Black Mesa Source: reviews appear, get the scores here

Free mod right?

100% free. And every bit as good as you’d expect if it had been done by Valve themselves.

So far the only complaint is the sound of the SMG.

@1
It is a mod.
I didn’t like it, but then again i don’t like the Half-Life franchise xD
I reckon that if you liked the first Half-Life, you’re also going to like this one, since it is that very same game, with a few additions here and there

@3: Oh my god, i’m not alone. Never liked Half-Life, at all.

I think we’re going to need some tar and feathers here.

Me neither. Dull game play and strange characters.

I find HL series quite interesting but I can’t understand why HL2 is considered to be a masterpiece. It’s a good game, with a catchy story and presentation and nothing, IMHO so superb! *flame suit on*

Personally the only true watershed I care to aknowledge in gaming is one that defines the pre Half-Life era, and the post Half-Life era.

There was nothing like it before, and nothing has been the same since. It’s the blueprint for what every AAA game aspired, and aspires, to be. Not a movie, but something just as good.

Whenever I run into something amazing in a game, like the opening to Bioshock, the term that me and my friends immediately reach for to describe it is “Half-Life”.

@7 Nah, I agree. Half-Life 2 didn’t outdo Half-Life anywhere that really mattered. I think it was unfortunate to land in a pretty awkward time where everybody was busy doing physics puzzles and lousy gimmicks like that.

It’s a good game, but it’s not gonna age well. I think Portal and Portal 2 took them back to that feel.

“There was nothing like it before, and nothing has been the same since.”

Yeah … not buying what you’re selling.

btw. didn’t like Bioshock either.

So which game is it you feel that did anything like Half-Life before Half-Life, exactly?

Unreal had to tell its cookie cutter story through text tablets. Quake just had you shooting at stuff because it looked awesome when you did.

@10: I don’t rate videogames like that.

I don’t care what it did back then, it has to deliver today, if it can’t do that, why should i bother?

Deus Ex is a game that still delivers today. Half-Life does not.

@11 Well, you specifically disagreed with the sentence “There was nothing like it before, and nothing has been the same since”.

I was thinking maybe you had something to substantiate that with.

Deus Ex launched two years after Half-Life. And as Black Mesa clearly shows, it’s still great fun with a bit of extra polish and doodads.

I recently bought a PC and (re)played HL2 as well as Ep1 & 2. Have to say I enjoyed every minute of it. The physics are still as good as most games today (in most cases even better). The openness is awesome (same goes for Crysis which I played for the first time only a week ago (had no idea that game was so good)) and the universe they’ve created is also really intriguing. I’m definitely getting this once it lands on Steam.

@12: Yeah, i think i kind of misread your comment. I apologize.

Anyway, i know Deus Ex launched later, i just think it’s achievements were far more important than Half-Life’s achievements.

I never played Half-Life when it came out, during that time i was still playing on consoles, so i guess i missed all that. I think my first real memories of PC gaming was Blood 2, which came out one month before Half-Life and i enjoyed it a lot. Recently replayed it, still fun.

Also bare in mind that the german version of Half-Life 1 was heavily censored, with robots instead of human enemies and people sitting on the floor instead of dying. It really messed up the gaming experience.

@14 No worries.

I loved Blood 2 as well. I wish Monolith would go back to that whole series. I played the first one as well, and it really stood out among all the assembly line Doom clones of that time.

I’ll just never forget playing Half-Life for the first time. The cinematic feel was something that no one else had done before.

Deus Ex was kinda the culmination of all the Looking Glass games, from System Shock to Thief which were amazing as well, but they were all aiming to blend RPG and shooter, the genius was in letting you choose, where Half-Life was more of a straight action movie, and the genius was in the presentation.

Half-Life didn’t singlehandedly build videogames, but I think it taught some much needed lessons about how you can present a game world, and guide a player through it.

@5
Not again

It’s really solid so far even though I am slightly disappointed with the crowbar swinging animation,it’s like I am poking things and not hitting them .Also,crouch jumping is really annoying at first but grows on you..especially since I didn’t pay for the damn thing .

Yeah I agree. The crowbar feels kinda messed up, and crouch jumping has always been a pain. That one ladder in the elevator shaft… Ugh.

Much of the level design is pretty old school too.

“Can’t find your way around? Tough!”

Yep,it’s old school all right,the absence of constant hand holding feels weird at times .

Why are they acting like this is a game? XD Sure reviews are fine but still lolz

Its liberating.

I take back my previous statement of loving you guys and replace it with severe disappointment.

Shame on you. Apart from DSB and Edo, you guys are still cool.

@20 I don’t even …what!?@21 Thank you I guess.

I find it so refreshing because its perfectly pace it has so much different elements in gameplay.Most importantly at least some kind of thinking is required.
I always loved in HL series how long it takes to introduce you to new weapons

Played right up until you reach the surface and the marines start showing up. Very impressive stuff so far! Theyve changed some things around so it feels kind of fresh but at the same time it somehow feels exactly the same. Agree with SMG:s sound being about the only complaint so far, along with the soldiers sounding a lot less scary. Man the SMG sound from the original HL is one of my favourite weapon sounds in a game ever.

Been playing this since yesterday. It’s good, really good considering it’s free. Constant crouch jumping has severely hurt my left hand though. Who’s idea was crouch jumping anyway? Of all the thoughts I’ve had on how game’s could be made better, make jumping awkward and annoying was never one of the.

@22 Ohh come on XD You know what I mean This is a review of a mod, it just seems a little silly to be acting like it’s a full game release that’s what I’m saying.

@8 – Watershedding:

Starcraft (1998) – revolutionized Online multiplayer strategy games, along with providing a good campaign and a new UMS map style for making custom content, ultimately redefined what quality strategy was all about along with spearheading strategy games to be a ‘pro sport’

As far as Half-Life.. it’s not half-life that was necessarily good by itself, but what people did with it that made it truly great: CS, DoD, NS & others.

Such a high score, and I’m sure their metacritic score will make the developer safe at their position until HL eps. 3 launched.
>_<!

@27 I don’t know about that, sounds like something that could turn into a pretty long discussion.

To me there’s a pretty straight line from Orcs and Humans to Starcraft. It didn’t come out of nowhere, and it relied pretty heavily on what came before it.

It had a huge impact, but I don’t think you can really call it a paradigm shift, in terms of defining design. RTS as a genre hasn’t exactly been energized by it.

@YoungZero: You don’t like Bioshock? OUT!!!

@YoungZero You’re a f**king idiot! I don’t know what are you doing here if you don’t like playing games.

@26 Download it and play it…THEN we can talk.

@32 I have lol. Sure it’s awesome, sure it has the production style of an actual full game but it’s a mod, a mod based on recreating Half-Life in the source engine.

Case & Point: http://wiki.blackmesasource.com/Black_Mesa:About_the_Mod
Ohh what does that say “About the mod”? Ohh yes.. yes it does.

@33 I’m sorry these reviews caused you so much pain,my bad.

@34 Wow you really feel the need to take everything out of proportion don’t you? I feel sorry for you XD

@33 Yeah its a mod for the source engine. A mod that is a singleplayer game. That you play. That has original music, animations, textures, sounds, voice acting and so on. It took a lot of people years to make it all, and it could have turned out good or bad. Thats what the reviewers are reviewing. Its hardly like fully reviewing a skyrim crafting components mod.

@31: I like playing games, you moron. I just don’t like playing these games. Overrated and pretentious is what they are. Kind of like a Coen Brothers movie.

@ALL Not loving Half-Life is like not loving Solaris in movies. Stupid people won’t get the privilege to.

Half life is pretentious? Its an FPS with dimension hopping aliens

YoungZer0, likes new DmC and Enslaved and other crap with crappy storyline.

Whatever.

@39: And yet people act like it’s the second coming of Jesus. They act like its story and characters are soooo deep.

@40: Judging the story of a game that’s not even out yet. Keep it stupid, Erthazus.

No one acts like that.

You yourself have acted like that in relation to Spec Ops though, I know that much.

@42: So? Spec Ops actually had a good story and it’s shameful that so few people checked it out. That’s why i continue to mention the game whenever possible. It is the first, true anti-war game.

And i don’t think i’m wrong. Just look at how aggressive some of the comments are, just because i dislike the game. And so many gaming websites especially praise the story of Half-Life 1/2.

I think the ‘Half-Life in 60 seconds’ video pretty much sums it up:

http://youtu.be/slRsexrhbG8

Pretty much all the “… in 60 seconds” sum up everything they’ve ever been made for.

Thats no indication of anything.

I also was’nt being entirely serious. No one praise the story of Half Life, what they are praising is the way its told. Now you might not like the story its telling, which is perfectly fine its pretty generic all said but nothing like Half Life had ever been attempted before and very very little after has come close to matching its sense of place, pace and sense of progression.

@44: Nope, i’m pretty sure people are praising the story, but i guess it’s only right to assume that they mean the storytelling, not the actual story itself.

But i really have to disagree on that.

Now, i’m going to use the opening of Bioshock as an example, as it has a very similar way of storytelling (If not the same) to kind of make myself clear.

You get into an elevator, you hear someone talk, stuff happens in front of you, you can choose to completely ignore it, staring at the floor if you want. But the fact remains that you really don’t have a choice but to sit there and wait until it’s done.

Same thing when you first encountered the first big daddy. Just stand there and watch, until the game decided to let you go.

It’s like an unskippable cutscene.

The dialogs work the same way. You have a small space in which you can walk, but you’re still waiting for events to unfold.

spec Ops had good story…

Lol. Cool story Bro. Nothing to comment here. You also need to add that gameplay there was innovative and refreshing.

About Half_life story. Is it good or not? It’s perfect for the First Person Shooter. There are no FPS games with the story that is in Half-Life and it has nothing to do with super plot from literature geniuses. It’s about how Valve delivered it.

HF is about generic lab scientist in the suit trying to get out of some bad situation but the way it is told with all secret stuff that you can find around and the way Valve introducing characters is just so awesome. Even Generic soldier feels so alive.

Gordon Freeman does not say any word at all but when you are progressing you feel that he can say so much. When you are playing you understand him. It’s hard to explain, but that feeling is awesome.