Black Mesa (Source) is out! After almost eight years!
Hello DocG, good to see you
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This needs a thread, not just a little mention in the 'my rig is freon cooled and consumes entire coal seams worth of electricity).

http://release.blackmesasource.com

Go get it! It's Half-Life 1, for free, redone in the spangly new-ish Source engine. This project has been in development hell since not long after Half-Life 2 originally came out and the bonus of Valve's own Half-Life Source was found to be lacking.

Windows only for the time being but if you can find a mirror that doesn't immediately crap out due to the demand then you're good to go.

Can't find any screenies that meet the forum's stringent standards so go to the website if you want to see how nice it looks.
I saw this all over Twitter today but didn't realise it's Half Life 1.. really? Is it? Just nicer looking?

Have I got that right?
It's Half-Life 1 made to modern standards, not just with slightly tarted up textures like HL: Source was.

If you don't want to download it the funny way, you can wait for it to come onto Steam.

http://www.pcgamer.com/2012/09/11/first ... or-launch/

(given it was slated to take me 19 hours, I decided to wait)
I played up to just after the resonance cascade, and the new dialogue is fantastic. Several excellent jokes that draw on the wider half life universe, but all totally fit in context too.

It's way prettied up, I'd say it's at least as good looking as half life 2.

Seems like they've really done a great job of it, although I'm not particularly far into it.
metalangel wrote:
It's Half-Life 1 made to modern standards

Modern standards eight years ago.
Still, it's better than Half Life 2.
Gotta say, I'm loving this. Lewie's right as well, the new script is excellent fun. Especially the stuff relating to conventions. I had a blast just wandering around the complex prior to the cascade. So far I've just encounted my first Vortigaunt. I don't know if it's my imagination, but it seems slightly harder than I remember when it comes to chunks of health and energy being whacked off. Probably my imagination though.

It looks great too, not just the textures but the fun physics touches and the new areas and labs.
I have installed this - will give it a whirl later.
NervousPete wrote:
it seems slightly harder than I remember when it comes to chunks of health and energy being whacked off. Probably my imagination though.


:hat: :hat:
Just had a quick blast around the labs at the start. Unlocked an "achievement" for handing a struggling gent some bog roll. Heh! Seems to have been crafted with a lot of love. Noticed a Chuckle Brothers mug. It's about time I completed Half-Life again, so I'll be giving this a proper play tomorrow.

And I'm glad they haven't added Xen yet. :)
Do I need HL2 to run this?
Nope, you need Steam and the Source SDK (which is free). So just download away!
I ask because the website is shit on wp7.5 and I've been busy as fuck all day getting ready for a business trip.

Now I'm having a sit down i might bung it on my work laptop for while I'm away. HM, does steam work on x64 windows 7 and uninstall cleanly? I think i have an account from portal 2 on PS3
Xen is awesome, you dildo.
Apparently I should have installed Steam and Source SDK before the extremely lengthy Black Mesa decompress, which is now running a second time.

A part of me is grateful the lovely "dorma bungalow" that only gets 1mbps was won by someone else before Hel's house sold, that "running a decompress twice" is the slow part of the "download 4GB" process.

Edit: Haha, I downloaded the wrong Source SDK, cue another 4.8GB download!
Edit: Also also, Steam re-installed the "English US" language into Windows, fuck you Valve. And re-enabled the language bar. And now I can't make it remove it. What the fuck?

Edit: Letting Steam add "Source SDK Base 2007" to run Black Mesa seems to have auto-added "Source SDK Base 2006", is it seriously the case that I need 7.5GB of Source SDK on top of 3.8GB of Black Mesa plus however much shit Steam itself installed?
That's Windows for you.
The Last Salmon Man wrote:
That's Windows for you.

Too obvious.
Yeah, this is excellent. It pulls off that trick of being largely what I remember Half Life being like, but obviously way way prettier, whilst also having a host of small new things that fit really well, and keep it interesting. I'd say it's a must play if you liked the original at all, and I'd not be surprised if once it's all finished at least some of the team get job offers from Valve.
They already work to 'Valve time' so they'd fit right in.

Image

Image
Meh! Sold!

I was resisting this as I can't help but think there's no reason to play through Half Life again, even if it is all prettied up.

But it sounds like these dudes have done a pretty incredible job with it, my curiosity has got the better of me, I must take a look.
Still installling....... keep watching!~
I played this, it's great and all but far from being blown away I find that it looks exactly the same as how I remember it. Obviously it isn't the same as it was but it is how I remember it looking. Conversely I played Gran Turismo the other week and was utterly shocked at how blocky it all looks now, my memories were of something which looked pretty amazing and so they have been warped by the subsequent versions.
I'm glad I'm not the only one that this happens to.

I realised that my mind was playing tricks on me on Halo Anniversary where you can switch between the old graphics, and the new graphics with one button.
Yeah, going forwards you never notice the change - it's only when you go back you realise. Your memory fills in all the blanks.
markg wrote:
Conversely I played Gran Turismo the other week and was utterly shocked at how blocky it all looks now, my memories were of something which looked pretty amazing and so they have been warped by the subsequent versions.


I had the same going back to Rage Racer. I was blown away when it came out, seeing individual cobbles on the streets, in high definition and proper lighting. And it still looks that way in my mind when I think back to it. But I played it again a while ago, and it looks like you're staring at grey pea soup.
Weird how that works, innit.

I actually know how that works, but am far too drunk and phone-keyboard-bound to go into it now.

Work trips. Bless. Tomorrow I'll be back to shitting bricks though.
The Last Salmon Man wrote:
Yeah, going forwards you never notice the change - it's only when you go back you realise. Your memory fills in all the blanks.

I filled in your Mum's 'Blank'.
Malabelm wrote:
But I played it again a while ago, and it looks like you're staring at grey pea soup.

Your Mum likes staring at my grey pea soup.
Who knew that this had a thread from over 3 years ago.

Anyway, I've been playing this because (a) I've only ever played Half-Life once on the PS2; (b) it's been so long I can't remember why it's so revered and (c) they've done everything up to Xen and I only have mildly hateful thoughts about Xen ruining everything up until Xen, and (d) curiosity as to how the Steam Pad will hold up because (hnnngh) Xbox pad hasn't got full support for some ungodly reason.

And then I bought that other Half-Life, Opposing Force, I think, because I've read some things that said that was good too but I've never played.

I think I should have done the non-tarted up Half-Life before Black Mesa but I'm a fair few hours in and it's sort of got its hook into me.
I think I enjoyed Blue Shift more than Opposing Force.
I've never played that either, although from what little I've read Blue Shift wasn't very good and Opposing Force was amazing. I'm not saying you're wrong that just appears to be the consensus according to my limited internetting.

Anyway, quick moan: I can't remember it being this difficult due to the enemies being reet cunts. The headcrabs get a pass because they're supposed to be frustratingly cunty (and I kinda love them for it) but the soldiers are just BAMBAMBAMBAMBAMBAM without a break. They spot you from whatever start position they've been given and just fire, fire, fire until you're dead. Or they're dead, obviously, but this is taking multiple attempts trying to leave an encounter with the minimum health loss. I swear I've played a good proportion of the game with sub-50% health throughout. Exit an encounter with less than 20% health and the next encounter is certain death and reverting to a much earlier save.

The new graphics are nice and all (albeit somewhat boxy, as is the norm with Half-Life for the time) but if have preferred they work on making the shooting bits more fun than these frustrating restart a thons.
Yeah, it's a hard game. Much harder than its sequel most certainly.

Also Blue Shift was short and not very memorable. Opposing Force wasn't much better, but it was just about.
50% off on Steam. Not sure you can get it anywhere else, mind. Oh, and the price? Seven fiddy.

I reckon it's reet worth it. Still no Xen though, but Xen is shit so, yay?
Xen is very shit.
Did you enjoy the giant testicle?
I also liked Zen.
2:2

Your move, Internet.
zWell, of all the people on Beex I would expect to enjoy being ravaged the a giant ball sack...
First screenshot of Xen is released and it doesn't look shit!

http://forums.blackmesasource.com/index ... creenshot/
It looks pretty shit* to me

*404: page not found
The other link was to the announcement and some text (mainly just "Hey, we're still working on this here's a picture.")

But here's the picture that they posted: http://i.imgur.com/TDl9vuR.jpg
And it's currently £5.99 in the Steam sale. Well worth the money even without Xen.
That's because Half Life ends with a cliffhanger at the point you go through the portal

I've erased all memories of shit jumping sections, crap testicle monsters and stupid large baby bosses that follow that.
Satsuma wrote:
https://m.uk.ign.com/articles/2019/06/25/black-mesa-xen-preview-fixing-half-life-1s-weakest-part?abthid=5d1166a295e3ae4b360004f2

Apparently it’s almost done.

I kind of stopped playing Black Mesa because it wasn’t finished. I might pick it up again once this is done.
It’s finally done and out of early access! Time to play Xen.
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