Hexen: 20 Year Anniversary

[DeathevokatioN]

Avoozl said:

Heretic could've also used a new boss for the extra two episodes.

New content is always nice, but to be fair those levels were released for free and weren't an expansion.

[Avoozl]

They were released as an update to the game, they aren't separate like DKOTDC.

[Gez]

The most disappointing part in HexDD's lack of new content was that the ending was exactly the same as Hexen's ending.

For SOTSR it would have been nice to have new sky textures at the very least, and new intermission maps.

[Cupboard]

I guess in both projects, for Hexen and Heretic, they had a surplus of people who were good at level design and too many people who were medium-to-terrible at art graphics. It wasn't worth the time and money to pay people to create new textures and "hub themes" because there was no market for such things anymore. They were merely seeking to capititalize off the consumers they had already won over by sheer loyalty to the solid and superior FPS experience via Carmack's engine. Nobody was going to pay premium dollars or euros for this product. They wanted to grab the people who already loved the "family of games" that were built off the Doom engine.

I think it's fair to say that they succeeded. Me for example, my father owned Hexen and Heretic but never got the expansion packs. It was up to me to update Heretic to 1.3 and find a copy of Death Kings of the Dark Citadel for Hexen. Those "mini-sequels" were devotionally developed for fans of the original games and Doom players in general.

[ETTiNGRiNDER]

terminus12 said:

Would anyone in the eastern half of the US possibly be up for some Chocolate Hexen co-op sometime this month in celebration? I have beaten the game before so if you haven't gotten past hub 1 this might be your chance haha

I'm on #DMstuff on irc.quakeworld.org a lot, hit me up there if you're interested

Yeah, I'll see if I can get on board for that if I find time.

[SavageCorona]

I reckon there should be a Hexen the way Raven did. I know that would be a total nightmare to organise but it's a cool idea.

[ETTiNGRiNDER]

SavageCorona said:

I reckon there should be a Hexen the way Raven did. I know that would be a total nightmare to organise but it's a cool idea.

Yeah, I would like to see something like that, but it'd take some mappers who are good at coordinating with each other to make good hubs or it'd just end up as a bunch of Blight-style ones (where the maps are all basically self-contained with some connections between them).

[Lila Feuer]

Hexen's one of those games I wish I could be a virgin with again. I still think it has an amazing atmosphere, even though I know what to expect and am used to it.

[Halfblind]

Gustavo6046 said:

I hate Raven's games for some reason, I prefer Strife.

Raven does have a lot of hit and miss when it comes to good games. Out of the games that I have played I have spent a lot of time playing through Star Trek: Elite Force and Jedi Knight: Jedi Outcast. I discovered that textures look better in Q3 than in EF. After playing a bit of Call of Duty: Black Ops it never hit the right tune for me to continue playing it. I would rather play Halo 3 and Halo 3 ODST over anything with the Call of Duty title. My favorite games from Raven include Hexen and Heretic 2 with the original Heretic being a close 3rd. I thought those 2 games were very innovative for their time. I was thinking that if I had the funds and my own video game company I would buy the rights to Heretic and Hexen from their respected owners.

rf` said:

Deathknights had far better hubs than the original game, but the final fight was just extremely dissapointing.

Do you mean Deathkings?

Cyanosis said:

The expansion to Hexen 1 I felt could of used new content, a new final boss, new monster, new inventory item, new anything. The re-use of puzzle items from the original was also lazy.

It might have been a bit lazy, yes, but the idea for DK was to use the resources available and use the existing puzzle mechanics and monster spawning and take it up a notch. Though the puzzles mechanics were the same as Hexen’s they are actually harder to solve. It would take you the same amount to time to complete the 3 extra hubs as it would the 5 original hubs. In DK most of the levels were better, with a lot more detail than what were in the original game. The last level was also very disappointing and could have used more work. It was just a small boss room and that was it. I thought the level with Korax was done better.

Avoozl said:

Heretic could've also used a new boss for the extra two episodes.

I think there was no need for any new monsters in Heretics expansion. D’Sparil was dead he could not summon another type of boss to harm you. I though Heretics expansion was great. My favorites with the expansion were Episodes 1 and 4 with episode 4 topping the list. Episode 4 also had my favorite heretic map of all time “The Ramparts of Perdition” that level was amazing, minus its missing texture in the phoenix room.

TheCupboard said:

Me for example, my father owned Hexen and Heretic but never got the expansion packs. It was up to me to update Heretic to 1.3 and find a copy of Death Kings of the Dark Citadel for Hexen. Those "mini-sequels" were devotionally developed for fans of the original games and Doom players in general.

Very true…

I actually owned these games in reverse. I had a copy of Deathkings first, then I owned Hexen, and finally I owned Heretic SOTSR. I am very happy that I have found all 3 disks. They gave me a lot of great gamming moments.


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For anyone who hasn’t progressed through hub 1, Here is a link to a lets play on dailymotion that I discovered a while ago.


Additionally has anyone ever played temple.wad for Hexen. I describe it as Hexen on a Roller-coaster. I played it when I first discovered Hexen mods. I never finished it, I reached a point where a platform was supposed to lower revealing one of the bosses but it never lowered. The texture continued scrolling down but no boss appeared. I attempted to start it back up with zdoom but the wad crashed the application and I could not play it after that.

[Mechazawa]

I have yet to beat Hexen, I should do that. So, thats what I will do. Beat Hexen.

[SavageCorona]

Good luck, take this with you: http://www.gamefaqs.com/pc/197554-hexen-beyond-heretic/faqs/1649

[terminus12]

ETTiNGRiNDER said:

Yeah, I'll see if I can get on board for that if I find time.

awesome!

quakenet.org
#DMstuff

I'll be on a lot today, Monday, and Tuesday, but not much time during the week, next weekend will be pretty good too though, usually late afternoon and evening US central time is good.

[ETTiNGRiNDER]

Halfblind said:

Additionally has anyone ever played temple.wad for Hexen. I describe it as Hexen on a Roller-coaster. I played it when I first discovered Hexen mods. I never finished it, I reached a point where a platform was supposed to lower revealing one of the bosses but it never lowered. The texture continued scrolling down but no boss appeared. I attempted to start it back up with zdoom but the wad crashed the application and I could not play it after that.

Are you talking about Temple 2 (with the Duke Nukem voice clips) or was there an actual Temple 1 that I missed? And are you sure you didn't just not wait long enough? It's been a while but as I recall Temple 2 had some strange design decisions in places and a really tall lift wouldn't have been out of the question.
At any rate, I'm pretty sure I've beaten that wad at least once, had some great ideas but also some just weird ones.

[riki2321]

Halfblind said:

Here it is the first of October in the year 2015. On the 30th of October marks the 20th anniversary of Hexen: Beyond Heretic. In 1995 Raven Software releases Hexen upon the world revolutionizing gameplay and atmosphere. For it was to first to include a hub based system of level progression and environmental fog effects.

So this month being the 20th anniversary I would like to know what you are doing to celebrate this milestone event and how this game has affected your gaming experience thereafter. I would also like to know when you first started playing it and why you still enjoy playing it today.

Woo! Awesome! I made one wad and i fucking enjoy that thing!!

[Halfblind]

ETTiNGRiNDER said:

Are you talking about Temple 2

At any rate, I'm pretty sure I've beaten that wad at least once, had some great ideas but also some just weird ones.

Reading the description, I remember it now, that is the wad. I thought it had some good architecture and a few good moments. I thought the author chose well when picking out textures from Heretic to include in the wad. I wish it worked in Zdoom, without breaking, so I could play it again.

--

Furthermore, we have only 1 more week until Hexen officially turns 20. This game has brought good memories for some and headaches for others. I hope that more people in the future can enjoy this game, even if it seems to be forgotten in the modding community.

I hope that by the 25th anniversary I can release something for it or maybe convert my Heretic project, when it is done, for Hexen. I hope to can also play through Krustus' Hexen project by then as well.

[terminus12]

I'd mod for Hexen if I knew how

[Gez]

terminus12 said:

I'd mod for Hexen if I knew how

It's not hard. Look at old ZDoom tutorials for pointers, most of them are really Hexen tutorials.

The main difference between Doom and Hexen is that action functions are parameterized. So instead of having action X be "open door with speed Y and requires key Z", and then separate actions for other keys and other speeds, you have just one open door action and then you choose the key it needs and the speed at which it opens as parameters. And the way the player activates it (use, shoot, walkover, etc.) is also something you can choose, so you don't have separate actions for the same thing but in S1/SR/D1/DR/G1/GR variants.

[Doominator2]

Oh wow already? I remember there being a thread a while back celebrating its 18th birthday. Wow it went by so fast.

[Avoozl]

I can't remember but did Kaiser ever finish his Hexen map set he was working on since a year or so ago?

[scifista42]

If you mean this one, the answer is yes.

[Halfblind]

Doominator2 said:

Oh wow already? I remember there being a thread a while back celebrating its 18th birthday. Wow it went by so fast.

The 18th huh, I must have missed that one. When the 25th anniversary comes around you bet I will start a 25th anniversary thread.

Avoozl said:

I can't remember but did Kaiser ever finish his Hexen map set he was working on since a year or so ago?

I just downloaded and previewed that level set. It looks pretty good. It also seems very fresh with more Hexen to explore.

Are there any other good map sets that have been released in the past few years for Hexen? Are there any other good map sets in the works for both Heretic and Hexen that I do not know of? I know that rf and Kristus are making ones that I would want to play. I also know that Robert Eckhart is also working on a Gzdoom version of Carnage Galore 3. Do you know of any others?

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Sorry I missed the actual anniversary, I felt a little sick that day, but here’s to 20 years of Hexen, it being possibly my favorite DOS based game of all time.