it was cool to discover Hexen as a missing link, or an inspiration, for the puzzle maps in Master Levels for Doom II or Eternal Doom (not Doom Eternal, scrubs). Hexen still feels distinct from doom because of the dark fantasy stuff. Hexen will also always flow differently than Doom because of the lack of hit-scan enemies. it never really tells me, don’t stand here, don’t walk in this way, don’t leave this guy alive. the action is less engaging in this specific sense because there are less micro-decisions to make in how each encounter is approached and literally looked at. Hexen makes up for it by the grueling complexity of its world, or arguably hits a good balance between that and its medium complex action. there’s a massive cognitive load put into that struggle for survival, while also managing my inventory, while also putting my close sight on every single possible suspicious detail. like burying carthage while battling for it or something.
it’s also a delightfully goofy game that plays around as it tests the player. it’s genuinely funny to hit a switch and watch 30 wizards float out of the walls.
I can’t say it’s painless. if, maybe, ideal puzzle design requires that you can visibly see and measure your inputs, it’s maniacal to make a puzzle game where your inputs interact with something you may or may not have seen. Hexen is the distended puzzle game, the whole world feels like a mechanical organism that shifts and stirs when I stand on its parts, or when I poke at its holes. it’s very difficult to decide if I’m going the right way, if I’ve been in specific places or not, or if I still need to be in one place or another. Hexen has a leg up (or down) by usually conforming to a logical system. the trouble is that the player never knows what logic or what system. and it still preserves the forbidden feeling, the feeling of impossible discovery, by having walls I needed to rotate or walk-through, by having invisible floating paths I needed to find and follow.
videogames absorbed fantasy in this way, they have reconstructed a generic sensibility out of a body of meditations on history and ritual. Hexen is fascinated with the mystery this presents. like a fromsoftware joint, it teases that possibility with violence. it’s a monotonous glaze toward the search for something! so this search will be painful and hard fought. because of really game designy tricks (and limitations of the doom engine) the feeling of the search is soooo embodied. I always approach fantasy from the search. I’m asking if it could be allegory, where the symbols came from, why these specific ones, what could it possibly all mean. it’s probably meaningless in Hexen, which is why the search itself set my mind afire. literally how good are you at close reading the juvenile nothings, will you find the rosetta stone, the secret pattern, they key that leads out of this obsession…
it’s also a delightfully goofy game that plays around as it tests the player. it’s genuinely funny to hit a switch and watch 30 wizards float out of the walls.
I can’t say it’s painless. if, maybe, ideal puzzle design requires that you can visibly see and measure your inputs, it’s maniacal to make a puzzle game where your inputs interact with something you may or may not have seen. Hexen is the distended puzzle game, the whole world feels like a mechanical organism that shifts and stirs when I stand on its parts, or when I poke at its holes. it’s very difficult to decide if I’m going the right way, if I’ve been in specific places or not, or if I still need to be in one place or another. Hexen has a leg up (or down) by usually conforming to a logical system. the trouble is that the player never knows what logic or what system. and it still preserves the forbidden feeling, the feeling of impossible discovery, by having walls I needed to rotate or walk-through, by having invisible floating paths I needed to find and follow.
videogames absorbed fantasy in this way, they have reconstructed a generic sensibility out of a body of meditations on history and ritual. Hexen is fascinated with the mystery this presents. like a fromsoftware joint, it teases that possibility with violence. it’s a monotonous glaze toward the search for something! so this search will be painful and hard fought. because of really game designy tricks (and limitations of the doom engine) the feeling of the search is soooo embodied. I always approach fantasy from the search. I’m asking if it could be allegory, where the symbols came from, why these specific ones, what could it possibly all mean. it’s probably meaningless in Hexen, which is why the search itself set my mind afire. literally how good are you at close reading the juvenile nothings, will you find the rosetta stone, the secret pattern, they key that leads out of this obsession…