Heretic + Hexen Re-Release: 5 Reasons This Retro Resurrection Actually Rocks
Heretic + Hexen re-release just crash-landed on every device that plays video games (okay, not your fridge… yet), reminding everyone that the ‘90s FPS scene was so much more than Doom and Quake. For anyone whose PC gaming experience starts at “Half-Life” and ends at “Fortnite,” buckle up—because Bethesda just unleashed these cult-classic, spell-slinging shooters in shiny new form, tweaked for modern hardware and humans who don’t have time to configure IRQ settings.
Let’s pull apart why the Heretic + Hexen re-release is more than just another nostalgia trap. Grab a staff, dust off your mana bar, and let’s charge through five honest reasons this deserves a spot on your SSD.
1. FPS History Lesson, Now With 100% More Functioning Hardware
There’s retro—and then there’s “my PC needs a floppy drive and a prayer” retro. Heretic + Hexen were once half-remembered legends, locked away behind DOSBox sorcery and hobbyist ports. This re-release, artfully resurrected by Nightdive Studios and id Software, packs both games (plus Hexen II and Deathkings of the Dark Citadel) with all the quality-of-life tweaks modern gamers take for granted.
No more hunting for wavering abandonware or suffering through stretched CRT screensavers. The experience is polished, crisp, and stupidly easy to run on your rig—even the kind you built from leftover Cyber Monday deals. It’s genuine heritage preservation, only with more pixel wizards and fewer museum docents. Heretic + Hexen might have been overshadowed by their satanic cousin Doom, but these games expanded what shooters could be: fantasy, puzzle-solving, and creative mayhem before that was cool.
2. Modern Performance: No More Chugging Like Dial-Up in 1998
This is the part where someone always remembers the phrase “DOS memory management” and tries not to dry-heave. The originals ran at frame rates that made PowerPoint look spicy. The new Heretic + Hexen re-release runs so smooth it’s practically unrecognizable. Expect modern resolutions, controller support, and performance that’s less “slide show” and more “hell yeah, chug that potion.”
And dear lord, the enhanced soundtrack by Andrew Hulshult. If you weren’t already headbanging to the MIDI originals, you might actually need to bolt yourself down for Hulshult’s new sonic assault. Crank it up—the music goes as hard as running from an Iron Lich with three hit points. Your ears (and the neighbors) will thank you, or at least file a strongly worded complaint.
3. Online Crossplay & Co-Op Modes: Nostalgia, Now With Fewer Couch Fights
We love split-screen, but let’s be real: eventually, stabbing your sibling with a pencil because they screen-cheated gets old. The Heretic + Hexen re-release leaps into 2024 with crossplay multiplayer—PC, PlayStation, Xbox, and Switch players can now team up, trash talk, and pretend you’d never camp the spawn.
There’s seamless online co-op, deathmatch, and even four-player splitscreen for local multiplayer mayhem, whether you’re reliving sibling rivalries or unleashing chaos with friends who never touched a CRT. Throw in robust in-game mod support and user-generated maps, and suddenly your arsenal is spitting out shotgun-fired fireballs or killer ducks. The modding community is already revving up—expect stuff to get wild fast.
4. It’s Not Alone—Doom: The Dark Ages Just Got Meaner
Don’t get it twisted: this isn’t the only retro FPS making waves. While Heretic and Hexen tap into the rune-carved roots of magical shooters, Doom: The Dark Ages just scored a brutal Update 2—free skins, “Ripatorium” endless mode, and new arenas designed to wring every last drop of power out of your reflexes.
The game smashed 3 million players in its first week alone (they’re probably all still arguing over the best shotgun). As we said in our review, that “weighty, bone-crunching” style is a new flavor, and honestly? It’s a goddamn blast. Heretic and Hexen share this legacy: heavy, visceral combat delivered at breakneck pace—just swap out shotgun shells for magic wands and murder geese.
5. It’s Not Just Nostalgia—Retro Shooters Are Having Their Moment
Retro shooters aren’t just aging relics for old nerds who argue over Voodoo graphics cards on message boards (though hi, that’s also me). The Heretic + Hexen re-release proves that sharp, brutally simple game design is timeless. No infinite marketing cycles, no 100GB day-one patches; just pick up and play, like Nintendo leaning in hard with that claymation Mario show. Sometimes, retro is genuinely the future—look at new boomer shooters and you’ll see the blueprints these games laid down for fluid level design, hidden secrets, and weapons that feel like angry fire hydrants.
Heretic and Hexen were among the first to show magic FPS could be just as gnarly and satisfying as modern ultra-violence. They built the DNA for games like Dusk and Amid Evil, and this re-release finally invites everyone to see that genius without needing a degree in DOS prompt wizardry.
- Instant buy for FPS historians, genre nerds, and anyone curious how we got from Wolfenstein to Valorant
- The perfect excuse to lecture your friends about why old games slap, then absolutely smoke them in deathmatch
- Zero danger of catching tetanus from ancient floppy disks—you’re safe, Grandma
Should You Play the Heretic + Hexen Re-Release?
Short answer: yes, unless you hate fun, or maybe you’re allergic to good design. Long answer: Give it a spin (on absolutely any current console or PC), experiment with the multiplayer modes, and marvel at how far we’ve come since dial-up rage and uncooked pizza rolls.
When you’re done? Dive into Kaiju No. 8: The Game and witness chaos on a different, much larger scale. Or reminisce about the glory days when all board games needed were dice and not a 40-page PDF patch note.
The bottom line: The Heretic + Hexen re-release is more than a nostalgia cash grab—it’s a genuine restoration that finally does justice to two genre-defining, criminally under-appreciated shooters. Own it, play it, and remind your hands what a real health potion is supposed to look like.