Incredibly detailed and intricate in some ways, shockingly inept in so many others. Taking a walk through an updated Black Mesa is just as awe-inspiring as you would think it is, especially if you have Half-Life as committed to memory as most fans do. The amount of work put into making it feel as exciting and novel as it was in Half-Life is not to be dismissed, they nail a lot of the minutiae that that made that game feel so disarmingly real in a medium where the game world's tangibility was not the priority.

But throughout the mod there is this weird push-and-pull going on between wanting to put new and interesting spins on the experience and spinning its wheels with fanservice or ideas that aren't very good. The awkward "They're waiting for you Gordon, in the test chamberrrr" is preserved for no good reason, the JUMPING PUZZLES are for some godforsaken reason even more prevalent, and Xen is capital T Terrible. They've made it longer! I actually like the Xen levels in Half-Life and generally think the hatred for them is overblown, but not in a million years would I have suggested making Interloper a TWO HOUR level to improve its reputation.

Xen is definitely visually stunning, but even then that loses what makes Xen so frightening and hostile in Half-Life: it looks like shit! It's a bunch of otherworldly nightmare platforms in a Hell dimension, it shouldn't look like Metroid Prime! I am at odds here because it definitely IS a new take on something old, which I appreciate. But it feels like such an obvious attempt at a course correction that it still ends up feeling desperate for approval.

There are other things I hate: the gunfights. The gunfights in Half-Life kick ass. They are chaotic, loud, exciting, and genuinely make you feel like you are solving problems when you just barely survive every one. Black Mesa just feels turgid in a way that is hard to quantify. The Marines feel less dynamic, like they just backpedal while dumping magazines into you. It's the same problem that keeps the Combine from ever truly being exciting to fight. Not to mention the updated artstyle means they blend in with the environment more, which while certainly more realistic, makes it feel less carefully designed than Half-Life 1.

That is the big difference, really, is that Half-Life is such a carefully and smartly designed game that every time Black Mesa stumbles it only manages to enhance Valve's brilliance with the original game. Realistically, should the BMRF have more doors around instead of room sthat lead to nowhere? Yes, but it also makes the design more cluttered and less elegant at guiding the player through the facility. It feels like they used Freeman's Mind as a design document at times.

I also have to say the music is completely at odds with the game's tone. Half-Life uses a lot of alien sounding synths and samples, creating a tone of mystery and unease, cold and careless science that goes too far. When action picks up you get very synthetic tracks with pulsing electronics. The rock music playing dramatic minor chords during action scenes just doesn't fit at all. Again, I respect the desire to try something different, but it's so wildly off the mark that I'm not even sure what they were going for.

There's other things that annoy me as a fan: I don't like the Nihilanth's voice, he doesn't sound quite as unknowable and more like a generic monster. I miss the maze in On A Rail because navigating it IS a puzzle. The ending is deflated by feeling like the game wants us to stand up and start clapping when we see the G-man instead of having the original's understated mystery. A lot of this is coming off like I'm an irritating fanboy, which is true, but the game is so indecisive if it wants to be a complete overhaul or a fresh coat of paint that I don't feel bad about doing so.

There is one thing here they do SO WELL, better than I could have anticipated, and that is the amount of world building here. I just absolutely adore the radios scattered about that gives you an idea of what is happening outside of Black Mesa. It makes the world feel so much larger and real, while also making you feel more isolated and out of your depth. It's little things like that that makes it hard for me to truly Hate this game, even with all of the irritating shit they add to it.

This is not a suitable replacement for Half-Life. I think that game is still so readily available and instantly playable that if you can't get into it that seems like a genuine personal failing on your part that you SHOULD be ashamed of. But if you do dig Half-Life, i think Black Mesa is a fine companion piece to get a second look at the same events. But I would never suggest you throw Half-Life in the dumpster and just move on with this, because it will make you think Half-Life wasn't that good.