Tuesday, June 9, 2015

Game: Black Mesa(Steam release 2015) – My Opinion

This is one of those things you have heard about for years. Getting excited for it then forgetting it and gettin excited again and so on. Why i got excited? Because it's total remake of Half-Life, and even though it's a third-party doing it it looks fantastic.

The story is the same as in Half-Life with you taking controll of Gordon Freeman, a theoretical physicist who works at Black Mesa research facility. He is working with an unstable specimen that makes the spectrometer explode and opens a portal between Earth and Xen. Gordon Freeman wakes up after the explosion seeing the destroyed lab. You learn that the communication with the outside has been cut and you need to get it restored. To get up to the surface you got to make your way through the partially destroyed facility, face of against soldiers who is there to cover up the accident and aliens ported from their dimension of Xen.

As a character Gordon Freeman is what you make him out too be. He doesn't talk and there are no cutscenes where he's not controlled by you. That means that everything you do is the only thing Gordon Freeman does. We know only a few things about him, like what he does and his age and so on. This may sound bad but it's really not. The other characters talk enough and they help the plot move forward at times. There's not much more to say about it really, but just know that it works.

I played the original game(Half-Life) when it came out in 1998 and it showed the world that First-person shooter games can have depth. They can show a story and make people think. When it came out in 1998 it got worldwide critical acclaim. It was also the first game made by a little company known as Valve. If you by any chance don't know what Valve has done they made Left 4 Dead 1 and 2, Portal and Dota 2. They are also the guys who gave us Steam on the PC. I also must mention Counter-Strike which was born as a mod from Half-Life. I have to say that this game is not 100% finished. They are not done with the last bit of the game, the part known as Xen, but they are working on it. The game plays great. Think about that, this game was made in 1998 and it works great in 2015. Very few games hold up this well. A lot of credit for that must go to the modders though. But the story still works too. The new textures look great and everything feels like its a new release of a new game. If you are like me and have played the original you will probably feel the nostalgia flow too. The guns still feel great, the setpieces look great and the crowbar is still there. I hope people who haven't played Half-Life takes this opportunity and play Black Mesa so they can see where it all came from. The fantastic opening scene where you are on the train going to work is something that was fantastic when it came out and it still is. I don't think it was usual to show credits in the opening before this either. This is a piece of gaminghistory that has been remade to run great on new systems and the only complain i have is that there are too many loadingspots in the game. I'm guessing the have to be there since they are there but they are a little annoying none the less. My advice for anyone on the fence about playing this is to play it. Wait, that's actually my advice for everybody. Play this and think about the fact that this was made in 1998. Yes it has gotten new graphics but the story and the gamemechanics are still the same. Play it now or wait for them to finish Xen and then play it but i must say, you should really play it. It's a great game from a great time of gaming. Never forget where everything starts, and this was the start for the modern first-person shooter.

TL;DR

A fantastic remake of a fantastic game from 1998. The last piece of the game is missing but it will come out when it's ready. A great piece of gaming history. I recommend this for all who love games or just love first-person shooters.

My question for you:
What's your favorite retro game?
What game do you want them to remake?


Please leave a comment(negative,positive, suggestions or/and answers).

Until next time, stay fresh.

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