Saturday, February 2, 2013

The Black Mesa Overhaul; Half Life in glorious modern graphics.

Title says it all.. I've been in a Half-Life mood after playing through Episode 2 again, recently. Horrible ending, by the way. Especially considering it's been 5 or 6 years since it came out and neither an Episode 3 or a third Half-Life game has yet to come out and is only hinted at or rumored on occasion. It's truly maddening...
But my post today isn't about that. Rather, it's about Black Mesa. Black Mesa while is the name of the facility in which the events of Half-Life take place, but is also the name of a total overhaul of the original game. Let me just say, it looks freaking fantastic! Holy gerbils it looks great! In case you're unfamiliar with it, the Black Mesa Modification Team took the original game and used the modern Source engine to update and overhaul everything; the texturing, the lighting, effects, soundtrack, et cetera and so forth.

Here's a comparison;

Old (Half-Life)












New (Black Mesa)














Ah, man... Back in the day, I played the crap out of this game and I'm so glad that this was made. It looks gorgeous, sounds gorgeous, and by golly, I love it. I highly recommend trying this out for yourselves. I've only discovered it recently myself, and have only delved into it just a wee bit, but I thought I'd rave about it a little bit. I plan on getting more in depth with it later on.

Here is the Black Mesa site to check out at your leisure; http://www.blackmesasource.com/#/home.


Seriously guys, well worth the very minimal effort it is to click the link and download. Beautiful update to a historic game.
Soon I'll also be revisiting Meteor Madness 3D, Full Throttle, and maybe the original Alone in the Dark (?). And I'll also be launching my vlog, once I get some vital material components.
Well, cheers!

2 comments:

  1. Wow that does look a lot better! I tried Half-Life having played Half-Life 2 and I just couldn't stand it, mainly because of it's graphics (which just look ugly to me as I didn't play it the first time around!). I shall keep this in mind.

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  2. Yeah, I've heard a number of people say that, which is really unfortunate because it's such a great classic. It's just one of those monumental games that helped influence future gaming as we know it today. I highly recommend you try it, especially since it's free. :P

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