Black Mesa Source: Preview

The beginning of the epic Half-Life 1 as you have not seen before!

Gendre: FPS

Format: PC, Mac
Publisher: Valve
Development: Modders
Release: Not yet announced
Players: 1 (Co-operative may be added), Multiplayer (Deathmatch)
Requirements: 2.4 GHz,RAM: 512 MB,DirectX 9 capable graphics card with 256 MB RAM
Site: www.blackmesasource.com

  

Black Mesa Source is a recreation of Half-Life with the use of the Source graphics engine. It remains in the pattern of first-person shooter. All levels and characters are designed with incredible detail, giving a new impetus to a great title.

Black Mesa Source is a modification of Half-Life 2. For this and only, it will be distributed for free via the Steam service. Furthermore it will be required that an already  paid title using the Source Engine (Half-Life 2 / Counter Strike Source) is installed, in order to play. Therefore, its requirements are about the same as other games using the Source Engine.

The plot has remained the same, the characters have not changed, but now we can distinguish, for example, who is Eli Vance, Dr Kliener and many others. Our story begins with Gordon Freeman being inside the tram and guided to the area where there is going to be held a very important experiment. But during the experiment, something goes wrong, as always, and the Black Mesa facility sinks into total chaos. A gate opened, being the product of the experiment, letting hordes of aliens in the corridors, exterminating those who get in their way. As if this was not enough, marines and government agents are sent to "mute", what happened in those scientific facilities, killing both aliens and scientific personnel. Gordon Freeman will try to escape, along with other scientists, overcoming any obstacle that stands in his path, either man or alien.

 

Now, regarding the technical features of the game we can say we are very satisfied. Each character is different from the other, which means that we will not find any identical characters; models of all these are designed in detail and so are their animation. AI is clearly enhanced in order to provide realism to the battles which will take place. The weapons which are going to be used by our character are those of the weapon arsenal in the first Half-Life: from the crowbar and the crossbow to the small alien creatures that hunt your opponents and even you! As far as the sound is concerned ambients have been added in many parts of the game and, additionally, there has been a great improvement in the various dialogues and they can be clearly heard, giving a new impetus in the acoustic field of play. Finally, the title consists of 20 levels filled with incredible detail, with a strong dose of realism and puzzles which must be solved to overcome any obstacle or a very strong opponent.

In the multiplayer part, there has been a discussion for the existence of a Co-operative Mode, but the developers have not made any clear statements.  It may be introduced after its release as a patch. But focus will be given to the Deathmatch mode, the most common form of multiplayer and the design of old and favorite maps like Crossfire, wouldn’t you like to hear again the alarm of incoming doom? The characters that will be used in multiplayer will be the known ones, as in the first Half-Life, and perhaps with some new additions.

 

Unfortunately no release date has been announced, but we know that it is already in the later stages of its production, so we hope to see it released in the mid-late 2011. The title is a MUST, let alone the fact that it is completely free!