Thoughts on Heretic

**E1 - THE CITY OF THE DAMNED**

**M1 - Docks:** Nice and succinct opener. A few winding corridors to explore in secrets, and a nice gradual introduction to the weapons and enemy roster. I probably wouldn't have the crossbow in a secret, is all. It's the best weapon! 9/10
**M2 - Dungeons:** A bit obtuse - has you stumbling around in the dark a bit (thank god for the torch powerup), and *friggin' large* for the second level of the game (153 monsters on Smite-Meister!). Tons of secrets that are pretty fun to find. What is with those four tightly consecutive doors, though? "Get Smart" vibes. 7/10
**M3 - Gatehouse:** This one has some quirks like the windy sectors, but otherwise not much to say here. I like the secrets in the starting room. 7/10
**M4 - Guard Tower:** A really cool map that I don't mind getting lost in. Some awesome shaping and settings in this one like the titular tower which has an awesome circular construction to it. 9/10
**M5 - Citadel:** A fabulous medieval city map. It's fairly huge, too - lots of thought put into this. Pretty easy to get lost in but top marks nonetheless. 9/10
**M6 - Cathedral:** Why would you hide a *crucial switch* in a dark corner of a room which is already behind a secret wall??!?! Other than that this map is alright. Just drags a bit, and is far from the most straightforward, layout-wise. 4/10
**M7 - Crypts:** Crawling with baddies and has some seriously tense moments. Thematically it's a bit all over the shop. The blue key room has a slightly less egregious form of M6's switch sequestered away in a corner, again behind a "secret wall". I guess this is the game training you to start looking for "secret" areas that actually turn out to be part of mandatory progression. 6/10
**M8 - Hell's Maw:** A bit of an underwhelming fight - as cool as iron liches are. Look at the huge amount of space versus how little of it you can actually walk on. Far too many items given for it to be any kind of challenge, although I admit blasting everything with the wings and tome in tandem is pretty fun. Also man, pods are really icky. 7/10
**M9 - Graveyard:** Intriguing design-wise, probably the most "secret level" material offering in the set with that big undulating checkerboard. A bit... plain otherwise? Another dark-corner-dwelling switch, in the area past the green door. What are they, shy? 7/10

**E2 - HELL'S MAW**

**M1 - Crater:** Another short but sweet M1. Does a pretty good job of changing the setting up and introducing the weredragons. 8/10
**M2 - Lava Pits:** Less than perfect. A bit unsure of itself theme-wise - rocks and lava aplenty, but very orthogonal. One part reverts back to the boring gray brick houses theme from E1. The secret to the far east demands you have wings of wrath to get out so god help you if you ever go back to that. Sabreclaws are honestly just annoying. 5/10
**M3 - River of Fire:** Large and imposing but honestly not a great play. Long trawls to get to where you wanna be. I dunno, the layout feels underutilised. Will make you wish for a radsuit. 6/10
**M4 - Ice Grotto:** I want to like this - setting-wise it's awesome, a hidden village tucked away beneath a lake of fire and ice - but it's just giant and sprawling and easy to get lost in. Low friction ice floors can go to hell. 6/10
**M5 - Catacombs:** Thematically a bit all over the place and has some weird shaping and cramped areas leading to awkward platforming and such. Not a huge fan. 5/10
**M6 - Labyrinth:** That huge ice square in the middle ruins everything good this map had. 3/10
**M7 - Great Hall:** Like M2, wants to be a set of caves but also a building. Feels like the texturing was left unfinished more than anything. Honestly not many "great" things can be said about this hall - apart from the music. 4/10
**M8 - Portals of Chaos:** I like this one - each corner has its own kinda-unique thing going on. Maulotaur count on the higher skill settings seems excessive, though - I'd have had 2 at most. 8/10
**M9 - Glacier:** Really not much of a glacier, is it? I mean there's an ice staircase but that's dumb. Feels overly monotextured like M7. The only instance in the game where a switch opens that little 64-wide exit door, which itself is pointless because the door is *immediately adjacent*. 4/10

**E3 - THE DOME OF D'SPARIL**

**M1 - Storehouse:** Doesn't give you the crossbow for some reason. Pretty hard as a result with lots of mid-to-high-tier enemies. The introduction of the ophidian leads me to believe they like hanging out in bathhouses. 7/10
**M2 - Cesspool:** The switch to unblock the exit door is again stowed away in a dark room that might have you searching for a bit. Otherwise inoffensive. Pretty tricky, too. 7/10
**M3 - Confluence:** A pretty cool map with an iconic opening shot and lots of other neat stuff going on, plus the most underloved music track. Can beat this one pretty quickly if you know what you're doing - much of it is totally optional. 8/10
**M4 - Azure Fortress:** I like how this one seems to be set underwater. Outstays its welcome a bit, though. Pretty easy to find the secret exit here, you'll probably find it first. 6/10
**M5 - Ophidian Lair:** Probably the first real challenging map, but I don't think it's because of the maulotaur. Unfortunately it's also pretty obtuse, found myself lost a lot here. 5/10
**M6 - Halls of Fear:** Decent map (with a less-than-decent name) with some challenging moments like the weredragon hallway and the maulotaur fight. Otherwise kinda forgettable. 6/10
**M7 - Chasm:** The main gimmick here is just an annoying tightrope walkway where you have to fight the excessive wind scroller in order to reach the blue key. Fun to fly around the side areas with the wings of wrath, though. Some fun fights in this one, nonetheless. 6/10
**M8 - D'sparil's Keep:** Pretty underwhelming closer. D'sparil isn't that fun to fight in such a huge open space, and like with E1M8 you're given a massive excess of items that just wind up going to waste since it's the final map. 4/10
**M9 - Aquifer:** A pretty challenging map with cool interconnecting architecture and another "underwater" texture scheme which I must say I'm a fan of, but it's not "secret level" material, by any means. 7/10

**E4 - THE OSSUARY**

**M1 - Catafalque:** A huge leap up in difficulty - stingey with ammo, and lots of high-tier enemies. You basically *need* one of the wizards to drop a tome for you. Maulotaur is entirely ignorable, though. 7/10
**M2 - Blockhouse:** Pretty fun carnage-fueled gameplay if you can stand the 4-way-symmetrical layout. Gives you loads of goodies in the outer moat. 7/10
**M3 - Ambulatory:** Puzzle map. Some interesting mechanics and encounters but lays on the secret-hunting pretty thick. 6/10
**M4 - Sepulcher:** Coolest opening shot. A couple of spots where you might be wandering but otherwise fine, at least for the regular exit. For the secret exit, you need to go secret-hunting *within* secret areas. Getting to the optional top half of the map is only accessible by *walking into* the monster closets that open in the start room, then hitting the switch behind the two blocking doors. 7/10
**M5 - Great Stair:** An interesting map - not without its challenges, particularly how the green door is sequestered behind a couple of secret walls. (?!) Those shoot-to-open stained-glass window cubes are hilariously 90s. 7/10
**M6 - Halls of the Apostate:** Definitely a filler map. Just doesn't look like much of anything. Has a couple of interesting setpieces/ambushes though. 5/10
**M7 - Ramparts of Perdition:** At least the setting is interesting, but some severe progression issues in this one. You have to scurry around for the first important switch which is behind a pillar. You then have to *walk near* the yellow door to open the crucial teleporter to the yellow key room. The room to the west with the phoenix emblazoned on the floor (the game's only non-liquid hurtfloor!) is the most interesting part of the map - pity you only fight like 12 gargoyles - but the final fight is where it gets fun, with tons of powerups including the wings in a big fight against the liches. 6/10
**M8 - Shattered Bridge:** Just the worst finale possible. Mazes, wind everywhere, the only key is in a secret, and the main gimmick is broken - you can just straferun across the bridge. Which I thank god for, because why in fuck's name are the bridge segments raised by *shooting the lifts across the way?* I've never *shot* at an elevator (especially at a distance) in order to unlock its arcane secrets. This would've been even harder to figure out back in the days of 320x200. I guess you're supposed to sling projectiles at all the ghost mummies on the other side and have the bridge restore itself whenever your shots phase through them and accidentally hit the lifts? Weird as hell. 2/10
**M9 - Mausoleum:** Headache incarnate. It's a giant fuck-off maze with half its lighting constantly pulsing. You need several torches just to allow your eyes to function. Only one key used, in an environment where color coordination to delineate areas would be really useful. The inner sections don't even look like anything, they're just silly setpieces, perhaps scraps of maps that they ended up wrapping in corridor. Avoid even warping to this one. Also guys... this one uses scrolling sky textures on walls, I'm not kidding. Behind the caged braziers. Whyyy. 1/10

**E5 - THE STAGNANT DEMESNE**

**M1 - Ochre Cliffs:** Some weird progression bullshit, like opening a secret wall and then *stepping into* the room behind it just to gain access to the exit door, and mandatory wall-humping for a fake midtexture in order to escape the blue key room. Maulotaur that comes out of nowhere is scary as shit. Not all that friendly for an M1. 6/10
**M2 - Rapids:** Pretty cool setting, interconnected nicely, lots of secrets to find, but just a few too many scrolling floors that make basic moving around a massive pain. 6/10
**M3 - Quay:** Another key behind a "secret" wall. Otherwise a pretty decent map, looks like a "place". Barrel-hopping secrets are fun. 7/10
**M4 - Courtyard:** Feels filler-y - a bit cramped and questionable use of wind in that one outside sector. Exit is placed really weirdly, almost hidden. 6/10
**M5 - Hydratyr:** Heretic's answer to Circle of Death, except much larger and more long-winded. Once you get the yellow key in the center portion of the map you never need to return to it, which seems a waste. Has a teleport-hub section which is a bit tiring. Monster placement is fairly impotent here - they're nearly all ghosts, so goodbye useful phoenix rod. 6/10
**M6 - Colonnade:** Ridiculous progression - crucial doors activated by *shooting*, easily missable stashed-away switches, this level has it all. Has it all *so* wrong. 3/10
**M7 - Foetid Manse:** Obtuse as fuck. You literally have to stumble around this map until things open up, starting with the opening drawbridge (why is it even lowered to begin with), and it only gets worse from there. 2/10
**M8 - Field of Judgement:** Big dumb arena map hell yes let's barbecue some maulotaurs with all the items in the game. 9/10
**M9 - Skein of D'sparil:** Not-quite-symmetrical, not-quite-asymmetrical layout. Also not quite *fun*. Big-ass maze with only one way out - pray you don't fall back into it while platform-hopping on the upper levels - and lots of crawling through blinking corridors picking off endless sabreclaws and ophidians. Best avoid. 3/10