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“Now that's a lot of bull!”
~Sam "Serious" Stone

Let's just admit it, guys, we live in the age of remakes and remasters. It's almost like every second announcement I hear nowadays is about yet another oldie being remade. Heck, more and more often we get remasters of games that came out virtually yesterday (yes, Life is Strange, I'm talkin' 'bout you). Sure, sometimes remakes end up being good. Awesome even. A lot of people loved CAPCOM's new take on Resident Evil 2. Crash and Spyro got a lot of love too. Remasters can be like that too. Just look at Command & Conquer. But sometimes? Sometimes, it's just way too obvious that our new “remaster” is just a quick and ugly money grab. And yes, Life is Strange, I'm talkin' 'bout you. Well, technically, I can mention Mafia 2, BioShock and many others, but at least they gave those for free to people, who already had the originals in their Steam libraries. So... yeah. Even though there are good remakes and remasters around, there's also a lot of bull. And what we've got here? It's a bull.
Long story short, Serious Engine failed to become a thing. Originally, when very first Serious Sam game was released, its creators planned to license their engine to the other developers for using in their own games. You know, like id Software and Epic MegaGames did in their Quake II and Unreal. Unfortunately for Crotem, nobody really cared. Well, with the exception of some marginals like Sunstorm Interactive, but... let's just say that games like Bird Hunter and Deer Hunter are not... something to be proud of. And it only got worse. Even though Serious Engine 2 had some nice things to offer (like HDR, bloom and ragdoll physics for example), it was even less successful. Nobody cared. Literally. Nobody. Everybody was way, way to obsessed with Epic's Unreal Engine 2. Tribes series (which used to rule multiplayer at one point) switched to it, new hits like Brothers in Arms and Star Wars: Republic Commando were all about it, non-FPS titles like Tom Clancy's Splinter Cell and Thief: Deadly Shadows proved that the engine did great in non-FPS projects too, and, of course, Epic did very good by themselves in their Unreal series and its multiplayer spin-off Unreal Torunament.
Like I said, nobody cared about Serious Engine 2. And Croteam? The guys just admitted their defeat. So, when they've started working on Serious Engine 3 with Serious Sam 3 in mind, they didn't even try making it available for commercial use. And yet, they needed money. Serious Sam 3 was supposed to be a pretty ambitious project (didn't end well, but that's the whole different story), so... yeah. There was that bright dude who decided to re-release the original Sam on new engine first. Because... you know. Money. I have no idea whose idea was that – Croteam's or their publisher's, Devolver Digital's. And yet, here we are – having the very first Serious Sam on Serious Engine 3. Which you won't see anywhere else (aside from HD re-release of the second “encounter”), since after this, it was somewhat improved, thanks to which Serious Sam 3 ended up being built on so-called Serious Engine 3.5, but again, that's the whole different story.
Anyhow, that's just it. What we have here is the first Sam on Serious Engine 3. End of the story. Is that it, though? Is there nothing new here? Well, for casual players that's it. There's nothing new. For die-hard Sam fans, though, it's not that simple. First – Croteam added some new secrets. There's one new secret on Dunes level (the sixth level of the game), while The Great Pyramid level, which never had any secrets in the original game, now includes three of those. Also, some maps were added for deathmatch mode. Including those from the Xbox version of the game. So-o-o... it's a good thing, right? It's the same game on more advanced engine with some tiny new additions? We-e-ell, no. Not really. Even though there's a couple of tiny additions I've listed above, Serious Sam HD is one of those “remasters” that actually feel worse than the originals. And yes, I'm talking about you, Life is Strange.
First of all, the entire scorematch mode was removed. Just because. Second, due to differences between engines, anti-gravity parts were completely removed too. Sure, unlike Second Encounter, the first one didn't have nearly as many of those gravity things, but still, it's absolutely ridiculous to have less content in the version that was supposed to be superior. Finally, due to the same exact problems, some secrets became easier to access. Which doesn't feel right. Score also comes with Serious Sam 3 approach, which means difficulty-based multiplier, but I don't think something like that is even worth mentioning.
So-o-o... ye-a-a-ah... Like I said, Serious Sam HD is one of those remasters that are actually worse than the originals. Does it look better than the originals? Well, yeah. Yeah, it does. Personally, I prefer more colorful palette from the original, but technically, this version does look better. But since the originals still look (very) good nowadays? I don't think sacrificing things like scorematch, gravity and overall balance is worth it. It's not like people who never played Serious Sam before won't enjoy this one. Exactly the opposite, the first Sam is a pretty enjoyable crazy-ass game. With hordes of enemies, satisfying weapons and a lot of basic “run and gun” fun. Those who didn't play the originals and therefore don't know about what was removed / changes, won't feel bad here. But for those who want the best experience possible? I totally recommend to stick with the original version instead. And naturally, when remaster can't provide you with better experience then before, it's a failure. Welcome to the world of WarCraft, Croteam. WarCraft III Reforged that is.