Hexen II

First there was Heretic, then there was Hexen, the sequel to Heretic...then there was a Heretic II and a Hexen II to make things really confusing. Of those two, Hexen II was probably most like the first two games.

Anyway, this series is (mostly) a fantasy based FPS. Hexen II plays very much like Hexen but features an extra class and some RPG elements. Classes include Paladin, Crusader, Necromancer and Assassin. The class system was reworked somewhat from the previous game and there are four classes now instead of three. The level structures is also similar to the previous game in that it consists of a hub that connects multiple levels. The actions you perform in one level may affect the other levels as well.

Hexen II used a modified version of the Quake engine. Like all good FPS games, there is a single player game and a multiplayer mode. I would argue that the single player games were better than the equivalent single player Doom and Quake games. However, a lot of exploration is required and some of the tasks you must do can be hard to figure out so if you are not a patient gamer than Hexen II is probably not for you.

Hexen II was originally released for Windows in 1997 with a Macintosh port following quite a bit later in 2002. It received mixed but mostly positive reviews at the time. There was also an expansion pack titled 'Portal of Praevus' released in 1998. Activision acquired the rights to release versions for the PlayStation and Sega Saturn but these were never released. I don't know if any work was done on those ports. Sadly, Hexen didn't do that well commercially selling only around 30,000 units which might explain why ports for the PlayStation and Saturn were never completed. If you want to give Hexen II a try, fortunately it is easy and cheap to do. Hexen II is available on gog.com for a mere $4.99.

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