Happy Birthday Half-life!

HAPPY 15TH BIRTHDAY HALF-LIFE! We here at Black Mesa have some big news![/size]

The Big News:
Last year, Black Mesa was one of the first Steam games to be Greenlit by you, our amazing fans. We’ve had quite a year since then, with a lot happening internally that we haven’t been able to talk about… until now. Black Mesa has been given the opportunity to be sold as a retail product on Steam! This is an incredible honor - one we never expected - but also one we found hard to accept.

We never developed Black Mesa with money in mind. Our team is made up of average, hardworking people, and no one joined the team to make money. For us, Black Mesa is purely a labor of love. We believe this philosophy has significantly contributed to the overall quality and feel of the game.

Our decision to sell Black Mesa rests on two key points. One is we believe we can make the game even better by having full access to the Source engine. This lets us tackle and fix limitations instead of working around them. The second is because frankly, our team could really use the financial help.

The Plan:
Soon you’ll see Black Mesa available on Steam for a relatively low price. But we aren’t dropping all support for the free version. In fact shortly after the Steam release there will be a completely new free version of the game. We also plan to open source our maps and some game assets to the modding community!

Purchasing the Steam version of Black Mesa is more about supporting the team and our efforts than anything else. However, the Steam version will include features that the free version simply can not have. We will be paying careful attention to feedback, and you’ll have a very real say in how the final game turns out.

Long-Term Plans and Xen:
We’ve been overwhelmed by fan anticipation for Xen, and we’re excited so many people are eager to conclude the game. To be totally honest however, Xen is still a ways off. Over the past year, we have spent a HUGE amount of time porting the game to a new engine and fixing hundreds of bugs. The work to port to the new engine was not because of the decision to go retail, this was work that had to be done to get Black Mesa onto Steam and support our future plans.

So, please be patient with us as we work to make Xen a stunning and worthy conclusion to Black Mesa. Until Xen is completed, we have multiple interesting additions planned for the Steam version of Black Mesa, which we will announce later on down the road.

Thanks,
The Black Mesa Dev Team

Congrats, hope to continue to see great things from you guys. You’ve definitely got my purchase.

I’m happy to pay this game, free or not, I don’t care take my money.

Good for you guys. It always staggered me that you gave away such a huge, amazing product. I look forward to clicking on the BUY button once it arrives on Steam. Best of luck in your continued adventure.

I hope to see it soon.

Blargh, I somehow expected this.
Still payin’ though.

Wow, Congratulations! I look forward to buying the new version! As for Xen, we can wait until you all think it’s ready. We believe in the team and in the process.

So you got Valve’s blessing for this? So cool. Expect all of my money!

I’ll certainly buy it! Xen might not be near, but the update to a newer engine makes up for it. What Source engine, though? Will we see any noticeable difference? People wouldn’t say “no” to a few screens showcasing it. I mean, if you are enticing us for the Steam release and Xen is still a ways off, showing us the result of the new engine, the bugfixes and other changes might be nice :stuck_out_tongue:

And how “soon” is soon? Are you using the anniversary to update us on the progress of the game or is this supposed to be a launch announcement? In other words, are we months away from the release or weeks?

https://www.reddit.com/r/Games/comments/1qzt64/source_engine_mod_black_mesa_to_become_a/

Just posted the news on reddit.

You should really fix your title wording. We aren’t taking features away from the free version. The free version of the game has been ported to Source 2013. Right now, that version is functionally equivalent to the released version of Black Mesa we released a year ago. When we got on greenlight, we were forced to move to another engine. Right now, we can’t tell you what that engine is due to our licensing agreement. Being on this new engine allows us to change how the engine works, modify tools, etc; things we plain and simply cannot do for the free version. I plan to open source the black mesa code for the free version. I also want the paid version to be open source (only client and server, nothing else) but we need to talk to VALVe about that. We want both versions of the game to be as moddable as possible. I don’t have a timetable on that part just yet.

Yeah, someone on reddit has already alerted me to that but I can’t seem to be able to change the title.

Nice

Awesome! You’ve earned my money! So …what does “soon” mean? We talkin’ later today, or a few weeks, or a month or two?

“Soon” is currently being hashed out. We are in the process of figuring out what features and functionality we want for the next release (e.g. steam workshop support, steam cloud, etc). Note I’m not confirming or denying that these features will exist in the release, just stating some examples :wink:

Ok, had the delete the old post and make a new one because I couldn’t change the title.

https://www.reddit.com/r/Games/comments/1qzt64/source_engine_mod_black_mesa_to_become_a/

Congrats! Keep it up.

I would just like to say that I would LOVE Workshop integration. Every game should have a Workshop!

Either way, you guys have my support!

I also have to give it up for Good Guy Valve, letting you guys sell a game on their own service, based on their own IP is actually really nice.

If I’m not mistaken, with that you answered my question too: this is not so much a release announcement as it is a progress update. Good to know. I got a bit over-hyped there for a minute, I think :stuck_out_tongue:

Are you guys considering using a crowdfunding website Kickstarter to help you cover your licensing fees from valve?

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.