[Bloodshot]

The menu is the reason I still play the non-steam version from time to time.

[LkMax]

for historical reference:

HL had an in-game menu for mods, I forgot about it...

[Mikko]

Wow, this thing is really starting to suck. I'm in "Forget about Freeman" and these hitscan grunts are really starting to piss me off. Oh how I missed the never-ending quicksave/quickload routine of these old "classics". On top of that, the game has now crashed six time since the start.

[MusicallyInspired]

I loved this game. It rocked. The only thing I wished they would have done was kept the last bit of Surface Tension that was cut (due to the guy working on it having to drop the project, I gather), but it worked well because the point where the Garg appears was completely unexpected and heart-pumping. It was brilliant.

I loved absolutely everything about the game. Except that maybe it was a tad too easy. Maybe I'll play on hard next time. Just some of the sections that I remember being rather difficult in the original and/or longer were easier this time around. But other parts were even better and more challenging this time around too. So overall I was very pleased.

[Blue Lightning]

Bloodshot, on 02 October 2012 - 06:54 PM, said:

I actually really like Water Hazard for the parts where the action ramps up. I especially love when you are driving through the waste and You're not supposed to be here plays because it's one of my favorite songs,

I always thought of that song as the "theme from Water Hazard", as it always stood out as the best represenative of the level. Fun but serious just like the level, and a gritty sound just like the gritty urbanisc feel and concrete-against-the-sky vista's of Water Hazard.

[Inspector Lagomorf]

This is a great game so far. It has most definitely been worth the wait. Duke Nukem Forever's dev team needs to take lessons.

A few points:
1. Not enough combat, especially in Questionable Ethics. I love taking in the atmosphere, but at some point it got to where I noticed "gee, there's a whole lot less enemies than I expected." This is on hard difficulty, too.
2. The physics engine seems to have gone haywire at this point in the game too. Barrels, ragdolls and chairs are flying around and falling into the floor when they are bumped into, kind of like what happens when you mess up the GTA4 physics files. This is a serious bug, especially since it removes a bit of tactics from the game.
3. Health and HEV charge is concentrated in very specific areas, e.g. after a big combat or at the beginning of a chapter, as opposed to interspersed throughout the levels as in the original game. The enemy mechanics sort of demand this since a single human grunt can take out a large portion of your health, but still...
4. Perhaps this game is too easy for me since I've already played through the original Half-Life several times, so I haven't really been caught off guard. Oh well.

I have been playing this game over the course of three days, and I'm still only midway through Questionable. I would pay real money for this game. At least $20.

[Bloodshot]

The physic's bug is a source engine bug, I haven't actually seen it in years though

Posting this here since it's a mod about Half-Life, but I don't feel like making a new thread


I think it's awesome that OF2 is putting things from Raising the Bar in their mod, like how the citadels actually arrive on earth.

[Blue Lightning]

Having a blast with BMS. What I'm doing now is picking a chapter, setting on hard, and trying to get through the chapter without dying. First I tried Office Complex, after 5 tries I beat it from the beggining. Then OAR, but after 12 tries, went to another chapter. Now Im playing the one with the dam, chapter 12...Dont know the name of it (Surface Tension I think)

Since I named my file "Black Mesa" (instead of BMS) and dropped it in my Sourcemods folder, it wont give the chapter names in-game, just numbers (Chapter 12_title). It also doesnt show achievments, which I'm grateful for.

[Bloodshot]

Wait, did you name it Black Mesa to purposely screw the mod up, or just not realize that it's supposed to be named BMS?

[Blue Lightning]

Just didnt relaize that I'm not supposed to name it Black Mesa. But it appears on my Steam menu as "Black Mesa" which is what I want.

Also, I dont want acheivements, that is kind of kiddish to me...like consolish or something. Well, when you name it "Black Mesa" appearantly what happens is it keeps tracks of your achievments as you go, but never shows them to you in-game!

[Mikko]

It appears as "Black Mesa" on your library no matter the name of the folder.

[Rellik]

Blue Lightning, on 07 October 2012 - 06:08 AM, said:

Just didnt relaize that I'm not supposed to name it Black Mesa. But it appears on my Steam menu as "Black Mesa" which is what I want.

if you name the folder BMS, it will show up as Black Mesa in your steam Library anyway. And also having the incorrect folder name breaks the chapter titles you see in-game, as well as the BM advanced options menu

Quote

Also, I dont want acheivements, that is kind of kiddish to me...like consolish or something. Well, when you name it "Black Mesa" appearantly what happens is it keeps tracks of your achievments as you go, but never shows them to you in-game!

Most of the achievements in BM you have to go out of your way to do. Unlike most games with achievements, the mods made it a point to have no achievements that show your progress, or are incredibly obvious.

[Blue Lightning]

Thanks for the info (+ 1 for the both of ya).

[thatguy]

Change things before you even see a primary result? That is bad lab work there. lol

Anyways, I think the Source Engine has more efficient physics since the beginning compared to every other engine. OMG, the Cryengine physics bugs. nightmares

[Blue Lightning]

Still playing this game every day. This and of course Darkest Hour online, which I always play (I'm in a clan there).

Black Mesa...the graphics here are top notch, the fun factor also tops. Surface Tension is not only one of the longer levels (probebly the longest level), but I am discovering some pretty cool secret places in this chapter. I even located a few "secret routes". The people who designed this game, in my opinion, have mod of the year.

[ReaperMan]

I still need to download this..... i can't believe that i haven't yet.

[Blue Lightning]

It's a free download. Have at it!

On Steam after a few posts by others doubting it will ever be released, I posted that I wish the team would give us some word on Xen. Then stormseeker, a BM team member, posted this:
[quote name='stormseeker;33543283]We are definitely working on Xen' date=' as well as our deathmatch component and bugfixes. [/quote']

This made me smile

[----]

And the missing parts of Surface Tension are modded too and almost finished.

With these parts re-inlcuded the story will make sense again.

EDIT:
It will even make more sense, once they have balanced out the XEN vs. HECU balance. Currently earth forces are kicking every single ass of the XEN creatures to the moon, back and then to Uranus. But still the earth forces retreat for some unknown reason. With the missing parts reincluded where it is shown how the soldiers getting their butt kicked and a bit of rebalancing of the other encounters in it all will make sense, finally.

[Blue Lightning]

fuegerstef, on 12 December 2012 - 07:45 AM, said:

And the missing parts of Surface Tension are modded too and almost finished.

With these parts re-inlcuded the story will make sense again.

EDIT:
It will even make more sense, once they have balanced out the XEN vs. HECU balance. Currently earth forces are kicking every single ass of the XEN creatures to the moon, back and then to Uranus. But still the earth forces retreat for some unknown reason. With the missing parts reincluded where it is shown how the soldiers getting their butt kicked and a bit of rebalancing of the other encounters in it all will make sense, finally.

I dont know about Uranus...mabye to Jupiter and back, mabye even Saturn and back, but Uranus? That's giving the HECU a bit too much credit isnt it?

Seriously though, I don't see what the gripe is. I see where the HECU is starting to lose big time in "Forget about Freeman". Mabye it isnt as prolonged as in the original HL1, but it's there.

[Bloodshot]

Surface Tension Uncut RC1 download

Quote

The first floor of the parking lot has been "grunged" up, darkened, and significantly expanded from its Half-Life 1 variant. It has an extra floor now too and some side areas to explore.



The Garage remains consistent in appearance with the other garages you find throughout Surface Tension. It's very different to the original, but for the better (I feel!)



The TOW courtyard you come to after breaking free from the garage. I made it an outdoor area consistent with the rest of Surface Tension. A DRAMATIC thematic improvement from the original, which was boring, bland and generic.



Another view of the TOW courtyard. You can see JUST how much I've changed it from the original, but you can still recognize traces of the original's spirit here.



Remake of the warehouse war between HECU and Aliens. I replaced it with an outdoor area which provides a much nicer aesthetic and allows for usage of aerial vehicles for dramatic effect. It's been replaced with a helipad and contains a very nice scripted scene with a Manta destroying an Osprey.



Another shot of the same scene, a bit later on. The LAV bursts out alongside some marines and cuts down the aliens.



From C2A5H, another scene with a large scale battle between the HECU and Aliens. Also quite changed from Half-Life 1's version. Contains more impressive aerial scripting.



Another view of the same area. I tried very hard to make the area look war-torn.



View of the roof the player must climb onto to progress. Note the 3d skybox in some ways looks like the original.



My re-imagining of Black Mesa's Gargantua chase. The Gargantua now bursts through the door, and crushes 2 marines with a tank, similar to the original.

This guy is really good. He's taken a lot of feedback and the maps are leagues ahead of what they were in the testing phase

[thatguy]

I'm hoping the full release will be leagues better than the last version.

[----]

s.b.Newsom, on 17 December 2012 - 12:48 PM, said:

I'm hoping the full release will be leagues better than the last version.

Talking about the surface tension maps or of the whole mod?

I haven't played the additional maps but the full mod (while very good overall) has too many issues to be considered "professional quality". Just one of many examples: In a professional game you wouldn't get stuck on screws that stick 2 mm out of the wall. And you wouldn't autowalk onto really small ledges that are at the bottom of walls (I am missing the English word here and am too lazy to look it up).
A professional product would have blocking volumes for those so that bullets correctly hit the wall and screws but the player isn't affected by the.

There is other stuff. But overall I like it and look forward to the fixed version and the full version.


And this is the first thing that jumped on me in the additional maps:


Seriously, no user made DN3D map would get away with that. Not even 15 year ago.

[Loke]

That do look pretty ugly. I haven't played the extended maps though and I don't really have any desire to do so, would've preferred that the BMS team finished up their stuff instead but that's obviously not going to happen.

Anyway, a guy recently released an addon for BMS which is a remake of the Half-Life demo called Uplink.

http://www.moddb.com...ack-mesa-uplink

Played through it yesterday, it's pretty good but it's not on the same scale as BMS. It also reuses sounds from Half-Life so there's no custom voice acting.

[Mikko]

I agree that while of high overall quality, the mod has all these little things that make it look amateurish (as in "opposite of professional", not "crappy").

[thatguy]

Still too much judging for my taste. BMS is still top notch mod quality. Even at its worst it didn't feel amatuerish.

[----]

Yes. I was a bit disappointed with so many (small) issues. I had believed they had been more professional after such along time. Especially with their attitude of not sharing any info. It somehow made me believe that an outstanding product is due.

As said. It is awesome mod quality. But not professional.

[Kathy]

fuegerstef, on 18 December 2012 - 12:09 PM, said:

As said. It is awesome mod quality. But not professional.

Isn't that the point of mods anyway?

[----]

Burnett, on 18 December 2012 - 12:14 PM, said:

Isn't that the point of mods anyway?

No. The point is to try to make professional quality. Which usually is not achieved, though.

A mod that doesn't try is bound to fail completely and completely uninteresting.

[Inspector Lagomorf]

fuegerstef, on 18 December 2012 - 12:09 PM, said:

As said. It is awesome mod quality. But not professional.

If it was professional quality, it probably wouldn't be free. That is what "professional" means.

The subtext here is "Now, Interceptor Entertainment's mods, those are professional quality."

[----]

Achenar, on 18 December 2012 - 12:22 PM, said:

If it was professional quality, it probably wouldn't be free. That is what "professional" means.

Professional quality does of course not mean that it is professional, but has the same quality as a sold product. But that is probably too complex to understand for some.

Look, my maps I made for UT2004 were rated as "as good as the retail content" by some people. But was it retail? ... guess, please ... nooo, Achenar, it was not retail. But it had the same quality (according to some players, I used assets from the retail product, of course)

And why does everybody here think that this is linked to ROTT or Interceptor from my part. That's more than ridiculous. But not that I expected something else fom some people here. Idiots.