Thread:Vorknkx/@comment-3547390-20161116194210/@comment-1496755-20161219182016

Heh heh, which do you think is more painful - solving puzzles or fighting Maulotaurs?

Yes, it is weird in many ways, which is one of the reasons for the relatively polar reaction - some love it, others hate it. You are right about the grittiness - Hex1 is definitely the darkest part of the series as a whole (and probably the goriest too). I agree about the stats screen - even a guy like me, who likes in-game statistics, can appreciate the break from the constant struggle to achieve something. It's nice that you enjoy the combat despite the limitations of being confined to melee. This might change slightly at some point, yet you can be sure melee will always be your primary mode of combat - the warrior wasn't given the greatest speed and jumping power for nothing. Puzzles are a very mixed lot, though, as you can see, they are pretty environmental and thus not hard to figure out. I like hub-based games for the same reason too - especially if the hub itself changes in some way to react to your actions (this is usually observed in games with superior engines, though).

Well yes, avoiding Doom's Nightmare difficulty was a strong early indication of how much you dislike respawning/reinforcements. At least Hexen's mechanic is more tolerable than Doom's, I believe. The feeling of chaos is part of the game's challenge, I suppose. Probably not the best method, for sure.

Some maps are a bit maze-like, yes, but most have pretty meaningful layouts. Of course, everything might look like a maze, if you move erratically through it (I'm so nasty) :P

Glad to hear that my intuation was correct - for quite some time I had this feeling you'd enjoy it more than most other sprite games. Dark Forces is a special case because it's tied to Star Wars and has to live up to its level of hype, plus they were trying to prove DF isn't just a "Doom clone" and has its own identity. The combination of these two factors is the reason for the story-driven campaign (which I like a lot), but also for the often weird level design, which tries to say "Hey look, Doom couldn't do this fancy stuff, but we can!" Aaaah, Daggerfall - gotta get back to that sooner or later. Wouldn't like to leave it unfinished...