Fully remaking a game is one of the most arduous tasks a developer can attempt, it requires a complete and total understanding of the original game's design in all aspects, from art to gameplay to audio, the works. In that regard there are plenty of aspects where Black Mesa succeeds - it's clear that the team at Crowbar Collective loves the original game and by extension the franchise, visually it's nothing short of gorgeous - there's always a unique detail to be found in every little corner, and the environmental storytelling has been expanded greatly to the game's benefit, I often found myself in awe watching events unfold throughout the game's many locales, infatuated with all the tiny things they sprinkled throughout every level. From the brand new HECU dialogue, which helps to humanize them more, to the Vortigaunts in Interloper, Black Mesa does an - and I cannot stress this enough, excellent job at contextualizing the original and even it's sequel, while offering it's own new twists that don't feel out of place at all.
Where Black Mesa misses the mark for me, however are in it's gameplay additions. I can't bring myself to be too harsh on it, because it's really impressive stuff, but it's very clear which areas were new / completely redone and which ones weren't based on how they play alone. The most common issue with these new segments is that their level design is at odds with the enemy design, these areas are expanded immensely in a way that seems like it wants to be played it wants you to constantly be moving from cover to cover, yet the enemy AI conflicts with this philosophy, they are by all intents and purposes slightly modified Half-Life 2 soldiers, and as such their main plan is to attempt to ambush you, which obviously doesn't work in these huge open arenas, so instead they just run straight at you directly. The result is a very sloppy, headache inducing gameplay loop that revolves around having to cower behind any cover you can find until the next soldier comes in your line of sight for you to shoot. The original game rewarded precise, tactical play, anticipating your enemies and making the best use of both your weapons and your environment to clear every combat encounter as perfect as possible within that given moment. Black Mesa rewards inactivity and mindlessly unloading on your enemies. Maybe I'm missing something - feel free to contest, but I tried, I really did try to approach the game's gunplay in different ways, and yet I found this was the only way to get through battles smoothly.
It stings because the less altered, smaller areas have good, even great gunplay most of the time. But when in the midst of the new stuff, the cracks within the design really begin to show. I don't want to herald HL1 as some unbeatable, almighty saint, because it isn't, nor do I really want to directly compare the two games, because they are different experiences, I appreciate what Black Mesa adds, but there's a clear disconnect between what made that game so fun in the first place and how Crowbar Collective approaches it. I feel like the designers themselves were aware of the flaws in the AI, because infighting and stealth has been killed off almost entirely, save for some scripted sequences, and they've been split up in a manner in which the enemies are less varied and less interactive with others, making fighting them often feel like a slog.
That general feeling of things dragging on for too long unfortunately leaks into the level design aswell, a lot of the redone areas are there for you to gush about (and yeah, the game's pretty.) but these kinds of changes are overabundant throughout the game and don't do much to justify themselves. Old portions of levels have been also been tinkered with in such a manner in which you now dance around the primary objective doing more arbitrary things for no discernible reason - in Lambda Core for example, instead of simply flicking a switch to turn on each pump and then leaving, you now have to first open the drainage door, ride an elevator to the top of the room, and then turn on the pump, all the while having to deal with Vortigaunts obnoxiously teleporting in. Depending on who you ask, this might be a positive addition, but to me it kills the pacing. Sometimes these modifications can be for the better, Questionable Ethics is legitimately fantastic and I much prefer this version's iteration of On A Rail. But most of the time, it feels like they just don't know when to stop. Surface Tension & Forget About Freeman have had some of it's most interesting sequences removed in favour for large, repetitive arena brawls. Residue Processing removes the (pretty bad) conveyor puzzles, but in the process of trying to "fix" makes a lot of the same platforming mistakes with it's replacement sections. Power Up is slightly restructured in a way that sounds like an upgrade but in execution circumvents a lot of the improvements it tries to make by having to dial down the HECU ambushes, which I feel like removed a lot of what was special about that chapter. But the worst offender?
Xen. The borderworld was overhauled almost entirely, and it shows, because it's Black Mesa's worst encapsulated within an agonizing 4 hours. It starts off great, you are treated to the beautiful scenery, get to explore deteriorating research sites, the puzzles are pretty decent... but it doesn't stop. Once you have gone through the first 30 minutes of Xen you have essentially experienced everything that chapter has to offer. The other hour consists of literally the same exact thing until you finally reach the end. Reach big room, find blocked passageway, find way to open blocked passageway, continue. Obviously they wanted to make Xen a much longer and more complete experience, but they did so in the worst way possible - repetition. But whatever, it's bearable. This same pattern continues into Gonarch's Lair, a lot of it is now running away from the Gonarch and occasionally fighting it for about thirty or so minutes until you make your way to the end where you're able to kill it. It drags, but at least up until to this point it's been somewhat entertaining. What comes next though, I cannot excuse. Interloper is nearly two hours of rotating between the same plug puzzles, tower climbing, and factory sections. Not only that, but it essentially kicks the combat away in favor of using the gluon gun to dispatch annoying swarms of Xen wildlife. I assume it wants to be a power trip like that of Half-Life 2's citadel segment, this becomes apparent in a final ascension part where, in a last struggle you fight off hordes of alien controllers, but it is so excruciatingly mundane that I probably wouldn't have finished the game if I wasn't such a big fan of the series in the first place. I don't want to let this chapter alone heavily affect my thoughts with the game, but by the end of it I was definitely feeling soured.
Nihilanth... is pretty good actually. Way better than the original's fight, I like the touch of the science team teleporting supply canisters and cover spots to you. Easily the best part of Xen, even if it is short, but that's exactly it. None of the other chapters or additions in general should be that long, they're purely just lengthy for the sake of it. There is so much fluff and padding suffocating what should be a fantastic remake, but Black Mesa just keeps burying itself in a plethora of unwise design choices and seems blind to it's own failures as a game. I have an immense amount of respect for the people behind this game, and it certainly is deserving of being sold as a commercial product. The game is almost universally acclaimed, and for a solid reason - it is without a doubt one of, if not the single most impressive fanwork ever made. But I just... can't get behind it.
Sometimes, less is more.
Where Black Mesa misses the mark for me, however are in it's gameplay additions. I can't bring myself to be too harsh on it, because it's really impressive stuff, but it's very clear which areas were new / completely redone and which ones weren't based on how they play alone. The most common issue with these new segments is that their level design is at odds with the enemy design, these areas are expanded immensely in a way that seems like it wants to be played it wants you to constantly be moving from cover to cover, yet the enemy AI conflicts with this philosophy, they are by all intents and purposes slightly modified Half-Life 2 soldiers, and as such their main plan is to attempt to ambush you, which obviously doesn't work in these huge open arenas, so instead they just run straight at you directly. The result is a very sloppy, headache inducing gameplay loop that revolves around having to cower behind any cover you can find until the next soldier comes in your line of sight for you to shoot. The original game rewarded precise, tactical play, anticipating your enemies and making the best use of both your weapons and your environment to clear every combat encounter as perfect as possible within that given moment. Black Mesa rewards inactivity and mindlessly unloading on your enemies. Maybe I'm missing something - feel free to contest, but I tried, I really did try to approach the game's gunplay in different ways, and yet I found this was the only way to get through battles smoothly.
It stings because the less altered, smaller areas have good, even great gunplay most of the time. But when in the midst of the new stuff, the cracks within the design really begin to show. I don't want to herald HL1 as some unbeatable, almighty saint, because it isn't, nor do I really want to directly compare the two games, because they are different experiences, I appreciate what Black Mesa adds, but there's a clear disconnect between what made that game so fun in the first place and how Crowbar Collective approaches it. I feel like the designers themselves were aware of the flaws in the AI, because infighting and stealth has been killed off almost entirely, save for some scripted sequences, and they've been split up in a manner in which the enemies are less varied and less interactive with others, making fighting them often feel like a slog.
That general feeling of things dragging on for too long unfortunately leaks into the level design aswell, a lot of the redone areas are there for you to gush about (and yeah, the game's pretty.) but these kinds of changes are overabundant throughout the game and don't do much to justify themselves. Old portions of levels have been also been tinkered with in such a manner in which you now dance around the primary objective doing more arbitrary things for no discernible reason - in Lambda Core for example, instead of simply flicking a switch to turn on each pump and then leaving, you now have to first open the drainage door, ride an elevator to the top of the room, and then turn on the pump, all the while having to deal with Vortigaunts obnoxiously teleporting in. Depending on who you ask, this might be a positive addition, but to me it kills the pacing. Sometimes these modifications can be for the better, Questionable Ethics is legitimately fantastic and I much prefer this version's iteration of On A Rail. But most of the time, it feels like they just don't know when to stop. Surface Tension & Forget About Freeman have had some of it's most interesting sequences removed in favour for large, repetitive arena brawls. Residue Processing removes the (pretty bad) conveyor puzzles, but in the process of trying to "fix" makes a lot of the same platforming mistakes with it's replacement sections. Power Up is slightly restructured in a way that sounds like an upgrade but in execution circumvents a lot of the improvements it tries to make by having to dial down the HECU ambushes, which I feel like removed a lot of what was special about that chapter. But the worst offender?
Xen. The borderworld was overhauled almost entirely, and it shows, because it's Black Mesa's worst encapsulated within an agonizing 4 hours. It starts off great, you are treated to the beautiful scenery, get to explore deteriorating research sites, the puzzles are pretty decent... but it doesn't stop. Once you have gone through the first 30 minutes of Xen you have essentially experienced everything that chapter has to offer. The other hour consists of literally the same exact thing until you finally reach the end. Reach big room, find blocked passageway, find way to open blocked passageway, continue. Obviously they wanted to make Xen a much longer and more complete experience, but they did so in the worst way possible - repetition. But whatever, it's bearable. This same pattern continues into Gonarch's Lair, a lot of it is now running away from the Gonarch and occasionally fighting it for about thirty or so minutes until you make your way to the end where you're able to kill it. It drags, but at least up until to this point it's been somewhat entertaining. What comes next though, I cannot excuse. Interloper is nearly two hours of rotating between the same plug puzzles, tower climbing, and factory sections. Not only that, but it essentially kicks the combat away in favor of using the gluon gun to dispatch annoying swarms of Xen wildlife. I assume it wants to be a power trip like that of Half-Life 2's citadel segment, this becomes apparent in a final ascension part where, in a last struggle you fight off hordes of alien controllers, but it is so excruciatingly mundane that I probably wouldn't have finished the game if I wasn't such a big fan of the series in the first place. I don't want to let this chapter alone heavily affect my thoughts with the game, but by the end of it I was definitely feeling soured.
Nihilanth... is pretty good actually. Way better than the original's fight, I like the touch of the science team teleporting supply canisters and cover spots to you. Easily the best part of Xen, even if it is short, but that's exactly it. None of the other chapters or additions in general should be that long, they're purely just lengthy for the sake of it. There is so much fluff and padding suffocating what should be a fantastic remake, but Black Mesa just keeps burying itself in a plethora of unwise design choices and seems blind to it's own failures as a game. I have an immense amount of respect for the people behind this game, and it certainly is deserving of being sold as a commercial product. The game is almost universally acclaimed, and for a solid reason - it is without a doubt one of, if not the single most impressive fanwork ever made. But I just... can't get behind it.
Sometimes, less is more.