Hexen FAQ 0.3 [Insert big hexen ascii logo here] [Someone make a good one and send it to me! email birdie@halcyon.com] [the best one gets his put here and his name in the credits! Woohoo!] [Try and make it fit into 75 coloumn text please.] ------------------------------------------------------------------------ I may be in touch with the folks at Raven soon. There is a pretty good chance they will support this as the "official" FAQ for Hexen. This also means I will probably be able to get all the juicy level-building details for all you guys! Keep a look-out for future versions, my info base is expanding fast! ------------------------------------------------------------------------ ************ *[Contents]* ************ * Whats new in Hexen? * The 4 levels * The Flame Mask * A simple walkthru * Cheat Codes * Weapons * Items * Monsters * Some text buried in hexen.exe! * Script info * Some limited tech info I havn't tested for myself the buried text or the tech data yet. Note that wherever I say "deathmatch" below, Cooperative mode will almost always do the same thing too. I just like saying "deathmatch" a lot more.I also havn't played coop yet ;) *********************** *[What's new in Hexen]* *********************** Hexen is the sequal to Heretic, which was a fantasy offshoot of Doom. Heretic and Hexen both use the Doom engine programmed by John Carmack at id software. These two games are made by Raven software, closely linked with id. This beta is a four level demo of Hexen. It is scheduled for release on Oct 30th. No coincidence that this is the day before All Hallow's Eve! As far as I know there will NOT be a shareware Hexen... just this beta demo which was released on Oct 2nd. For those who havn't played Heretic, it had a set of items that could be carried and used at any time in the game. This was new to the Doom engine. Hexen also has most of the first Heretic's artifacts, plus many new ones! Hexen also has added a lot of atmospheric effects (like lightning in the background and MANY ambient sounds). Another nifty effect seen in level 1 is that you can actually break windows! There are some other peices of terrain that can be affected too, like the gray burnt trees can be destroyed. The first ting you notice when playing is that you can choose one of three characters to play now! They all have strengths and weaknesses. The fighter has maximum armor, strength, and speed, but almost no magic power. All his weapons are close range. Any long range power he has usually costs a lot of mana and isn't extremely powerful. The first three of his four weapons can be used (with lesser effect) without any mana whatsoever. They gain additional power by using mana however. The cleric is the "in-between" guy. He has medium speed and strength, decent armor, and good magic power. He has some long and short attacks, plus he can use some items more effectivly than others can. His super-weapon is not as powerful as the mages, but it "homes" in on enemies, so it doesn't require careful aiming! It is the most expensive (mana-wise) weapon in the game. The mage has low armor, speed, and strength, but is maxed out in magic power. He has some very punishing weapons, plus the only ranged weapon in the game that doesn't require mana. His fourth weaponis the most powerful in the game, while using less mana than either of the other two classes do for their "ultimate weapon". When playing Hexen, there is a lot more emphasis on puzzles and traps now. No more simple hacking and slashing! (there still is a lot of that though!). I have found some rooms with very interesting traps, from crushing pillars to poisen darts. Another new feature is randomness in the terrain. Sometimes pulling a lever can do one thing, but play the level again and it might do another. This randomness is not used to a major extent in the beta, but has a lot of potential for making levels that are different each time you play. Yet another new thing is the ability to travel back and forth between worlds. For instance, level 2 has portals to levels 3,4,5 and 6 (5 and 6 are not available in the beta, however). Some actions you do in one level can affect another. Sometimes you have to get an item in one level (like the flame mask) and bring it to another to accomplish your goals. There are three very important changes to the engine now that make it more powerful than ever: 1) You can now actually occupy the same x and y location as other "obstacle" objects if you are above or below them. I have used the wings myself to fly and stand on an Ettin's head while he tried to kill me. Note that "walking" on creatures is not fully supported - the engine still had me moving as though on the ground (it was an icy ground, so I was sliding around on the poor Ettin's head!). Obstacles like statues and tree stumps can be stood on as well. 2) The lines that make up the walls can be moved now! In Doom, doors could only open up and down. In Hexen, they can swing or slide as well! There is a trap in level 4 where you are on a narrow ledge and the wall moves out to push you off! Being jammed between two moving walls can really hurt too! 3) Probably one of the best changes: Triggers now activate scripts instead of single actions. Now walking into a room can do all sorts of neat things at once, like lowering the lights, opening two doors behind you, teleporting monsters into the room, and dropping the floor 20 feet! Scripts can also be used to automate "continuous" actions. See the end of this FAQ for more info on scripts. "Sounds great! Where can I find the beta?" The two best ftp sites are ftp.idsoftware.com in /idstuff/hexen (if you can use fsp, try fsp.idsoftware.com, it is much faster) and ftp.cdrom.com in /pub/doom/idstuff/hexen. id's web page is at www.idsoftware.com. **************** *[The 4 Levels]* **************** Q: Where are the four levels? A: They are all there. The "fire guardian" and "ice gurdian" levels are levels 4 and 3, respectivly. When you look at the auto-map it will tell you the name of the level in the lower left corner, just above your keys and armor bar. Level 2, called "Seven Portals" actually leads to levels 3, 4, and 5 with two portals to each, and then on to (I assume) #6 at the very end. The portals to levels 5 and 6 all say "access denied - beta" when you enter them. The reason Seven Portals leads to all these different worlds is because you can travel back and forth between worlds, and some things you do in one world will affect another. Thus, in the fire world, when you pull the chain that says "you hear the distant cracking of ice" you are affecting something in the ice world, so you should go there next. Unfortunately, this beta version does not actually show you any changes there. I believe that in the full version this same chain will activate script #19 in the Guardian of Ice level, opening the room to the firekey. When playing in deathmatch, all four levels each contain their own set of ALL 4 weapons for each class. Yes, all three parts of all three superweapons can be found on each level. You can pick up other peoples weapons too! You can't use them, but you gain mana. ****************************** *[What the flame mask is for]* ****************************** Q: Where the heck is the fire key? A: It is in the room described in the next question. Q: What on earth is the firemask for? A: It plugs into a hole in the wall that is only accesable in deathmatch right now. Unfortunately, when playing deathmatch the firemask itself is not present! ** UPDATE ** Get the firemask, and go to the large circular room in the Guardian of Ice level. Activate script #19 (see cheat keys below) to reveal two swords on the floor pointing to doors. The one on the right is where you put the firemask! ********************* *[A simple walkthru]* ********************* Level one is pretty self explanetory. there is one wall that only opens in deathmatch though, and it will teleport you to a high-up spot outside where the level start is. here is what you can do when playing single-player on "Seven Portals" After the face asks you if you are prepared to die, jump down into the water and whack the nasties. Grab any nifty toys in the area, and look for a pull-switch on the inside of one of the pillers. The piller is in front of the middle golden door on the left side (when facing south, just outside the start of the level). When you pull it, that same door will swing open revealing some chaos serpents. Before you try and kill them with your puny weapon #1, go back and grab weapon #2 which should have dropped down on a large gray pillar that dropped to near-ground level at the same time you pulled that switch. This weapon will need blue mana, so make sure you have some of it. Depending on which character you choose, your second weapon should help a lot in killing them. Enter the room they came out of, and go up to where you see a quartz flask above some wooden stairs. There is a window there to the next room. When you move up there, the lights behind you go to almost zero, and two passageways open up. you will have to jump to get to them, and they both go down stairs onto an icy floor where an elevator slowly moves up and down. Get on it and you will find the portal to the Ice Guardian level. When you get here, you will see a corridor ahead, and soon as you step out two monsters attack. Dispatch them,then look at the walls. One is gray stone (same as the fire-world) and the other is rusted metal (same as world #5 that you cant get to. I assume it's going to be called "Metal Guardian" or something close from the looks of the level though). Both of these are closed, and will only open later after doing some other stuff. Continue down the corridor to a roughly circular room. about 3 seconds after entering the room, the floor will lower and monsters teleport in. A staircase forms leading back the way you came, and you see another room now with 4 pillars in it. There are two walls that look like doors, but won't open at all yet (in fact, you must cheat to get them open in single-player. Script #19 should do it). Behind those pillars is a switch. When you pull it, all pillars rise up, then randomly crash down a few times. They will all stop in the "up" position now. One of the four pillars will have a sword on the floor pointing to it. (The sword is a sector with a slightly higher light level, so you should see it fine). If you step into this circle, you will port back to "7 Portals" and two more doors will open there. If you step in any of the other three, you will die a horrible squishing death. Note that the pillar that transports you is *random*... everytime you play and pull the switch, a different one will be selected as the "teleporter" and the other three become nasty-death. When you get back outside you can fight with more nasties (they slowly respawn even if you do not pick the hardest level. They only come back like once every 5 minutes though, and only small creatures ever come back, nothing large). Two more doors will be open, they are on the same side as the ice portal you took, slightly north or south from there. The southern one will has a switch at the end. When you pull it, two rooms open up (one of which you can't see from where you are). one of them will send another serpent at you. If you step towards that room and turn around, you will see another one with a portal in it. This portal has rusted-iron borders and won't let you use it (it goes to level 5). The northern room is exactly like the southern one, but the borders are gray stone and you CAN use this teleporter. It takes you to the Guardian of Fire level. This level has some really cool features in it. First off, when you first get there, the wall ahead of you opens in a cool pattern. The room beyond the wall will erupt and sink when you step in, so step back quick. The floor will drop in jagged segments while fireballs fly up, then when the whole floor is gone a pool of lava rises up to where it was. Skip across the lava into the door on the right. In here, on the right side is a switch that says "you hear the distant creaking of ice". It does nothing in this beta version though. Going further through you come to a room that already has monsters in it, but even more teleport in to join the fun. There are two doors here that both need the fire key. bummer. There is an unmarked wall that will open up to a long bridge with many green flasks on it. Get lined up straight, and *run* across the bridge fast. Try not to turn once you are on t he bridge! When you step on, the whole screen shakes and the bridge starts collapsing as rocks fall from the ceiling. Cool effect. When you get to the end (the door you ran towards will close before you get there) just wait for the shaking to stop, then look for a ledge on the side that you can jump to. Carefully follow this ledge until it leads to a narrow doorway out. This leads to the middle of the level, you have already been here. But in the narrow doorway there is also a pull-switch that opens the door that closed before. Go back along the ledge and enter that room, and you have the Firemask (A source of confusion for many players!). The firemask makes your character grunt when he uses it against a wall. Not only is this cool, but it ALSO fits into a slot that you can't reach in single-player mode unless you activate script #19 in Guardian of Ice. (Or use clipping). Go back to Guardian of Ice and type MWAGABAZA19. Take the right door and get the fire key. The left door leads to a cool room where you get the steel key, but it doesn't fit anywhere in the beta levels. This glacier room will make the floor crack and move a lot when you enter it. After it stops, follow the left wall till you find a switch. Pull it, and the floor will move a LOT more now. Stand where you are if you want to live! Some sections of the floor will rise up and crash into the ceiling. Others will drop amazingly low creating deadly pits. After it stops moving carefully go through the doorways at the back of the room. This second room has a flat floor (for now) and some of those ice creatures, but they don't move and can't be hurt. I don't know if they are statues or if they are supposed to come back to life later or what. When you get the steel key the floor moves some and some ettins appear to kill you. Now you have the firekey, so go back to Guardian of Fire and open `er up! Enter either room, and pull the switch there. A wall opens... step in there and it lowers down to a room with more neat things in it. At the end of this room is a wall with a symbol that matches the firemask! Hey! When you step in front of that wall, two elevators drop and take you up to some corridors where you see more of these masks. Step into a teleporter. Pull a chain there and and you hear "grinding gears". Now look for a switch that looks like the chaos symbol. Push it and you port to a room that looks like the two secondary rooms of "7 Portals" but the door is closed and wont open (script 31 or 32 should open it. They also open in multi-player mode). There is a switch here, pull it. Then look for a teleporter that will take you back to "fire guardian". From here go back out to the courtyard of 7 Portals. The only way further now is to cheat more. But lets face is, once you start, you can never go back. So, shamefully type in "BRAFFEL" and get 25 of every item. Use the wings of wrath to fly up and start hitting switches on that tower. The lowest of the three opens up the stone door in the ice level. The next one up opens the metal door right by there. The highest one opens the big bronze doors at the south end of 7 Portals. Note that pulling the highest one by itself wont open it, all three must be pulled to open it. Go back to the ice level. When you step near those two doors they slide up and presto, more rooms to explore. Take the one on the right first (technically, when the game is working right, it would be open before you can enter the metal door). This is two rooms of ice, with a few buttons. Pressing them opens up a portal to the Fire level, although the walls in the area you go to will match the metal level. In here there are rusty walls and a very, very long drop. Creep around the edge... and when you are almost all the way around... the wall pushes you off! Quickly, use those wings to fly! Or for the skillful (like me) who can see it coming (the wall looks different), you can try and set it off without falling. Either way, the fall will kill you, even in god-mode. In fact, when god-mode is on and you die, you can't restart the level, it takes you to the menu instead. So save often! After the trap is set off, the lava floor of the pit will rise up to you. It rises very fast, but has an amazing long way to go, so it takes a few seconds. Once it is up, jump down there and get onto the bridge that goes across the lava to a round platform. There is a switch here that causes "distant rumbling"... it is raising some stairs in 7 Portals (stairs that lead to the 2nd of the three switches... but you cheated and pulled it already, cheater!). From here exit back to the lava area and take the portal back to 7 Portals. You can climb the stairs if you want and get some tone in your legs, or go to the ice level again and take the left corridor this time. (Take note! Pulling those switches does not actually open the two doors... just *walking* next to them does. The three switches themselves all control the big gold doors. I found this out later after experimenting a bit). Back to the ice level, into the metal door on the left. It's got a neato trap room, and an ice room with some guys in it. On t he backside of a pillar in that room is a switch. If you pull it and hold still, you will be pumped full of poison darts. If you pull it and move, the darts miss but two nasty nasty guys with shields attack you. They are hard to kill because when those shields are up they can't be hurt, and can reflect most spells back at you! Fortunately, they don't raise their shields till after you hit them. So just try not to hit them with lots of little spells. Instead, use one or two big ones! (oh yeah, the all-weapons code is "CRHINEHART" you cheater you... normally only the 2nd weapon can be found for each character in single-player mode). The final area to visit is beyond those big gold doors in 7 Portals. In there are many nasty things... after you kill all the serpents more doors rotate open to the south, and more of the shield-guys attack. Once you kill all of them a glittery bridge appears further south leading towards the final portal (which is disabled). Watch that drop! It is a loooooooooooooooooooooong one! I used the wings and it took me forever and a day to reach the bottom safely. Notice that there is a gap in the wall on the left... you can make a running jump to go in there and find more surprises (namely some mana and wings of wrath... oh yeah, two serpents too, in close quarters, fun). If you miss the jump you will die though... Up by the portal is more mana, and the first piece of weapon #4! If you sneak around behind the portal, there is also a "combined" mana that you can grab, which is the *only* green mana available in single-player mode so far... Thats it. Thats all the rooms you can get to. If you want _more_ you have to play multi-player, in which case ALL those bronze doors open for you and you can see more of the ice level. Besides, deathmatch is so much cooler, not to mention that you can find all the weapons and items that way... (After writing the above I finally got the clipping code, RJOHNSON. Now you CAN go anywhere!) *************** *[Cheat Codes]* *************** BGOKEY = God mode CRHINEHART = All weapons + full mana MRAYMONDJUDY = All keys (one of them looks like a little axe, cool!) BRAFFEL = 25 of each item (this will not give you the firemask or other "one of a kind" items). REVEAL = same as IDDT in doom. Useable only in map mode. Shows you lots of neat places you can't go. SGURNO = 100% health JSUMWALT = coordinate display EBIESSMAN = pig mode ;) RRETTENMUND = ticker to count your framerate (like Doom's devparm mode) MWAGABAZA## = Script (01-99) I have no idea what this does! KSHILDER = sound debug. Shows info BPELLETIER## = warp. The setup warp shows you can go up to map 41. Although, like Doom II, I'm sure you can do more if you correctly name them into a WAD. RJOHNSON = No clipping mode. go through walls! No clipping means you will fall through the sparkle bridge at the end of 7 Portals and die unless you can recover quickly. Also, ala Heretic, the previous games cheat codes will hurt you! RAMBO = takes all your weapons away except #1 QUICKEN = instant death! Another important key is the F5 button. It is for suicide... useful in deathmatch because sometimes you "fall" into the floor by accident and get a hall-of-mirrors effect. I don't know why it happens, but it is annoying. If you have a teleporter, or wings of wrath, you can get out of it without killing yourself. Here's some other interesting keys: All the numbers above 4 activate certain artifacts (if you have them in stock). this proves that the beta does have all the weapons (unless something changes!)... this is sad because four per player doesn't seem like nearly enough! But I do think that a multi-player cooperative game would be very nice to mix the weaponry up a bit! 5 = Icon of the defender 6 = Quartz Flask 7 = Dark Servant 8 = Flechette 9 = Banishment Device 0 = Chaos Device \ = Disk of Repulsion = Porkulator I certainly hope these become editable in the near future! *********** *[Weapons]* *********** All classes have four weapons. The fourth weapon must be made up of three separate pieces before it can work. The first weapon does not need any mana. The second uses blue, the third uses green, and the fourth uses lots of both. This is true for all three classes. Also note that in multi-player mode you CAN pick up items that belong to other classes, but you can't use them. I think there is a code that lets you change classes during the game, but I don't have it yet. Fighter: #1 - fists. These suck, but at least they have more range than you would expect of your arms! The fighter can land three punches in quick succession on a target, so he can deal out more damage quickly than the other 2 classes. Note that the 3rd punch will have very slow recovery though. It is a good idea to either back up a bit, or stop after 2 and restart again. #2 - Timon's axe. This glows with blue mana, and makes a flash when you hit someone. It uses blue mana, but only when you actually hit someone. If you beat on the wall with it it will make the flashes but not cost mana. #3 - Hammer of retribution (name?). This can be used with or without mana, and is about 2 times more powerful than the fists (or so). If you have green mana, and swing it without hitting anyone, it will spend mana to fire a "flaming hammer" out that explodes. This is much more powerful than the hammer itself. If you do hit someone, whether you have mana or not, it will just thump them without using any mana. #4 - Quietus (sp?). This is a big sword that has green flames on it. It uses blue and green mana (about 12 or 15 of each, it uses more green than blue) and fires a spread of 5 or 6 green fireballs which are quite powerful. It fires them weather or not you are at close range to someone. I think that the sword itself doesn't actually hit anyone like the hammer does, just the fireballs. So you can only use it if you have enough mana. Cleric: #1 - Mace of something-or-other. As powerful as the fighters fists, but slower recovery. It doesn't have the extra-slow recovery of that third punch though. #2 - Serpent staff. This thing blinks once in a while! Anyway, at long range it fires two green wavy fireballs that hit for poison damage. At close range, it hits continuously draining the victims life and giving it to you! Uses blue mana (1 per shot, not sure how much when you drain) #3 - Fire hands (name?). Fires a streak of fire across the ground, exploding if you hit someone with it. Does good damage, uses green mana. It has a limited range, but that range is pretty good. You just can't fire it across huge chasms. Note that even though the fire travels on the ground, you can still shoot it up. The fire makes a path any direction you fire... it just happens that most of the time this happens to be along the ground. #4 - Big nasty cross whos name I forget. This thing is pure evil! Fires a big gray burst that splinters into four ghosts. These ghosts fly out in a straight spread if no enemies are nearby, or fly in circles around nearby villains. They do a lot of damage as they fly around, and scream all the time. When they kill someone, they look for another victim to fly around. They do disappear after a little while though, or if there are no more enemies. Mage: #1 - Wand. This is like the elven wand... unlimited range, but weak. It does have neat looking tracers though. #2 - Frozen shards. This is cool. Uses 3 blue mana to fire a *big* spread of icicles. Each icicle does a little damage, but there are about 12 or so per volley, so it adds up at close range. Also, you fire more straight than you do spreading, so even at long range you can hit one target with about half of the shards. When a target dies from these, instead of falling he becomes frozen. After a few seconds, or if he is hit with something else, or falls, the frozen guy will shatter into lots of pieces. These pieces sit on t he ground and slowly melt away. Pretty cool. If a player dies by this, his screen turns blue, and he dies like normal, but the point of view does not fall to the ground. You can watch your killer move around, and then you shatter and the POV falls. #3 - Arc of death. This is a bolt of electricity that follows the ceiling AND the ground. If it hits someone, it stays on them and hurts them for about 3 seconds. After it hits, it "locks on" to that person. So if they move it will follow. If you move VERY fast, you can outrun it after it locks, but not usually. #4 - Huge skull staff. Forget the name of this one too, but it fires three incredibly powerful fireballs. Each one is capable of killing any of the creatures I have met so far in one hit, as well as the players (except the fighter if he has a really high AC... but even then he is very near death, and thats from ONE of the three fireballs). Uses 12 of each color mana. ************* *[Artifacts]* ************* First, these items are directly descended from Heretic: Wings of Wrath: Let you fly for about a minute or so. The time seems to be unlimited though if you have god-mode on. Quartz Flask: Gives you about 25% health back. These will be used *AUTOMATICLY* when your life hits 0. Mystic Urn: Gives you 100% health back. These will be used AUTOMATICLY when your life hits 0, but only AFTER you run out of Quartz Flasks. Chaos Device: Teleports you to the player1 starting point of the level. Torch: Well, duh! Now for some new stuff! Banishment Device: Like a Chaos Device, but you use it on others instead! It fires a neat-o pattern of rings. Whoever gets hit by it (monsters included) gets teleported to the player-1 start position of the level. For some real fun, transport a bunch of MEAN monsters, then hit another player to send him into the thick of them! Boots of Speed: What can I say? They make you run faster. Dragonskin Bracers: These glowing purple bracers increase your AC by 4 when you use them. Disk of Repulsion: Makes ALL enemies within a certain range of you get pushed AWAY. Can be used to get out of corners, smash guys into the wall, or push guys of the cliff (great fun here!). Pushing people into the wall does do damage to them, but not very much it seems. I had to use 5 disks to kill an Ettin. Dark Servant: Too cool! When used, you toss a Maulator "voodoo" doll out a few feet. Sometimes it sits there and you can pick it up again. Sometimes it becomes a giant Maulotor for 30 seconds to pummel your enemies! The success rate seems to be based on your class. The fighter can't get it to work very often, the cleric sometimes, and the mage most of the time. Also, the Maulotor can attack *you* too, but he seems to attack the mage very rarely. Perhaps the stronger magic skill means he has better control? Porkulator: Just like the morph ovum of Heretic, but it turns people into pigs! Note that when you are a pig now, you can use items. Anyone who is a pig can throw the green flechette flasks as though they were the fighter. Wings of wrath can make you a flying pig (Pig of Wrath!). Flechette: The green flasks. Each class uses these differently. The fighter chucks them forward and they bounce off of the walls and floor. It explodes when it either hits someone, or comes to rest for 3 seconds. The cleric drops it right where he stands (run!), then it quickly explodes into a noxious cloud for about a minute. Anyone walking into this cloud suffers poison damage. The screen turns green and they cough a lot. Even after they leave the cloud, they will take damage while the screen slowly fades back to normal. The mage drops these like the Timebomb in heretic. it explodes very quickly! This is one of the most plentiful artifacts in Hexen. Scroll with the blue rune on it: This raises the life of all three classes to 100%. Also, when the cleric uses it near any dead monster (I havn't tryed it in deathmatch yet) that monster comes back to life. No creature can be "reserected" more than once though. If you try a second time they disapear in a puff of smoke. Does anyone know what the fighter and mage do with it? Icon of the Defender: This gives you invincibility without changing the color of your screen, which is handy. It also has side effects which are different for each class. The cleric seems to fade in and out, a kind of temporary invisibility I think. The fighter and mage do not have any effects visible in single-player mode. I will check multi-player soon to see what I look like when I use them. Chalice: Again, don't know the full name here. But this artifact, when used will fill your mana levels to the max. ************ *[Monsters]* ************ So far I have only run into 5 monsters in the beta. There are a few places where there are monsters in multi-player, but not in single player (just like many artifacts and weapons). Ettin - The first monster you will probably see is the two-headed brown beastie wielding a mace. His attack is hand-to-hand range only, so he is not a major threat. All the players hand weapons have a greater range than he does (even the fighters punch!). Typically takes about 5 or 6 hits to kill using the weakest weapon of any class. Fire gargoyles - These creatures resemble the gargoyles from Heretic, but they are on fire! They are also much smarter: They shoot fireballs at you in bursts of three, and the strafe side to side quickly when they fire, maiking them very hard to hit. A fire gargoyle in its "resting" state looks like a gray fiery sphere. When you "wake them up" they unfold into themselves. Chaos Serpents - D'Sparil rode one of these at the very end of Heretic. It is a large (taller than you) creature that shoots fireballs at you or bites at close range. They are not nearly as hard to kill as the one in Heretic, but they are still trouble, and usually appear in groups of two or three. Icey guys - These can not normally be found in single-player games unless you use the cheat codes to go to them. They look like Swamp Thing but bluish and made of ice instead of green moss. They fire spreads of ice shards that have the same effect as the mages #2 weapon. When you kill these guys (with any weapon) they shatter like an icicle. Centaurs - These creatures are tough to kill. They don't have a lot of hit points, but everytime you hit them they raise their shield and become invulnerable (and can reflect most spells). After they drop their shield they can be hurt again. ***************** *[Hidden texts!]* ***************** The following info was posted by Kyle Hofmann on usenet. He found this text buried in hexen.exe [begin Seven Portals ending text] Having passed the seven portals which sealed this realm, a vast domain of harsh wilderness stretches before you. Fire, ice, and steel have tested you, but greater challenges remain ahead. The dense tangle of forest surely hides hostile eyes, but what lies beyond will be worse. Barren deserts, dank swamps, and musty caverns bar your way, but you cannot let anything keep you from your fate, even if you might come to wish that it would. And beyond, flickering in the distance, the ever shifting wall of the hypostyle seem to mock your every effort. Your mind still reeling from your encounters within the hypostyle, you stagger toward what you hope is a way out. Things seem to move faster and faster; your vision blurs and begins to fade... as the world collapses around you, the brightness of a teleportal engulfs you. A flash of light, and then you climb wearily to your feet. You stand atop a high tower, and from below come the screams of the damned. You step forward, and instantly the sound of demonic chanting fills your blood. By all the gods of death! What place have you come to? By all the gods of pain, how will you ever find a way out? The mightiest artifacts and weapons of the ancients barely sufficed to defeat the heresiarch mand his minions, but now their foul remain lie at your feet. Gathering the last of your strength, you prepare to enter the portal which leads from the heresiarch's sanctum. Above you, the ramparts of an immense castle loom. Silent towers and bare walls surround a single spire of black stone, which lies square in the center of the castle like a brooding giant. Fire and shadow twist behind gaping windows, dozens of baleful eyes glaring down upon you. Somewhere within, your enemies are waiting... "...and he shall journet to the realms of the dead, and contest with the forces therein, unto the very gates of despair. But whether he shall return again to the world of light, no man knows." Damn. Damn damn damn damn damn damn damn. [end text] Now for the end game text: [begin text] With a scream of agony you are wrenched from this world to another, every part of your body wreathed in mystic fire. When your vision clears, you find yourself standing in a great hall, filled with ghostly echoes and menacing shadows. In the distance you can see a raised dias, and upon it the only source of light in this world. This can only be the chaos sphere, the source of Korax's power. With this, you can create worlds... or destroy them. By rights of battle and conquest it is yours, and with trembling hands you reach to grasp it. Perhaps, now, a new player will join the cosmic game of power. Like the pawn who is promoted to queen, suddenly the very reaches of the board seem to be within your grasp. But there are other players mightier than you, and who can know their next moves? [end text] *************** *[Script Info]* *************** Ever wonder what those scripts do? In Doom, when you crossed a linedef that triggered an action, it simply sent the action number to any sectors that shared its activation number. In Hexen, linedefs activate "scripts" that can do any amount of actions. An example is in the "Guardian of Ice" level, when you place the firemask in the proper slot, two doors open to the sides of the room showing lava flows going beneath the floor. A pillar of ice in the center of the room slowly melts down to a puddle, bringing down the fire key, then the two doors close again. This all happens from putting the firemask into the one slot! Each level can have as many as 99 scripts, although none of the levels in the beta use more than 35 I think. You can activate scripts by using the code "MWAGABAZA" and it will ask you "Activate which script (01-99)?". Type in two numbers and there ya go. Most scripts will not have any visible effect, since many just open doors and you usually are not near them when you do it ;) Some do major things though. One script in "guardian of Ice" lowers *ALL* ceilings to the floor, which really sucks. So be careful, and expect to reload your game once in a while. Also, some scripts are running continuously. An example would be a script that makes the lights of a hallway blink on and off in a pattern (like the corridor leading to the fire key). When you try and activate these, you do not get a "activating script number ##" message because it is already running. This script system is VERY similar to the programmable elevator system in Dark Forces. Note also that if no script exists, a message pops up saying that it couldn't find that script number. I will be adding to this list almost continously, watch for changes. [Level 1 scripts] 01 Really messes the map up! 02 Opens first swinging door. 03 sets off fire ball traps. 04 opens gold doors behind glass? Maybe not. 05 opens something or other. Probably on other side of map. 06 opens gold doors wider. Can be done forever.. 08 "the door is locked" message. 15 sets doors to crush. 17 opens final portal. Could be 16.. [2 Seven Portals] 01 I had to do this twice.. Not sure.. Opens first gold door. 10 doesn't exist? a few others don't give the script prompt also. [this is probably a continous script. See my note above] 18 lifts all middle stairs? 19 Opens Top gold door? 26 "Greating Mortal" Are you Ready to Die? 29 Brings down metal tower usually holding the second weapon. 31 -32 opens gold doors to the sides.. Not the middle right though. [3 Guardian of Ice] 02 Do not activate! Lowers main circular section. By going there you activate it twice and it just looks bad with all the HOM. 03 Don't activate closes off section imediately to the left when you start. 04 opens gold doors to room with emerald key 06 opens gold doors to room with emerald key, then opens door at top of steps. Can be done again and again to open doors wider. 07 in room behind swinging doors, lowers 4 lifts around final portal to reveal monsters. 08 Don't activate Brings ceiling to floor! Major Hom. Can't move. 19 Turns on light in the shape of a sword pointing to the door right and left in the circ main area. You can now access to fire key to the right if you have the mask and the steel key to the left. 11 says "the door is locked" 12 starts crushing ceilings near silver key 14 allows access to teleporter in center of room behind swinging doors. 15 causes gold doors near emerald key room to open and close. 16 after a short delay, causes various doors to open in room with emerald key, revealing monsters. ***************** *[WAD file info]* ***************** This is just the beginning of the info, and is not very detailed yet. The format is close to the Heretic/Doom type, although the level names are MAP01 MAP02 etc, more like Doom II. There are some big changes too so none of the current editors will load them without some tweaking. The THINGS entries are twice as long, and have the following format: 0. tag number? 1. x position 2. y position 3. bitmask of some sort? 4. angle 5. thing type 6. thing options (some extra bits have been added) 7. bit mask of some sort? 8. ? 9. ? The LINEDEFS entries are one field longer, and have the following format: 0. from vertex 1. to vertex 2. flags 3. data for trigger lines? 4. lower byte is code of some sort for trigger lines? upper byte contains code of what happens? 5. additional data for trigger lines? 6. right sidedef 7. left sidedef or -1 The other level resources look generally the same. (The above info, sketchy as it is, should be enough to at least make it possible to write something to allow the levels to be loaded into an editor.) This info was sent to me by Paul Falstad. He also writes about the following, which I believe is the scripting info for the levels. There's a BEHAVIOR resource for each level, which looks really scary. The format looks like a mini wad file. first 4 bytes: ACS\0 next 4 bytes: longword offset of directory ...data... The directory starts with a longword containing the number of entries, followed by the entries, which consist of three longwords. The first longword is an identifying number of some sort; the first few entries have id numbers of 1, 2, 3, 4, etc. but the later entries have seemingly arbitrary numbers. The next longword is an offset to the entry data itself. I don't know what the third longword is. I have no idea what the actual data that the entries are pointing to is. It's probably some compiled language of some sort, so I'm not optimistic about figuring out what it does. It looks like a series of longwords, which are instruction codes of some sort. I don't know what they do, except for 0x4f and 0x34, which look like jump instructions of some sort (they have longword offsets following them). Also, 0x01 is probably a "return" instruction, since it occurs at the end of each entry. After the directory is a longword containing a count, followed by that many longwords, which are offsets to strings. The strings are things like "GlassShatter", "FireDemonAttack", "THE DOOR IS LOCKED", etc. This would indicate that the BEHAVIOR data allows you to attach arbitrary sounds and strings to a linedef. All this info (I believe) will eventually turn into a working knowladge of how the scripting system works. My guess is it has a limited set of commands for moving linedefs and such, as well as triggering sounds and messages. This will make level building more difficult, but will be an immense tool of power for making fantastic levels! --------------------------------------------------------------------------- If anyone has extra info, email me at birdie@halcyon.com. Please only send useful information, not stuff like misspellings (of which there are many, I know). I will get the names of the items and weapons tomorrow too, but if anyone has the real names of each creature, please let me know. Feel free to add this to any web page or whatever, although you probably wont want to till I get the better version (ie, correctly spelled!) out. Make sure you give me credit for it too! --------------------------------------------------------------------------- Arne Michaelsen - keeper of the FAQ, email: birdie@halcyon.com Special thanks to: Todd Wagner .... for many cheat codes and activation keys. Killian ............ for listing a lot of scripts. Deird'Re M. Brooks ............. for the clipping code. Paul Falstad ........................... for the tech details. Kyle Hofmann ...................... for the hidden text.