A lot of the guides and other fanmade materials from the HL1 era seem to advocate actively killing them as soon as they are no longer useful (security guards, too, but that might also be because they drop ammo), but just judging by screenshots and other materials posted here very few people do that in Black Mesa.
Am I right in this assumption? What are your reasons for doing one or the other?
I always went out of my way to save them (and have gotten fairly good at doing so with scientists who probably aren’t supposed to be savable, like the one who runs in front of the turret in Office Complex), and was actually disappointed that so many of the ones in BM are now part of scripted sequences and cannot be saved no matter how skilled you are. I guess it just fit in with the character of Gordon as an ordinary civilian trying to work his way through this massive disaster.
I don’t begrudge anyone engaging in a little workplace massacre after a bad day but I mostly try to keep everyone alive.
In my opinion the tone of Half Life’s (and Black Mesa’s) story allows the player to feel good for helping people out and alternatively not feel like a monster for indiscriminately slaughtering your colleagues. So wonderfully 90’s.
I don’t really get why you would kill them, even in the original Half Life. If you want to massacre people, play through Surface Tension. Not only there do you get to feel like an action hero badass, but the Marines there deserve for the indiscriminate slaughter of innocent people.
I have never seen the need to kill scientists or security guards. They’re not actively trying to kill me so I leave them be. If the HECU and aliens weren’t trying to kill me, I’d leave them alone, too…but then it wouldn’t be much of a video game. Regardless, it just seems unnecessary and they could potentially help you along the way.
I’m trying to save as much people as possible even when it’s dangerous for my health and I will use more ammo because it will be better to have someone to talk instead of having a dead body near from you.Also when I played HL1 and especially Opposing Force I’ve tried to not use my allies at all and killed all of my enemies alone and only then I escorted them without casualties.
I don’t kill them, not just because they have some neat dialogue, but also because I’ve actually developed a liking for a few characters. (to name a few: the security guard in Office Complex behind the fence, the security guard in Surface Tension you meet after acquiring the hivehand and the security at the end of Surface Tension you meet in the hangar building. In fact, I’ve grown so emotionally attached (lol.) to the last security guard, I even found a way of saving him: Right after the alien grunt teleports into the security booth to smash the shit out of the guard, you can headshot the grunt with the shotgun’s alt fire to kill him in just one shot, saving the guard from getting the shit beaten out of him. Unfortunately, as expected, this is a scripted scene and saving the guard isn’t even meant to be an option. Because of that, the guard doesn’t react to being saved, he just stands there, looking around, not saying a single word (UNTHANKFUL TWAT).
I’ve gotten pretty good at saving scientists who were meant to die as well. Especially in We’ve Got Hostiles there are plenty of scientists running straight into the marines’ (more or less) open arms. You can save quite a few of them when you’re fast enough.
I do agree with Flow, however. That Gluon scientist has an EXTREMELY high tendency of making me “accidentally” hit Mouse1… “It appears that you don’t have any trouble killing things” - WELL SPOTTED. NOW TAKE A GUESS WHAT LIVING CREATURE I WILL BRING MYSELF TO USE IT ON…
I did exactly the same thing. I suppose if a player is skilled enough (i.e. not me) it wouldn’t be much of a difference compared to, say, saving the scientists in WGH, but it just makes sense to clear the way first.
I’m not entirely sure if this makes tactical sense in a less game-logic-based scenario where more aliens can teleport in at any time and any moment you aren’t within sight of a scientist is a moment you can’t shoot the Vortigaunt that materialized right in front of them, but it still seems like the right way to go about it.
Also, even though I originally wondered about the futility of saving people who are kind of going to get bombed later on anyway, I do think that by leading them to much safer areas (and of course saving many of them from immediate danger!) deeper underground and far away from the eventual bombing you would have a measurable positive impact on their survival chances.
If anything, I wish the developers would have made the facility staff more mobile, so that you could get up a good crowd of scientists and leave them all under the protection of a small army of security officers- both the ones who are trapped behind a ladder or some small piece of debris, and the ones who steadfastly refuse to follow you for no good reason. (Although, if you’re willing to cheat a little, binding “ent_fire !picker gagdisable; ent_fire !picker enablefollow” to a convenient open key will convince nearly all of them of your good intentions…)
Yeah, a lot of the more rigid scripting kind of bothers me. Case in point, the scientist who gets spooked by the sniper in Surface Tension- killing the sniper will cause him to run into the minefield, but since the mine that kills him only spawns an instant before he steps on it even firing a rocket onto that exact spot well ahead of time will not save him.
Another one that bothered me was the pair of scientists in the vent in Office Complex- back in HL1 I was able to reliably save the one assisting by killing the one he was trying to pull out, and that has now been removed. It made a weird sort of sense in-universe as well, but I never found a good, in-universe reason why Gordon couldn’t put down his gun for a moment and lend a superstrong, power-armored hand to the extraction effort*. Even if whatever is in that vent** is strong enough to make whatever part you’ve grabbed part company with its owner, that’s still the assisting scientist saved.
*Other than engine limitations, of course, and even then it wouldn’t be that hard to rig up an OnUse input that changes the result of the scripted sequence.
**Just what is in those vents dragging full-grown humans around, anyway? Zombies? How are they getting in?
Haha, I’ve been wondering what that creature is that pulls people into ventilation shafts as well.
Remember that ventilation shaft in Unforeseen Consequences with the scientist on the ladder? youtube.com/watch?v=Q4n20Ws2g0s#t=24m50s
(the part in question is at 24:50)
Now, ask yourself: how the shit did they even manage to get themselves into that situation?!
Here’s my theory: After the resonance cascade, some scientists thought it was a good idea to climb up into the vent using the ladder, feeling it’s safer up there. Unfortunately for them, they failed to realise that headcrabs can teleport anywhere in the facility. A headcrab teleported into the vent and zombified one of the hiding scientists. Another scientist (the one that’s being dragged into the vent) quickly crawled away, trying to exit the vent. His colleague who was still outside, probably about to enter the vent as well, quickly climbs up the ladder to drag him out, aaaaaand then both die.
Another reason I believe it’s a zombie who’s pulling the scientist in Unforeseen Consequences AND Office Complex is because in the beginning of We’ve Got Hostiles it’s shown that zombies seem to enjoy pulling people into vents and turning them into… well, gibs.
Sounds a bit weird, doesn’t it…
But yes, I feel like Gordon could easily help the scientists (at least the ones in Office Complex). But, then again: NOT EVEN THE SECURITY GUARDS DO SOMETHING. Which is funny, because they actually DO react to the scientists being pulled into the vent. I believe they say something along the lines of “Oh, that does not sound good!” (as a reaction to hearing the scientists’ screams) and “Oh shit, that thing tore them to pieces! I don’t think we should stick around…” But they don’t lift one finger to help the scientists, lol.
“When it comes to protecting science, this guy’s on your side.”
But when it comes to protecting SCIENTISTS, that’s a whole different story. Lol.
I always do that in Office Complex, and other chapters as well. It is such a sad to see that this is no longer possible in Black Mesa. And here I thought I was the only one doing the utmost to save them, even to the point of almost sacrificing myself. So glad to see I am not the only one!
I have a friend who argues that killing them is doing a favor for them. In the end, they will most likely die horribly in the nuclear explosion, and even if they somehow escape, they will have to face the Portal Storms or the Seven Hour War. Which brings us to a philosophical question, is it justifiable to kill someone to stop them from suffering from a yet-to-happen future disaster?
Whenever I play Sven-Coop with him, he is always discouraged that he cannot kill them (which is a good thing for me, haha).
The scene in Unforeseen Consequences is another one that bothers me to no end- Gordon can’t even grab the ladder to prevent it from falling on the one who survives.
I never really saw it that way, and not just because I’ve gotten into the habit of ignoring the events of Half-Life 2. Apparently scientists are able to exit the facility via the rail system, and so long as they stayed deep underground they actually would have a pretty decent chance of surviving the nuke and being able to wait the military action out. It’s also important to remember that HL2 does actually have a lot of people in it, and they had to come from somewhere. I mean, yeah, their chances of surviving until the 2030s wouldn’t be great, but honestly I doubt a lot of the older ones would be alive then even if they got to retire to the Gulf of Mexico.
I save them. I just get, you know, emotionally attached to the scientist/security I meet on my journey. I just wish there were more places where you could actually ‘save’ them, including the scientist that was holding on to dear life before he fell in the elevator shaft.
The one location in the entirety of Half-Life where I could reasonably have made the case for killing a friendly NPC was probably the first security guard after climbing up the elevator shaft in UC (“Why are they wearing science team uniforms?”). Killing him grants you early access to the Glock, which is actually quite useful in that opening segment. In all of the other scenarios, I saw absolutely no point in murdering anyone (plus back during the timeframe when I first started playing the game, it generally left a bad taste in my mind whenever innocents died).
But in Black Mesa, the same situation is completely different. The fact that you are unarmed-- plus the general survival horror atmosphere-- gives you an incredibly strong incentive to keep him alive as long as you possibly can: he has infinite ammo, and you only have some flares. Letting him die puts you at an enormous disadvantage. Not only that, but he is your only buddy against an evil horde of zombies that is out to kill you, and it’s immediately established that the two of you will be working together to figure out what to do. Some people hate the changing of the crowbar placement, but I thought that it was one of the most genius moves that the BM devs made.
I always try to save them. The only time I kill them is if I loose my shit and murder them because they would get stuck/stop following me. I always saw the guards and scientists as kinda like the soldiers in XCOM, because in XCOM, when one of your men die, you tend to get hit in the feels. The same applies to the NPC’s in this game (at least to me). Besides, its always nice to have an entire army of scientists talking to each other as they follow you :3
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.
