soon as you get hit and you should grab them all eventually. There are like 20-30 of them available in the level.

Fun fact #1: There is a rare chance when a pod is spawning, it will randomly make another to explode. Not sure why this happens but it was rare to happen and I've only seen that happen a few times before, I don't know if on this level or another one with infinitely spawning pods.
Fun fact #2: Heretic Registered v1.0 crashes after the text screen when it tries to show the Ordering screen because that screen was removed from the registered HERETIC.WAD. I don't know if this still happens in registered v1.2 but it was fixed in v1.3 (SOTSR).

 

E1 deaths: 0

E1 overall: Pretty good! Unpopular opinion but I think I slightly prefer it over Doom's Knee-Deep in the Dead, mostly for E1M9 (because I never found Doom E1M9 secret level as kid and when I found it many years later, I wasn't impressed by it) and the fact Heretic's City of the Damned is a bit more varied compared to the tech bases of first Doom.

Screenshot: 

[Horus]

+++ Frog, Toad and Frog & Toad

[Zedonk]

E3M7 The Chasm

Secrets: 10/10

Right off the bat, you get given the Ethereal Crossbow with the Dragon Claw located in a secret area quite soon after.  I feel like hiding the Dragon Claw is a bit mean because the Hellstaff and the Phoenix Rod are only found in the 2nd half of the map - after you face the maulotaur.  The maulotaur was one of the best maulotaur encounters thus far, there's no ring of invulnerability available and there's no gauntlets of the necromancer for you to turn maulotaurs into health packs XD.  (There is actually a Gauntlets located in the level but you only get access to them after facing the maulotaur.)

 

Another notable area is the windy section which can be a bit unexpected if you haven't played the map before.  (You'll be thinking "what's this invisible force pushing me off this bridge?").  For me, it's just another one of those quirks I love about heretic.

9/10

 

 

[antares031]

E3M8 - “D’Sparil’s Keep”
BP-WS, KIS(%): 218/100/100

 

Welcome to the final boss level with no "The" in the title. You may expect something like a spider mastermind, but D'Sparil is far different than not only a spider mastermind, but also the Icon of Sin from Doom 2. Jump into the pit with gargoyles, grab a crossbow and a shadowsphere, fly up with the wings of wrath, and quickly take the teleporter, before the timer of wings runs out. The first room greets you with disciples, and rewards you with a dragon claw. Keep your claw ammo as much as you can, because you're gonna need it a lot later. The second room surprises you with lots of nitrogolems with no valuable rewards, which is kinda shame. The third room throws ophidians at you, and the last iron lich of this episode. Don't forget to use a shadowsphere to deal with the iron lich. And before you step into the last teleporter, open the wall with a drain hole near the teleporter, so you can get some precious supplies. Now jump to the teleporter, but don't fall down to the platform yet. You need to grab a phoenix rod, a tome of power, and an enchanted shield, before you jump down from the trident.

 

The final boss, D'Sparil, greets you with his pet chaos serpent. This is basically his first phase, and he lets his pet to do all the work first. The chaos serpent spits a fast and powerful fireball at you. Once its health is decreased, it'll spit more fireballs per attack, up to five fireballs. This is pretty easy phase, and just a normal hellstaff should be enough to kill the pet. But before you do that, grab wings of wrath at the right side of giant altar, fly up to the corner of alter, and press the banner with golden eagle to reveal secret areas. The one near the wings gives you an invulnerability ring, and the one at the other side will give you a mystic urn.

 

Now it's the highlight of the final boss, the second phase. Risen from the corpse of his pet, D'Sparil is capable of shooting a huge lighting bolt with blast damage, summoning a pair of disciples, and it can teleport around the entire arena. This may sound not too bad, until you realize that the more damage you give to him, the more frequent he teleports around. Not to mention that he'll cast his magic faster, and more often on black plague, thanks to the faster reaction. D'Sparil himself is also the monster with the highest hit points in this game, having 5 times more HP than an iron lich. And it shares the same armor type with a maulotaur, blocking any splash damage and 50% of empowered hellstaff's raindrop damage.

 

Again, using an invulnerability ring and a tome of power together with a phoenix rod is an easy way to cut down his HP. Since he doesn't use his teleportation ability that often, when he has full HP, just incinerate him with a flamethrower as long as you can. The flamethrower's insanely high firing rate will cause him lots of pain, making him stunned for brief moments. The worst moment comes, when his HP goes down to half. In this state, he teleports around the arena even more frequently, while he still summons his disciples. And keep in mind, the less HP he has, the more chance he gets to spawn disciples. This could be so frustrating, when you're running out of supplies. Since he teleports around the arena so quickly, a hitscan weapon would be more efficient to give him damage at this point. Equip your dragon claw, and snipe that bastard, until his HP reaches to near zero. Now he gets more chance to teleport around, but he gets less chance to cast his magic. Wipe out those disciples first, and mark one of his teleport destinations, rather than chase him down. Once he teleports to the spot you marked, give him a final blow to finish this game.

 

Oh boy, what a final boss fight. This is certainly more unique than Doom's spider mastermind and icon of sin, but this teleportation gimmick is truly exhausting, especially on black plague. Nevertheless, I think that this "uniqueness" is something that makes Heretic more than just a mere doom clone. And it's honestly better than a spider mastermind. Not sure if you compare D'Sparil with the Icon of Sin, though. I guess some people will prefer the stationary demonic face on the wall with less HP and no teleportation gimmick, while others will prefer the one without a rocket launcher dart puzzle on the moving platform. Personally, I'm in the latter camp.

 

 

In conclusion

 

Heretic is definitely more than just a doom clone. By improving Doom's id Tech 1 engine, Heretic provides lots of features that Doom wasn't capable of. It also introduces new mechanics to doom engine, such as inventory system, ultra-fast projectiles (keep in mind that the vanilla doom has a practical limitation on projectile's speed), ice & wind physics, and various particle effects. The game still has reminiscences from Doom, such as a dragon claw as a chaingun, a phoenix rod as a rocket launcher, gargoyles as lost souls, and so on. But Heretic moved a couple of steps further, by providing alternative & empowered versions of existing elements. I think many people will agree that a tome of power is one of the most unique powerup items in any doom engine games. It's not quad damage, but it is still powerful, and it makes the combat more interesting. Speaking of combat, the system of physics & magical attack is also quite interesting. Not only you need to know the types of attack and monsters, but also you can use it against specific monsters, by using a partial invisibility of this game, a shadowsphere. Confronting tens of undead warriors? Just use your blursphere, and problem solved.

 

The downside of Heretic is the lack of variations of monsters. It's definitely better than Ultimate Doom, but Doom 2 did it even better. If there are monsters like revenants, pain elementals, and arch-viles in Heretic, the combat could be more interesting, rather than a series of projectile shooters. Surely iron liches and maulotaurs have special attack patterns, but they only appear as rare boss monsters. Another downside is cryptic progression of several levels. It's not as cryptic as Eternal Doom, but it's still easy to get lost in some levels, such as E1M6. Also, this is just a personal opinion, but the lack of BFG-equivalent weapon is kinda underwhelming. Firemace is not a bad weapon, but it's definitely disappointing, compare to BFG9000.

 

Nonetheless, Heretic's concept of "Medieval Fantasy" first person shooter is undoubtedly interesting. The art design, the soundtrack, all of elements were done really well to build these worlds of Sidhe and one of Serpent Riders. Those art assets, MIDI soundtracks, and sound effects were used in lots of doom mods, including some of my wads. I wonder if I can beat the rest of expansion episodes on wand start now. But then again, the episode 4 and 5 are no joke at all, throwing a maulotaur and iron lich in the very first level :P. Anyway, it was so fun to revisit the game this month, and I hope the other reviewers enjoyed this game as well.

 

Intermission summary: Imgur album set

* A level with the longest playtime: E1M6 - "The Cathedral" (18:32)

[ReaperAA]

E3M7: The Chasm

Kills = 117/117

Secrets = 10/10

Deaths = 0 (Total deaths in the wad = 5)

 

I won't write a big walkthrough type review today, but I will say that this map serves well as the penultimate map of Heretic. Plenty of fine traps and setpieces, from the very starting crossbow ambush to the windy sector area. My favorite is the maulotaur fight, which is arguably the best maulotaur fight in vanilla Heretic. If you are wand-starting, you will most likely have to avoid the maulotaur and go to teleporters to ultimately reveal the hellstaff (with a few disciples guarding it) before tackling the bull.

 

The windy sector is also really neat.  To get the blue key, you will have to cross the chasm on the poison lake. There is also a strong wind flowing there from east to west. So be careful when crossing the chasm, and also be careful about those Ophidians/Iron Liches on each side. At the end of chasm is the blue key and the wings of wrath. You can use the wing to fly across the poison lake and enter the area with those Ophidians/Iron Liches. Those areas have really nice goodies, including the enchanted shield.

 

One thing I will say is that before going to the yellow key door, press the wall at the north that reveals weredragons and ultimately leads you to the dragon claw. You will need the dragon claw as you won't get the hellstaff and the phoenix rod until late in the map.

[xX_Lol6_Xx]

19 hours ago, northivanastan said:

Although that raises some interesting questions. Which version will we go for (0.12.1 or latest autobuild)? Will Double Impact be included, seeing that it's just another WAD but vanillafied?

 

Double Impact was already played, so I guess that if Phase 1 wins we'll play only the first three episodes.

[TheOrganGrinder]

E3M8: D'Sparil's Keep

 

Of classic Heretic's three end-of-episode boss maps, I think this is the one that, to me, feels as though its map areas and encounters outside of the boss arena are the most perfunctory, existing to provide those playing from a wand start with weapons, artifacts, and supplies enough for the final confrontation with D'Sparil, but not really managing to do much or possess much of an identity beyond that.  It's up to the big bad himself to do the heavy lifting of keeping the level interesting; does he manage that?  Well... honestly, I'm in the perhaps odd position of having played Hexen before doing more than dipping a toe into Heretic, so the space in my mind occupied by the chaos serpents has always been that of a big but ultimately not so tough filler monster employed liberally from the second map onward, rather than the legendary, mythos-defining beast encountered here.  Similarly, when I think of the Serpent Riders themselves, it's the mental image of Korax, eldritch and monstrous and multi-limbed, that holds primacy over Bargain Basement Sauron as encountered here.  That's probably unfair, but formative experiences can't help but be formative.

 

Mechanically, I think D'Sparil represents a few "firsts" within the realm of Doom-engine games: the first multi-phase boss entity (even if D'Sparil astride his serpent and D'Sparil on foot are two separate creatures within the workings of the game, the one replacing the other upon the serpent's grisly death), the first monster to combine ranged attacks with the ability to spawn other monsters, the first teleporting monster, even in as limited a fashion as is seen here, able to teleport only to specific spots within the map.  And all of that is interesting but I think on a basic level D'Sparil lacks offensive power compared to the Maulotaurs of the previous episode, and the fight can become an exercise in chasing him down and whittling away his steadily-building coven of Disciples rather than a battle for survival against the onslaught of a potent foe.  Still, I think he stands as a good example of the way Heretic's overall aesthetic is deliciously warped just a little bit away from stock fantasy imagery; on the one hand, he's easily dismissed as just an evil wizard riding a dragon, but the chaos serpent is bovine as much as it is reptilian or draconic, and D'Sparil himself is a darkly messianic figure as much as a sorcerer, a weaver of self-aggrandising mythologies and a builder of cults in his own name.  I'm sure he was a much stiffer challenge back in his own day, too, and the combination of teleportation and minion-conjuring is enough to keep the game's final encounter dynamic and more than just a matter of circle-strafing with the fire button held down.

[Doritos420]

E3M7 - The Chasm

I’m not sure why, but I had a lot of fun playing this map, maybe just in the right mood. Beginning is lackluster, just fighting some orphans who are locked up, but after that I think it picks up well. Tons of enemies, and exploring a large complex with lots of secrets and minibosses. I especially liked the area past the green door where you have to go though a small cave area that opens up into a windy bridge/chasm part (finally an excuse to use the wings of wrath). Also great song from the custom midi. The level was quite linear, but still I enjoyed it immensely.

[fran]

+++ Doom Zero

[ReaperAA]

On 4/26/2021 at 3:25 AM, Zedonk said:

+++ Hexen: Beyond Heretic.  : D

 

Now that I think about it, I would also like to see Hexen ^{if only because I want to see people suffer from the switch hunting}. So...

 

++ Hexen: Beyond Heretic

(I am also keeping my previous Heartland/time-tripper nomination too)

[Capellan]

 

[TheOrganGrinder]

Since I didn't vote at the end of my E3M8 post:

 

+++ Hexen: Beyond Heretic

 

(with apologies to @dobu gabu maru for potentially having to figure out how to pace that over the course of the month)

[Zedonk]

E3M8 D'Sparil's Keep

Secrets: 3/3

The first thing to note about this level is that it is possible to softlock yourself if you don't fly out the pit before your Wings of Wrath run out.  It's unlikely that this happens to anyone but I thought it is worth mentioning.

 

The encounters through the portals can get pretty hard as you're trapped in small cramped rooms with projectiles swarming you.  I was a bit too greedy not using the tome of power given to you at the beginning.

 

The boss fight with D'Sparil will be the greatest game of hide and seek you've ever played.  Who knew that a ruler of a monstrous demonic horde could be so cowardly?  In order to win the fight you first have to kill D'Sparil's serpent on which he rides (hence, the name Serpent Rider) before killing him himself.  Furthermore, the lower health he gets the more he teleports round to opposite sides of the arena, summoning his Disciples to do the fighting for him.  When on low health, I find the untomed Dragon Claw to be quite effective as it is one of the few weapons that is fast enough to hit him (the tomed version uses too much mana for my taste.)  If you run out of Claw ammo, you can always run around in circles and wait for D'Sparil's own minions to kill him which I always find funny XD.

 

6/10

 

 

 

My conclusion on Heretic:

I love Heretic to bits. :)  It's second only to Hexen which is on a completely different level that is simply beyond Heretic.

[FistMarine]

Episode 2: Hell's Maw - Overview

Spoiler

E2M1: The Crater
A nice opener. You start behind a wall and as soon as you turn around it, you will face a bunch of gargoyles. You should try conserving your wand ammo until you find the Crossbow, so make every shot count and even try using the staff. Thankfully the Crossbow is found immediately in next room (as well as a torch). After you press the switch, you will have to backtrack and go through the opened door. Here you will first meet the Weredragon, one of the enemies that appear only in the registered version. His attacks can be easily dodged most of the time and he has a chance to drop 10 crossbow arrows, which is twice of a normal pickup. They are much needed because if the beasts don't drop anything, you may run out of ammo. There are many beasts lurking in the cave on harder difficulties, so it's recommended to lure them outside and you will have an easier time dodging their shots.
After you clear the cave, you have to jump into lava and grab the yellow key! It is guarded by a beast, so be careful! Go through the teleporter and you will find yourself at the start of the level. Now go towards the yellow door and clear the next cave. Grab the green key quickly to minimize the lava damage and then go up the stairs. Do the same on the other side to get the Dragon Claw! Don't worry about falling in the middle if you wanted to grab the flasks (only one present on the hardest skills), there is an invisible teleporter that will send you back at start.
After you have cleared the whole level, you should go back and find the secrets if you haven't done so already. They hold much needed supplies, such as a silver shield, a tome of power and ammo. The other secret holds the Hellstaff, which is the first new weapon you will get and acts like a weaker plasma rifle, although when tomed, it will be one of the most powerful weapons with a single projectiles that homes in targets and it creates an invisible cloud that will rain onto your enemies. The rain doesn't affect you, thankfully.
There is an unmarked secret that holds a Mystic Urn, the first of the registered items, which gives you full health when used. It's best to save it for emergency situations, as the flasks are plentiful and should take the priority over the Urn.

Fun fact: The powered Hellstaff shots will change color depending on your player color in multiplayer.

E2M2: The Lava Pits
An interesting level that features quite a couple of tricks. As soon as you begin moving, the walls will raise and you will see a bunch of gargoyles coming towards you and the Sabreclaws waiting down there. They are the second of the registered enemies and they are pretty much the pinky demon equivalent from Doom, only in that they have no pain chance, they do very low damage and attack quickly to compensate. You have to drop down and run over the platforms while grabbing all the stuff because the platforms will sink into lava, meaning you will have to deal with the lava damage...
As soon as you go into the next room, you will notice a pit that you can drop into. Make sure you have the crossbow selected and the tome of power activated, as you will get ambushed down upon entering and the walls will lower revealing many gargoyles and sabreclaws. It seems like you're stuck for a moment but thankfully you are given the wings to get back up and grab the yellow key as well as other goodies.
After you clear the next rooms, you will find the Chaos Device for first time, which teleports you back to the beginning of the level. It is useful to escape deadly situations, such as getting surrounded by many monsters or getting stuck in a slow crusher. There is a lesser known trick that will be mentioned later, useful for multiplayer games.
The green key setup is interesting, as soon as you grab it, two ghostly undead warriors get unleashed. One of them is sitting on top of the gauntlets, so once you deal with them, grab the gauntlets and continue exploring before exiting!
Most of the secrets are easy to find (one of which is your second chance to get the Hellstaff, in case you missed it previously) but some of them require backtracking and one contains a nasty surprise: the return of the Iron Lich! Oh yeah and before that, some weredragons that can ambush you if you are not careful. The reward for that secret guarded by the lich is a prized Enchanted Shield that gives you 200 armor points and absorbs 75% damage! It is way better than Doom's mega armor and I would say is close to the Quake's red armor in terms of strength, with only the absorption being slightly different (Quake red armor protects 80%). So make sure you get it before exiting because you will need it for the next level!

E2M3: The River of Fire
A very interesting level. Features lots of lava, which must be traversed occasionally, especially if you want to collect all the items. Since I'm a resourceful player, I would advice to leave the timebombs for later because it's not worth grabbing them and damaging your armor, better save your armor for monsters instead. Or for the parts where you MUST traverse the lava, mostly to press the switch and to get to the blue doors. You don't want to be without armor when fighting the enemies later in level. Better make use of the armor pickups you get in the level!
Oh yeah and at beginning of level you can get ambushed easily if you are not careful, as some weredragons get unleashed behind you as soon as you start moving! So make sure to take them down quickly or just run away and pick them off from a distance.
The most interesting thing about the level is the appearence of the mini volcano that spits fireballs that can do good amounts of damage if someone unlucky enough happens to stand close to it when it erupts. When required to walk through lava, it's best to avoid getting too close to these, just avoid them and you should be fine. You don't want to get hit by a fireball because it hurts, a lot!
Earlier I said to not go in lava yet until you clear most of the level first, to conserve your armor. I would recommend grabbing the silver shield (if you are out of armor or have very little left) and the ring of invincibility at least and use it on one of the trickier rooms. You will also find the Phoenix Rod for the first time (which is opened when the blue key becomes accessible), which is the Rocket Launcher equivalent and the game's most powerful weapon. When tomed, it turns into a flamethrower which you can use to kill your enemies quickly at close range and it only uses ONE orb at every 10 or so seconds, assuming you are holding the fire button the entire time. It is tricky to pull it off correctly and mostly recommended using the tomed version against the E2 & E3 bosses, otherwise stick with the unpowered mode.
Also, if you are lucky, the game's ultimate weapon, the Firemace, has spawned somewhere in the level and it can be found at 3 different locations. For me, it spawned on lava, as you can see in the screenshot. If you cleared the whole level and didn't find it, you can find it again on either E2M9 or E2M6. Hopefully it will spawn, as it's always nice to have some extra ammo in the inventory (that can be used of course).
The only annoying thing in my current playthrough is there was a beast roaming around that I initially missed, so I had to search for it and thankfully it wasn't far away, so I could get all the kills. Once again Thank God for the backup saves!

Fun fact #1: In original Heretic v1.0, extra Firemace spawn spots are replaced by Disciples in E1 (only seen in custom levels), Weredragons in E2 and Ophidians in E3 (we will get into that soon). Additionally, in E4 (yes, there is an E4M1 in original Heretic, you will see soon) the extra Firemace spots are replaced by Shadowspheres! The downside of this, is that extra monsters can be glitched in certain places (preventing certain secret places to open and even disallowing the player to get 100% in the said level) or refuse to spawn at all, meaning it will not be possible to get all kills anymore in very rare cases. I'm not sure what causes a kill to be missing but it doesn't always happen, I managed to get all kills so far.
Fun fact #2: Tomed Firemace deals 10000 damage and can kill any non-boss enemy in one hit and in original v1.0, even Iron Liches will be instantly killed. Additionally, in multiplayer, the Chaos Device protects the player from getting insta-killed from the tomed Firemace, which when hit, causes the player to teleport at start of level with health halved. I have not played Heretic multiplayer in DOSBox before, only in Skulltag (in 2009-2010) and even then it was mostly coop, so I'm not sure if all the information is correct but I'm gonna assume that yes, it is, based on just testing against monsters that could reflect attacks (like the Centaurs & Heresiarch from Hexen) in some custom Heretic wads I played on some Skulltag servers back then.

 

E2M4: The Ice Grotto
Probably the most interesting level of the episode. The ice standing on top of lava doesn't make any sense but that's fine, I don't like questioning realism in video games. With all that said, I found interesting to slide on ice, even if that meant less control for the player and being a bit more vulnerable to enemy attacks.
The player should focus on the direct threats and leave those disciples for later. After you enter the building and access the teleporters, you will have to deal with two disciples, one of which guards the green key. Annoyingly, I managed to lose almost all my 200 armor (that I entered level with) just until I reached the part with the green key, thanks to not being able to dodge the beast attacks while sliding on ice and getting attacked by a disciple as soon as teleporting! I had to go back and grab that silver shield that I saved, thankfully in the rest of the level I didn't take much damage, so I was fine overall.
Also just realized at the moment of writing and forgot to mention before that having a tome of power active results in not being frozen anymore during teleporting animation.
Halfway through the level, there are some buildings accessible filled with enemies. In the screenshot I took, a gargoyle died in a glitched frozen state, which I found funny and remember reading about it before, I think I got to happen before but it was rare, so here is an opportunity to see the glitch. Also there is a torch that can be found on a pillar but I'm not sure if there is a teleporter that sends you there or you use the wings to get it, because it is possible to grab it just from bumping into it. It may take a few tries to grab the torch but it's definitely possible to grab it that way.
At the end, there is an iron lich that awaits you and it can be killed easily with the phoenix rod. The exit is nearby (and guarded by a disciple) but don't go through it because there is a secret exit to be found! It becomes accessible after stepping on the final room (I think) and then returning to the beginning.
The door where Phoenix Rod was located should be open now. I don't think I found the E2 secret level as a kid because at that time I didn't think to backtrack to the beginning of level. I also found in my recent playthroughs that you don't need to use a chaos device or wings of wrath to return to the start of the level. Just find one of the teleporters that opens at some point and it will send you back to the beginning! Grab all the goodies you saved and prepare for the secret level!

 

E2M9: The Glacier
Secret level time! This is quite a tricky level and features the respawning pods again, though only some of them respawn, namely those located in the corners. So be careful where you stand and shoot!
Other than a couple traps that may surprise you at times (mostly inside the secret areas), this isn't a very difficult level overall. Much like the previous secret level and the upcoming E3 secret level, they are more like extra regular levels and not gimmicky levels like those from E2 & E3 from Doom or some of the secret levels from Duke3D.
This is your second chance to get the Firemace. If it still didn't spawn, then you have another chance in E2M6. For me it spawned at bottom of the "ice mountain".

Fun fact: This is the level shown in the first demo that plays in all the registered versions of Heretic. Sadly, due to code changes (probably related to Firemace spawns), the demo desyncs in later releases, meaning only the initial v1.0 plays this demo fine. The player dies on the ice mountain. In the desync, the player dies after picking up the crossbow and getting slaughtered by the sabreclaws.

 

E2M5: The Catacombs
Quite an interesting level and the return of the water! This makes me believe that this level feels like a cross between an E2 and E3 level.
The most interesting part is when entering the river, the walls will lower around you, revealing various enemies. Activate the tome of power quickly and clean the room! Then in the next room take out the iron lich.
When backtracking, I noticed that door was opened on the first river and a lot of beasts came out. I went down and safely killed them all from there, without taking any damage.

Fun fact #1: This is the level shown in the second demo that plays in all the registered versions of Heretic. Unlike the other demos, it doesn't desync thankfully. The player only makes it to the waterfall and dies at the gargoyles.
Fun fact #2: This is the only level in E2 that reuses a song that already played before (in E1M4). Some levels in E3 also reuse certain songs.

 

E2M6: The Labyrinth
Another interesting level but it can also be confusing at times (hence the name), especially if you don't know what you are doing. My earliest memory from back in mid 2000s is the first time I reached this level, as soon as the level began, the computer simply froze. I have no idea what caused the game to freeze the PC but it was definitely strange and it has never happened again since then. Okay, I did have rarely Heretic freeze DOSBox (mostly when loading a saved game and trying to open a door that was already open, a very old Doom bug that was fixed in later versions) but other than that, I don't remember any other similar instances.
OK, back to the level, I guess it's fine. Not much to say about it. The ice returns in the main hallway and the outside area has many pods. The hardest part was when you get teleported in a room full of beasts! I had the tomed crossbow ready but still managed to lose like half of my armor. The rest of the level ain't too bad. I liked telefragging the sabreclaw that got teleported from the green key room and then landed on top of it.
The firemace appears for the last time in the episode, so now it's your chance to get it if it didn't spawn before! If not, better luck in next episode! For me, it spawned inside the labyrinth.

 

E2M7: The Great Hall
Here we have another one of those levels filled with lots of lava. You need to make it across the platforms and make sure to not fall down there yet! You will have to endure some damage until getting back up and it's not worth it in the end! Ignore the stuff that is down there for the moment, just continue running towards the next room.
Some secrets require you to run through lava, so save them for the end of the level. Better conserve your health/armor until the end!
As has been the case so far, most E2 levels feature an Iron Lich somewhere in the level, mostly guarding the exit.
When I returned later to look for secrets, I found funny how the beasts located down at beginning of level, they all got killed by lava balls while I was away doing my business.
There is one annoying thing that made me search for a while and do a bit of reloading, since I had a backup save from reaching the end of level and having to find the rest secrets. The iron lich dropped a morph ovum and inflated the item count (forgot to mention iron liches can rarely drop morph ovums as well). I got 20/20 items when I initially exited the level but realized I was still missing an item. After reloading and trying to look inside lava while flying or using the ring, I had to take a look at doomwiki.org (it's especially very useful when playing custom wads and seeing what the level contains) and try to guess what type of item I missed. It was a flask sitting in the lava! Right there close to the Enhanced shield. I didn't realize there would be items in the lava. So I redid that last part and ended up with 21/20 items at the end of level like I expected!

 

E2M8: The Portals of Chaos
Boss level time! Depending on your skill level, you will fight one, two or three Maulotaurs! In my case, it was three maulotaurs!
The easiest and fastest way to complete the level (if playing continuous) is to rush to the Maulotaurs room and try killing them as fast as you can with tomed Phoenix Rod and Ring of Invincibility. You should kill one (and injure the second one) before the invulnerability runs out if you are fast enough. If you are lucky, the maulotaurs were busy fighting back against those that hit them by accident (though the minions will not fight back), which makes it easier to concentrate on killing them, assuming the other maulotaurs don't throw you around. The rest bosses can be finished with whatever weapon you desire. The reason for this is that killing all bosses in a level will automatically kill all other enemies present in the level as well. So you don't need to waste your time and resources to kill remaining enemies if you are in a hurry, though it is recommended to do so, if you don't want the enemies to interfere with your plans while dealing with the maulotaurs.
There is apparently another way to quickly kill a maulotaur by luring it into one of those crushers but it is quite risky and not worth the effort. The crushers are dangerous anyway, so I don't recommend this method unless you are out of ammo or something (almost impossible on a continous playthrough, I end up almost every level with full ammo on all weapons).
And finally, if you have the time and patience to lure a maulotaur at the starting point, it is possible to telefrag it using a Chaos Device! It is difficult to time it right and at the moment, it's not worth the risk. It is, however, a better idea on a less complex map with more maulotaurs, like the last level of E5, the final level of Heretic SOTSR! OK, maybe we are getting a little ahead for now.
In the current run, I killed one maulotaur and injured another one before invulnerability expired, so after that I was trying to run and avoid other enemies because I decided to rush this time and ignore most of the other enemies. It was both a good and bad idea because I didn't get cornered while running and there were still some enemies left that got killed upon the last maulotaur dying, so at least I got some use out of this trick. I still had 140 armor left, so everything went fine, at least. After that, I went to the two secret areas and grabbed whatever was left, like another shield and some wings. And the flask that you can see on the screenshot.
Once all maulotaurs are dead, the exit portals are open!

Fun fact #1: Maulotaurs can rarely drop Phoenix Rod ammo (10 rounds!) or a Mystic Urn. They didn't drop anything here, though.
Fun fact #2: The Maulotaur reappears in Hexen as a friendly creature summoned upon using the Dark Servant artifact!

E2 deaths: 0
E2 overall: Pretty good! Some parts were tricky and it shows an increase in difficulty with the more aggressive environment and monster types available. In my opinion, the episode is far better and more varied than Doom's The Shores of Hell. My only complaint is that unlike Doom that gave you the BFG in E3, in Heretic you can find all weapons (if you are lucky) in just the second episode. Would have been more interesting if the Firemace got introduced in E3. However, there IS an enemy that gets introduced in next episode for first time...
Screenshots:

 

[ReaperAA]

E3M8: D'Sparil's Keep

Kills = All of them

Secrets = 3/3

Deaths = 0 (Total deaths in the wad = 5)

 

And it is finally time to face D'Sparil. At the start of the map, jump into the pit and deal with the gargoyles by grabbing the goodies below. Use the wings of wrath to get out of the pit and to go to the opened teleporter. There is a also a secret room with the bag of holding and some other good stuff in the starting room, so make sure to grab that. Once you start going through the teleporters, you will have deal with some traps in small rooms and obtain goodies along the way, before unlocking the final teleporter that takes you to the D'Sparil's arena. Once you get to his arena, instead of falling down from the trident shaped platform, make sure to grab the phoenix rod, enchanted shield and the tome of power before jumping down. Also make sure to grab all the ammo/goodies before you start attacking him.

 

Speaking of D'Sparil, he has two phases. In the first phase, his mount, the chaos serpent, attacks you with fast fireballs. As its health decreases, it starts spitting more fireballs until it dies. The serpent can be easily killed with just hellstaff spam. But as antares mentioned, make sure that you grab the wings of wrath at the right side of the giant altar, fly up to the both of the corners of the alter, and press the banners with golden eagle to reveal secret areas to obtain the ring of invincibility and a mystic urn before you kill the serpent.

 

The second phase is where D'Sparil starts to use his magical staff to attack you. At first, he only fires a fast moving lightning bolt at you and teleports around the arena occasionally. But as his health drops, he starts summoning his disciples (what a coward) and starts teleporting very fequently. This makes it especially hard to land hits on him at skill 5. Once it becomes nearly impossible to land projectile hits on him, equip to the dragon claw and start circle strafing around the area (and thus avoiding the disciple attacks) until D'Sparil dies.

 

Overall, it is a very fun fight and definitely much better than any of Doom's bosses.

 

Conclusion

 

Heretic is pretty fun game that is unfortunately downplayed by many players as being Doom but inferior, which I think a bit unfair. When it comes to Doom 1 vs Heretic, I think Heretic is overall a better game. While the weapons are not as great as Doom, the enemies are more varied than Doom 1 and the level design is also much better when comparing original 3 episodes of Doom vs original 3 episodes of Heretic. Not to mention that Heretic adds features like inventory system, ability to look up and down and other small improvements.

 

Where Heretic looses is in the monster variety department when compared against Doom 2, which made it not being able to reach Doom 2's level of greatness. Still, I think Heretic is probably the best FPS (other than Doom 2) at the time it was released. What other games were anywhere near as good as Doom or Heretic? Rise of the Triad? Marathon? I don't think so. I find Heretic much better than either of those.

[xX_Lol6_Xx]

I only had time to play the final level, but, to make it a little special, I also recorded a demo

 

Heretic

 

Chocolate Heretic, E3M8, bringest them oneth, wand start (demo included)

Demo: e3m8bylol6.zip

 

Oh boy, far better than Dis, before you can even get close to D'sparil, you have to fight against a lot of his minions, including an iron litch, once you get some decent weapons you get fo fight the serpent rider himself, D'sparil has very interesting gimmicks, first you have to kill his serpent, I don't recommend using melee weapons since ¿She? can deal a lot of damage. After killing the serpent you must fight the big wizard directly, and he has more health than any other enemy, he can summon Disciples and once he's health is "medium-low" he will start teleporting around the arena. Use the wings of wrath to collect the enhanced shield (If you store it for later) and find the two banners, those are doors, grab the ring of invincibility and the mystic urn. And after a while he'll die. After that a switch will open up, press it and end the level.

 

Overall, Heretic is a good game, it has cool looking areas and very interesting enemies, the first episode might be my favorite, not only because of the music, but also because the levels are rather good, somewhat realistic, some of them have nice verticality. E2 has also very good maps. And (IMO) they play very good on bringest them oneth. D'sparil's underwater dome is.... interesting, you really wouldn't expect it on this kind of game. Nice game, good midis and excellent ambient.

 

[SiFi270]

E3M8: D'Sparil's Keep

d'sparil is a coward

[LadyMistDragon]

The Chasm

 

A map that really packs on the enemies, A.D. 79's "Precipice" might be more appropriate if the entire map contained the sort of veticality I've seen in a few Heretic wads, but regardless, it's good. It's better than hearing E1M5 again, at any rate.

 

Going through the dungeons isn't hard for the most part, despite a seriously-stacked enemy counter.  but the Ophidians surrounding you are quite hard. There's a crossbow not too far away, but constant side-stepping's just tedious. This was the map where I really started to get annoyed with Sabreclaw mobs (they are all OVER Masters of Chaos and I like that wad) that basically exist solely to soak up your Dragon Claw ammo, a Dragon Claw which is incidentally hidden in a secret. Seriously, don't play the first few maps of E4 because it has these kinds of moronic design decisions shoved into the first few maps. More Were-dragons are shoved into small areas which needless to say force you to watch your step.

 

There's one area that gives the map its name, and I'm not sure it's so much a chasm as a closed area(that's just the Doom engine I guess) filled entirely with acidic sludge. The Ophidians and Iron Lichs in the caves at the side may seem a bit much, but if you saw the unusual bit of lit wall earlier, you'll have picked up a Pheonix Rod that makes handling them small potatoes and you don't even need the extra Tome of Power.

 

Speaking of the Tome of Power, there's a Maulotaur that you're forced to fight in a fairly cramped hallway. I died once to him which might be expected, who knows? But it wasn't hard to kill him. The fire mace didn't spawn for me though. booooo

 

D'Sparil's Keep

 

Seems fairly modest at first. You're on a star-shaped platform in the middle of a very aquatic-themed room with a switch in the corner that raises the water level and open a teleporter in one of the corners. You go to different rooms and face various mobs without Tomes of Power while hitting switches. Eventually, you're able to access the final arena where you face off against D'Sparil.

 

The pulse-pounding Dragonfly/Jimmy composed track is worthy final boss music. I'd go far as to say that Jimmy is a better composer than Andrew Hulshult and ought to take a few more professional contracts like Prodeus. Anyways, the first phase doesn't seem terrible difficult, and you can reserve your Tomes of Power for the second stage, where D'Sparil shoots nasty destructive lightning your way and summons Disciples to harry and eventually overwhelm you. As you whittle down his health, he will teleport more and more when shot, and by the end, it becomes incredibly difficult to find the time to use the Crossbow, and you're better off using the Hellstaff. Hopefully, you won't have all wasted it on the Disciples because there's plenty of ammo around. Eventually though, he'll expire and you can claim victory!

 

I'll be honest, Heretic is actually only my third favorite Doom engine game behind both Doom and Strife, but that's not a comment on its failings anywhere near as much how much I enjoyed those two games in comparison. The inventory system was an amazing innovation copied by an FPS I don't enjoy anywhere near as much: Duke 3D. Kevin Schilder at times creates some incredibly evocative soundscapes, but it's got to be understood you can't have one guy makes music for 27 levels. The setting is amazing and is an interesting take on a setting that normally depends on a rechargable finite resources (mana or magic) as opposed to a nonrechargable finite resource. The Tomes of Power take practically all the game's weapons to the next level and make them genuinely engaging to use. The final boss is at least 5 times better than a stupid platform puzzle where you find the right way to shoot at a fucking wall could ever be. Finally, I actually thought Heretic had robust enemy variety, even taking into account some of them were basically Doom enemies with a palette/attack swap like Revenants/Undead Warriors, or Gargoyles/Lost Souls or Sabreclaws/Demons. Maybe some of them are a little bit too tanky at points, but that was never an issue for me in the main game (Masters of Chaos or Hymn on the other hand.....).

 

The game's mood is often too gloomy for me at times, but the main problem is that the weapons (like the 'defender of the faith' the ethereal crossbow) don't have that classic id feel of engagement to them. Marathon, a game where the level design is a serious mixed bag, is the only game in terms of weapon feel I think comes close to Doom. This...well, it's behind Dark Forces in overall fun factor I think, but the fact remains this is still an incredibly-designed FPS that's aged considerable better than other games of the period (like Marathon, for instance.)

Edited April 28, 2021 by LadyMistDragon

[dobu gabu maru]

10 hours ago, TheOrganGrinder said:

Since I didn't vote at the end of my E3M8 post:

 

+++ Hexen: Beyond Heretic

 

(with apologies to @dobu gabu maru for potentially having to figure out how to pace that over the course of the month)

 

I'd probably have to separate it by hubs. While Hexen has 31 maps total, anyone that's played it knows you're not done with a map when you "exit" it ;_;

 

Freedoom Phase 1 at 4 votes

Doom Zero is at 3 votes

Hexen is at 3 votes

[Endless]

Just coming by to leave my vote, hehe!

 

Doom Zero + + +

[Doritos420]

E3M8 - D'Sparil's Keep

To me the start of this level was a bit lame. A series of bland rooms that locks you in and has you fight a handful of monsters. I do have to say the lich was surprising, but it just felt like a way to decrease my health/armor before the final boss (a bit pointless since there’s an armor pickup right at the ending arena spawnpoint). Other than that I loved the final boss. The fact that it had actual phases was really cool, I liked how he teleported around too and summoned more followers. I do have to say I wish he had a few more varied attacks, the one he used was very easy to avoid so actually fighting him was not too hard, but still very fun. Great fight!

 

 

Closing Thoughts - Interesting game. It’s hard to think of it as a separate entity than Doom since they share so many similarities. I feel as though the level design was overall a bit stronger than Doom. To me (generally speaking) Doom Ep1 is great but Ep2 & 3 are a bit lackluster in comparison. To me Heretic was more consistently good, but without reaching the heights or depths or Doom 1.

 

Playing through it again I remember why I stopped playing it in the first place. The area in E1M6 (The Cathedral) where you need to find the secret door in order to progress really rubbed me the wrong way. I was thinking that future levels would rely on that, but I was happy when this was not the case.

 

One thing they added that I loved was the atmospheric sounds and effects (water splashes, wind, ice). A new addition was the item system, though I didn’t like the way it was implemented.  If you’re making a fast FPS I don’t want to be fiddling with the item menu when I’m running around, so I did not use it very often. I think an improvement would be to cut back on the amount of items just to have it be less cumbersome when scrolling through.

 

When it comes to weapons I liked them fine enough, but compared to Doom they seem a little watered down (could be because the enemies are tankier). To me the wand is an improvement to the pistol, just due to the increased fire rate. I liked the crossbow, the knockback effect on the enemies was cool, but I think it lacks the punch of the shotgun. My favorite weapon was probably the dragonclaw. The hellstaff was fine, but just feels like a weaker plasma rifle. The phoenix rod again was fine, but I was never super pumped to use it. And lastly there’s the fire mace which I did not enjoy and nearly forgot about.

 

As for the monsters I think Heretic really shines with their boss type enemies. Some creative and memorable attacks from the Iron Lich, Maulotaur and D’Sparil. I actually kind of wish there were some more Maulotaurs in the levels as normal enemies. Having varied attacks and the last boss having phases was really cool. Wish there was more of this sort of thing.

 

All in all, pretty fun game but not mind blowing.

[golbeeze]

+++ Doom Zero