Black Mesa Source is released

[Gary]

Haven't got far, but I must say; the intro/train ride mapping was some of the best mapping I've seen...

[Epifire]

My downloads are still not unpacking for some reason. They turn up invalid and will not extract. Seems like a bunch of other people on Moddb are having the same issue, so I am hoping the devs will provide a new download or help out in some other way to resolve it.

[joe_rogers_11155]

i downloaded via desura. worked perfectly.

this is without a doubt the greatest Source mod that has ever been made, and it may never be topped by anyone...not even Valve.

Unless Valve makes a new engine, that is...then the BMS will have to make Half-Life 2: Source 2. They will become the HL2:S2 team.

[Shr3d]

Until* VALVe releases their new engine

[Armageddon]

Finished it, just amazing other than no floating babies until the final battle. And cutting the whole vent crawling section. And the undetailed place at the start of Blast Pit. But amazing and I'm glad there was no Xen, the game is long enough as is and the ending felt like an ending.

[Wills]

Finished it with goosebumps almost too prickly to handle. It was worth the wait. Just incredible; an astonishing and monumental recreation of a masterpiece. It was exciting, exhilarating, challenging and beautiful. I'd forgotten how smart and brutal the grunts and assassins were. The difference between the scripted cannon fodder of some of today's COD clones versus enemies that rapidly path find, work together, attempt to flush you out and strike fast made the wonderfully paced battle's feel panicked and terrifying.

I only came across two game breaking moments throughout the whole experience: I got stuck on the second crusher during Residue Processing and couldn't get past it without NOCLIP and I blew up the Tank in the Transit Maintenance Center towards the end of Surface Tension/Forget about Freeman before it blew up the wall, thereby creating a path for me.

Although the pacing and original work is that of Valve's (and it doesn't feel aged at all), the work the Black Mesa developers have put into this is just beautiful... I'm happy with where it ended too, although I know Xen is coming, it seemed right to leave it here, it almost curtails better in Half-Life 2. I leap into the teleporter and BAM I'm on a train outside City 17... what the fuck? That would be awesome.

Astonishing. I'm off to start playing it again.

[zombie@computer]

Those assasins are pretty much impossible to defeat on hard, lol. I'm not that much of a fps player but man, i died a few thousand times in that last part near the lambda core.

I've had the game crash on me quite often tho, really shame because the rest of the game surpasses amateur level.
Mapping is top notch. Especially lambda core levels are awesome. Shame they left in the teleport 'maze'; Didnt like it in hl1, dont like it in bms.

On a sidenote:

Anyone also had trouble finding the pumps in the lambda core? The signs say the pumps were up, but at least in #2 they were very much 'down'. I actually used a barnacle to get me to the top floor, only to realize i had to go back down because the entrance to the pump was at -2.

On a more important matter:

What is the hidden hat mentioned in the achievements?

[Chrille]

I always set-up tripmines and position myself in a corner when dealing with assassins. Makes it fun to fight them, and lure them into traps. The teleporter maze I also found really easy the large HECU fights were a bitch, though, on hard. And lambdacore was a clusterfuck of me trying to find my way around the pump areas

The hat is in the container bay in Lambda Core where the assassins are:
http://i.imgur.com/8WrmB.jpg

[cpl. punishment]

On a more important matter:

What is the hidden hat mentioned in the achievements?

I don't know if there's more than two, but there's one in the image Chrille posted, and a second one through one of the teleports in lambda core (either 5 or 6, IIRC).

[Smurftyours]

The pump areas were fucking confusing.

[Armageddon]

The teleport maze is my favorite part of Half-Life 1.

[srredfire]

My opinion is that it was an excellent re-imagining of Half-Life, but I disagree with Arma and Wills 100%. I think that the ending was literally the worst ending of a game and/or mod EVER.

The ending is the equivalent of if you were playing Ocarina of Time, and right after you collect all the medallions and the bridge to Ganon's Castle is created, you walk inside the front doors, and the credits start.

Or you walk into Bowser's Castle and the credits start.

Basically just pumps you up saying, "YEAH LET'S KICK SOME ASS" and then you just STOP.


They should have just waited. It had been, what, 7 years? A few more years wouldn't have mattered. They should have waited until all of it was done and then we could have a full game instead of cutting the last 1/4th of the game off and now we have to wait AGAIN for God knows how long.

It was a bad move and I think it was really stupid for them to do this.

That being said what they released was amazing and I love it and blah blah.

[Vicpop]

The hat is hidden in a cargo crate at the beginning of lambda complex.

[Epifire]

Hope they get some good way for people to be able to play from the Xen off of their save point in the end of this version otherwise I agree, it would be a pretty bad move to release most the game and then overright that with the full version later. Then all those people that played it through before may be much more hesitant to play it again just to go to Xen, but I know I would anyway just because I am a hardcore fan. That reminds me I still need to finnish the original HL 1 cause I stopped on the Interlopers chapter. I am no old fan and played the HL series backward so give me a break.

[otihome2469]

Just beat it and like many have said already, wow. It truly felt like a valve game and it had plenty of 90's nostalgia all the way through. The game was actually pretty challenging on normal unlike most games today which was a welcome change. Major props to the BMS team.