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JohnnyDioxin
Inspiring
April 29, 2018
Question

Black Mesa - finally done?

I'm just downloading a 3.6GB update for Black Mesa. Considering at the beginning of the month they were saying they were very close to release - could this finally be the Finished Article? (unnoticed bugs excepted)

    31 replies

    JohnnyDioxinAuthor
    Inspiring
    April 30, 2018
    Ah - not the final release but a new game engine:

    Xen Engine Public Release
    We have patched the latest version of the Xen Engine and released it to everyone. Please let us know on the Steam forums if you run into any game breaking issues. As we have mentioned before, this is important to test our new features so that the Xen release can be as flawless as possible. We will probably do one more “Engine” release just before we drop Xen, in order to make sure that everything is running smoothly on everyone's machines. We want the Xen release to be as close to a simple content release as possible! Here is what is in the latest patch:

    As per -

    https://store.steampowered.com/news/?appids=362890

    Johnny's Scale Models Showcase i5 9600k @4.5GHz; 16GB DDR4 3200; 6xSSD; RTX2080ti; Gigabyte Z390D Mobo Rift CV1; Index; Quest; Quest 2
    bigmike20vt
    Honored Contributor
    April 30, 2018
    does this support VR?
    Fiat Coupe, gone. 350Z gone. Dirty nappies, no sleep & practical transport incoming. Thank goodness for VR :)
    SkScotchegg
    Inspiring
    April 30, 2018
    What is this exactly? They're remaking Half Life 1? or Half Life 2? and whats Xen? Is this coming to VR? I've never heard of this.
    UK: England - Leeds - - RTX 2080 - Rift CV1 & Rift S - Make love, not war - See you in the Oasis!
    Anonymous
    April 30, 2018
    It is a remake of the first Half Life in the updated Source engine - it is fairly faithful to the original design of the first game from a narrative standpoint. The biggest upgrade to the visuals comes in the form of the level design - Black Mesa is no longer just as a series of corridors but actually feels like the innards of a large R&D facility.

    Xen is the last chapter of Half Life where you explore the alien world of Xen - these levels are either hated or tolerated but not loved by many in the original. From what I understand - the team responsible for Black Mesa is taking extra care with these levels so as to not ruin the atmosphere they created but make them less of a slog to get through.

    It has been a while since I played it as I am waiting on the the Xen levels to finish it - but even in it's current Early Access state is a very good game. It actually plays like what I remember Half Life to play like when it came out 20 years ago through my nostalgia glasses lol
    Chazmeister
    Inspiring
    April 30, 2018
    I'm still waiting for news on the officially sanctioned HL2 VR mod that was announced seemingly ages ago now (but probably wasn't that long ago really).
    SkScotchegg
    Inspiring
    April 30, 2018


    It is a remake of the first Half Life in the updated Source engine - it is fairly faithful to the original design of the first game from a narrative standpoint. The biggest upgrade to the visuals comes in the form of the level design - Black Mesa is no longer just as a series of corridors but actually feels like the innards of a large R&D facility.

    Xen is the last chapter of Half Life where you explore the alien world of Xen - these levels are either hated or tolerated but not loved by many in the original. From what I understand - the team responsible for Black Mesa is taking extra care with these levels so as to not ruin the atmosphere they created but make them less of a slog to get through.

    It has been a while since I played it as I am waiting on the the Xen levels to finish it - but even in it's current Early Access state is a very good game. It actually plays like what I remember Half Life to play like when it came out 20 years ago through my nostalgia glasses lol



    Thanks for the info mate, and I'll defo check this out for sure! I loved Half-Life back in the day! I remember playing it when I was about 14 and I my PC could barely run it, my cousin had to upgrade my ram lol.

    You didn't answer one of my questions though, is this for VR or just standard 2D on a monitor?


    UK: England - Leeds - - RTX 2080 - Rift CV1 & Rift S - Make love, not war - See you in the Oasis!
    JohnnyDioxinAuthor
    Inspiring
    April 30, 2018
    Yes, I have played the first few levels and it's a pretty good mod of Half-Life. I got it a couple of years ago and recently reinstalled it.

    I'm pretty sure you can play it in VR with one of the utilities (VorpX or Vireiro) using the Half-Life VR settings.

    Think this was DK1:

    https://youtu.be/mnM7SbjxSTE

    but it has changed a lot since then - for the better.

    http://www.vrspies.com/immersivegamer83/black-mesa-looks-amazing-in-virtua/

    PS: this was the official stance on VR a couple of years ago - I'm looking for more recent info:

    https://steamcommunity.com/app/362890/discussions/0/371918937262383435/

    We never even officially announced that we were planning on supporting
    VR in BMS, so I'm not sure why people are so upset. We mentioned we were
    looking into things in the odd forum post here and there, but nothing
    concrete ever. Our initial experiments didn't work out well at all, even
    though we obviously hoped they would.

    The game and engine are
    not well suited to a VR experience. Some guys from Valve themselves even
    told us that attempting VR on our engine and game was not a good idea.
    There are way too many intrinsic issues with the game and engine. Our VR
    programmer explained these issues in extensive detail to us before he
    left. The work required to make even a bare bones VR experience not
    terrible is extensive. And we don't want to half♥♥♥♥♥♥things, say what
    you want about us but we always aim for quality.

    Of course VR
    users think BMS VR is a good idea. They want things to play and don't
    have to invest time or resources into developing the tech and experience
    on a 10 year old engine. They don't already have our HUGE amount of
    work on their plate. That isn't a criticism of VR users, of course, but
    from a customer standpoint there is no downside. To the developer, there
    is. We don't think it is worth it. Sorry if that disappoints some
    people, but we're trying to be cognizant of scope growth and keeping our
    priorities straight, particularly as that's what a lot of our fans and
    community seem to care about the most!

    To conclude, it probably won't happen, sorry.


    And this, one year ago (having watched a vid of the Doom3 mod):

    That's interesting... I didn't know you could get acclimated to VR if it
    made you sick. Makes sense though. Yeah the weapons not being in the
    world space is a big issue for VR (and a total pain for regular
    development). Hummm... even if we were to reevaluate it we wouldn't be
    able to dive into this stuff till next year at the earliest.


    Johnny's Scale Models Showcase i5 9600k @4.5GHz; 16GB DDR4 3200; 6xSSD; RTX2080ti; Gigabyte Z390D Mobo Rift CV1; Index; Quest; Quest 2
    RattyUK1096940
    Inspiring
    April 30, 2018
    @SkScotchegg - it is a pancake game...

    I've played it for about 16 hours and as @SimonSays28 said, it is a very good remake of HL1 and just as much fun to play.  I downloaded the update yesterday but yet have to fire it up again, bloomin' VR games (did I hear someone mention SkyrimVR?) keep eating up my gaming time ATM :p
    PC info: AMD Ryzen 9 5900X - Sapphire 7900XTX - 32GB DDR4 4000 - 3 NVMe + 3SATA SSD - Quest 2 & 3
    DaftnDirect
    Honored Contributor
    April 30, 2018
    Blimey, I bought this a good while back & forgot I had it. Must play it some time.
    13700K, RTX 4070 Ti, Asus ROG Strix Z790-A Gaming, Corsair H150i Capellix, 64GB Corsair Vengence DDR5, Corsair 5000D Airflow, 4TB Samsung 870 , 2TB Samsung 990 Pro x 2, DK2, CV1, Rift-S, Quest, 2, 3, Pro, Windows 11 Pro 24H2 (10.0.26100)
    Anonymous
    April 30, 2018
    Yep - sorry forgot to mention it is not a VR game. I meant to but got carried away typing about the game lol

    I had just turned 11 when it came out - we had to play it in software mode - with the screen set to maybe 2/3 the actual screen (remember when games allowed you to shrink the screen, lol). It wasn't until a year later or so that we got a better PC and could play it as intended - definitely played a lot of Half Life and its expansions at the time. I miss the good old days, lol
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