Half-Life

While Black Mesa may be rebuilding Half-Life's world on a slightly more modern foundation, modder James "MrGnang" Cockburn reckons there's some life in Valve's old GoldSrc engine yet. Half-Life: Echoes is an impressive mod released last Friday, putting the player in the shoes of a scientist elsewhere in the Black Mesa facility when everything goes to hell. Cue the usual running, gunning, fighting soldiers and weird…

Tagged with mods, Valve, Half-Life, Half-Life: Echoes.

Sometimes, things just take time. When an amateur team remake an FPS classic up to AAA standards in a modern engine in their spare time? Yeah, that'll take a while, but the patience seems to be paying off for fans of Black Mesa. While so so far the ambitious (and Valve-endorsed) Half-Life remake has mostly adhered to the structure of the original, developers Crowbar Collective reckon…

Tagged with Black Mesa: Source, Crowbar Collective, Valve, Black Mesa, Half-Life.

One of my favorite parts of getting a press release is getting a press release that doesn't reveal any information about the game itself. You get a vague promise about a game that might happen someday if some people get together. Normally, I don't give that much of my time. This announcement is different. There's a new MMO and the folks behind it represent some…

Tagged with Darewise Entertainment, MMO, vagueposting, Dishonored, Half-Life, Rokh, Thief.

Folks, I think we're going to have to let Half-Life go. It's been over a decade since Valve did anything with the license (beyond cross-promotion deals), and the seemingly posthumous leak of the sequel's planned story beats cemented the sense that the series wouldn't be returning any time soon. Seemingly disinterested in using it themselves, Valve have been approving the use of the Half-Life setting and assets (if…

Tagged with Royal Rudius Entertainment, Half-Life, Hunt Down The Freeman.

A proper playable demo of Final Fantasy XV Windows Edition is coming next week, containing the RPG's first chapter, following the recent benchmark tool. A demo! In this day and age! Bless their hearts. Square Enix have talked a lot about wanting to do the PC version right, mods and all, and they do seem to be going for it. They're even teaming up with…

Tagged with Gordon Freeman, Final Fantasy, Final Fantasy XV, Final Fantasy XV Windows Edition, Half-Life, Half-Life 2, Square Enix.

If your Christmas plans include gathering the family around the meat tree and singing songs celebrating the return of our saviour, Gordon Freeman, I have bad news: Black Mesa is delaying the launch of its final chapters. The sanctioned fan-made Half-Life remake had previously planned to launch the remade Xen levels in mid-December but yeah, that's not happening any more. Why? Because they're still not…

Tagged with Crowbar Collective, delay, Black Mesa, Half-Life.

While Valve Software are unable to continue Half-Life in a way they like, some former employees seem drawn back to HL after leaving. Former Half-Life writer Marc Laidlaw recently leaked a Half-Life 2: Episode 3 plot idea and now Cayle George has released a new Half-Life mod. Available now free through Steam, C.A.G.E.D. [official site] is a short singleplayer episode set in a prison. I…

Tagged with Cayle George, Future Games Select, mods, Half-Life, Half-Life: C.A.G.E.D..

The lesson here is "never go to sleep." All sorts of things happen while people sleep. Cats go on adventures, presidents threaten nuclear war and, well, ex-Valve writers post thinly-disguised plot summaries of the unreleased and, so far as best guesses go, long-cancelled Half-Life 2: Episode 3. Long time Half-Life scribe, the excellent Marc Laidlaw (who left Valve last year), casually tossed out a link…

Tagged with Half Life 2: Episode 2, Marc Laidlaw, Half-Life, Half-Life 2, Half-Life 2: Episode 3, Half-Life 3.

Though Half-Life [official site] is almost nineteen years old and its sanctioned fan remake Black Mesa is nearing completion, Valve have launched a wee patch for their pretty okay or whatever vintage FPS. The patch fixes a few crashes and exploits, and hit other Half-Life engine games too, such as classic Counter-Strike. Given how much of modern PC games history connects to Half-Life and its…

Tagged with Counter-Strike, Counter-Strike: Condition Zero, Half-Life: Opposing Force, Ricochet, Valve, Deathmatch Classic, Half-Life, Half-Life: Blue Shift, Team Fortress Classic.

So committed is third-party Half-Life remake Black Mesa [official site] to emulation of its much vaunted inspiration that it has now fully embraced ValveTime. Black Mesa was first released as a free mod in 2012, followed by a spit'n'polished paid version two years ago, but still with the notorious jump'n'fail alien world section from Half Life's final act missing. Plan was to rethink rather than…

Tagged with Crowbar Collective, Black Mesa, Half-Life, Half-Life 2.

That's a long time to wait to find out what really happens when you shoot a Barnacle creature. Germany has long been notorious for the strict limitations it placed on videogame content, and the noble Half-Life was a particularly infamous victim of the censor's stamp. Until now. That means no more robots instead of soldiers, no more barnacles spewing nuts and bolts instead of blood…

Tagged with censorship, Valve, Half-Life.

The Black Mesa [official site] gang have shared a first look at Xen in their Half-Life remake. You might remember that they launched Black Mesa without Half-Life's oft-maligned final chapter, set in the alien world of Xen, because doing it right was taking yonks. You might further remember they're planning to launch Xen in summer 2017. You might... well, I was surprised by this first…

Tagged with Crowbar Collective, Black Mesa, Half-Life.

The makers of Black Mesa [official site] have announced plans to add the final section of their Half-Life remake, Xen, in summer 2017. They explain that it's taking so long because they're really fleshing out that alien world. I do admire the confidence to declare you're making Xen bigger, given how unpopular that section is with some players. They might be happier to hear you've…

Tagged with Crowbar Collective, Black Mesa, Half-Life.

Marc Laidlaw posted a fascinating blog entry from a younger version of Laidlaw about the development of Half-Life from the narrative perspective. By "a younger version" I mean that it comes from his own hand but via a file timestamped the day after Half-Life was shipped and is thus far closer to the game's... ground zero? than the Laidlaw of now.

Tagged with Marc Laidlaw, Valve, Half-Life.

Happy 20th birthday, Valve! Yesterday. Happy 20th yesterday. Sorry, I only just saw the Facebook notification. On August 24th, 1996, ex-Microsoft employees Gabe Newell and Mike Harrington made a beautiful baby who was mighty eye-opening. In the dreamy game of "What if...?" one curious hypothetical is: what if Valve never existed? There can't be many companies who've had nearly as much impact. Steam (eventually) revolutionised…

Tagged with Counter-Strike, Steam, Valve, Half-Life, Half-Life 2, Left 4 Dead, Portal.

Half-Life and Portal movies are "in development", according to JJ Abrams. The director told IGN that "We've got writers, and we're working on both those stories. But nothing that would be an exciting update." Which means clearly Abrams isn't familiar with Half-Life fans, who can see excitement in a cloud shaped like Gordon Freeman's face.

Tagged with J.J. Abrams, Valve, Half-Life, Portal.

Here's a bit of nostalgia for you: Sven Co-op [official site] is now on Steam. The seventeen-year-old Half-Life mod is available as a free standalone game, and—thanks to a fair bit of generosity on Valve's part—includes all of the Half-Life campaign maps. For free. That means you can head to Steam, download the game, and start playing co-op Half-Life right now. Again, for free. No…

Tagged with Steam, Valve, Half-Life, Sven Co-op.

After 18 years at Valve, working on everything from Half-Life to Dota 2, writer Marc Laidlaw has confirmed that he's retired from the company. That's an eternity for the games industry! He wrote novels before getting into video games, and it sounds like he's getting back to writing for himself.

Tagged with Marc Laidlaw, Valve, Dota 2, Half-Life, Half-Life 3.

Now that the commercial version of Half-Life fan remake Black Mesa [official site] is out in Early Access form (and pretty great so far), what'll happen to the original free mod? Not that much, really - which is hardly a surprise. Developers Crowbar Collective haven't given up on it, as they said they wouldn't, but expect future updates to be more along the lines of…

Tagged with Crowbar Collective, mod, Black Mesa, Half-Life.

If we acknowledge that many jokes have been made about the Half-Life series then may we, you and I, accept that there's no need for us to crack any more and vow never to ever again ever? The commercial version of Black Mesa [official site], the fan-made remake of Valve's seminal Half-Life, arrived on Steam today at £14.99/$19.99. On Steam Early Access, to be precise,…

Tagged with Black Mesa: Source, Crowbar Collective, Steam Early Access, Black Mesa, Half-Life.