Half-Life News

Given how much time has passed since Gordon Freeman first rode the automated transit system into our hearts, I think we're all comfortable now with admitting one unassailable truth: every single moment spent in the original version of Xen is a nightmare. Half-Life 2 is 20 years old. Valve has marked the occasion with a revised and tweaked version of the FPS. But historically, it's modders who have fixed the very worst part of the iconic shooter series, first in the superlative Black Mesa, and now in its spiritual successor. An unofficial remake of Half-Life Blue Shift is available to play right now, and it's just gotten a new chapter that makes Barney's excursion into the alien border world actually enjoyable.

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The Half-Life Blue Shift remake, built using Black Mesa, is finally back

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Short, grounded, and with regular beer-owing guy Barney as its hero, Blue Shift could be my favorite Half-Life game. Half-Life 1 gets points for originality. Half-Life 2 has excellent set pieces in the form of City 17, the coastal road trip, and Ravenholm. But Blue Shift - like Opposing Force - is so tight and focused, and rounds out the resonance cascade story so well, that I think it takes the metaphorical crowbar. As HL2 gets closer to its 20th anniversary, the idea of a Half-Life 3 feels both closer and further away than ever. Valve might be keeping quiet about the future of its FPS, but modders are hard at work. The unofficial Half-Life Blue Shift remake, built using the fan-made masterpiece Black Mesa, is finally coming back.

Read the rest of the story...

RELATED LINKS:

'New' version of Half-Life discovered with cut content and secrets

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• Fixed HLTV startup crashes and incompatibility with 25th anniversary maps.
  
• Fixed memory leak that caused a crash after repeatedly changing brightness or gamma.
  
• Enabled /LARGEADDRESSAWARE to support mods with large memory requirements..
  
• Miscellaneous mod compatibility fixes.
  
• Miscellaneous security fixes.
  

2024 has been a goldmine of Half-Life discoveries. The series has sneakily reappeared in a Counter-Strike 2 update, a mysterious Half-Life 2 patch might hint towards 20th-anniversary celebrations, and Half-Life 3 feels closer than it's ever been. There's never been a better time to dig into Gordan Freeman's silent adventures. Now, if you're as much a fan of beta builds and cut content as I am, I've got a real treat for you. A decades-old disc containing a prerelease Half-Life build has been found, and it's been archived for good measure.

Read the rest of the story...

RELATED LINKS:

Here are some of the best Steam games most own but too few have played

Half-Life players somehow manage to beat Opposing Force in 17 minutes

Underrated Half-Life game gets huge new Steam record 23 years later