Hexen: Beyond Heretic Review

In all honesty, Hexen is a bad PlayStation game. In its day, Hexen may have been on par with other first-person shooters, but this game is way too late to make a mark on the consoles. If that wasn't bad enough, the PlayStation version of Hexen is an absolutely horrid translation.

Hexen is a first-person 3-D title that uses a modified version of the Doom engine. The main additions to the engine are crouching, jumping, the ability to look up and down, flying, and an inventory used to store extra powerups. Hexen was originally a PC title, and it didn't make huge waves on release. The story is set in a world of magic and sorcery where nonbelievers are slaughtered by an evil regime. It's your job, as either a cleric, warrior, or mage, to stop the killing by, well, killing more.

The graphics in Hexen are just plain bad. The enemies use only a few frames of animation, making them seem weak and really goofy looking. Getting close to one of these enemies (or an item, wall, or anything else for that matter) results in lots of pixelation. The graphics are similar to the PC version, but they end up closer to the Saturn version, only not quite as washed out. Compared to Disruptor and other first-person shooters on the PlayStation, Hexen comes out close to the bottom of the pile.

Gameplay is almost as big a problem as the graphics. The collision detection is way off. A monster can be standing what seems like 10 feet away and still get hit with a punch, club, or any other physical attack. Also, control is sloppy, which makes some of the platform jumping required in the later levels extremely frustrating. The rest of the gameplay involves bashing monsters, finding a key, and using it to open a door that leads to more bad guys. Occasionally, you must backtrack to a level you've previously played to see if a switch you hit in another level affected anything. While this is a neat idea, it quickly becomes a real chore.

Hexen on the PlayStation is a huge and terrible mistake. The game moves at a sluggish pace, and the graphics are abysmal. Do yourself a favor and stay away from it at all cost.