Rising from the Dead

For those in the game industry there is one franchise that fans have been eagerly awaiting to get their hands on for years, Half-Life. Half-Life was created by Valve Software, owners of Steam, creators of TF2, and all around best game company ever.

Half-Life, when it came out 1998, was a huge step for not only game design but for narrative story telling. Unlike many games, there is not a single cut-scene to be found in half-life. Everything is viewed straight from the first-person view of the player, and ever since it that style has become a staple for Valve games.

Now I will confess that I had never played HL1, I played Half-Life 2, the 2004 sequel. I never got around to it because it’s difficult to go back and player older games, simply because of the rate technology changes, and more specifically how much graphics change.

However, this past Friday Black Mesa was released. Black Mesa is the fan mod project that rebuilt the majority of HL1, giving the game a huge graphics overhaul, while preserving the games content. The project was done by people across the world, over a period of almost five years.

The mod was also one of the first ten to be approved for Steam Greenlight. Because it is a replication of another game, it is freely available for anyone to play. This past weekend I jumped into it and thus far, the only thing I have to say, is that the game is a labor of love and is worth the time of anyone who calls them self a games.