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    A celebrated series of award-winning FPS games which has consistently pushed the limits and expectations of the first-person shooter genre since its inception.

    Black Mesa in Pictures: Or why I still like HL1 more than HL2

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    BlazeHedgehog

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    Edited By BlazeHedgehog

     Every year or so, GAF has a "Replay the Half-Life Series" thread. Last year, I played through Half-Life 2 and most of Episode 1. I don't really like Episode 1, but that's another blog post entirely, but needless to say I never made it to Episode 2. This year, I booted up Half-Life 1. I've been holding off replaying it in anticipation for Black Mesa Source, but since it looks like Black Mesa Source will probably miss their 2010 deadline (after also missing their 2009 deadline), I figured it was time I give it a go through again.



    I also decided to play the game on Normal difficulty this time. Being sort of a wuss, I used to default to easy mode a lot, but nowadays easy mode has started to feel a little too easy. I've actually found myself craving more challenge - something I never thought I would do - and so I've been making a slow, concerted effort to play more games at harder difficulties. As such, I am used to playing Half-Life and being a one-man-army - blowing through the entire game as an unstoppable harbinger of death. Well, that's partially a lie - I haven't actually played Half-Life to 100% completion in over five years. I start new games a lot, usually make it to around "Blast Pit" (the area with the giant worms) and never get back to it. The added difficulty changed the game up enough that I actually managed to clear the whole thing this time around. When you can't just rush enemies and expect to survive, it's kind of interesting how easily Half-Life lets you play things stealthily. During the "Hazard Course" tutorial area, they specifically teach you that crouching down will make you nearly invisible to enemy detection, and it's shockingly effective. I found myself in quite a few scenarios where I was low on health, and sneaking around while crouched down ended up saving my life.
     
    It also reminds me why I love Half-Life 1 more than Half-Life 2. Now, settle down - I don't mean that as a diss on Half-Life 2. HL2 is still an incredible game, one of the best in the industry, but it's also missing a lot of what made HL1 special. There's a genuine sense of action and reaction in Half-Life 1. There's a greater sense that you're part of a larger world - scientists cower when you fire weapons near them, and if you kill one of their buddies (accident or not), other scientists that witness the event will run in fear and refuse to trust you. If you manage not to be a jerk, you can recruit them to your cause so that they follow you around - but they are people, and they will only follow you so far until they become too afraid to continue. Scientists and security guards can be valuable assets, opening locked doors or providing covering fire during an intense shootout. Those things happen in Half-Life 1 because the Player has made a decision that enables them to happen. In Half-Life 2, scenes like that only happen because the storyline requires it. Rebels only follow the player around because they're at that part in the storyline - they automatically join the player when near, and dead comrades are eventually replaced with new ones without any input from the player. Half-Life 2's greater sense of having definable, named characters also removes HL1's sense of chaos. In Half-Life 1, the game's entire plot is relayed through a bunch of people who can only be referred to as "that guy over there". "That guy over there", who is apparently important to telling the story, can be recruited by the player, and can take damage. Most distressingly, he can also die. None of these actions have to happen, but they can (and sometimes do) happen. If a story-related character accidentally dies in Half-Life 2, the game simply fades to black and tells you words to the effect of "Game Over, please try again."
     
    And the A.I.!  Perhaps the Combine are technically more intelligent than the soldiers in Half-Life 1, but they're never given a chance to show it. Encounters in Half-Life 1 are set up so that Marines have a tactical advantage over the player. Soldiers actively seek out cover, attempt to flush out camping players with grenades, and organize themselves to flank targets for maximum efficiency. Most Combine soldiers, in comparison, seem relatively stationary - they rarely bother to take cover, and even when they try, there's not usually many available options to safely regroup. Half-Life 1 is full of crates and boxes of monstrous size, offering up plenty of stationary cover. Most of Half-Life 2's crates are generally of small size to make them easy to manage with the gravity gun, and there's not much else that's large enough to be worth hiding behind. As such, most Combine Soldiers have a grand total of two tactical options: Go towards the player or flee further down the same corridor that the player will eventually pass through anyway. Episode 2 tried to rectify this with a sequence where the player is pinned inside of an Inn, giving soldiers clearly defined cover points outside, but up until that moment, there wasn't a whole lot for them to work with.
     
    None of this makes Half-Life 2 a bad game, it just makes one that is notably less dynamic than its predecessor. That's not to say HL2 doesn't have some benefits of its own - HL1 ends on a sour note with " Xen", an alien world full of some of the toughest creatures in the game and some absolutely brutal (and seriously out-of-place) platforming challenges. HL2's final Citadel assault is at first incredibly intense firefight before becoming almost tranquil, with an extremely lengthy tour through the ranks of the Combine war machine. HL2's last battle is confusing, until you finally learn the trick to it - unlike HL1's battle with the Nihilanth, which is aggravating and borderlines on being just plain silly. I may have forced myself to play the game on normal difficulty, but when it came time to brave the depths of Xen, I ended up just turning on God Mode for invincibility.
     
    With HL1 out of the way, I fully expect Black Mesa Source to finally see release sometime in the next couple of weeks, just to spite me finally breaking down and playing the original game again.
     
    Edit: If you're wondering where the models in my screenshots came from, hit up the Half-Life Improvement forums. Half-Life Improvement is a community dedicated to remodeling and retexturing Half-Life, Counter-Strike 1.6, and a handful of older games. All of the models in my screenshots came from there.
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    BlazeHedgehog

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    #1  Edited By BlazeHedgehog

     Every year or so, GAF has a "Replay the Half-Life Series" thread. Last year, I played through Half-Life 2 and most of Episode 1. I don't really like Episode 1, but that's another blog post entirely, but needless to say I never made it to Episode 2. This year, I booted up Half-Life 1. I've been holding off replaying it in anticipation for Black Mesa Source, but since it looks like Black Mesa Source will probably miss their 2010 deadline (after also missing their 2009 deadline), I figured it was time I give it a go through again.



    I also decided to play the game on Normal difficulty this time. Being sort of a wuss, I used to default to easy mode a lot, but nowadays easy mode has started to feel a little too easy. I've actually found myself craving more challenge - something I never thought I would do - and so I've been making a slow, concerted effort to play more games at harder difficulties. As such, I am used to playing Half-Life and being a one-man-army - blowing through the entire game as an unstoppable harbinger of death. Well, that's partially a lie - I haven't actually played Half-Life to 100% completion in over five years. I start new games a lot, usually make it to around "Blast Pit" (the area with the giant worms) and never get back to it. The added difficulty changed the game up enough that I actually managed to clear the whole thing this time around. When you can't just rush enemies and expect to survive, it's kind of interesting how easily Half-Life lets you play things stealthily. During the "Hazard Course" tutorial area, they specifically teach you that crouching down will make you nearly invisible to enemy detection, and it's shockingly effective. I found myself in quite a few scenarios where I was low on health, and sneaking around while crouched down ended up saving my life.
     
    It also reminds me why I love Half-Life 1 more than Half-Life 2. Now, settle down - I don't mean that as a diss on Half-Life 2. HL2 is still an incredible game, one of the best in the industry, but it's also missing a lot of what made HL1 special. There's a genuine sense of action and reaction in Half-Life 1. There's a greater sense that you're part of a larger world - scientists cower when you fire weapons near them, and if you kill one of their buddies (accident or not), other scientists that witness the event will run in fear and refuse to trust you. If you manage not to be a jerk, you can recruit them to your cause so that they follow you around - but they are people, and they will only follow you so far until they become too afraid to continue. Scientists and security guards can be valuable assets, opening locked doors or providing covering fire during an intense shootout. Those things happen in Half-Life 1 because the Player has made a decision that enables them to happen. In Half-Life 2, scenes like that only happen because the storyline requires it. Rebels only follow the player around because they're at that part in the storyline - they automatically join the player when near, and dead comrades are eventually replaced with new ones without any input from the player. Half-Life 2's greater sense of having definable, named characters also removes HL1's sense of chaos. In Half-Life 1, the game's entire plot is relayed through a bunch of people who can only be referred to as "that guy over there". "That guy over there", who is apparently important to telling the story, can be recruited by the player, and can take damage. Most distressingly, he can also die. None of these actions have to happen, but they can (and sometimes do) happen. If a story-related character accidentally dies in Half-Life 2, the game simply fades to black and tells you words to the effect of "Game Over, please try again."
     
    And the A.I.!  Perhaps the Combine are technically more intelligent than the soldiers in Half-Life 1, but they're never given a chance to show it. Encounters in Half-Life 1 are set up so that Marines have a tactical advantage over the player. Soldiers actively seek out cover, attempt to flush out camping players with grenades, and organize themselves to flank targets for maximum efficiency. Most Combine soldiers, in comparison, seem relatively stationary - they rarely bother to take cover, and even when they try, there's not usually many available options to safely regroup. Half-Life 1 is full of crates and boxes of monstrous size, offering up plenty of stationary cover. Most of Half-Life 2's crates are generally of small size to make them easy to manage with the gravity gun, and there's not much else that's large enough to be worth hiding behind. As such, most Combine Soldiers have a grand total of two tactical options: Go towards the player or flee further down the same corridor that the player will eventually pass through anyway. Episode 2 tried to rectify this with a sequence where the player is pinned inside of an Inn, giving soldiers clearly defined cover points outside, but up until that moment, there wasn't a whole lot for them to work with.
     
    None of this makes Half-Life 2 a bad game, it just makes one that is notably less dynamic than its predecessor. That's not to say HL2 doesn't have some benefits of its own - HL1 ends on a sour note with " Xen", an alien world full of some of the toughest creatures in the game and some absolutely brutal (and seriously out-of-place) platforming challenges. HL2's final Citadel assault is at first incredibly intense firefight before becoming almost tranquil, with an extremely lengthy tour through the ranks of the Combine war machine. HL2's last battle is confusing, until you finally learn the trick to it - unlike HL1's battle with the Nihilanth, which is aggravating and borderlines on being just plain silly. I may have forced myself to play the game on normal difficulty, but when it came time to brave the depths of Xen, I ended up just turning on God Mode for invincibility.
     
    With HL1 out of the way, I fully expect Black Mesa Source to finally see release sometime in the next couple of weeks, just to spite me finally breaking down and playing the original game again.
     
    Edit: If you're wondering where the models in my screenshots came from, hit up the Half-Life Improvement forums. Half-Life Improvement is a community dedicated to remodeling and retexturing Half-Life, Counter-Strike 1.6, and a handful of older games. All of the models in my screenshots came from there.
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    moelarrycurly

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    #2  Edited By moelarrycurly

    Oh god this is such a walk down memory lane...

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    NTM

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    #3  Edited By NTM

    Where the heck are those pictures from? That doesn't look like Half Life, or the upcoming Black Mesa game. Is it modded? 'Cause it kind of (not entirely) looks like the PS2 version of Half Life. Hm, maybe an older version of what Black Mesa was originally going to be. By the way, did you just beat the Half Life games recently?  
     
    For the most part, I thought City 17 was a much better atmosphere than the already great enough Black Mesa (which I hope they flesh out even better in Black Mesa). Nowadays, I think Half Life in general needs an overhaul in the gameplay department. I can't stand it, though I still like to go back and play my (used to be) favorite series ever every once in a while. 
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    keyhunter

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    #4  Edited By keyhunter

    Large community mod projects totally never get finished.

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    Baillie

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    #5  Edited By Baillie

    You've just gave more boners to gamers than jessica chobot ever could.

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    Scrawnto

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    #6  Edited By Scrawnto
    @NTM said:
    " Where the heck are those pictures from? That doesn't look like Half Life, or the upcoming Black Mesa game. Is it modded? 'Cause it kind of (not entirely) looks like the PS2 version of Half Life. Hm, maybe an older version of what Black Mesa was originally going to be. "
    Half-Life: Blue Shift included improved textures which were compatible with the original Half-Life. That's probably what we are seeing here.
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    BlazeHedgehog

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    #7  Edited By BlazeHedgehog
    @Scrawnto said:
    " @NTM said:
    " Where the heck are those pictures from? That doesn't look like Half Life, or the upcoming Black Mesa game. Is it modded? 'Cause it kind of (not entirely) looks like the PS2 version of Half Life. Hm, maybe an older version of what Black Mesa was originally going to be. "
    Half-Life: Blue Shift included improved textures which were compatible with the original Half-Life. That's probably what we are seeing here. "
     
    Silly me, I meant to address this in the blog. Half-Life Improvement was a mod that was going to completely overhaul all the models and textures in HL1, but they never quite finished it. That didn't stop their forums from blossoming in to a hub for touched up models and sound effects. If you want to spruce up HL1 and make it look a little prettier, register and browse around their forums a bit. All the models you see in these screenshots were from there (though I made a couple of personal tweaks to some of them).
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    RobotHamster

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    #8  Edited By RobotHamster

    This thread reminds me that I never did play Half LIfe 1, and it also reminds me that the guy who does the freemans mind videos will never finish them either. 

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    Daveyo520

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    #9  Edited By Daveyo520

    Something has been done to the guns.

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    Scrawnto

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    #10  Edited By Scrawnto
    @BlazeHedgehog: Oh, I see. Thanks for clearing that up.
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    BlazeHedgehog

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    #11  Edited By BlazeHedgehog
    @keyhunter said:

    " Large community mod projects totally never get finished. "

    The way I heard it, Black Mesa Source was "almost done" by the end of 2009, and that they would be releasing in 2010 "for sure". They redesigned their website for the impending release sometime around January 2010, and from then on, it's been nothing but radio silence until earlier this week when somebody outfitted all of the characters on the site's front page with santa hats and other christmas regalia. Somebody's still alive over there.
     
    I'm not holding my breath, but secretly, I am totally holding my breath.
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    captain_clayman

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    #12  Edited By captain_clayman

    makes me wanna play this game again.  not a fan of the texture packs though,

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    BlazeHedgehog

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    #13  Edited By BlazeHedgehog
    @captain_clayman said:
    " makes me wanna play this game again.  not a fan of the texture packs though, "
    What's wrong with them?
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    deactivated-5f9398c1300c7

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    I found HL2 to be a better game. I just didn't enjoy HL1 all that much, even before HL2.

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