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“Black Mesa's initial launch in 2012 also coincided with the introduction of Valve's Steam Greenlight program, which allowed users to vote for games to be added to Steam's storefront. Black Mesa was one of the first games to be voted on by fans and approved by Valve as part of the program, and soon after Valve approached the team about releasing Black Mesa as a commercial project. With full access to the latest version of the Source engine, and the ability to earn money from the project after working as volunteers for so many years, Crowbar Collective agreed. The game then launched in Steam Early Access on May 5, 2015. At this point, the Xen sections were still a work in progress, but Black Mesa's Early Access release allowed for valuable feedback and bug testing from the community. Eventually, after a couple of betas and some stress testing by players, the full Xen chapter was released on December 24, 2019, which brings us to now and the full release of version 1.0. 'Through luck, hard work, and maybe a bit of ignorance, we didn't shy away from our goal of bringing this game to completion,' said project lead Adam Engels in a blog post celebrating the 1.0 release. 'We are proud of what we built. We think this upcoming 1.0 release is the best, most polished, and most fun version of the game yet.'”• 'Black Mesa' Is Not the 'Half-Life' You Remember [Vice Gaming]
“It's more like Gus Van Sant's shot-for-shot 1998 remake of Alfred Hitchcock's Psycho than the cleaned-up and 'digitally remastered' release of Star Wars. It's not just a bunch of high resolution textures, but a meticulous recreation of a long, complex, and beloved game in a more recent engine, with a few embellishments. Black Mesa's ambitions were so exciting when I first saw a trailer for it in the 2000s that I decided I wouldn't play it until the entire thing was finished. Different parts of it have been playable for years, but last week Black Mesa's developer Crowbar Collective started beta testing the 1.0 release of the game, meaning the entire thing is playable, beginning to end, including the game's last chapter, Xen, which takes place on an alien world. [.] What this means in practice is that Black Mesa tells the same story with a lot more fidelity. This is clear from the game's opening and iconic tram ride, where the player spends a long time looking around and absorbing the Black Mesa facility before being given any agency. What was once a giant, bare wall the player passed by is now a diorama of meetings rooms and labs filled with props—coffee cups, piles of papers, computers—and populated with more detailed character models going about their business. These models are one of the biggest improvements Black Mesa brings to Half-Life.”• A masterful remake that improves upon a classic [Eurogamer]
“Black Mesa starts with a ballsy opening gambit, an introductory tram ride that's longer than the one in the original Half-Life. It's odd to think such an iconic moment in FPS history was one of the less-liked aspects of Half-Life on launch. Extending it is a deliberate move on Crowbar Collective's part. It gives you more time to notice the extra details they've added into the introduction. Black Mesa is more populous than in Valve's original vision, with scientists loitering around the newly introduced railway station, and guards manning security checkpoints that didn't exist in the original. It isn't merely visual stuff that's changed either. The carriage's welcome message now sounds like it's emanating from a speaker, while a whole new soundtrack plays its opening notes out as a 27-year-old MIT graduate begins his worst day at work. It's a statement by Crowbar Collective. We're not messing around, nor are we slaves to every pixel of Valve's game. This, ultimately, is what defines Black Mesa. The willingness not just to replicate, but to attempt to improve upon the core experience of Half-Life. To refine what works and, crucially, remove what doesn't.”• Xen doesn't suck anymore. [PC Gamer]
“Half-Life is still great, but feels increasingly stiff and dated as the years roll relentlessly on. But Black Mesa being built on the foundations of Half-Life 2, borrowing its weapon handling and chaotic physics simulation, makes for a much more dynamic and engaging first-person shooter. And thanks to an abundance of movable and breakable objects, and devilish traps that frequently cause explosive chain reactions, the stricken research facility has never felt more reactive, unpredictable, or dangerous. But let's talk about Xen, because this is where Black Mesa makes its biggest statement. In the original Half-Life, Freeman's arrival on Xen was, for most players, something of an anticlimax. It's not as bad as people remember, but this otherworldly expanse of floating platforms, bizarre alien flora, and grubby textures is a low point for the game, with frustrating low-gravity platforming and a tedious boss battle against a giant testicle. But after years in development and several delays, Black Mesa achieves the impossible and makes Xen one of the best parts of the game. The new Xen is stunning to look at, and feels genuinely strange and otherworldly—as this cosmic place-between-places should. Shortly after teleporting there, Freeman finds himself gazing across a vista of weird floating creatures and a swirling, vivid nebula. Comparing both versions of Xen side by side, it's almost comical how much of an improvement this is.”