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RTTP: Heretic

Guilty_AI

Member
I've been on a boomer shooter streak lately and the latest one i've tried is Heretic.

I honestly liked this one better than the original Doom. First i liked medieval setting FPS more, then i also had the impression levels had much more enemies in general, meaning i was "in action" a lot more frequently. And finally, they did away with the scan-hit enemies from Doom, which was one of the most annoying aspects of that game.
The items, which i was initially under the impression i wasn't going to use at all, turned out to be a great addition to the formula and i found myself using them frequently. On that note i also thought only letting you carry over one item of each type to the next level was an interesting design choice (assuming it isn't a bug), i felt it was a great way to stop players from hoarding items.

With all the praise said and done, i have to say, the last two episodes (the ones from the expansion apparently) had some really bullshit design. I can forgive the immense difficulty on E4M1, since i imagine the idea was to give players a sense of desperation and inspire them to rush to the exit, but some of the later levels on E5 required you to do some really obscure stuff in order to progress, either having you find some secret wall that only opens if you shoot at it as opposed to interacting with it, secret walls hidden under very dark corridors, flashing lights that gave you headache, or buttons that open some wall in some corner on the other side of the map. The last boss fight on E5 was also a bit underwhelming.

Ok, have some cool soundtrack

 
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TintoConCasera

I bought a sex doll, but I keep it inflated 100% of the time and use it like a regular wife
Loved seeing my bro play this when I was a kid. It's so colorful and the enemy and weapons design is very cool.

Have you considered playing Heretic II? It's not an FPS, but kinda feels like a prototype of Jedi Knight II in many ways, including some cool melee combat. Worth a go, I remember liking it a lot back in it's day.
 
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Guilty_AI

Member
Loved seeing my bro play this when I was a kid. It's so colorful and the enemy and weapons design is very cool.

Have you considered playing Heretic II? It's not an FPS, but kinda feels like a prototype of Jedi Knight II in many ways, including some cool melee combat. Worth a go, I remember liking it a lot back in it's day.
I actually remember playing heretic 2 as a kid, although i only found out recently that was what i was playing.

I plan to go through the Hexens first (release order and all that). Sucks H2 isn't available for sale on any digital store, meaning i'd probably have to "acquire it". But maybe they'll make it available until i get around to playing it, like what happened with Blood Omen.
 

Ragnarok

Member
I’m curious as to which difficulty level you played Doom on if you weren’t in constant action? Because Ultraviolence makes it a different and significantly more awesome game.
 

Guilty_AI

Member
I’m curious as to which difficulty level you played Doom on if you weren’t in constant action? Because Ultraviolence makes it a different and significantly more awesome game.
I always pick the one right in the middle (should be "Hurt me plenty" on Doom and "Bringest them oneth" on Heretic).
Ultra hardcore difficulty in those games just don't tend to be fun, or aren't meant for first playthroughs. As a matter of fact, reading online on it, infinite respawing monsters without infinite respawing ammo doesn't seem like something i'd enjoy playing for the first time since i'd have to rush through every level.
Even second to hardest difficulties usually come with "spoilers" in the form of monsters that were only meant to appear later, or require an understanding of the game i wouldn't have yet.
 
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Laptop1991

Member
I remember playing this way back in the day on PC, it was a good game at the time, i played Hexen and Heretic 2 a lot more though, loads of fps in the 90's.
 

TintoConCasera

I bought a sex doll, but I keep it inflated 100% of the time and use it like a regular wife
Guilty_AI Guilty_AI for me GZDoom is the way to go. Just make sure to disable crouching, jumping, free vertical aim (for DOOM) and the godawful bilinear filtering.

You should also consider giving DOOM a go in Ultraviolence if you ever feel like it. It's not that hard, kinda easy even, and it's considered the legit way to play it. Cool thing is, instead of having harder enemies, they are the same but the enemy positioning is different, so it's more replayable.

I have to try this one, is there something like Brutal Heretic :messenger_kissing_smiling:?
Of course there is!

 

amigastar

Member
Guilty_AI Guilty_AI for me GZDoom is the way to go. Just make sure to disable crouching, jumping, free vertical aim (for DOOM) and the godawful bilinear filtering.

You should also consider giving DOOM a go in Ultraviolence if you ever feel like it. It's not that hard, kinda easy even, and it's considered the legit way to play it. Cool thing is, instead of having harder enemies, they are the same but the enemy positioning is different, so it's more replayable.


Of course there is!


NICE!!
GManLives seems to like it
And those water particles OMG
 
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Guilty_AI

Member
Guilty_AI Guilty_AI for me GZDoom is the way to go. Just make sure to disable crouching, jumping, free vertical aim (for DOOM) and the godawful bilinear filtering.

You should also consider giving DOOM a go in Ultraviolence if you ever feel like it. It's not that hard, kinda easy even, and it's considered the legit way to play it. Cool thing is, instead of having harder enemies, they are the same but the enemy positioning is different, so it's more replayable.
Thanks for the advice. The only problem is that i have a lot of these shooters on my backlog to go through (Hexens, Marathons, more Dooms, Shadow Warrior Classic, Quake 1&2, a bunch of new retro ones like AMID EVIL, Hedon, Ion Fury and so on), so it might take a long while before i go and replay one of them :messenger_grinning_sweat:

Of course there is!


:goog_unsure:
 

SmokedMeat

Gamer™
I picked up the Heretic/Hexen bundle about a month ago, but haven’t started any of them yet.

Is Nexus Mods a decent source of mods for these, or should I look elsewhere?
 

Saber

Gold Member
Heretic is good, but only good part is the first 3 weapons. The rest is either unspired or garbage.
The same with monsters. Enemies like the necromancer are cool, but them you face things like overkited minotaur or boring serpent and felt like the devs are a mix bag. Also usable power-ups is just a bad design, you end up forgetting you even had them. Doom and Quake do miles job at this department.

Its a fine game, but still not on par with Doom.
 
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Guilty_AI

Member
Is Nexus Mods a decent source of mods for these, or should I look elsewhere?
I wouldn't be able to tell since the only mod i used was GZDoom, which has its own site.

Heretic is good, but only good part is the first 3 weapons. The rest is either unspired or garbage.
The same with monsters. Enemies like the necromancer are cool, but them you face things like overkited minotaur or boring serpent and felt like the devs are a mix bag. Also usable power-ups is just a bad design, you end up forgetting you even had them. Doom and Quake do miles job at this department.

Its a fine game, but still not on par with Doom.
I used those items quite frequently though, sometimes it even felt like a necessity to have them. I think the only weapon i didn't like was the firemace (this thing) since it didn't do a lot of damage, had terrible accuracy and ammo depleted quite quickly, i only used it when i wanted to conserve ammo for other weapons. I found use for all the other weapons in the game.
 
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Bragr

Banned
I've been on a boomer shooter streak lately and the latest one i've tried is Heretic.

I honestly liked this one better than the original Doom. First i liked medieval setting FPS more, then i also had the impression levels had much more enemies in general, meaning i was "in action" a lot more frequently. And finally, they did away with the scan-hit enemies from Doom, which was one of the most annoying aspects of that game.
The items, which i was initially under the impression i wasn't going to use at all, turned out to be a great addition to the formula and i found myself using them frequently. On that note i also thought only letting you carry over one item of each type to the next level was an interesting design choice (assuming it isn't a bug), i felt it was a great way to stop players from hoarding items.

With all the praise said and done, i have to say, the last two episodes (the ones from the expansion apparently) had some really bullshit design. I can forgive the immense difficulty on E4M1, since i imagine the idea was to give players a sense of desperation and inspire them to rush to the exit, but some of the later levels on E5 required you to do some really obscure stuff in order to progress, either having you find some secret wall that only opens if you shoot at it as opposed to interacting with it, secret walls hidden under very dark corridors, flashing lights that gave you headache, or buttons that open some wall in some corner on the other side of the map. The last boss fight on E5 was also a bit underwhelming.

Ok, have some cool soundtrack


I'm playing through Doom at the moment, it's always been one of those games I played tons of, but never actually finished. But it is actually quite remarkable how much they got right in that game, almost every early FPS got some absolute horseshit going on, usually as you said, with the progression.
 

Saber

Gold Member
I used those items quite frequently though, sometimes it even felt like a necessity to have them. I think the only weapon i didn't like was the firemace (this thing) since it didn't do a lot of damage, had terrible accuracy and ammo depleted quite quickly, i only used it when i wanted to conserve ammo for other weapons. I found use for all the other weapons in the game.

The only reason I use the other weapons besides the crossbow, viking helm and the crystal staff(sorry forgot the names) is because I rather prefer waste ammo with other weapons and save them when needed.
-Apocalyse staff or whatever is similar to Laser rifle from Doom but it has a worse blinding effect that covers even more of your screen if you're close. Its hitbox is also worse, making you hit walls/corners more frequently. Magic version is just lame, even if its damage is somewhat good its not that fast to deal with monsters because looks more like a gimmick than a weapon
-Phoenix staff is a worse version of Doom Rocket Launcher, with way less max ammo, rare ammunition in stages and a stupid knockback as if its a rocket launcher. Also its magic book version its incredibly stupid.
- Firemace is the worst weapon ever made in a game. Its basically a chaingun/laser clone(as if the game didn't have any) with an incredibly bad projectile that does mediocre damage(which varies alot btw), can easly miss and its useless against ghosts. And don't even want to touch the aspect of magic book, which simply make its projectile bigger, slower but IK most one enemies. Btw is for some reason an extremelly rare weapon and ammo, as if its a godlike weapon or any closer to BFG.
- One of main reasons itens usability is frequent is because the game lacks stationary power-ups and lacks a regular medikit equivalent(which btw is transformed into an usable purple potion). You could do a similar aproach as Doom or Quake and the game would be alot better.
 
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Majormaxxx

Member
Boomers are from the baby boomer era so it’s probably the dumbest shit I’ve seen in a while.
Boomers are older folks. At this point, genx and millenials that liked those 90s shooters are seen as old people by the teens and 20 somethings. So in a way, they are the new boomers. Obviously if you take it literally, boomer shooter doesn't make sense since the majority of baby boomers are not gaming.
 

SpiceRacz

Member
whatever you say, dumb fuck. That's the meme for your generation, right?

period-leonardo-dicaprio.gif
 
Boomers are older folks. At this point, genx and millenials that liked those 90s shooters are seen as old people by the teens and 20 somethings. So in a way, they are the new boomers. Obviously if you take it literally, boomer shooter doesn't make sense since the majority of baby boomers are not gaming.
The term boomer came up literally because of baby boomers controlling the government.
 

Guilty_AI

Member
The only reason I use the other weapons besides the crossbow, viking helm and the crystal staff(sorry forgot the names) is because I rather prefer waste ammo with other weapons and save them when needed.
-Apocalyse staff or whatever is similar to Laser rifle from Doom but it has a worse blinding effect that covers even more of your screen if you're close. Its hitbox is also worse, making you hit walls/corners more frequently. Magic version is just lame, even if its damage is somewhat good its not that fast to deal with monsters because looks more like a gimmick than a weapon
Didn't really have these problems with it. I don't know if its because i used GZDoom or something (maybe its an issue with the original visuals and controls) but i'd use it rather frequently against stronger enemies.
-Phoenix staff is a worse version of Doom Rocket Launcher, with way less max ammo, rare ammunition in stages and a stupid knockback as if its a rocket launcher. Also its magic book version its incredibly stupid.
The magic version pairs up really, really well with an invincible ring. Each flame burst only spends one piece of ammo until you let go of the trigger. So you could easily kill a minotaur or two using this combo practically without wasting any ammo.
- Firemace is the worst weapon ever made in a game. Its basically a chaingun/laser clone(as if the game didn't have any) with an incredibly bad projectile that does mediocre damage(which varies alot btw), can easly miss and its useless against ghosts. And don't even want to touch the aspect of magic book, which simply make its projectile bigger, slower but IK most one enemies. Btw is for some reason an extremelly rare weapon and ammo, as if its a godlike weapon or any closer to BFG.
Yeah, firemace was dumb.
- One of main reasons itens usability is frequent is because the game lacks stationary power-ups and lacks a regular medikit equivalent(which btw is transformed into an usable purple potion). You could do a similar aproach as Doom or Quake and the game would be alot better.
I didn't use just the medkits (in fact, it was one of the items i used the fewest alongside the urn). Magic book, invincibility and the flying thing were the most frequently used, practically on every level. The egg was also very useful for dealing with crowds when you're low on ammo (also a bit hilarious) but there weren't a lot of it. The one i liked the least was probably the timebomb, didn't do a lot of damage and was dumb to set up, only used during some levels where i had to conserve ammo.
 
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amigastar

Member
So i've tried Brutal Heretic and it'a blast. Graphics really look nice and game is fun as hell.
Only thing is it freezes. Have to figure out why.
Edit: ok, i've used the Brutal Heretic RPG v5.0 edition, now it works.
 
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Ragnarok

Member
I always pick the one right in the middle (should be "Hurt me plenty" on Doom and "Bringest them oneth" on Heretic).
Ultra hardcore difficulty in those games just don't tend to be fun, or aren't meant for first playthroughs. As a matter of fact, reading online on it, infinite respawing monsters without infinite respawing ammo doesn't seem like something i'd enjoy playing for the first time since i'd have to rush through every level.
Even second to hardest difficulties usually come with "spoilers" in the form of monsters that were only meant to appear later, or require an understanding of the game i wouldn't have yet.
You’re describing Nightmare difficulty. Ultraviolence is basically Nightmare without the respawning enemies, and it’s THE way to play the game. I agree with you usually the middle option is the way to play most games but Doom really really needs to be played on Ultraviolence
 

Northeastmonk

Gold Member
I own them on Steam and I really enjoy playing Hexen, Hexen 2 and Heretic. What’s odd to me is that MS releases Hexen on their store for PC only.


It’s great, but why just PC and not Xbox? Why not all consoles?

This was recent too, last month it came out on the MS for PC.
 
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Guilty_AI

Member
I own them on Steam and I really enjoy playing Hexen, Hexen 2 and Heretic. What’s odd to me is that MS releases Hexen on their store for PC only.


It’s great, but why just PC and not Xbox? Why not all consoles?

This was recent too, last month it came out on the MS for PC.
They've been available for sale in digital stores for a while (from before the bethesda+MS deal i believe), not to mention Heretic and Hexen both use DOS emulators.
I think they just aren't bothering with console ports since these games aren't as well know as the likes of DOOM or post-Daggerfall Elder Scrolls.
 
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Saber

Gold Member
You’re describing Nightmare difficulty. Ultraviolence is basically Nightmare without the respawning enemies, and it’s THE way to play the game. I agree with you usually the middle option is the way to play most games but Doom really really needs to be played on Ultraviolence

The good thing about Zdoom and similars is that you can set up fast monster protocol without the need of Nightmare.
 
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