Heretic II
"Classic". It is often reminisced about in the style of "ah, there were games in our time, not like this current tribe..." But not many dare to actually play, much less complete, a 'masterpiece' from a decade ago. For the graphics, to put it lightly, are scary not in the way the developers intended, and the gameplay is often simple and straightforward (yeah, the 'run and shoot' genre has developed all this time). Unless a remake of something old and legendary is released (or is just announced), then the younger tribe, familiar with last century's games only through mentions in specialized publications, might just visit old-games to download and see "where did it come from, really?" Finding the original Doom in a boxed version would probably only be possible with a collector.
I wouldn’t say I’m much of a collector. And definitely not a fan of the shooter genre. In the era of 386s, I played "Digger", "Street Cat", and "Sokoban". Then, for a long time, I wasn’t into games. Nowadays, my preferences are more RPG than shooter. In general, I haven’t seen any old shooters at all, and while I’ve seen new ones, they didn’t capture my interest much. However, periodically surfacing statements like "game development is not what it used to be" spark a little curiosity - "What was so great about it?" Not long ago, in a shop that's been selling discs (it used to sell cartridges for "Dendy") for a long time, I found some interesting boxes in the backroom. Including Heretic II - the original edition.
Heretic II
Developer: Raven Software
Publisher: Activision
Release year... Right, 1998 \_\_
Box:
Cardboard (234x182x44).
Game Disc:
In a jewel case with cover.
Manual:
48 pages, black and white (210x148). With beautiful illustrations. You can find something similar on the disc in the "help" folder in HTML format, but that's not interesting \_
If you believe eBay (1, 2, 3), then the package indeed contains - game disc + manual. But, after all, this is not a collector's edition, is it? \_
(2 photos are not mine. For comparison only))
Even for the picture book, 150 rubles is not too much, but here we also have the game \_
The disc's autorun screen.
The installation process. Nostalgia...
Since the box said "Windows 95/98/NT", I confidently clicked on the shortcut, without setting any compatibility modes (Win XP SP3). And yes, it worked \_\_
Heretic II - Intro
Honestly, I haven’t gone beyond the tutorial mode yet, but even what can be seen in the Tutorial looks quite nice.
We have a big-eared muscular guy. By clicking the left mouse button, he casts something like a fireball...
that can break barrels (but not crates, you can only jump on crates).
Or you can pull out a weapon...
and smash two barrels at once :)
Apparently, the big-eared guy is a Jedi :)
When stowed, the halberd hangs from his belt like a small handle, but it activates with a characteristic glow.
If you jump on crates, you can get somewhere and find something there.
For example, a glowing thing...
which, upon picking it up, causes a strange book to fly around the hero.
After finding other interesting and useful items, nothing else flies around.
But some finds make the hero glow with joy \_
A bow. A bow is good... and very effective.
However, Jedi are indeed great sorcerers \_\_
Corvus, the hero, in new armor.
If you don’t just study the pictures in the manual, you can learn, for example, what the main character's name is \_\_\_
Useful and Interesting Links:
Technodynamic Heretic 2 Review Page
Heretic II for PC - GameRankings
Heretic II Trailer