let me just copy my review of half-life...
Half-Life Black Mesa is as classic as you can get... Wait a minute...
Black Mesa is a fan made remake of Half-Life, and to be honest, it's my prefered way to experience this classic.
Everything that made Half-Life great makes Black Mesa great.
Black Mesa still has the base of Half-Life's methodology "Run, Think, Shoot and Live", but it is enchanced with thoughtfull changes to controls and movement. Weaker chapters have been improved upon with more tuned level design; weapon tweaks make the whole arsenal more appealing and already excelent setpieces and excelent sequences were improved upon - something I thought was nigh impossible.
The pacing of the campain is excelent, from one encounter to another encounter, the flow of everything is on par or sometimes greater than in Half-Life. Still escaping the failing facility through it's different sectors, finding survivors and discovering more and more about the facility; it's still all there and witnessing the fallout of our actions is still captivating.
And Xen chapters itself are impressive - they are no longer bad!
Reworked and completely redesigned into something new while retaining most of the beats the original had and conveying them better than ever. Beautiful alien enviorment with sparse interference of Black Mesa temp-facilities scattered here and there, that are joy to explore and retaining all the level design principles and knowledge that Half-Life is known for.
Problem of slowly depleeting resources in later chapters are absent thanks to frankly good move to make scientists from overworld sent you care packages, making them actually help you.
Interloper chapter has still little pacing issue, but it is not bad as it is penultimate chapter and it being longer feels like final stretch to reach finale, so that basically resolves itself.
I would still highly recommend playing the original HL before Black Mesa to appreciate video game history and what an amazing game it still is. But Black Mesa is better and absolutely amazing. A worthwhile play!
Black Mesa is a fan made remake of Half-Life, and to be honest, it's my prefered way to experience this classic.
Everything that made Half-Life great makes Black Mesa great.
Black Mesa still has the base of Half-Life's methodology "Run, Think, Shoot and Live", but it is enchanced with thoughtfull changes to controls and movement. Weaker chapters have been improved upon with more tuned level design; weapon tweaks make the whole arsenal more appealing and already excelent setpieces and excelent sequences were improved upon - something I thought was nigh impossible.
The pacing of the campain is excelent, from one encounter to another encounter, the flow of everything is on par or sometimes greater than in Half-Life. Still escaping the failing facility through it's different sectors, finding survivors and discovering more and more about the facility; it's still all there and witnessing the fallout of our actions is still captivating.
And Xen chapters itself are impressive - they are no longer bad!
Reworked and completely redesigned into something new while retaining most of the beats the original had and conveying them better than ever. Beautiful alien enviorment with sparse interference of Black Mesa temp-facilities scattered here and there, that are joy to explore and retaining all the level design principles and knowledge that Half-Life is known for.
Problem of slowly depleeting resources in later chapters are absent thanks to frankly good move to make scientists from overworld sent you care packages, making them actually help you.
Interloper chapter has still little pacing issue, but it is not bad as it is penultimate chapter and it being longer feels like final stretch to reach finale, so that basically resolves itself.
I would still highly recommend playing the original HL before Black Mesa to appreciate video game history and what an amazing game it still is. But Black Mesa is better and absolutely amazing. A worthwhile play!