This is a fan art of Corvus, the main character of the games Heretic and Heretic II made by Raven software. Since most of you maybe don't recognize this elf mage and don't know these games, I should explain a little.

Heretic was a first person shooter made by Raven software and published by id Software (the makers of Wolfenstein 3D and Doom) for ms-dos back in 1994. It used Doom's game engine and that's why it was really similar to Doom, except with a fantasy-setting, telling the story of an elf mage Corvus (though his name wasn't revealed until the sequel Heretic II, in this first game he was only known as "Heretic", because his race was judged being heretics by the forces of evil that invaded their world), on a mission to destroy the serpent rider D'Spair who had invated his world.
Even though Heretic was very similar to Doom, it was innovative as well as it was the first fps-game that featured the ability to look up and down and fly. It also featured power-ups and items that were able to activate from the inventory whenever the player wanted, not immediately just like in Doom. This item inventory became very common in almost every old first person shooters ever since, for example in games like Duke Nukem 3D, Blood, Shadow Warrior, Redneck Rampage, and Quake 2. Among these new features Heretic also included more realistic water-effects; when the player drops in the water, some water splashes around. There were also water turrents that can draq the player. Heretic was also the first fps that included ambient noises in the background to deepen the atmosphere and create even more creepy feeling than Doom.

Heretic didn't become as big hit as Doom though, but it did get it's own expansion and also got a spiritular sequel Hexen in 1995, which got it's own sequel Hexen II in 1997. Hexen-games didn't follow the story of Heretic, but were based on the same universe and were very similar to Heretic. In fact Hexen was originally supposed to be second expansion for Heretic, but it was made to be it's own standalone game as it was too different to Heretic.

Heretic did get it's own real sequel too in 1998 when Heretic II was released for PC. Heretic II was developed by Raven software that made the previous game and both Hexen-games too. But Heretic II wasn't published by id Software, that had published Heretic 1 and both Hexen-games. But id Software proved their Quake 2 engine for this game and the game itself was this time published by Activision.

Heretic II was infact the black sheep of the whole Heretic-Hexen series. Instead of being first person shooter, Heretic II was a third person action game involving shooting and lot of jumping. But despite this completly new game style, Heretic II still focused most on the action and shooting just like Heretic 1 and it included many familiar weapons, spells and power-ups from the previous games.
From it's story the game followed the story of the elf mage of the first game and it was now revealed that his name is Corvus. After defeating the serpent rider D'Spair Corvus had found himself trapped in other dimension far from home. He had wandered around in this dimension for a long time until all of sudden a portal leading back to his home was opened. But at home Corvus finds out that everyone have died because of a plague or became zombies, and he has to find out the cause of this plague and a way to cure it as he gets infected as well.


I myself have always liked whole Heretic-Hexen series a lot, especially Heretic and Heretic II, and decided to finally do some fan art of these games as they really should deserve more attention. In this picture I made Corvus look more like what he looked like in Heretic 1 and carrying the weapons seen in this game. The pants though I made to look more like what they looked like in Heretic II. :XD:

Corvus belongs to Raven software
Art is by  kilju - me