For a Hexen III, my vote would be Winnowing Hall (WINNOWR) and/or Seven Portals (JACHR), since those songs are pretty iconic for Hexen. And if full streamed audio is too much or too far removed from the original composition style, something like MOD/tracker formats can give a consistent sound while still being a sequenced format. A few weeks ago, John Romero did an interview after his release of Sigil for Doom: slayersclub.bethesda.net/en/article/1vt4DnYWjIz6T8KbegBs8G/nods-to-mods-interview-john-romero And in it, he teased at the notion of a new Hexen map pack, among other things. Maybe the rights to the series are tied up in Activision or whatever, but you can always make new content for Hexen itself: maps, music, whatever. Exactly the way you did it in the 90s. Imagine how that would go over: the original devs release a new expansion! These days, we have things like MP3s and remixes; Xeotroid put out a particularly nice set (Hub 1 at ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-IxQ65lYNbmI.html) and I can play it in GZDoom using that in place of the MIDI music. Modern take on CD audio, but without having to cut corners to make it fit.
I appreciate these interviews, i still return to the games and it's cool to hear stuff from the composers (in particular i complete Heretic at least once a year, it's interesting how gameplay can change if you set some challenge like starting from scratch at every level without retaining the weapons/etc from previous map). Hope you can have an Heretic 2 focused video too, and other Raven games like MageSlayer, its OST is Heretic/Hexen like or the Necrodome one that has that vibe from the same composer indeed :) About the freedom you have making music now compared to the past i see similar things with graphics: with pixel art or basic 3D the developers tried to push their creativity with what they could use. Certainly consoles/computer cards with good sound chips, nice built-in instruments were a good base to have, people still use the Sega Genesis audio to create music because it is quite interesting even now. The C64 had a powerful system for the time and there are some good examples from that era too. It's also fun to see how some synth songs are recreated with modern tools from the same author and viceversa, for example Yuzo Koshiro "upgraded" Etrian Odyssey music from the DS to the 3DS remakes or still do FM or remixed versions of the modern songs in later titles of the series. Very cool and varied soundtracks, from powerful rock battle themes to mix of relaxing or dark ambient tunes :) The Heretic and Hexen franchise is within Activision so i have little hope for a remake or sequel (don't know if they could lease or sell the IP but even Heretic 2 isn't available anywhere digital so i think they don't care) but an independent effort i could see totally see it. Even the Daggerfall/Arena original creators started to create a spiritual successor to those titles because after those the Elder Scrolls series lost some of their ideas and they want to return and try to fulfil what the technology at the time limited a lot. So maybe if the right people are motivated enough... i think a dark fantasy fps, even with third person option close to the character like in Resident Evil 4+ or Dead Space, is untapped potential ;)
Thank you, some very good food for thought that comment! There is quite a few other composers I would like to have on the series. Would be great to get Kevin back for Heretic 2 or Hexen 2. I am also looking at getting some C64 composers on at some stage :)
so when we are going to get proper album for hexen? with japanese like treatment, full original tracks, maybe a couple of unreleased tracks (?), orchestral versions for at least some of them... :)
It's a bit sad that Raven Software is now stuck in the Call of Duty jail, their last original game was Singularity from 2010. I still hope that one day we'll see a Heretic/Hexen sequel, even if it would be developed by a smaller team than the next CoD entry.
