For multiplayer I’d like to have the vertical recoil removed and the spread increased slightly. Maybe the damage should also be lowered slightly. The grenade-launcher should have more delay after each shot to prevent spam. On the other hand the max-ammo for the grenadelauncher should be increased to 5. Most of the time I always ended up not using the GL because I didn’t want to waste my ammo. Personally the GL was one of my favourite weapons in HL1 and atm there is not much use for it in BM. Hell… Even with the RPG you can carry 6 rockets. Why not 5 grenades for the GL?
My feedback so far for Surface Tension (note that there are things that were problems with the original Half-Life, not just specific to Black Mesa in all cases):
Played on normal.
The first tank you come across when you pop up from the sewers has a crazy trigger-happy machine gunner. If I go into one of the huts, I can’t even sprint across the area without getting gunned down from about 80 health. The only way I could get rid of him was popping out from the hut to fire rockets, but it shouldn’t be that hard-hitting, surely?
During the laser grid/bomb room, you should be able see some kind of bomb/explosives when you open the door after the Scientist has said his warning. Either a window into the next room directly ahead (I think it’s parallel right?) or some actually in the first corridor. It was never immediately apparent that was the problem, and nearly everyone I know playing it first time - the first thing they do in this level is shoot out the first trip mine they see.
In addition to this (specific to Black Mesa), the white out from the massive explosion happens way too fast, almost instantly. There should be a few minor explosions before the big one, otherwise to a new player it just looks like a cheap death and that they are being killed instantly by normal trip mines.
Soon after that, once the Hive Hand is obtained there is a shitty sniper in the alleyway. Honestly, all the snipers in this game are shitty as they aren’t all easy to lob a grenade up to, but this one is the worst. They should be more open canopy like the HL-2 ones to reward cautious eagle-eyed players.
Finally, all over Surface Tension there are ample fun places to have headcrab zombies, which seem to be mostly forgotten about in this chapter. In HL2, they were an ever present threat, even when nastier enemies came along. I think this chapter could benefit from a few, especially around the mined areas where there is bugger all else to fight. If anyone is curious about exact locations, I can list a few.
EDIT (More): With regard to the Osprey, a scientist/security guard could be cowering in the room with the hole in the floor (right before you drop down to deal with the Osprey area), that explains that the Osprey needs to be shot down (eg. “The Lambda Complex is just on the other side, but we ain’t going anywhere with that aircraft dropping soldiers all over the place. We’re gonna need some heavy artillery to take that bastard down” )
The tank machine gunner in this area is able to take pretty cheap shots at you while you’re at the recharge/health stations.
The gun turret just past this point where the Vorts keep teleporting in has a bit of a line of sight issue. The only way to see what the hell is going on (because of the ramp, I imagine) is by standing on top of the ammo boxes in front of it. Seems a bit naff.
When you fall out of the vent after the soldiers shoot through it, the Gargant appears a little quick. I think it needs a beat for the player to turn and face the soldiers, and for the soldiers to think they’ve got the upper hand before the Gargant crashes through. Probably needs more soldiers there in case the player manages to kill them before the Gargant appears. The Gargant should be distracted by a few soldiers throughout the tunnel to give the player a chance to see that its impossible to kill with guns and for some flavour, as opposed to just doing a full-sprint to the end. (also makes it more viable to put the HL2 limited spring back in, hint hint).
I really like the artillery fire, but there just isn’t much to do here. You beeline for the ladder and you’re safe on the top no matter what, and there’s a lot of the area wasted (why would you even go in the water part? What the hell are the floats for?) If its a bunch of red herrings fair enough I guess, but it would frustrate the hell out of me as a new player if I was dicking around there. What if when you start doing the manual wheel to open the doors another Gargant comes crashing through the exit doorway? Would be a nice surprise and force the player back the way they came, perhaps instinctively jumping for the water bit, and having to swim through, around and back out to get back to the artillery console? The Gargant can then crash through the closed gate to get at the player in that area.
Finally, the roof collapsing is now a cheap death compared to the original. In the original, if I remember you could see the sections of ceiling buckle before they collapsed giving the player a chance to figure out what was happening. I would suggest the first section falls as normal, but it also buckles and breaks some of the railing, making an obvious clear way on to the road below, then mortar/brick-dust starts to fall during another quake (alerting the player to get the hell out of there), then the second section falls down. I would also have another section fall down in the road in a similar fashion for one final dodge, and a way for the player to climb back up on to the gangway, and finally exit.
Anyway, thanks for a great game. It’s replaced Half-Life for me, easily.
So I think other people have said this, but anyways.
I’ve been replaying the game on hard, just at the end of Apprehension now, and holy shit Assassins do a LOT of damage. I’m at 100/83, and I poked my head out around the corner and got shot down to 16/0 before I knew what was going on. I think they could do with a nerf on hard.
Man I miss being able to clear out the assassins with the have hand… now the weapon is damn near useless as the projectiles don’t seem to track most targets.
The assassins’ damage was bugged and will be nerfed in the upcoming patch.
Oh, though I didn’t mind it, cause it was right before takeout.
But anyway, as hugest fun of your “Uncut” mods - can you tell me two things:
- Is there any estimate of when it will be in workshop?
- I didn’t try that yet, but will they work right now (if I replace maps in steam version) or not?
One quick suggestion about the alien slaves:
Can you make them hit each lighting when you are in their field of view? Their attacks don’t deal much damage, take long time to charge and can be dodged easily atm.
I think the security guards need a recoil animation.
It looks a little bit stupid, if they shoot with their guns.
I also don’t like how dying npcs switch to ragdolls. It looks like a sandbag that flops to the ground (I am talking about npcs with a death animation like the scientist in Blast Pit).
Both of these are known bugs that we hope to get to in the future.
Some small suggestions:
- can you change the vortigaunts so that they keep facing you while they charge their attacks?
-can you please change the effects on the tau-cannon? The beam of the charged shot should be thinner (maybe just like your current primary attack beam effect)… means it would be nice if you added an even thinner beam effect for the primary fire… Also when I fire my charged tau-cannon the sound is pretty long. I think it would be cool to make the sound shorter to make it sound more powerful (maybe keep the current sound but play it faster, but not sure) Edit: Don’t make it thinner but make it last a shorter time… Play the effect animation faster… - can you add hotglow effect on walls for the tau-cannon? (glowing bullethole impact-effect… it was really usefull in HL1DM, because you was able to see the hotglow-effect from both sides of a penetrated wall. Watching the hotglow-effects you always knew from where you got wallgaussed. )
- It would also be nice to have a thinner Egon-beam effect, because most of the time it’s blocking a lot of the enemies model when you get shot. As an opponent it’s rather hard to aim on the Egon-guy because his beam blocks a lot of your view… But this might be intended… Maybe think of changing it later when the other weapons are more balanced.
- can you reduce specular effect on aliengrunts slightly?
- when you blow aliengrunts into pieces they keep growling like you shot them with MP5 or something…
- i think it’s suggested already but anyways: sounds for splatter effects… check half-life/valve/sound/common/bodysplat.wav
- i think I already suggested this somewhere aswell: 2 different types of blood effects… one small for body hits and one big one for headshots.
- please revert the recent changes to the MP5… Atm it’s way harder pure luck to headshot your opponent on mid range (~300 - 400 units) while holding down your fire-key… Current playeranimations also make headshotting harder than in HL1, because playermodels always lean slightly forward while aiming with their guns. In HL1 the mp5 was about mouse-aim and good tracking (pure skill is when you can manage to follow the enemies head perfectly… it’s not about recoil compensation. Also when you stop shooting the current MP5 in BM your view takes a very long time to degenerate the horizontal viewshift)
- yesterday during the stream i noticed that shotgun primary fire is way more useful than secondary fire… Please buff shotgun secondary fire in some way (maybe more damage OR maybe closer spread pattern OR maybe slightly shorter delay after shot… )
- please remove the blood-decal below the tau-cannon in center-area of undertow… it looks too intended right there…
- please change the dropsound… I know it’s maybe very nitpicky but please can you make it sound like you land with both your feet at once? Ofc you can land with one feet after the other irl but I think in most cases you land with both feet at once… And in a game you land only one time and you are on the ground… To me it’s just irritating to have two sounds when landing… Also, if you are ever going to add bunnyhop in future (i hope) the current dropsound will sound really annoying (you will sound like a running horse)…
btw: I just got 100% of the achievements in Steam Black Mesa 
Make the hecu soldiers use more dialogue please, and put a filter over it. btw. and/or use different voices. (but i thinks thats wip now anyway). so far i like the new voice acting much much better than in the original 2012 release.
btw. i don’t like the medics… and it’s too bad, that there are no balaclava soldiers like in original half life, but i’ve read somewhere here that it’s due to engine constraints… (but then again, the assassins wear masks too?)
Yeah, maybe I’m missing something, but it’s really hard to tell the different soldiers apart. The commander with the red beret stands out, but no one else does.
The reason I point this out is, as with Half-Life 2, shotgun soldiers can be quite nasty. While Half-Life 2 originally had all of the Combine Soldiers looking the same, except for the Elites of course, they eventually repainted the shotgunner variant to help him stand out so players could prioritize him. I don’t know if putting balaclavas on their heads would be sufficient, but a clear visual distinction would help gameplay.
It would be cool too if the security guards give you a magazine for your pistol when you are low on ammo
Speaking of hecu medics, do they only appear when playing on hard? I never saw any soldier healing other nearby marines and don’t know what they look like compared to grunts or grenadiers
There are HECU medics on all difficulty levels, and they will attempt to heal injured opponents by giving them healthkits. They don’t do it too often. They are wearing a red cross on their helmet, I believe.
The combat medics should be using glocks. cause IRL medics are not armed in combat as they are being sent there to heal people no mater the side. as this is an alien encounter yes some soldiers may arm them selves or be given a fellow squad mates gun but I doubt they would be sent in with mp5’s and shotguns as they are the medics.
Aka limit medics to glocks in the first encounters in we got hostiles but later during the surface tension levels give them the mp5’s and shotguns again (enough dead soldiers or scared medics would arm them selves)
Medics need to be more prominate when fighting as if you see one you are either going to shoot them first or shoot them last.
Minor idea for some fun, maybe have the first major encounter with a squad have an event where if the player kills all the squad members but the medic the medic will drop there gun and shout something like “please don’t shoot, I am a none combatant”, this gives the HECU soldiers a more human feel and pulls up the moral implications of what is going on.
I mean really if that first medic is spared it would likely be a good showing of moral high ground for the players the HECU are shooting unarmed people but the player will not. (though admitidly many players would shoot the poor guy)
You… have a really rosy view of combat medics. They haven’t been limited to sidearms since about WWII. Medical personnel are technically protected by the Geneva convention until they draw and fire a weapon, but since the US has been mostly fighting wars against insurgents for the past 40 yrs (i.e. guys who don’t recognize the rules of war…) USM combat medics are pretty much just regular infantry with additional medical equipment these days, fully armed and part of the fight until someone needs triage. Besides which, the absurdity of a medic attached to a unit freely massacring civilians then trying to pull the “noncombatant” card is pretty high…
Not to be the kind of a** who roots for a change and then regrets it, the MP5 has gone too far back towards nerf in the new patch (0.0.2). I love that hard mode is now HARD again, which is great. But with the increased health of the grunts and decreased damage/accuracy of the MP5, it makes me feel like they’re kinda bullet-spongy. It’s turned into a war of attrition where we trade lots of bullets back and forth. Mostly, I think it’s the decreased accuracy, because now when I send a half-dozen rounds at one of their heads, most of them don’t hit and it feels like I’m not doing as much damage as I should. My reward for taking the time to line up headshots isn’t, well, too rewarding any more. To be fair, an SMG isn’t exactly a precision weapon (still kind of odd they aren’t carrying assault rifles…), but it seems like Gordon and his fancy power armor should be able to manage recoil pretty well. With the current accuracy, a lot of the combat takes place just a bit outside of the effective range of the MP5, and there really isn’t another staple weapon that can fill that gap between mid to far range. Really, I’d split the difference between the first release and the new patch, and then I think it would feel much better.
And I know that currently bullet spread is hard coded into the game, but is there any possibility that you would be able to put that somewhere that’s easy to change (like the skill.cfg file?). That way I can tweak values to my hearts content until it feels right to me, and leave you in peace :-D.
Also, I still hate the shotgun. It just feels dramatically under-powered in hard compared to the enemies. I tested it a bit and found that at around 10ft away from a soldier, centered on his head, a single shot was akin to blowing spitwads. Even giving him both barrels (of a single-barrel gun… sigh silly Valve…) only killed him half of the time. And with the delay after alt-fire, that’s a 50% chance that I’ll have most of my health stripped off before I can finish the job. So… lets just say it doesn’t get much use when I can typically kill someone faster at the same range with, well, pretty much any other gun.
Finally, any way for you to turn off dynamic lighting for the guns in MP but leave them in SP? Or split out muzzle-flash dynamic lighting into a menu option so players can choose for themselves whether to use them? They really do add a lot to the ambiance of the setting by flash-illuminating the darkened corridors of BM…
I know that, but keep in mind the following the HECU sent in are being sent in to do a clean up mission on a science facility on intro they have little to no clue about the aliens hell when they are first introduced it is obvious that some of the soldiers haven’t even seen them.
As this is a clean up operation arming none direct combat personnel would be a waste of resources. This isn’t so much A they wouldn’t be armed cause geneva convention thing.
also game is set in 1993 which is before the war on terror so yeah there goes that bit. (yes we where fighting them but not as pronounced or often).
Then there is the fact that OP force which is a half life canon (ish, race X isn’t canon but the events are including the nuke) has medics in the HECU army armed with pistols only. so even teh canon of the game states they should be armed with pistols at least at the start.
As for the pulling the none combatant card, if you just saw your hole squad killed by one guy would you pull that card if you could… I know many people would.
Pretty sure the game is set in the early 2000’s.