Title: Heretic II
Publisher: Activision
Developer: Raven Software
Release Date: 1998
Platform: PC (Windows, also ported to
Linux by
Loki)
ESRB Rating: M (Mature) for gore and violence
Game Description
Heretic II is a third-person adventure game with a strong storyline that
balances its combat elements. Heretic II picks up where Heretic left off:
Corvus, the Sidhe warrior, returns to his home of Silverspring.
Unfortunately, Corvus discovers that his people have become infected with a
mysterious plague that results in both ugliness and homicidal insanity.
His former neighbors now chase him around with sharp objects and try to chew
his arms off. The rats in town have taken up the habit of chewing on Corvus's
legs; it is never a good idea to stand motionless for very long. It is your
task to guide Corvus through Silverspring and find out what has happened to the
villagers. Perhaps you ought to look for someone who has not been affected by the
plague?
Controls, Options, and Movement
One of the aspects I like most about Heretic II is the customizability of
gameplay and game appearance. There is a fairly complex, yet easy to navigate,
menu of options available when you start up the game. You can adjust screen
size, volume, mouse sensitivity, game difficulty (Easy, Medium, and Hard),
camera speed, resolution, brightness, graphics quality, video driver
selection, and violence level. The violence level setting will not affect
how many kills you have to make; it simply changes the amount of blood you see
when an enemy is killed (or if you are unlucky, if you are killed!). You can set
your own key bindings for character movement, attack, and weapon / spell switching;
I especially like using the mouse scroll wheel to switch through weapons and
defensive spells.
There is an option to have Corvus "run always", and I highly recommend this.
It is much easier to chase down or evade enemies while you are running. You
can bind a key of your choice to make Corvus walk slowly, which is really only
necessary on precarious ledges or while trying to inch close to the edge of
something.
During the game, it will be necessary to jump large chasms and squeeze through
small openings in order to clear certain areas. Jumping is greatly assisted
by use of Corvus's staff, which he can employ as sort of a pole-vaulting
device.
Terrain
Heretic II takes Corvus through towns, swamps, castles, and sewers. The
majority of the game takes place on solid ground, but Corvus does have to
navigate a swamp (which it is possible to sink into if you are not careful)
and swim in certain areas. Corvus can swim underwater for a limited period
of time; if he stays under too long, he will begin to suffer a health penalty
and can eventually drown. There is a powerup that enables Corvus to stay underwater
much longer than he can under his own power, but he does not get this until fairly
late in the game.
Indoor areas are full of staircases, ledges, lifts, and beams. The game is
somewhat three-dimensional in that progress is not always along the ground,
but possibly up a pile of crates or down a shaft. Sometimes you must employ
creative means to get through doors and walls, such as using an existing
mechanism to bash through a wooden surface blocking your progress. It is
generally not very difficult to figure out the mechanisms in the game; they
tend to consist of conveniently located switches that control a heavy object attached
to a rope and pulley system.
Corvus is not immune to gravity or force-induced trauma; if you jump off
too high a ledge, you could be severely injured or killed. If you stand
under a descending elevator, you will be crushed. Sometimes, enemies will
sneakily attack by attempting to drop crates on your head; this game requires
vigilance and attention to detail if you are to survive.
Health and Power
Corvus starts out with 100 health points. If he drops down to zero, he
dies, and there is no respawning in the single-player mode of this game. You
should save often while playing Heretic II; there are plenty of opportunities
to die! Health is restored by health vials, which give back 10 health
points, health flasks, which give you 30 health points, and Spirit Shrines,
which restore you to 100%.
Magic is quantified by an energy called mana, and there are two
types of mana: offensive (green), and defensive (blue). As with health,
you can obtain mana when it is dropped by defeated enemies, as well as at
mana shrines. Weapons (such as the staff, which is a melee
weapon, and the hellstaff, which has its own special ammo), do not require
mana when they are used. However, all offensive spells (which generally
involve some sort of energy projectile) deplete green mana, with the exception
of the Flaming Fist spell that can operate in a much-weakened capacity
when all your mana is gone.
Defensive spells deplete blue mana, and most of them involve some sort of
protective field that will damage or momentarily block the progress of enemies
attempting to attack Corvus. The most interesting of the defensive spells, and
perhaps the most useful, is the Tome of Power. The Tome is a book carried
by Corvus that is also a plot item. Mostly it just sits there in his inventory,
but during cut scenes it sometimes gives advice and story background to Corvus.
If used with the Defensive Spell command, the Tome of Power will enhance the
capacity of any offensive weapon or spell Corvus is currently using. The
power increase here is really phenomenal; it makes the spells look REALLY
cool and sometimes makes it possible to defeat a difficult boss fairly quickly.
A single use of the Tome of Power in this manner depletes your entire repository
of blue mana, so use it judiciously.
In addition to health and magic, Corvus can benefit from armor. Armor
can only be obtained at Armor Shrines, which are scarce. Silver armor gives
100 points of additional resistance to damage, and gold armor (a rare but
wonderful prize) offers 200 points of protection. If your gold armor is
wearing down, you can replenish it at a silver armor shrine; a nice trick
to pull off if you can manage it.
Enemies
Heretic II has plenty of enemies to keep you busy. Most of the fiends you
meet will be plague victims; the majority of these can attack only at close
range, melee-style. A few of them can use spells; these guys generally stand
on ledges and attack you from a distance. The plague victims are more of
a nusiance than anything else; they are not likely to kill you unless you
are greatly outnumbered and not paying attention. Of course, all the enemies
are much more difficult if you are playing on a higher difficulty level. Players
trying Armageddon mode for the first time are advised not to get to cocky! Plague
victims can be taken out easily with a few swipes of the staff. The plague
victims with magical capability are best dealt with by distance weapons such
as the Flaming Fist or the Hellstaff. I tend to use the plain wooden staff as much as
possible; first of all, it's fun (I'm a big fan of melee fighting in video
games, owing to my terrible aim with distance weapons!) and second of all,
it conserves ammo and mana for more challenging enemies.
The rats are everywhere; again, they are basically pests (though watch
out for the giant rats in some areas!). You can take most of them out
by simply stepping on them with a satisfying CRUNCH. They can wear away
steadily at your health if you stand still, and it seems like no matter how
many times you kill them, more keep appearing. Get used to the rats, because
they will follow you pretty much through the entire game.
In the swamps, you will encounter prehistoric-type animals; creatures
that look rather like pterodactyls, and others that look rather like
dog-sized dinosaurs. The biggest danger from these guys is that they might
knock you into the swamp.
While swimming in most bodies of water, you are likely to meet some
rather unfriendly fish. They will try to bite you. Kill them with
a spell, because staff and bow weapons will not work underwater.
One of the most irritating enemies in the game is the plague-spreading
guy. These humanoids are equipped with sacs that release deadly plague
gas when Corvus draws near. This is nasty, nasty, stuff: if you stand
in a cloud of the vile green vapor, your health will decrease at an
alarming rate. Kill these enemies as quickly as possible; they will keep
releasing the gas as long as they are alive. It is also best to use
some sort of distance weapon on them, so as to avoid exposure to the gas.
They make a very distinctive noise, kind of a gorilla roar, that is quite
handy for figuring out if one of them is in the area. If you hear the
sound, keep your guard up!
There are other enemies in Heretic II but I am not going to give a
detailed description of all the enemies in the game. Suffice it to say
that each area will have its own type of enemies; you will meet
reptillian humanoids at one point, and insectlike humanoids at another.
The area bosses can be quite challenging. As is the tradition in most
adventure games, the key is to find an enemy's weak point, or note a behavior
pattern that results in vulnerable moments. The game's end boss is somewhat
difficult, but rather anticlimactic considering the numerous traps and puzzles
and mazes Corvus must pass to get to the end boss.
Spells and Weapons
Corvus begins the game with his staff (a wooden pole with an attached blade),
the Flaming Fist spell, and the Tome of Power. Over the course of the game,
Corvus discovers other spells and items whose utility varies. The staff
is extremely versatile, but dangerous because of the proximity required for
use. Learning to quickly hack an enemy to bits with a deftly-placed staff
is quite satisfying. The other weapons and spells obtained in the game are
listed below.
Weapons
Hellstaff: a rapid-fire device that shoots energy projectiles at
enemies. It can hold up to 200 ammo (hellorbs).
Storm Bow:A bow whose arrows create a thunderstorm at the point
of impact.
Phoenix Bow: A bow whose arrows deliver flaming death at a
distance. Very, very powerful, if you have good aim!
Offensive Spells
Flaming Fist: Corvus can use this spell to throw fireballs
at enemies, Mario-style.
Thunder Blast: A magenta energy blast is delivered when this
spell is cast. Using the Tome of Power on this spell creates a
very effective force which sometimes kills an enemy in a single shot.
Sphere of Annihilation: To use this spell, Corvus must first
"charge" up. When the energy is released, a massive shock wave erupts
360 degrees around the caster. This is a very effective spell but
a little on the slow side, and heavy on the mana consumption.
Firewall: A moderately fast spell, the Firewall will not
help your network security, but it will set your enemies on fire. An
enemy continues to take damage as long as the flames persist.
Iron Doom: The "normal" and Tome-enhanced versions of this
spell are quite different. Normally, the iron doom spell produces
a rapid-fire spreading spray of small spiked balls. It is not one
of my favorite spells; for some reason, I have trouble getting it to hit
anything. However, the ENHANCED IRON DOOM causes the player to hurl
a massive metal spiked ball at his enemies. It is quite impressive
and deadly.
Defensive Spells
Ring of Repulsion: This spell produces a momentary field
of blue energy that will not damage any enemies except rats, but
it can keep them out of your hair for a second or two.
Meteor Swarm:This spell releases green meteors that swirl
around Corvus's body. These meteors can cause impressive damage to
weaker enemies.
Teleport: Sometimes, Brave Sir Corvus simply needs to bravely
run away. The Teleport spell will transport Corvus to a random
location in the local area, away from iminent danger but perhaps
into even greater danger.
Morph Ovum: The game designers had a sense of humor. This
spell will temporarily turn the target into a chicken. Incidentally,
there is a cheat code you can use to turn yourself into a chicken at will.
Once in a while, the chicken transformation will result in not a tiny
clucking, feathered weakling, but a MASSIVE CHICKEN OF DEATH whose
footsteps pound and who can snap enemies in half with its beak. The first
time this happened, I thought I was hallucinating, but apparently it
is an established phenomenon.
Lightning Shield: I absolutely love this spell. It will
grant anyone who comes near you with a massive electric shock. It is
extremely powerful and a very effective means of offense as well as
defense; you can run up close to an enemy and try to zap them!
Multiplayer
Heretic II has two multiplayer games: head-to-head and cooperative. The
cooperative mode is rather unwieldy; if one player dies, confusion ensues
as s/he tries to catch up with the other player. The deathmatch-type
game is much more fun, and is often played in fan-created worlds. My
significant other and I have spent many a joy-filled hour blasting
each other to bits with phoenix arrows and slicing one another into
chunks with the staff. (Violent video games are the key to a healthy
relationship, perhaps?) The multiplayer mode allows you to choose
several different skins, as well as a female character (who, of course,
embodies the concept of bulletproof nudity). You can set the rules
for each match: for example, you can restrict fighting to staff-only,
or spawn random enemies.
Game Quality
Well, the gaming industry is tirelessly raising the bar as far as
graphics go, so Heretic II's 1998 graphics don't look particularly
impressive by today's standards. The game is based on the Quake II engine,
which for quite a while was top-of-the-line. Nevertheless, the graphics are
good enough to look like the objects they represent; humanoids look at least
vaguely human, and the gameplay is so much fun that you probably won't
care that Corvus's hair is about as bouncy as a Ken doll's. I can't imagine
any gamer nowadays having a non-3D graphics card; basically any 3D card will
do. Heretic II looked halfway decent on my old TNT 2, and runs fantastically
with my lower-end GeForce 4.
There are some bugs in the game; patches help somewhat, but I had some
issues with stability, especially in multiplayer mode. The game has managed
to freeze the entire Linux operating system into your-only-option-is-to-hit
-the-power-switch mode. I have also had problems with corrupted save games;
at one point, I was JUST about to beat the end boss, and my game started
crashing every time I opened it at a certain point in the plot. For the
most part, however, Heretic II plays quite smoothly; the instability might
be related to idiosyncrasies of my system.
Overall, I'd rate Heretic II quite highly. I have never actually played
Heretic, but from what I could tell, Heretic II stood nicely on its own.
The game is enough of a challenge not to be boring, and the storyline is
compelling.
References:
http://www.ravengames.com/heretic2/corvus-gear-02.html
http://www.ravensoft.com/heretic2.html