Did you find Black Mesa "scary enough?"

Black Mesa Archive The Cafeteria
#1

Hey guys, new to the forum and I’d like to share my thoughts so far on BMS.

First off, I really don’t need to tell you guys what a brilliant job you’ve done. So I’ll just skip to what I intended to write.

Did you guys feel that Black Mesa Source is scary, or is scarier/less scarier than the original Half-Life? Here are my thoughts.

Although BMS is a great game, I just feel like it’s not as scary as the original. Going through the tram ride in the original Half-Life and hearing that deeply depressing/ambient music really scared (and still scares) the fuck out of me, and really makes me feel like I’m extremely… alone; that was something I didn’t feel at the beginning of BMS. The music throughout the game is good, but it has more of a badass feel than a scary, more intense feeling; it’s as if Gordon Freeman was the composer. Also, I’m not sure if it’s just the modeling of Half-Life, but it’s imperfections almost make it scarier than a more realistic looking game.

Anyways, just my thoughts. What do you think?

#2

It needed a few more scary headcrabs jumping from vents…

Overall It was great but a few scary scenes got missed out but a few new scary ones got added

#3

it was scary good that’s what it was

every room of every map had that “visual vista” feel that valve had in key parts of their games

if not for the technical problems and lag issues I would accuse the dev team of working with Valve in secret

#4

the scariest part of HL for me was actually Xen, so I’ll have to wait how it turns out.

A few ohhh shiiiiiit moments in BM were the newly placed Gargchase in ST, the first Ichy encounter and when you set free the Agrunt in QE. And I found the zombies in the beginning of UC a LOT scarier than in HL.

#5

Developers still have to learn, so they were not that good at setting up mood and at sorting gameplay according to storytelling rules.
Today watched some of HL walkthrough and its levels above BM at many departments. Although Ive replayed it years ago for like million times till got bored to even touch again, now after all of those years I feel like I`d have more fun replaying HL again than playing BM through for the second time.

#6

Not really scary, cause most areas are well lit

DooM 3 had such area were it was really dark and u could see a bit with ur flashlight and suddenly a monster was behind u or the ceiling felt down…

Same with AvP2, I still love those game. Playing as human scared me at most!

#7

I think this is very difficult to compare like this.

HL1 was scary at its time, and we therefore think of it as scary. I play it often and I no longer find it that scary. BM had a sense of new-ness and re-added some element of surprise and scariness to me, not to mention the awesome effects.

I agree that HL1 did an amazing job at making you feel alone and “without answers” in a situation where everything is crumbling and you have no idea what to do.

HL2 took this away completely by adding in sidekicks (Alyx, Barney, Father Gregory) and a more complex story line involving the entire Combine looking for you, being famous and all.

I think BM kept HL1’s feeling of loneliness very nicely, especially that they were not afraid to keep all the longer and less action-packed sequences, where you just wonder around exploring things without anything attacking you for quite some time. They actually made those interesting, and left you time to think, increasing immersion.

Scariness is a complex thing, it can be caused by this feeling of loneliness, or simply by the awesome effects. In that sense, I’d say BM adds to the scariness thanks to the awesome effects (blood, cinematic effects, etc…).

I think we need to be aware how HL1 was a big deal at its time, compared to our “video game literacy” that’s already in place today. It takes a lot more to scare us today than it did then!

Also, yes, bad graphics can be scary, take a look at Afraid of Monsters. But that’s because your imagination takes over where there’s missing information. But that’s another story!

#8

Honestly I think Half Life delivered extremely well in some chapters, but under achieved in others

In some chapters like Questionable Ethics, you couldn’t go 10 seconds without encountering a scientist or guard.

It was similar in Office Complex, but the incident literally happened less than an hour before, so everyone was in a panic. And of course offices would be filled! It just seemed that certain chapters didn’t help convey the whole “alone” aspect of it.

But that said, my main reason for loving QE was the constant companionship.

It’s just easier when you have someone beside you

Man, I’ve been playing too much multiplayer stuff
Bitch about your teammates, yet always stay near them

#9

I think horror should’ve played more of a part in BM. While the original Half-Life didn’t focus on horror alot of the time, that can be attributed to the engine, which didn’t allow for very horrific lighting or other scary qualities at the time, as well as Valve not really thinking of exactly what they want Half-Life to be. If Valve had completely remade Half-Life the same way they did CS and DoD in Source, it probably would have been a horror game, as Half-Life has the potential to be a horror game. In BM, while they did a great job bringing the whole sci-fi action packed adventure feel to it, I wouldn’t have minded if they made an effort to be a horror game as well.

#10

The only honestly scary bits for me were the Ichthyosaur encounters (yes, every one of them, I’m a big wuss), and then probably the Garg chase scene.
Even so, it wasn’t a true sense of fear at the total environment, and I often didn’t experience fear for too long in comparison to a game like Penumbra which just holds that sense of fear and only makes you want to cry every increasing minute.

The ichthyosaurs are scary looking and combined with generally poor water visibility or in general the water tends to make me panic, but they were so weak (health wise),it didn’t take long for me to get over my 2 seconds of dread and just shoot the dumb things.
Garg chase was less scary and more “oh god oh god just run”. More of an energetic kind of fear, not a “be scared for the sake of scariness”, if that makes any sense whatsoever.

Granted, HL isn’t exactly a horror genre game, and I wasn’t expecting much of a scary game, so that’s probably why I wasn’t as scared overall.

#11

I thought they were equally scary.

#12

I agree that the original was more scary than Black Mesa. I don’t know if it’s the graphics or the music, or the fact that this time I knew when and where most monsters would come at me :stuck_out_tongue:

But yeah, Black Mesa feels much more action packed, and a lot less scary than the original.

#13

Lol, HL is not a horror game. In terms of scariness, its more about atmosphere and anticipation players can feel during theyr playthroughs. In terms of atmosphere, there isnt any consistency, no, atmosphere is simply inappropiate. At beginning of BM, atmosphere was great, really left impression of viable workplace, however when shit blew up and went crazy, atmosphere didnt change to reflect that. It was like running through corridors and fighting zombies without feeling any emotions. There wasnt any atmosphere and game didnt improve much at that department through whole game. As for anticipation, I didnt see any properly executed buildups in game. For example, if you didnt expect anything and atombomb blows up in your country, your reaction would be "WTF, complete nonsense, shit", but if there were previous warnings and predictions for such danger to happen, then there would be anticipation to this event and when it happens, reaction would be "Holy shit, it really happened! What do I do now, Im gonna die, help!".

  • in BM there are no buildups, game doesn`t prepare player for events ahead, we can just fly through corrdors free as birds and thereby any suprise elements in game are WTF moments, without having any buildups to make palyer to expect something to happen.
#14

With no Poison HC/Zombies? Just about right, like original.

I loved the atmosphere of post-RC, pre-RC, and the rest of the game. I felt sufficiently alone, and companioned at the same time.

All I wish for is I could spit back at the Bullsquids!

#15

I’d be careful not to go too far down that path, though, pRopaaNs. One of the moments in Black Mesa that I thought was most disimproved from Half-Life was the first military encounter. In half-Life, it was a total surprise, and a horrifying one. In Black Mesa, it was insanely cheesily overly-built-up, with it all but stated that the military would be evil before they got here. (“The military coverup is just a rumor - right?”) As a result, the corresponding moment in Black Mesa isn’t horrifying, just disappointing. It feels less like a betrayal and more like a “yup, as expected”.

#16

Im sorry, Ill have to pass on answering this, because I dont want to go into details when I barely remember those bits from HL and BM. But if I have to say something, then its that, military betrayal or not, purpose of those buildups is to build emotional experience while playing game. And there was buildup for HL military betrayal, because it was intentional to build up impression of military as rescue squad till cover was blown, because purpose of that was to make us experience this kind of emotional experience of beign backstabbed or whatever you could describe it. It wasn`t like it came from nowhere and without explaination, as it changed direction of game completely and it was plot directed turn of events.

#17

i am wuss, i loved the scaryness, it wasnt to scary it was just fun!

#18

What? Doom 3 was not scary at all. It was let down entirely by level design. EVERY SINGLE TIME you walk into a new room, you knew to turn around because there’d be a monster already there or just about to spawn in the corner. That’s not scary, that’s predictable. The fact that there ISN’T a headcrab in every vent in the game actually makes BM scarier as you simply can’t predict it.

#19

Hard to believe that someone dont find DoomIII scary. Predictable or not, it isnt suprise factor which scared me at game, but atmosphere and monsters. Beign alone on planet full with demons from hell and inside dark crampy corridors, heck, even going into hell itself.
You must be numb to fear, man.

#20

HL1 was more scary. HL1 and 2 are different genres.

Half-Life was aimed at the Lovecraftian Horror/Sci-Fi world, while HL2 was aimed at the cyberpunk world. BM Devs tried to do HL1 as it would have been if it was like HL2.

I think thats their mistake, they think that because HL2 was made by Valve recently it means that is the way Valve would have done HL1 remake today. But it isn’t, Valve are more complex at giving each Half-Life game its own theme. Each Half-Life game(not counting Episodes) is practically its own genre. But i didn’t expect it to be a true HL1 total conversion, its still fun to play the way it was if it was more like HL2. So i accept it for what it is, not for what it could have been.

But Black Mesa is not a HL1 total conversion, its a re-invision of the perspective of HL2 done in HL1 if it was made today.

Basically, HL1 and Doom 3 have more in common. While HL2 and Deux Ex: Human Revolution has more in common. They were made with different ideals.

HL1 and Doom 3 both were about the accidents and the dark mystery. HL2 and Deux Ex: Human Revolution is about the human puppet states and the bigger movement of bad guys in a heavily digitized world (Although HL2 is more like George Orwells book ‘1960’, or whatever it was called, while Deux Ex is more aiming at William Blake’s corporate dystopia)

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.