Joined: 6/22/2007
Posts: 181
Location: Eastern Michigan University
Hexen 64
For those of you unfamiliar with Hexen, it's an RPG-themed take on the first-person shooter. In fact, it's a sequel to a similar title called Heretic (a game known best for carrying the dubious title of "the first Doom clone") and both are based on the Doom engine, though they're happily altered slightly so that you can jump. Instead of playing as the perpetually furious marine, you are given the choice of three different character classes: warrior, cleric, or mage. Each class plays a little differently, with the warrior being stronger, faster, and lacking in magical attacks; the mage is weaker, though he has far-ranging magical attacks that allow him to keep his distance from enemies; and the cleric is a mix of the two. Artifacts have different effects for different characters as well. For example, the flechette item acts like a grenade for a warrior, a bomb for a mage, and, best yet, a poison gas cloud for the cleric, which can be used to take out multiple enemies if placed correctly.
Joined: 6/22/2007
Posts: 181
Location: Eastern Michigan University
Speed Mechanics[/u]General[/u]
Hexen 64, bases character movement on two values:
Character Class
Analog Range (using this controller setting)
Basic Land Travel[/u]
You do not need to search memory to find out how fast you are traveling, simply start your analog force at 0, and keeping increasing it until you notice a shift in speed, keep doing this until you have hit max speed, this is your 'max speed range'
For optimum speed, a force at maximum N64 range will be more than enough.
Jumping[/u]
Jumping in Hexen 64, shares most of the same qualities as other FPS's. In order to perform an optimum jump your character should be traveling at full speed in a straight line. Turning in air, or using an opposing force on the analog will slow your character down.
It is my observation (however untested) that jumping at full speed through opening doors allows you to achieve a greater distance and initial speed over screen hugging.
Another observation (partially tested) I made is that if you perform a jump at the peak of traveling upwards (ie: stairs, slopes) you will achieve a faster speed.
In order to chain jumps without losing velocity, you (must?) should jump in a straight path, and jump as soon as you hit the floor. This technique is called bunny hopping.
Object jumps may also be performed in this game, which allows for very creative routes. Monsters, trees, urns, or anything solid may be a potentional tool for object jumps. Because of the height achieved by object jumping, the target destination may actually be reached faster because you avoid turning, and downward/upward land traveling.
Another trick that is doable, yet as of now has not found us any useful sequence breaks is jumping on an air-born monsters head, and using that to get to normally unreachable places.
Example: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F362-3Bd-7o
Joined: 6/22/2007
Posts: 181
Location: Eastern Michigan University
Memory Values: (by okaygo)
A35AD8 - Player #1 Health Value
A2A53C - Player #1 Health Value
A346A7 - Character Pointing (Directions for Level Display)
A347A7- Character Pointing (Directions for Level Display)
A295FB (2 Bytes) - Green Mana Bar [51200 max]
A295FC (2 Bytes) - Green Mana [200 max]
A295FD - Blue Mana Bar [51200 Max]
A295FE - Blue Mana [200 max]
Cleric Weapon Resources: (by okaygo)
Weapon 1 - 0 b, 0 g
Weapon 2 - 1 b, 0 g
Weapon 3 - 0 b, 4 g
Weapon 4 - 8 b, 8 g
Damage: (by okaygo)
A2B808 - Melee Damage
The following is taken from http://hexen.ravengames.com/
I can't verify 100% of this information.
Ground Monster Stats:
Joined: 8/1/2004
Posts: 2687
Location: Seattle, WA
Since when did we need to have megathreads where one person relegates information?
On top of that, didn't you admit yesterday that you had barely played this game, to the point that you didn't even remember half of the game mechanics or even what the Wraithverge was?
I'm not sure if this justifies the mage for the rest of the game, but it can skip a section of the first level by shooting the bell without even opening the tower.
Although fighter might save more time in the long run for all the hordes of ettins/centaurs you gotta plow through. Not to mention faster speed.
You could probably skip the secret levels, they don't really add much to the game. Although the one for seven portals is pretty fun.
Joined: 6/22/2007
Posts: 181
Location: Eastern Michigan University
zdude255 wrote:
I'm not sure if this justifies the mage for the rest of the game, but it can skip a section of the first level by shooting the bell without even opening the tower.
Although fighter might save more time in the long run for all the hordes of ettins/centaurs you gotta plow through. Not to mention faster speed.
You could probably skip the secret levels, they don't really add much to the game. Although the one for seven portals is pretty fun.
I will get around to adding all of those tricks, but the Cleric's weapons save time in the long-run. I am going to Wiki most of the documents, as soon as I finish up some stuff.
I'm not sure if this justifies the mage for the rest of the game, but it can skip a section of the first level by shooting the bell without even opening the tower.
This might not be practical for a 1P run, but someday when some ambitious person starts the 4P co-operative run one character should definitely be the mage for this reason!
I honestly thought the fighter would be the best choice, mainly just because of the best running, jumping and speedy flechette use. He's also much better at killing centaurs who can really get in your way in the Guardian Of Steel and Caves Of Circe maps.
Joined: 6/22/2007
Posts: 181
Location: Eastern Michigan University
FreshFeeling wrote:
zdude255 wrote:
I'm not sure if this justifies the mage for the rest of the game, but it can skip a section of the first level by shooting the bell without even opening the tower.
This might not be practical for a 1P run, but someday when some ambitious person starts the 4P co-operative run one character should definitely be the mage for this reason!
I honestly thought the fighter would be the best choice, mainly just because of the best running, jumping and speedy flechette use. He's also much better at killing centaurs who can really get in your way in the Guardian Of Steel and Caves Of Circe maps.
Pick the fighter, put it on skill 5, then try to get through the Seven Portals. I had a hard time fighting the last boss with cheats on skill 3.
Cleric has the biggest advantages when it comes to facing both Heresiarchs throughout the game, because of the gas cloud Flechettes.
My time for the PC version of Hexen for ingame time was at 39 minutes and 50 seconds when entering the portal to the end of the game, and I was using the Cleric.
Also, it would be a good idea to experiment with using enemies as stepping stones. With that technique, it's possible to do things like getting the Sapphire Planet early before lowering the two sets of steps, and landing on one enemy after another in Castle of Grief can avoid having to activate the lifts to reach the top series of switches.
Also, it is possible to hit all switches, both top and bottom level. I think it's possible for PC, I don't really have the N64 version of the game so I can't test it on that version.
Hmm, now that I think of it, is it possible to do that Porkalator glitch in the Castle of Grief on the N64 version of Hexen? I know it has been fixed for v1.1 of the PC version.
Hmm, now that I think of it, is it possible to do that Porkalator glitch in the Castle of Grief on the N64 version of Hexen? I know it has been fixed for v1.1 of the PC version.
I spent a great deal of time trying to get it to work recently, both standing in the way of the trap near the Gibbet teleport and trying to reflect Porkalator shots at myself. I couldn't manage to turn myself into a pig at all in Castle of Grief.
The trap definitely didn't work. It still might be possible to porkalate oneself by reflecting it off a centaur's shield, but I tried and wasn't able to; there were a lot of pigs running around.
Joined: 8/1/2004
Posts: 2687
Location: Seattle, WA
FreshFeeling wrote:
It still might be possible to porkalate oneself by reflecting it off a centaur's shield, but I tried and wasn't able to; there were a lot of pigs running around.
It's very possible to reflect a porkelator shot off of a Centaur shield at that point in the game. I'm pretty sure I pulled it off on the console in the past, though I didn't really appreciate the skip back then.
Joined: 6/22/2007
Posts: 181
Location: Eastern Michigan University
PC speed is about two times faster then N64, and the game play is a tad different.
Differences:
Loading times
Control Scheme
Strafing
Running
Jumping
Character Speed
Emulator Coder, Site Developer, Site Owner, Expert player
(3573)
Joined: 11/3/2004
Posts: 4754
Location: Tennessee
I redid all of episode 1, this time with low resultion and zoom. I improved every level and as a result this movie is 13383 frames (3.72 minutes) faster.
Another bonus of changing the graphics resultion is that the bridge in fire 1 is not graphically messed up.
While this is much faster, this is still our test run. So there are many things that can be improved.
Joined: 6/22/2007
Posts: 181
Location: Eastern Michigan University
adelikat wrote:
I redid all of episode 1, this time with low resultion and zoom. I improved every level and as a result this movie is 13416 frames (3.72 minutes) faster.
Another bonus of changing the graphics resultion is that the bridge in fire 1 is not graphically messed up.
While this is much faster, this is still our test run. So there are many things that can be improved.
I am very pleased with outcome of our test runs, I know for a fact that a few hundred more frames can be saved from obvious mistakes we made in this route. (collisions, hitting to many switches, not aggressive enough)
Joined: 8/1/2004
Posts: 2687
Location: Seattle, WA
adelikat wrote:
I redid all of episode 1, this time with low resultion and zoom. I improved every level and as a result this movie is 13383 frames (3.72 minutes) faster.
Not too shabby. I'm glad that you've started using Flechettes to tear through mobs now.
My only qualm, and this is one that always bugs me, is that you can use a lot of your waiting time to not wait so much. When you get the Emerald Key, for example, you could run around and grab the few Flasks and whatnot in the room while the trap resets. You could also maybe take a few swigs of Flask while waiting for Guardian of Ice to open, thereby allowing you to be a bit more reckless in Guardian of Metal. Just a few thoughts, and I know that they'll be kinked out in the final version.
I'm sad that you get to skip so much of the game :(
Pick the fighter, put it on skill 5, then try to get through the Seven Portals. I had a hard time fighting the last boss with cheats on skill 3.
Are you referring to the room with tons of Wendigos? Yeah, that one is a pain for any character. Korax isn't going to be that difficult for a TAS to do. May have to figure out how to manipulate him a bit, but he shouldn't be that hard unless the other enemies that he summons become a problem. He should be dead before the second wave is unleashed. If anything, good use of items will make the run successful, as they can heal health and mana instantly when needed.
One thing I gotta ask, is the hardest difficulty going to make this run more entertaining, or will it just drag it on as the player slaughters more and harder enemies?
Gotta think about how much time the hardest mode is going to add for each enemy killed. Hexen has a lot of enemies too... Of course the run will be dashing past a ton of them as well. Hardest means fewer items as well, though this may not impact the run quite as much as the increased enemy HP.
Joined: 6/22/2007
Posts: 181
Location: Eastern Michigan University
zdude255 wrote:
okaygo wrote:
Pick the fighter, put it on skill 5, then try to get through the Seven Portals. I had a hard time fighting the last boss with cheats on skill 3.
Are you referring to the room with tons of Wendigos? Yeah, that one is a pain for any character. Korax isn't going to be that difficult for a TAS to do. May have to figure out how to manipulate him a bit, but he shouldn't be that hard unless the other enemies that he summons become a problem. He should be dead before the second wave is unleashed. If anything, good use of items will make the run successful, as they can heal health and mana instantly when needed.
One thing I gotta ask, is the hardest difficulty going to make this run more entertaining, or will it just drag it on as the player slaughters more and harder enemies?
Gotta think about how much time the hardest mode is going to add for each enemy killed. Hexen has a lot of enemies too... Of course the run will be dashing past a ton of them as well. Hardest means fewer items as well, though this may not impact the run quite as much as the increased enemy HP.
Any room that requires you to skill monsters on Skill 5 for the fighter is near impossible. The last boss with the cleric can be killed in sub-1min (skill 4). As for being on skill 5, thats a good question I wanted to go on skill 3 in the first place, but it really ends up being a walk in the park.
Can you strafe on the 64 version of this game? I can't seem to be able to remember doing so.
I think the cleric is probably the best choice of character as well. While the Fighter can run faster, this might not be as much of an advantage when you take into account the sheer number of traps and things in this game you need to wait, if only slightly, for. Plus the Cleric kills boss enemies faster. He sucks against centaurs though. The mage has that shortcut in Winnowing Hall, but this hardly seems a fair tradeoff, even taking into account the awesomeness that is Arc of Death.
I'm pretty sure the Castle of Greif skip works in the 64 version.
Out of curiosity, will you guys be playing any of the bonus levels?
Looking forward to seeing this one done, though in the final run try to be really violent or creative with waiting times : )
Joined: 6/22/2007
Posts: 181
Location: Eastern Michigan University
Strafing does work on the N64, however adelikat and I disagree on the consistent use of it during the rough draft. After about Hub 1, I have been practicing straffing in frame advanced so I can optimize better on the final.
Part of the run will include using an item dupe glitch and the exploiting of Chaos Devices which will take maybe 10 seconds per item, and save a few minutes each use.
The castle of grief glitch does not work in the N64 version.
The Cleric is by far the best character to play with, making great use of stun flechettes, decent speeds, and a powerful last weapon. It was easier to complete Korax on skill 4 with the cleric, using only all weapons (no artificats from the start of the level), then it was to do it with fighter on skill 5 using all weapons, infinite items. He just takes too much damage from the close range and the damage dealt isn't good.
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The jumpy can get very tricky and some of it needs to be done in frame advanced. Sometimes you need to strafe for extra speed, it is doable in frame advanced or low speed.
