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Black Mesa Released
ProbablyJoe writes "The long awaited Source engine remake of the Valve's original Half Life has finally been released. The initial release only includes the story up until Xen, but the developers say they'll be adding the rest of the story, along with an online multiplayer Deathmatch mode, soon. The game is available to download for free, and only requires players to install the Source SDK (included with all Source games, or a free download). The highly anticipated release has also caused a huge amount of traffic for any servers hosting the files, with GameFront, GameUpdates, and Black Mesa's own CDN brought down within minutes of the release. The project has also been approved by Steam's Greenlight program, and will hopefully be available through Steam soon, though no timeframe has been given."
Thank you Black Mesa Team!
"I say we take off, nuke the site from orbit. It's the only way to be sure."
No crowbar nerf.
That was a joke.
Ha ha.
Fat chance.
(Anyway, this cake is great....)
The initial release only includes the story up until Xen, but the developers say they'll be adding the rest of the story, along with an online multiplayer Deathmatch mode, soon.
More episodic releases in the Half Life universe? NOOOOO!!!
/* No Comment */
Based on the development time of this, the Xen levels will take about two years.
But I'm not complaining, no one liked Xen anyway. Thank you, guys!
The Internet King? I wonder if he could provide faster nudity.
I have classes to study for and clients to work for, this is NOT a good time.
Over here: http://ftp.acc.umu.se/mirror/misc/BlackMesa/
Mostly used to hosting linux distributions, but this looks like someone might care to download too. Go ahead and eat a few gigabit/s for us. :)
Why do you think he's taking them?
They do have a torrent, just they hosted the tracker on GameUpdates which pretty much crumbled under the weight. Why they didn't use one of the many public open high-capacity trackers I do not know.
I used to get high on life, but I developed a tolerance. Now I need something stronger.
There's a torrent link on the official Black Mesa site, it points to:
http://www.mediafire.com/?khmzyygg4vetko0
I'm downloading it now, Black Mesa team says "Please seed!"
I assume 3.8GB installed. The torrent is a setup program and a 7z compressed 3.07GB file.
"Have you ever thought about just turning off the TV, sitting down with your kids, and hitting them?"
It's what is in the official torrent. My torrent client says 3146.1 MB.
Projects I honestly thought would ever see release. It's been a good past 10 days or so for fan made games.
"The problem with socialism is eventually you run out of other people's money" - Thatcher.
and only requires players to install the Source SDK (included with all Source games, or a free download)
I followed the link for the free download only to find a link to steam://run/211. Can I install the SDK without also installing Steam?
systemd is Roko's Basilisk.
I still don't understand what was wrong with the original Half-Life? I'd love to play a fan made episode of Half-Life, but if I want to play Half-Life itself, it works great in Wine.
Is anyone else sick of remakes? Fan made or official, I don't care. Try something new!
Give me Classic Slashdot or give me death!
It is beyond reason why they set a private flag.
DHT would handle it just perfectly, but now a torrent is brought down because trackers can't cope.
I still don't understand what was wrong with the original Half-Life?
The graphics are 14 years old. If you're sick of the remake, just don't play it. It's not like anyone is forcing you to, or even charging you money if you actually do want to. If people want to spend their time upgrading a 14 year old game that they really love because they think it would be even better with modern(ish) graphics, they can. And for the people doing so, it serves as a nice resume builder as well, whereas making their own game would probably not receive nearly so much press and would therefore be far less impressive.
"None can love freedom heartily, but good men; the rest love not freedom, but license." --John Milton
Currently sharing at 140mbit. Now, if I could only get more than 20mbit down, it'd be awesome.
The graphics are 14 years old.
And? Vermeer's Girl with a Pearl Earring is over 300 years old. Great works of art don't become less beautiful because they are old.
Give me Classic Slashdot or give me death!
We have that. It's called TF2, and it's even free!
For large sets, this will be our guide even unto death, for the LORD will work for each type of data it is applied to...
You might have a point if Girl with a Pearl Earring was a cave drawing.
For large sets, this will be our guide even unto death, for the LORD will work for each type of data it is applied to...
Next up? Can we get Blue Shift? Opposing Force? :D
This is going to make me go install those again, I guarantee it.
For large sets, this will be our guide even unto death, for the LORD will work for each type of data it is applied to...
The graphics are 14 years old.
And? Vermeer's Girl with a Pearl Earring is over 300 years old. Great works of art don't become less beautiful because they are old.
Video games do. Well, technically they were ugly to begin with, we just didn't notice because it was the best we had (and usually better than what came before). The graphics, mind you, not the gameplay.
"None can love freedom heartily, but good men; the rest love not freedom, but license." --John Milton
Half-Life: Source used all of the same models and maps, but added the physics engine for rag-doll effects, used shaders for improved water effects, had some limited dynamic lighting improvements (I think?), replaced the pre-rendered 16-bit skybox with dynamic effects, and cleaned up the specular/normal maps for better bump mapping and such. That is, it was a port to a new engine, with almost no changes to the content other than the cleaned-up normal maps and the quick switch-out of the skybox. Black Mesa is not a port, but a remake. They redid all of the maps and most of the models that weren't available already as part of HL2, so it takes full advantage of all the new shaders and lighting stuff, and has much higher resolution textures and models.
ASCII stupid question, get a stupid ANSI
The fact that all the direct download links appear to be overrun, but the Torrent works fine is a strong argument for why Torrenting isn't in and of itself piracy.
i ~ Celebrating Science, Cyberspace, Speculation
Seeing that TFC came out a little after the original Half-Life, I wonder whether there will be a Source port of TFC. Like Fortress Forever but without the bugs and the developers changing the gameplay every week and mistakenly make some classes MUCH stronger than others.
Why wouldn't they just port TF1 rather than TFC if they're going to redo everything anyway?
Then again, both a TF1 or TFC remake would have to compete against the juggernaut that is TF2.
Incidentally, TF2 has one of the problems that you complain about... constantly changing the gameplay. Yet that's what's kept it interesting over the last 5 years: TF2 currently has 10 game modes across 57 official maps (and all sorts of custom maps) and a wide variety of alternate play styles based on being able to swap out your weapons in the respawn room. The stock weapons are generally the most powerful with 4 major exceptions I can think of: Pyro's Flamethrower is inferior to the Rainblower or Degreaser; Pyro's Fire Ax is inferior to the Axtinguisher; Medic's Bonesaw is inferior to the Ubersaw, Amputator, or Solemn Vow; Soldier's Shovel is inferior to the Escape Plan, Equalizer, or Discliplinary Action.
Granted, the last major TF2 update basically added a Killing Floor mode to the game... but it needs special servers to run it since it's restricted to 6 players instead of the usual 24-32.
(Psst, TF2 is free btw if you haven't tried it... you just need a Steam account)
GLaDOS for President 2016! "Well here we are again. It's always such a pleasure." -- GLaDOS, 2011
I realize :
* this was a lot of work
* it's free
* mac isn't a gaming platform
* I shouldn't complain
But I somehow thought that Black Mesa would run natively on mac since it uses Source. I've been very happy playing Portal/Counter Strike/Half Life 2 on my mac.
Screw it, I might get a PC just to play Half Life again...
Nobody is forcing you to play black Mesa. Don't want it, don't install it.
Change is certain; progress is not obligatory.
Source is the game engine Steam is integrated with. Why does it surprise you that a game (or mod) made in it requires Steam?
Besides which, Steam has been running for 9 years and is making money hand over fist, I doubt it's going to disappear anytime soon.
GLaDOS for President 2016! "Well here we are again. It's always such a pleasure." -- GLaDOS, 2011
Anyone have cryptographic hash codes for those two files?
Who ordered that?
7.2gb installed.
Did they perhaps recompress the 7z archive to shave off that ~ 800mb then?
For large sets, this will be our guide even unto death, for the LORD will work for each type of data it is applied to...
This is a remake, not a port like Valve did.
Mada mada dane.
Not to mention they aged because we aren't playing on 640x480 screens anymore - people are rocking laptops with 2880x1800 screen resolutions (or tablets with 2560x1536). Or even just 1080p or 1920x1200. What looked good at VGA tends to look just terrible at the higher resolutions everyone runs at.
It's effectively going from standard-def to high-def.
Half Life's just one of those games that people like well enough to do a proper conversion.
Yeah, I tried it a few years ago and hate it. TF2 is retarded. No grenades, everyone's slowed down, the game has achievements, it has this stupid comic book theme to it, etc. They gave in to the kiddie noobs' complaints about TFC. What happened to conc jumping, bunnyhopping, EMPs, etc.? And sentry "sapping" is just stupid. One thing that Fortress Forever got right was adding trimping, conc holding (which only half exists in TFC), and really fast scouts.
I should have been more clear about the gameplay. For instance, they keep talking about nerfing the pyro. But they just buffed the medic's nailgun. The medic can be at near point blank with a HWGuy, so EVERYONE plays medic now. This is the problem when you have a fan-based game developed by people who don't see the big picture. The original TFC devs got the game just about right on the first try, and the FF devs have been messing up the gameplay for years now.
captcha: irately ;)
I'm way behind of games but actually tried Half-Life 2 not long ago and was duly impressed. Then tried Half-Life to get the full story - but Half-Life does feel really icky to play today.
I think it makes a lot of sense to take puzzle elements and story from Half-Life and bring everything up to the same quality level as Half-Life 2. And while graphics and sound are a big part of it, it's not all. The surroundings in Half-Life 1 are much more static in some way, it's less immersive.
you'll see problems with people who can't play the original HL because of weird incompatibility issues related to its age
That's funny. Just the other day people were saying that the big problem with Linux as a platform was constant breakage of backwards compatibility. But Half-Life works perfectly on Wine to this day.
Give me Classic Slashdot or give me death!
I have a Mac and previously bought a copy of Half Life 2 along with Portal and some other stuff in a pack. Previously I was able to download some mods that weren't made specifically for Windows or Mac and they played just fine.
How exactly is Black Mesa different from those mods? I understand that it would need to be ported to Linux or Macs so... why was it packaged as an executable and not a cross-platform type mod?
I've never played the original Half Life so was kind of looking forward to this release. D'oh!
Cwm, fjord-bank glyphs vext quiz
Sorry friend but I have TF Classic and TF 2 and they are NOT the same thing, not even close. In TF Classic for example the server host can set up his own MP3s for in game events which can be fricking hilarious. When I got hit 3 times in a row by a turrent gun I got to jear a clip from the AC/DC song "Big Gun" "Big Gun #1, Big Gun kick the hell out of you" which made me damned near fall out of my chair laughing. Also the different traps and grenades make it a VERY different experience, you can fly low but if you don't CYA all it takes is walking around the corner into a trap and BAM! That's your ass Mr Postman...which BTW I heard that clip when I got popped by a trap, again much laughter.
So for those that think TF2 is the same as TF Classic with better graphics I urge you to buy TF Classic on Steam, its cheap, the servers are full of people 24/7, and its a fricking blast and a half. Personally I don't care for TF2 at all, but TF Classic is just a hoot.
ACs don't waste your time replying, your posts are never seen by me.
Then why did you whine to begin with?
Change is certain; progress is not obligatory.
Never say never. Plus, having all your games locked to a single account means that if the account is marked as bad (stolen/hacked, or otherwise considered damaged) you could lose access to all your games you basically rented, should Steam Support not solve things. Why invest in a platform where you can't easily walk away and keep your games if things go sour?
I would much prefer using Steam if Valve completely removed their own DRM from the platform, such that I could back up and archive my downloaded games no matter what happens. I can do this with GOG, why not Steam? If Valve are concerned publishers won't want to use Steam without DRM, then they can elect to have DRM if they must. But most games I've played seem to require the Steam DRM at the very least, and that isn't palatable to me when you're putting down your money to buy something.
Most people on Slashdot are fucking idiots.
Blue shift?
Play Azure Sheep if you want to see things from a bluesuit POV.
Watch this Heartland Institute video
It works fine on windows too.
APK, just a little hint, you cannot call it a 'fail troll' when I got someone mad enough to follow me all over Slashdot.
Change is certain; progress is not obligatory.
Actually, this is not correct. The release date was released only a month ago. The development took eight years, but it's not like you could plan ahead like for a solar eclipse.
So for those that think TF2 is the same as TF Classic with better graphics I urge you to buy TF Classic on Steam, its cheap, the servers are full of people 24/7, and its a fricking blast and a half. Personally I don't care for TF2 at all, but TF Classic is just a hoot.
No, TF2 isn't TFC. It's a completely different game with a lot of differences in design style. After all, they had nine years to decide what they didn't like about QTF and TFC when designing TF2.
The "cartoonish" graphics and differently accented characters are there so that you can recognize a class by silhouette or sound (except disguised Spies).
Other major changes you're likely to notice sooner than later are:
1. The removal of grenades.
2. The fact that you can walk through teammates, but not enemies.
3. That allied Spies are shown as a Spy wearing a paper mask instead of the enemy they're disguised as.
A large part of the TF2 meta-game is changing your equipment to meet the team's current needs; you can change your loadout in any of your team's respawn rooms or while dead. Just be aware that it will move you to the currently active respawn room (or a random one on maps that have multiple active respawn rooms, such as ctf_2fort).
Also the different traps and grenades make it a VERY different experience, you can fly low but if you don't CYA all it takes is walking around the corner into a trap and BAM!
The removal of grenades from the game was for several reasons.
1. Grenades were very unfriendly to new players who would end up wondering how the heck they just got killed. This is mentioned in the Developer Commentary for TF2's tc_hydro.
2. To stop the "I'm going to die, time to spam grenades in hopes that I hit someone" behavior. This is mentioned in the Developer Commentary for TF2's tc_hydro.
3. To restrict jumping abilities to fewer classes in order to differentiate them from one another. At the current time, these classes have better than normal jumping: The Soldier can rocket jump up to high surfaces. The Demoman can sticky-bomb jump up to high surfaces. The Scout can double, triple (with Force-a-Nature gun or Atomizer bat), or quadruple jump (with Force-a-Nature and Atomizer). If a Medic with a Quick-Fix is healing a Soldier or Demoman, any rocket or sticky-jump forces will be duplicated by the Medic.
Since you mentioned traps... the Demoman can still set traps with his bombs... as an added bonus, his bombs now stick to surfaces so they can be stuck to ceilings and the sides of doors. They also no longer share a clip with the pipe bombs.
Pyros have alternate flamethrowers that encourage ambushing (see: Backburner, Phlogistinator).
The Heavy has the Tomislav minigun that doesn't make any noise when spun up, the Brass Beast minigun that deals a hell of a lot more damage than normal (at least at close range), and the Natascha minigun that slows down anyone it hits. Now, granted each of these has their own downsides over the standard Sasha minigun... Natascha and Tomislav both do less damage, while the Natascha and Brass Beast both take longer to spin up.
Engineers have mini-sentries that build in 4 seconds and repair themselves up to 100% of their health as they build. Meaning that if you can't destroy them in one hit, they will heal themselves. Moving them makes them redeploy in 2 seconds.
Scout and Sniper now both have melee weapons that do bleed damage. The Scout also has a secondary weapon that does bleed damage.
So no, traps aren't gone... but they do require you to change your character's loadout to use them (except for Demoman, which requires that you don't change your loadout).
In TF Classic for example the server host can set up his own MP3s for in game events which can be fricking hilarious. When I got hit 3 times in a row by a turrent gun I got to jear a clip from the AC/DC song "Big Gun" "Big Gun #1, Big Gun kick the hell o
GLaDOS for President 2016! "Well here we are again. It's always such a pleasure." -- GLaDOS, 2011
Oh, as for traps, I forgot to mention taunt kills.
Each class has a taunt kill on one or more of its weapons which will kill anyone standing in front of them when they use it.
Weapons that have taunt kills are:
The Scout's Sandman and Atomizer bats have the Bonk taunt, which makes the Scout imitate Babe Ruth's famous called shot. At 5 seconds, it's the longest taunt in the game, but it's also the only silent taunt kill in the game... and a hilarious way to kill Snipers that aren't paying attention.
The Soldier's Equalizer and Escape Plan picks both have the Soldier do his Kamikaze taunt, killing all nearby enemies and himself. It's the only taunt kill that can hit people behind the player, but also the only taunt kill that kills the player using it. If the soldier is wearing the Lumbricus Lid hat, this taunt will also make the "Hallelujah, Hallelujah!" sound from Worms.
The Pyro's secondary weapons (except the Scorch Shot) all have the Hadouken taunt, which is an imitation of Ken/Ryu from Street Fighter. It only hits people directly in front of him. At 2 seconds, it's one of the shortest taunt kills in the game.
The Pyro gained two more taunt kills when Meet the Pyro came out. One is for the Rainblower flamethrower. It's a reskin of the normal flamethrower, but it also has a 3-second long taunt kill. The taunt kill has a large rainbow over it only visible to people using a Pyroland item, but is otherwise unseen... although the music for it can still be heard. It hits anything within a small semi-circle in front of the Pyro.
The Pyro's other Meet the Pyro taunt is with the Scorch Shot. The Scorch Shot has the Pyro imitate his scene with it from the Meet the Pyro short. Anyone in close range in front of it will be instant-killed; it acts as a normal Scorch Shot projectile any farther away than that. Note: This is the only taunt kill in the game that uses ammo, which is bad when you consider that Flare Guns only have 16 ammo to start with.
The Demoman's swords (there are like 5 of them) all have the Decapitation taunt, which slices the head off of whomever they hit with it. Takes about 4 seconds, although the kill is at about 3 seconds in.
The Heavy's Fists and Holiday Punch melee weapons have him pull out his fingers like a gun, killing anyone a short range in front of him. The Holiday Punch also forces an enemy to laugh when hit from behind or with a critical hit, so it's common to finish them off with the taunt kill.
The Engineer has the Discord taunt with his Frontier Justice shotgun. He pulls out a guitar, plays a chord, then hits anyone in front of him with it, killing them.
The Engineer also has the Organ Grinder taunt on the Gunslinger melee weapon (which is the one that gives you mini-sentries). He pulls a cord on his robotic arm, which cause it to start spinning, dealing 1 damage per tick to anything in front of him, then instantly killing them at the end of the taunt. Takes about 4 seconds.
The Medic's Ubersaw melee weapon has the Spinal Tap taunt kill. He pulls back his Ubersaw, then after a second or two jabs it forward, killing anyone in front of him and giving him 50% Ubercharge if he hit someone with it.
The Sniper's Huntsman bow has the Skewer taunt kill. He pulls out an arrow and stabs it forward, stunning anyone he hits. This takes about a second. After another second, he pulls it back, killing anyone in front of him (even if they weren't hit by the initial stab). At 2 seconds, this is tied with Hadouken for shortest taunt kill.
The Spy's Knives (except for the Spy-cicle) all have the Fencing taunt kill. The Spy starts doing a fencing maneuver, dealing a small amount of damage for the first two hits, and killing anyone in front of him with the third. Takes about 3 seconds.
Note: These times are all from memory as I can't access the TF2 Wiki from here.
GLaDOS for President 2016! "Well here we are again. It's always such a pleasure." -- GLaDOS, 2011