Been a while since I last checked the forums. And I get here, and receive eye candy. Soooo want to play this! 
Ah yeah, this will add to the existing game right? It wonât be a separate game? Or DLC purchase? Although if you can pull off a DLC that makes the map addition go in seamlessly, amazing. 
This is included at no additional charge. Black Mesa does not have any dlc purchases.
this is amazing, great job guys! This is definitely something worthy of looking forward to. Especially since it looks like a huge inspiration for this was Dear Esther which i LOVE. Keep up the good work!
The environment looks kind of uninspired, to me it just looks like a regular cave and all of that previous criticism that can be seen in this thread. Though Iâll wait and see, it is a screenshot of a very small part of the level after all.
However it is kind of irritating to see people call others âwhinersâ just because they decided to share their concerns, you canât expect the feedback that you get to be positive all of the time. You will get criticism about your work, it can be about gameplay or aesthetics itâs something you canât avoid, at the end of the day itâs your decision whether you are going to listen to that criticism or not but I donât think that telling people to keep quiet and be happy with what is given to them is a mature response.
Anyways I get that Black Mesa is like a personal project, itâs made by people who have a certain plan about how to make the game more interesting for themselves and just happened to share it with us. Looking at it from a smaller scale itâs kind of similar to the way we all mod games to suit our preferences, some of us change models others add hunters in the battle for city 17, whatâs fun to us might be annoying for others. I have come to accept Black Mesa for what it is, a different beast with a Half-Life paint job, which is kind of the good thing about it. It doesnât replace the original but instead keeps both versions relevant because they are so different and yet so good.
Canât wait to see more of Xen. Best of luck.
Regarding calling others âwhiners,â are you referring to us as in the devs? Weâre perfectly capable of handling and listening to all kinds of feedback, and as my responses in this thread have hopefully shown, we have no issue with listening to negative comments. All Iâve told people is not to be too hasty to judge a book by its cover. Which is pretty much the only response I can reasonably give. I certainly never called anyone a whiner or responded badly to negative comments. On the other hand, if youâre referring to what other community members are saying about negative comments in this thread; well, if youâre entitled to come on here and post criticisms, surely they too are entitled to consider those criticisms to be âwhining,â and to address them as such. Where do you draw the line? From my moderator perspective I havenât seen any comments in here from anyone that I felt were over the line, hence why the thread has overall been very civil and constructive, I feel. Perhaps it is worth rereading the thread?
Regarding Black Mesa being a âpersonal projectâ similar to âchanging modelsâ and âadding hunters in the battle for 17,â I really donât feel like thatâs an apt analogy. Black Mesa is a full game sold as a retail title, of AAA scale, painstakingly developed by a passionate team over a huge period of years, with overarching vision and design principle. I donât mean to sound overblown or pretentious (it IS just game, after all), but itâs certainly not akin to a model swap or a fresh coat of paint. If it was, we could have had this finished in 2007. Weâre not designing around âwhatâs fun for usâ and âmight be annoying for othersâ. Weâre trying to make a great game. Our Xen isnât just going to be âthe way we mod games to suit our preferences,â weâre focussed on creating a tight, polished and professional experience from start to finish, and pulling off something that Valve didnât. No small order. Will we succeed for everyone? Absolutely not, obviously. But that doesnât mean that we just threw all our random cool ideas at the dartboard and hoped that they stuck because we thought they were cool. Weâre not appealing to the lowest common denominator here, but weâre not making it just for ourselves either. Itâs for Half-Life fans!
To be perfectly frank, Iâve learned a few things over the years with game design and modding, one thing thatâs really stuck out to me is if youâre not having fun playing/using it after its in a playable/usable state, youâre doing something wrong. This applies to all types of entertainment.
That said, I think you guys and gals on the team - both past and present - have proven you love Half-Life and want to do it justice. Obviously the final product wonât appeal to everyone, that just comes with the territory.
Everyone should keep an open mind - while it looks like a terrestrial cave its still in Xen and according to Half-Life canon, it is a Border World, its not farfetched for something like that to be there and there could be other environments that are a stark contrast to this one.
This is probably naive of me to think such a thing, but if a group of people want the magical Xen cave to be orange, wouldnât there be a mod changing lighting effects a week after Xen is released?
I donât think thereâs anything preventing anyone to be making mods that change the map, although yeah its gonna take a while, just keep in mind Source can be heavily modded, this is technically a mod (in literal terms) as well
P.S: I donât know anything about mapping so go ahead and roast me if you want
You are correct in your claim that the game can be modded relatively easily to change the style of Xen in terms of lighting etc to how people would want it. Iâm sure people will take cracks at that.
However, you are incorrect in your assertation that our game is âtechnicallyâ or âliterallyâ a mod. Itâs not, under any definition of what a mod is. Our game is a game. Whether you think the game is particularly different from its mod incarnation, or whether you think itâs worth the money or stuff like that are entirely separate questions, but they are not questions that make our game not a game. Just because something starts out as a mod, does not mean that later incarnations are âtechnicallyâ or âliterallyâ mods. Thereâs no real basis for calling the Steam version of BMS a mod, much like you wouldnât call CS or Killing Floor or Dota mods anymore.
Iâm not saying Black Mesa is a models swap, Iâm saying that itâs created by people who have their own vision on how the game should be and that is why you are changing things like the Xen levels. You might be selling the game but youâre still making changes that suit your taste. Itâs no different from the way people change things in games because they have their own visions on how it should be, itâs just on a much larger scale to the point where you have the âfull gameâ, a series of changes made by personal taste. Also I doubt the team started Black Mesa with the thought of selling it as a retail title.
Also, yes I was speaking mostly about the community, if people arenât talking about how awesome everything is then they are salty or something. And yes, moderators have said before not to judge something by itâs âcoverâ (âIâd say, letâs enjoy what they provide and then, when they finally release Xen (or even more screenshots), THEN we can begin providing our input.â danielsangeo). If you post something then you should expect criticism even if the thing is in development. And yes I have read the thread.
[Posted the image here so you donât have to open it in a new tab]
What about the mist above the water in the cave?
I wonder what would be a reason to be there. Obviously the ambient temperature of the cave
must be lower then the temperature of the water, therefore evaporation.
But, those glowing crystals, maybe you could put them in the pool of water and added bubbles form around them
making them appear as they are heating the water. Also it could look nicer.
Of course this is an idea, not a request.
Fair point on the personal changes business.
Regaring the rest, moderators are not developers. Developers are specifically marked with the âdeveloperâ tag (or the âcommunity managerâ tag in my case). For our moderators, the screenshot was entirely new for them too and Danielsangeoâs comment was posed as a community member too. Thatâs why he was referring to us as âtheyâ rather then âweâ. I can see how that may have appeared unclear, though.
We (the team) expected criticism and weâre perfectly comfortable with what people were saying negatively about the shot. Weâre not arguing with or silencing anyone!
Iâm going to critique pretty much every bit of game-related material I see because Iâm a critic- thatâs my hobby. I critique here -like I do all criticism- not because I think Black Mesa is bad and should go away, but because I want it to become the best it can possibly be. The developers, Iâm sure, can handle people suggesting that they change things, and ultimately itâs up to them to judge whether something I mention is just idle speculation or something they genuinely missed and would make the game better; to decide whether or not they want to implement any of my suggestions or anyone elseâs- thatâs how criticism works.
I also think there has indeed been a vaguely negative response from the community to people who are critiquing the screenshot or who donât like it, from the people who do. Theyâre not telling us that they think our changes would make it worse (which would be perfectly OK- no critic is infallible) but rather I get the sense that people think we are being somehow⌠insufficiently enthusiastic or supportive, and that this has had something of a chilling effect on criticism. Iâm not sure itâs intentional and itâs definitely not harassment-level stuff a moderator needs to get involved in, but that is the general impression I get.
Xen will be made whether we come out to cheer on the current artistic direction or not. Criticism might make it better, and positing that you like Xen the way it is and donât want it changed might keep it from being made worse, but saying other people arenât enthusiastic enough wonât really do anything other than discourage people with anything of substance to say from coming forward.
I just find âIt looks like a caveâ not particularly interesting or constructive critique. Xen had caves. Much of Interloper had caves. An entire Blue Shift chapter is caves. Donât have to praise necessarily, but âitâs a caveâ is just not useful. We know it wonât all be caves. If they donât like it, thatâs fine, they donât have to, but saying it looks like an cave when Xen has been known to have caves just elicits a âYeah, we noticed, shush alreadyâ response because no oneâs including anything useful with that comment. Thereâs been little discussion on the lighting or atmosphere (other than one guy who threw every possible color combination at it), or geometry, or for specific graphical/design choices. Everyone either has nice things to say or absolutely has to point out that itâs a cave.
To add my own addendum to this excellently written point:
I feel similarly about the other prevailing negative comment âitâs not alien enoughâ, but not because I feel that said comment isnât necessarily a legitimate criticism. In some contexts, it absolutely would be. But in response to a single clearly intentionally understated screenshot, it feels a littleâŚovergeneralise-y. Particularly as the comment is usually framed as âXen needs to be more alien!â. Perhaps this is our fault for choosing a not so alien environment for our single reveal screenshot, but I also guess that sometimes you canât win. I reckon if weâd pulled out some of our more alien work, others would have said âI hope itâs a bit more grounded and less ridiculous in placesâ. All Iâve really done in response to this criticism (contrary to how others seem to perceive it, which ois confusing me), is to try and assure peopleâŚâhey, donât worry, it gets much more alien in places.â Which I donât think is unreasonable or attempting to silence critics?
I find the comment about lack of alienness to be in the same vein as if someone said âOh man, thereâs no action in the screenshot at all. I hope Xen has more action than this!â Itâs commenting on whatâs not there, rather than whatâs there, in a way, similar to what Crypt says. Which again, I think would be far more reasonable in the context of a screenshot dump or a video or something; but not a single screenshot. But then, to almost counter my own point, perhaps my view of that is informed by the fact that I KNOW that Xen is a lot more alien in other places, so perhaps thatâs colouring my judgement too much, I donât know.
At any rate, you guys are sure in for some lovely surprises once we finally get Xen out there and finished. Particularly those of you who want it to be more alien!
I think this is a fair criticism of the criticism of the criticism of the criticism (yes, this is what the thread has become).
Iâd clarify by saying my particular issue is the paucity of more organic elements compared to dead rock- itâs the stalagmites in particular that I think make the area look generic and non-alien.
People arenât just saying that âit looks like a caveâ but rather they are having a discussion on how organic/alien this cave should look like. Itâs being concerned about what the environment has to offer, yes itâs a cave and you canât avoid talking about the cave in a screenshot that only features a cave, but itâs more of a question of what that cave has to offer that is interesting (or true to the source material).
There is a difference between this
and this
One obviously has more unique features and an arguably more creative design. Itâs fair to say that if it was a screenshot of a more standard looking xen then people wouldnât be so worried because it would be exactly what they would expect. But maybe itâs better this way, after all if the plan is to surprise people by gradually making things more interesting then it wouldnât be wise to ruin the surprise with an image of a more âXen likeâ place. Plus I think this image has done plenty in stirring interest and starting a discussion.
Snark, Iâm gonna try really hard not to respond in a very sarcastic way here.
But youâre comparing this:
https://steamup.ru/uploads/posts/2013-03/1362682402_kogda-vyjdet-prodolzhenie-black-mesa.jpg
with this:
https://i.imgur.com/9ruvLbv.jpg
Why arenât you comparing the cave with this?
https://cdn.themis-media.com/media/global/images/library/deriv/1369/1369335.jpg
To wage critism about how 1 piece of a level looks⌠Itâs 1 screenshot, it doesnât show how the whole of all levels looks in bms xen, but of one particular cave.
Iâm sure there will be organic caves and non-organic caves. If all the levels looked like the image you linked, people would complain that it would just look the same.
As Admiral Sakai said, I think weâre waging into âcriticism of criticism of criticism of criticismâ territory here. Itâs some serious critiception and probably isnât that useful.
Letâs focus on the screenshot specifically from now on, please. There are decent points to be made, but then againâŚitâs just one image. Thereâs really only a certain amount to talk about! The main point of the screenshot was âhey, weâre definitely actually doing stuff, this is the kind of quality you can expect!â rather than a broad statement of our artstyle or design principlesor whatnot.
Yeah, I just feel like⌠Itâs 1 screenshot.
Itâs kinda too early to give feedback about how it will affect the xen world.
Iâm sure there will be enough organic stuff in the game, so if the cave isnât so organic, thatâs ok.
It will only help reduce the feel of repetitiveness which would happen if everything in the xen was organic.
Itâs the same level (Talking about the two Half life 1 maps, one being added as a mod for black mesa) with the difference being that the textures are a bit more polished and shiny in the updated version. The reason I chose it is because I wanted to compare the art direction between the two images and not the fact that one of them has better graphics than the other, plus I wanted to compare it to other cave like areas, but the other Half Life image also looks really interesting even though it has less detail.
By the way I realize that itâs an image from a part of a level, that doesnât mean it shouldnât be criticized, itâs still bland.
Founded in 2004, Leakfree.org became one of the first online communities dedicated to Valveâs Source engine development. It is more famously known for the formation of Black Mesa: Source under the 'Leakfree Modification Team' handle in September 2004.
