Doom Vs. Heretic/Hexen?

hex11 said:

There is a good game in some alternate universe that has features of both Hexen and Strife...

It was Hecatomb. :(

I love the lore for Heretic/HeXen more than Doom's demon invasion plot, but gameplay wise I prefer Doom and Doom II over the others. I really enjoy playing HeXen, but seeing the slower pacing generally slacks on me I'd probably have Heretic in second place as it's Doom, but with a lot of cool artifacts to abuse, interesting art design (Actually, I like HeXen's art more), and the monsters are all pretty cool and I prefer more of them to HeXen's (As in HeXen it's more or less fighting Ettins for a good chunk of the game mixed with Centaurs, who are basically Ettins who can block, with a gargoyle thrown in for good measure ever once in a while. Sure in Heretic it's basically four different enemies for the first chapter, but the gargoyles are usually mixed into two kinds and the undead knights can generally surprise, plus ghost monsters add another element to it).

Speaking of Ghost monsters... They're not natively in HeXen, are they?

Clonehunter said:

Speaking of Ghost monsters... They're not natively in HeXen, are they?

The only time you'll see ghost monsters is if Korax summons them (probably just in the second phase). They aren't really any different than normal monsters either, except if I remember right there's a strange old bug in original Hexen where if you kill a ghost with the disc of repulsion, it dies but doesn't disappear.

Antroid said:

Different strokes for different folks (who could've imagined?): I f-kin love the concept. I always liked old pixely rpgs of the Might and Magic series (particularly 6-8), and hexen reminds me way too much of them, only more action-oriented and without all the RPG stuff. Basically it's like one really long dungeon. I couldn't care less for the fact that we get very few weapons, or very few monster types, I was enjoying the atmosphere way too much. And the exploration aspect was fun for me, too. Honestly I prefer exploration gameplay with some token fighting to keep things not completely safe to the non-stop combat from map start to map finish that Doom usually has - the latter actually bores me much faster.

I don't even know why I place Dooms above Hexen, actually.

I'm another oldschool RPG fan and there's always just been a certain "expansive" quality to Heretic's sound design, music, and levels that I find immensely compelling, a sense that there's always much more than you ever actually see. It's a shame that the later episodes tend to have relatively simplistic/gimmick-based levels. Something about maps like The Glacier and Halls of Fear feel positively cozy to me, all the warm/earthy colors of the architecture and precious lights against those deep menacing red and blue skies.

I consider kristus' Curse of D'Sparil PWAD an exceptional example of bringing the gameplay flow of Heretic up to that "vast" feeling I've always gotten from the game's atmosphere and architecture. Mind you, this is basically the only Heretic PWAD I've ever played because there seem to be so few of them with serious effort behind them.

rf` said:

This tired question again? Well okay.

I love all the Doom-games equally. Doom, Heretic, Hexen, and yes even Strife. :D

I don't see it as tired, I am simply curious and haven't gotten a good survey anywhere else. So far it seems everyone favors Doom more, which would kinda make sense considering this is "Doomworld" ;3.