Residue Processing appreciation thread

[metalmunki]

On the one hand, I’m glad they included it. On the other, I’m surprised they stuck so rigorously to form as not only can the ‘puzzles’ be quite tiresome in this chapter, but there is ALOT of wasted space that could have just been left out or abridged.

I found parts like that in Lambda Core as well. It’s not the BM Team’s fault, as its in the original design, but I wouldn’t have minded or probably noticed if they’d trimmed the fat a bit around these places. It’s quite cool that it makes things feel like a real place, but its not like there are any items around these areas to reward the exploration so you just end up finding redundant corridors or dead ends.

[Dotard]

There’s this passage downstairs with 2 Bullsquids, and it’s quite prolonged from it’s HL1 counterpart. The weird thing is, NOTHING IS THERE.
No items, no puzzle… just ammo to waste and a dead-end.

[YosemiteSam]

@jon583

Have to give special credit to the mapper on this area for staying true to the original so well. Because its probably not the most glamorous level from the original game, doesn’t feature much combat and has lots of environment navigation puzzles (which don’t seem to be very popular these days) I was half expecting a drastically altered version. But the one I found was satisfyingly atmospheric and visually pleasing (compared to the original which is probably one of the ugliest levels). Nice job.

Nice job? GREAT JOB! Residue Processing was near perfectly done, loved it, maybe a few more headcrabs and zombies would have been nice.

[Malidictus]

Residue Processing is one of the real marvels of Black Mesa: Source, I have to say. I badmouth it for circumventing the vat jumping puzzles, but the original Residue Processing really was shit, no pun intended. I played through Black Mesa’s version and was never confused, lost or disorientated. I played through Residue Processing in the original Half-Life not an hour ago, and I STILL got completely lost in the fucking conveyor belt puzzle just because it’s so poorly designed.

Well, and because this chapter, more than any other, just doesn’t look like anything. Well, it looks like Doom - a maze of unfamiliar textures that could mean anything at all, but at least Doom had a map. Half-Life does not.

What Black Mesa did with Residue Processing is nothing short of astounding. The added detail makes every location tangibly unique and immediately identifiable, which helps immeasurably in keeping track of where you are in relation to the level at large. Not only that, but the actual conveyor belt puzzle has been untangled and made nearly linear, so it’s next to impossible to get lost on it. You can “cheat” and go back on one conveyor that skips about half the section, but even then you’re not going in circles, just skipping head.

I’d forgotten how bad the original Residue Processing was, so my hat’s off to the Black Mesa team for making a river of shit into a great level.

[dky.tehkingd.u]

@Dotard

There’s this passage downstairs with 2 Bullsquids, and it’s quite prolonged from it’s HL1 counterpart. The weird thing is, NOTHING IS THERE.
No items, no puzzle… just ammo to waste and a dead-end.

That area is where you end up if you screw up the conveyor puzzle and fall through the hole that they set up under the right-hand conveyor belt. It’s a trap. The stairs are meant to take you BACK, not forward.

[Dotard]

That explains it “_”