Xen has got to be done, they have been working on it since… around 06, 07. I remember applying for a mapping position (yeah I get laughs out of it now to) and they were mainly looking for people who had a great use of geometry and what not. At that time was when I kept quiet and eagerly been waiting just for the Xen levels that I got denied to.
Great big news! 
This is the closest thing to a progress update we’ve seen yet in like 380 days!
Heck, for all we knew there were still entire levels from Xen at 0% (which i was beginning to think), but apparently not!
Or is this statement something we should also take with a bag of salt, like you said we should do with every non-official statement?
Also, will you know when to stop improving things in the mod, it’s tempting to never stop, no?
Great news ram, so its fair to say that the current mod build in relation to my hypothetical potato cooking is at the point of applying butter to the finished product… yum.
That’s good news, but given the point of this thread, now everyone needs to stumble across it in the ‘An Outsider’s Point of View on Black Mesa Release’. Might make more sense to throw that on twitter.
They’re done with Twitter, dammit!
maybe find some way to put it on the wiki 
well ive been following this mod for about since late 2008. been meaning to get around to starting acount but im lazy. id say if they give us updates that would be so awesome. but if they don’t, its understandable because of the disappointment of release dates and things of that nature. im with the group of people that really Loves the updates but wont wont rip someones head off if we dont get them. no biggie. cause all my anger is allready reserved for ep3 and or halflife 3 
All I want is to know that this mod is not going down the path of perfectionism. The problem with “when it’s done” release dates is that there’s no single definition of “done”. One team can release a mod when it’s 99% done, and another will drill down to 99.99999% done, re-polishing everything until it’s polished raw.
FUCK YEAAH (:
What a wonderful news, Ram! I feel pretty happy right now, and I’m gonna tell this news to my friends, so they can be happy too Thanks for such a nice update!:3
If Raminator’s post isn’t an update, I don’t know what is.
:fffuuu: Third millennium here we come!
So right now your’re like Gearbox tweaking Duke Nukem Forever?
don’t try to read too much into it. just take it for face value. it sounds promising, and that’s good enough for me. the devs have gotten really good at not giving out too much, lest they accidentally give out incorrect info. that’s part of the reason they didn’t do another public release date, after all.
i’m not worried. last time i heard they hadn’t even started on xen, so y’know, they’re coming along nicely IMHO.
i mean, when you stop to think about the scope of what they’ve been doing, it’s pretty mind boggling. they’re giving us the ability to see the half-life story with fresh eyes. and they’re doing a good job at it too. i honestly can’t think of another remake of any game, commercial or non-commercial, that has not only not exploded into flames/faded into obscurity, but, dare i say it? improved upon the original. i’m pretty confident in what i’m saying here. you really can’t rush this kind of thing. while i know that’s not what people are really trying to do, my strategy for the last four or five years has been to kind of just sit back and watch all the pieces fall into place.
the wait will be worth it. when the mod is finally release you’re going to be glad they didn’t spill every little detail.
Ok, now I am pissed. What took so long for a dev response???
J\K!!!
Naw, The dev pretty much covered what I needed to hear, and hopefully most of the community. I know there will still be some naysayers who think the mod dead, but for my purposes it’s a done deal. Good to hear from the big wigs.!
Here’s Raminator’s reaction to the thread “Mod update: please read everything” discussing his quote :
I don’t agree: Entire Xen-levels could still have been in starting phase or not even started yet, but apparently they are not, so yes that is news to everyone.
so why is it still on the main page? if they had the time to update it for christmas, they could’ve as well removed the twitter box.
I don’t know why but when I think of twitter all that comes to mind is fiddling a twat. That’s it. Nothing major. That’s why I don’t take twitter seriously.
Well here is your quote:
I get from the bold text that that there are no levels that haven’t even begun yet or are still in starting phase.
If i’m mistaken then what’s the point of the bold text, if it doesn’t have any meaning and is so generic then you could as well have said that at the very beginning of the development of the mod, “we’re just fixing and improving things of Half-Life”