Hexen: Beyond Heretic

Status

Data import tested, play not: GOG’s installer imported on the PS3 (2026-10-27, 85 s) and DSDA-Doom reached the title and played demo1 with the launcher’s arguments; nobody has played it on Walnut yet. Its launcher starts DSDA-Doom 0.30.0 (Debian’s package with Walnut’s patches, dsda-doom), which plays Heretic and Hexen too (started as dsda-hexen, Debian’s link to it); it plays Freedoom 2 at about 56 fps on its OpenGL renderer.

• Data: game-data-packager’s hexen-wad (build.toml [data_setup]), made from the player’s own copy, in /usr/share/games/doom/hexen.wad.
• Launcher (desktop/launchers), NoDisplay=true with X-Walnut-Requires= the WAD (shown once the menu rule for it exists, PLAN 5.10): dsda-hexen -iwad /usr/share/games/doom/hexen.wad -vidmode gl -width 1920 -height 1080 -fullscreen.
• Deathkings of the Dark Citadel: gdp’s hexen-deathkings-wad (HEXDD.WAD 1.0 or 1.1, in /usr/share/games/doom/hexdd.wad) is optional data (edition expansion); its own launcher adds -file /usr/share/games/doom/hexdd.wad and needs that file. Not tried: none of the user’s copies has HEXDD.WAD.

Which copies work

game-data-packager wants HEXEN.WAD 1.1 (20083672 bytes, md5 abb033ca…453f); DSDA-Doom 0.30 plays nothing else.

• GOG, setup_hexen_beyond_heretic_1.1_(42801).exe (148062304 bytes): HEXEN.WAD 1.1, the CD’s data track as game.gog, the CD music as Ogg Vorbis, no Deathkings. gdp 89 didn’t know the installer; our patch 0010 unpacks it with innoextract, as gdp does for GOG’s Heretic. An installed GOG folder works without the patch.
• CD, Steam (common/Hexen) and any other 1.1 copy: as gdp knows them.
• 1.0 (20128392 bytes, the floppy and early CD release): gdp refuses it and DSDA-Doom says “The Hexen v1.0 IWAD is not supported”. Raven’s 1.0-to-1.1 update is an RTPatch delta for DOS; we don’t apply it yet.
• Macintosh CD (1996, Hexen.WAD 21078584 bytes, md5 b68140a7…93be, sha256 06baa5ee…5913): accepted since gdp patch 0011 as hexen.wad?mac (a 1.1 copy). It is the 1.1 game (the same maps, sounds, music lumps and graphics; 11 lumps differ, CREDIT, HELP1-2 and LIFEGMM1-8, and it adds 291 lumps of its own: fonts, status bar pieces, menu art), but it lacks DMXGUS and GENMIDI, the DOS sound driver’s instrument banks. DSDA-Doom loaded GENMIDI for its OPL player at start whatever snd_midiplayer said and stopped with W_GetNumForName: GENMIDI not found (exit 255). Our DSDA-Doom patch 0007 makes a missing GENMIDI mean “no OPL player” (LoadInstrumentTable() checks W_LumpNameExists; I_OPL_InitMusic() already handles the failure): with this WAD the OPL music player is unavailable, the other players are not. Our default is fluidsynth, which takes the same D_ music lumps through its soundfont, so the Mac copy plays with music there (the music itself not judged by ear). Title and demo1 on the PS3 (2026-10-27): picture right. Both changes are upstream candidates (DSDA-Doom, Debian’s gdp).

Engine options

DSDA-Doom is the one Walnut ships and patches; the research’s pick for vanilla exactness is Chocolate Doom (a draft here). The options:

• Chocolate Doom (the pick: vanilla-exact; chocolate-doom)
• Crispy Doom, DSDA-Doom, Doomsday, Russian Doom

Research

What the surveys and plans said about it, newest first; each line names its source, the section and the date.

• 2026-10-20, pc-classics.md, “Alternatives and popularity”: Heretic/Hexen (1994/95): Chocolate Doom, vanilla-exact: the pick.