Crash in the Half-Life 2 Awakening mod and the Portal 2 comic.

Half-Life Series
#1

On page fourteen of the LAB RAT comic, on the table, next to the portal gun is a Zero-Point Energy Field Manipulator/Gravity Gun. On the wall there is a health charger and a HEV charger. This, the gravity gun, proves that Black Mesa have been stealing things from Aperture. And that makes Half-Life 2 Awakening completley useless, since Mossman tell Shephard that they have a prototype of their latest research, the Gravity Gun. Also, in the down-left corner, there is a combine health panel, which proves that the combine found the Borealis and used some of its technology.

Also, on page 9 you see Chell’s file. There is a lot of ones and zeroes, which can be transalated in to The Cake Is A Lie. Which makes three present Cake references in Portal 2: The above, the scrolling text on the monitors that can be transalated in to the cake recepie and of course, the GLaDOS Emergency Shutdown and Cake Dispensery door.

#2

Mods aren’t canon anyway. Nobody ever said the gravity gun was invented at Black Mesa. You say that Black Mesa stole from Aperture, but it is also possible that Aperture “acquired” Black Mesa’s health and HEV chargers. It is more likely that Black Mesa bought the HEV suits/chargers and health stations from another company.

#3

Recall that the ASHPD has a feature wherein it grabs objects, similarly to the gravity gun, but it lacks the ability to draw them from across a room or punt them. I interpret this as Aperture stole a gravgun from Black Mesa and reverse-engineered some of its tech into the ASHPD. And as Bob mentioned, I’ve always thought of HEV as being a third-party company who both labs might have purchased from.

I’m curious, though; how does the presence of a gravity gun at Aperture prove that Black Mesa was stealing from Aperture? It seems that it would be the other way around.

#4

If Aperture made them, and if Aperture and Black Mesa are rivals, I doubt that Aperture would sell any chargers to their enemies.

Allthough, the Gravity Gun didn’t appear until 2020, when HL2 is set, and the Portal 2 comic is set way before that, even way before Portal 1 who’s set before HL2. I would belive that the comic flashbacks are set at the same time as the Black Mesa incident, if not before that.

#5

There’s nothing to suggest that the gravity gun wasn’t already an invention of Black Mesa that Eli just carried out with him when he fled.

Really, consider the personas of both Black Mesa and Aperture, as they’ve been created by Valve. Aperture is intentionally over-the-top ridiculous (the devs blatantly state this in Portal 2’s commentary), while Black Mesa is its straight-laced counterpart. For even further evidence, compare Cave Johnson to Wallace Breen. It’s far more likely that Aperture was stealing BM’s technology than the other way around.

#6

Old

#7

Wait, wait, wait, is this a mod we’re talking about?? seriously?!? its a mod, mods have nothing to do with the cannon Half-Life series!

#8

Ehh I’m still classifying Black Mesa as my replacement Half-Life but still.

But yeah, Awakening was never canon, especially if Valve ever decides to include Shephard in Episode Three or later.

#9

CLEARS THROAT VERY LOUDLY In Lab Rat, it was just an Easter egg, so stop speculating. And Awakening was non-canon. It hardly even had a story. That is all.
That, and this states that the early Gravity GUn was made from Combine technology. And the Combine weren’t on Earth until after the Balck Meas Incident.

#10

I think I figured it out, in Half-Life 3, you fight Gman who is the president of HEV corp.

His creepy face and suit are made of kevlar and nanocarbon tubes manufactured by the same people who made the HEV suit, which makes him totally indestructible, his only weakness is the power of the Vorts

#11

…Obviously I meant a company other than either of the two we were talking about in this thread. And if Aperture was selling them, it would have been stupid to blacklist Black Mesa, simply because they have so many in HL1. That’s a lot of money they could have made back after buying all those moon rocks.

#12

But the real truth is that he is that nanosuit guy from crysis 2.

#13

Black Mesa ==> Inspired Aperture ==> Inspired Crysis ==> ???
HOW LONG DOES THIS CHAIN GO?[/SIZE]

#14

Allthough, there never were a Gravity Gun in Black Mesa, and the Lab Rat comic makes it look like as if they were working on the technology. So, we can only persume that it is set shortly after the 7 hour war, and that Aperture stole technology from the combine to evolve their weapons.

#15

Actually, no. We wouldn’t assume any of those things.

#16

(ignoring the above)
Well, maybe Aperture did steal from Black Mesa, maybe BM stole from Aperture. Cave being so angry about BM stealing in the pre-recorded messages in Portal 2 for me proves my theory. And about the Gravitygun just being an easteregg: Bullsh*t. Lab Rat plays a big part as history for the Portal storyline, as I’ll call it.
If you guys read that the gravitygun was built by combine technology, then maybe Eli and Kleiner had seen a blueprint of the Gravitygun, the fact of Kleiner having a blueprint just like that in his lab could prove my theory even more. So if they found that blueprint, they could simply build one of their own with the combine technology.

It feals great to be taken seriously here at the Half-Life forums!

#17

How can you be taken seriously when you make no sense?

You are comparing a mod to an actual game. Are you kidding me?

#18

Forever I’m afraid. I’m sure there’s a chain linking Crysis to the Golden Girls.

#19

https://half-life.wikia.com/wiki/1998#1998
This might help you improve your theories. Altough I think they are mostly correct.

#20

Cave Johnson is an unreliable narrator. He’s a bitter old man so clearly wrapped up in his delusional science schemes that nothing he says can be taken seriously. His accusations of Black Mesa “stealing from Aperture” are more than likely meant to be humorous: really, it was Aperture stealing from Black Mesa and attempting to pass off the technology as their own, then pulling the “they stole from us!” card when Black Mesa’s technology ultimately became more viable and successful.

It all fits in the ridiculous “persona” Valve have created for Aperture science. Look all over Aperture, and you’ll see references to Black Mesa everywhere: they’re obsessed with their competition with BM, and constantly struggle to gain the same status and recognition that BM has gained. Look around BM, and you won’t see Aperture mentioned anywhere; it’s because Aperture doesn’t even register. They’re a pathetic has-been research company whose funding and status have long since dried up.

Aperture started out as a shower curtain manufacturing company. They transport materials around their lab in a ridiculous series of vacuum tubes. The Repulsion Gel was originally a diet aide. Cave Johnson purchased millions of dollars worth of moon rocks for no good goddamned reason, just to see what would happen.

Nothing about Aperture is meant to be taken seriously; everything has a humorous edge. The only thing of any consequence that ever happened at Aperture was the accident involving the Borealis, the details of which haven’t been divulged yet. It’s a horribly run company that Cave Johnson threw all of his fortune into, and before it collapsed, it had been hemorrhaging money since day 1.

Really, if you’ve graduated middle school, this all just falls out.

Founded in 2004, Leakfree.org became one of the first online communities dedicated to Valve’s Source engine development. It is more famously known for the formation of Black Mesa: Source under the 'Leakfree Modification Team' handle in September 2004.