Just reposting the actually relevant stuff that got moved…
Just given the area in which the dead scientists seem to be congregated, I don’t know if I’d go with the taunting graffiti. It’d be more effective, as it is in BM, just in the tunnels. Also more jarring if there are otherwise no HECU hostiles in the area: giving it time to sink in rather than it being just another incidental detail that’s easily missed in a firefight. The evidence of the extermination of the civvies in the office complex works well enough in this area. Not to tell you how to do your job, but I think it might work a bit better if the ‘execution wall’ wasn’t just out in the main hallways. This is an active HECU strongpoint, and they’ve had time to fortify. It doesn’t really make sense that they’d just leave corpses lying around in the open. Maybe use that conference room.
If you DID want to add more of the graffiti though, (and I’m going to break my own rule and make a scene suggestion that’s more than just aesthetic or layout-based) maybe make it an otherwise deserted area with traps? In other words, the HECU have left a body there with a taunting message, but rigged it with tripmines or a sentry gun, so any BMRF personnel that try to investigate and/or remove it trigger the trap.
Right, but who’s to say that they didn’t do that? That’s the point, it leaves the scene itself up to the player’s imagination.
Though as you said, lots of Valve’s storytelling is scripted sequence based, a large reason they’re such excellent storytellers is that the environments tell their own story too. Just think of Ravenholm - the vast majority of the exposition the player gains during that chapter is just from the environment alone. Using environmental cues coupled with scripted sequences is a very powerful medium for storytelling. Overloading the player with scripted sequences makes it a Call of Duty game, and there’s nothing wrong with that - but it’s not what Half-Life is about.
Each player will visualize that scene slightly differently, because everyone interprets stuff differently. Yet the basic premise of the scene can never be lost, that’s why I like it. However you try and visualize the way the scene panned out - it ALWAYS ends with the 4 dead scientists in a line.
It could work being a scripted sequence, I’m not saying it won’t. But I really like it the way it is now. Plus, given the fact the HECU already appear to be extremely occupied with fighting the aliens, it really wouldn’t make sense for them to execute the scientists as the player arrives, and then start fighting the aliens. It would require a large overhaul of the entire office sequence in order to fit in. In addition, as MSKyuuni said, there aren’t any particularly brilliant lines I could use for that scene either.
There’s no evidence whatsoever that the office complex is an active HECU strongpoint. From the moment you enter it to the moment you’ve left, the HECU are struggling to fight the aliens, and are never once in control. You’lll also find HECU corpses absolutely littered around the complex, and no signs of fortification AT ALL, save for in the very first room by the stairs down to the railway tracks. If anything, I’d say the implications are they’d pretty much just finished clearing out the office (i.e. killing the scientists) and were in the process of beginning to clean up and fortify when the aliens started giving them trouble. It would make sense that they hadn’t moved the corpses just yet. In addition, if I were to add the graffiti in the hallway, that would create the implication that the scientists were left there to create a message for any would-be “rebels” so to speak (i.e. Gordon himself). Hence why they’re in a very obvious place. It seems to me that it would work fine with the graffiti out there in the hallway, for that reason.
Thanks, but I wouldn’t be too sorry! This thread’s been very up and down, much moreso than the ST thread. It all seems to have cooled down now, for “obvious” reasons, so it should be smooth sailing from here on in.
@Test: Thanks for responding. I think you are right… After all, Valve is famous for leaving players to stich up the story from clues around, and to follow in their example would be considered wise. After all, this is your mod, and you clearly have a good reason not to implement it, so I am not complaining. @MSKyuuni So the voices are in the same sound file as the elevator falling? I guess that would make sense. Well, thank you.
Text, what would your thoughts be on a lone HECU soldier, dead with a pistol in his hand (14 rounds), and a Shotgun or MP5 prop by his side? The implication being that he was cut off and surrounded, out of ammunition, and chose to end his life on his own terms rather than let the Aliens get to him.
It might be a bit morbid, but it’s not past HL to have such a scene (there’s one in HL2 with a dead rebel and a revolver, and one in EP2 featuring a rotting corpse and a shotgun, with some nasty splatter on the wall behind). I don’t think BM had such a scene.
I just came up with what I think is an EXCELLENT idea which I figured I’d share with you guys to gain some community feedback.
I didn’t really like the dynamite guy on the E map in HL1. His positioning was random and the way it was setup forced you to backtrack for ages, as well as him being easy to miss. Why exactly would he blow up the dynamite instead of just trying to shoot you? The dynamite didn’t really do anything anyway, and it was in an illogical place.
I was 50/50 about even bringing him back. Those kinds of scenes with advanced destruction are very tricky to implement indeed. They’re A LOT of work, particularly without a team of modellers to do cinematic physics.
This may have been suggested before, I can’t remember, so apologies to anyone if I didn’t consider it a decent idea before. My layout for D/E/F/G now makes it into a decent idea, as I didn’t quite know how I was gonna lay it out before.
After emerging from priming the rocket on the BMS B map, I now have it so the player heads towards a large room which looks like this (cheers jessiestorm for the pic):
There is a large set of double doors at the end of the track which will be clearly marked “Primary Launch Pad Access,” or words to that effect. Maybe somewhat well hidden or apparent in the open will be some Satchels and some explosives crates attached to the walls/ceiling around it. As the player approaches (either on foot or on tram, I’d imagine most players would approach via tram), an HECU will shout “stop him!” or words to that effect, and the explosives will detonate, dropping debris all over the doorway and completely blocking it off. It should be fairly clear to the player that the HECU, in an attempt to stop him reaching the rocket, have just blocked off access. In a nearby security office (shown in the picture as a small office), there may be a map or schematic of this section of the map, with the primary access point marked, showing that the only other way to access the rocket from where you are is to travel through the material transport part of the rail system.
Through a bit of layout wizardry, the sealed access to the Mat Trans part of the rail system will be nearby, behind a blast door clearly marked “Mat Trans”. This should make the transition between themes clear and not jarring.
So there you have my plan. It alleviates a few problems posed previously by the B maps being slotted in where they are:
-The player will no longer wonder why the HECU didn’t de-prime the rocket in between the B and C map. We could assume that the HECU thought blocking off the rocket access would be enough, and/or that they didn’t know how to de-prime it or that it even needed to be de-primed.
-The player will now clearly be able to see why they had to take a detour through the Mat Trans system, because their primary access has been blocked.
-The difference in themes/lighting can now be made pretty clear and work decently too, as it will be clear the player is entering an entirely different system.
Let me know what you think. I really like this plan.
Could work. Would be difficult to make it clear to the player that he killed himself rather than being killed by a guard/whatever.
Geez, you got it all figured out, huh? Honestly, I was pretty happy with the original arrangement, anyway. This is just icing on the cake for me. Greatly thought-out, I can’t find any flaws in this plan but I wouldn’t doubt someone else will.
Sounds great. Is “stop him!” something you can already create from voices or are you going to record it? You might put a retinal scanner for the double door considering it would be the main access to the silo. You could also have a security camera outside the door and not have the marine voice at all and then add in a small security office at some point with a monitor showing that location as fuzzy and labelled “Launch Pad Access” or something with a marine or two inside and a dead guard along with some kind of detonator that the marines used to blow it when they saw you. Just an idea.
Also for the execution scene you could maybe have one body in a body bag already and have other bags nearby as if the H.E.C.U. were in the process of cleaning them up when interrupted by the aliens. Personally the scene how it is now doesn’t bother me at all, but it’s a thought.
BTW, that rocket is the same as the one you prime later, right? So, will that door roughly coincide with one of the closed red doors you see once inside the silo? Or maybe I’m missing something?
Wait, actually. I did think of one small thing. You said ‘or words to that effect’ when it came to the HECU detonating the door. I’d go with something other than ‘Stop him!’ It just sounds like an odd thing to say when you’re about to launch a planned trap. Just wanted to give my opinion on that.
Okay, seems like fairly positive feedback on this idea, which is good, cuz I’ve already started to implement it. The layout at the absolute most basic level is already pretty much complete.
I’m running into problems actually with slotting the maps in within the existing B/C structure - they’re turning out to be MUCH larger than I’d imagined and they’re actually a fair amount larger than their HL1 variants. However, I’ve made a few adjustments to the overall layouts of the levels and I think I’ve finally found an excellent space-efficient solution.
Progress wise, at this point I’ve added back into the game (at a very basic level) the last missing half of the D map, and I’ve started work on the E map (which is now B1). I’ve started creating the very basic layout for B1. I really haven’t got a great deal done though. As forecast, do not expect my work to be as blazingly fast as it can be/has been in the past. Uni’s busy now, I don’t have a great deal of time to work on this stuff like I did before. I’ll try my best to get the A maps into a testable state for the weekend, but don’t expect to see anything of the B maps for another few weeks, if not longer.
I’m also picturing the testing cycle to be quite a bit shorter than ST Uncut, but that’s primarily because my mapping principle/level is much more solid than it was going into ST Uncut. I’ve learned from a lot of my mistakes from that large project (bear in mind that was the first single player thing I’d developed for the Source Engine, and my first ever release). Don’t expect 10 public test versions like there were back then - more like 4 or 5. Partly because I’m hoping to produce a better product for the first release, and also partly because I just don’t have the time to do that like I did for ST Uncut, what with my dissertation, 6 assessed essays, etc etc rapidly approaching. In addition I’ve been getting community input right from the start here whereas with ST Uncut it was a bit more of a “wildcard,” so to speak.
I’m not really sure where your confusion is arising from here, so I’ll just clarify what I said earlier.
BMS’s B map was the first 2/3 of HL1’s D map, plus a little bit of original material. It then transitioned into BMS’s C map which was roughly a little bit of the G map and the H map.
With my edit, BMS’s B map will now represent the entirety of HL’s D map, with a little bit of extra content, in fact. All the edits (aside from the rotation/areaportal rebuilding) made to the map occur AFTER the Rocket Priming. You know, the part where you leave the silo and get a second tram to carry on. Instead of going to a lift which takes you to C, you now go right, towards the “Primary Launch Pad Access” Blast Doors or whatever I’m going to call them. It will follow the design of this section of D:
See the tunnel leading out from that section in the distance? That will be replaced with a very prominent blast door, marked “Mat Trans,” which has to be opened via a control panel. Past that door will be the transition to BM_B1 (roughly all of HL1_E and first half of HL1_F). This is the Mat Trans section and will feature the different lighting and slightly different tunnel design.
Hope this clears things up.
It’s alright, that was just a rough guess as to what I’ll use. I’ll just use the most appropriate recorded HECU line I can find.
Except it’s all part of the same ‘Materials Transport’ system you’re in; Just a different section of it.
Sounds like a good idea though.
One thing…
You might want to make the player open the door by solving some kind of puzzle or something. Maybe have the door broken in some way and solving the puzzle fixes it…?
It just seems weird that you would have the HECU cut you off like that, but then essentially just allow you to push a button that opens up a detour to get around them.
(Realistically, you’d think they would have blocked that door off too if it could be opened from the start. Otherwise what would be the point?)
A puzzle is unnecessary. You make it sound as if the player gets a quick detour round the first door to get to the rocket but in reality it’s a very long journey into the guts of the rail system. The player takes a convoluted and long enough route that it’s safe to say the HECU may not even have known that he could take such a detour, or that he was going to. Plus the HECU have a large fortification at the end of the Mat Trans system too, in the form of their assault on you at the top of the C lift. Perhaps they were trying to steer you towards it, as they didn’t have control of the launch pad at that point in the story, hence why they had to cut off the door that gives you immediate access. Or they were stalling you. Or they didn’t have control of the detour’s door yet. There’s any number of potential explanations that fit, really.
I don’t think that’s a problem. My biggest concern right now is the use of space, it’s a bit difficult trying to fit all these maps in the limited space imposed by Black Mesa’s map structure.
Whilst I’m fairly indifferent about this (the case being that most players probably wouldn’t notice), I will say that it always bothered me that there were rarely signs of conflict before the player turns up, it’s only ever occurring as he’s arriving. In other words it would be good to have some alien and human corpses as well as bullet casings (if they can be implemented) and bullet holes.
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.
