Review of Heretic + Hexen

After, like, a million years—okay, more like thirty—Heretic finally hits consoles again. And hey, it brought its buddy Hexen along for the ride. Last we saw Hexen on consoles, it was hanging out on the old PlayStation, the Saturn, and good ol’ Nintendo 64. Now, they’re together on the Switch, thanks to Nightdive Studios. You know these folks, right? They’re those retro game wizards—you can’t not know them.

Anyway, this package is stuffed, absolutely crammed, with goodies. You get both original games, an old Hexen expansion, plus fresh expansions for both Heretic and Hexen. Oh, and a heap of bonus content. So much to explore—it’s like a treasure hunt!

Now, about Heretic. It’s basically Doom, but like medieval style—magic wands instead of shotguns kind of thing. Doom’s baby brother, I guess. Don’t take that as a dig, though. Heretic does some slick tricks with the same engine. Yeah, you can spot the Doom DNA all over it. Weapons, enemies, basically cousins or something.

But Hexen? That’s a whole new beast. It flipped the script for shooters back then. You pick from three classes—each with their own weapons and stuff. Level design feels like a maze at times, focusing on exploration and puzzles. Feels like you’re wandering through a Zelda or Metroid game sometimes, honestly. Kinda wild.

And don’t forget the expansions. Three of ’em. One old, two spanking new. The new Heretic expansion, Faith Renewed, really shows off what the engine can do. And those new Hexen expansions? I swear, they’re even better than that Deathkings thing from ’96.

But man, the save system is a headache. Seriously, all five games—yep, five—share the same save space. One lousy quicksave slot. So, I’m knee-deep in Hexen, quicksave, then hop into Heretic and—oops—overwrite it. A mess. Sorting through saves is like rummaging through a junk drawer.

Graphics-wise, Nightdive plays it cool. HD by default but not the fancy 4K stuff—this is on the Switch, not Switch 2, mind you. You can tweak the resolution, aspect ratio, crosshair—you name it. But there’s this weird thing with the full screen HUD; skies don’t match up right. Tiles all funny. N64 didn’t have this. Maybe the old PC one did? No clue.

And speaking of N64, that port was the bomb—best home console version of Hexen, in my book. It missed those snazzy cutscenes, but who cares? It nailed performance and accuracy. Seeing it next to this new release makes me wish for texture filtering options. HD makes those textures shout and not in a good way—can we get a CRT filter, please?

Heretic + Hexen on Switch? Stellar. One great game, one downright amazing one. New and old stuff adds real depth. Just wish the save system wasn’t so clunky and we had more visual options. That CRT filter would be a dream. But hunting down an N64 or dealing with janky PlayStation or Saturn versions? Nah, this is a win, even with its quirks. Fingers crossed for more Heretic/Hexen down the line.