Black Mesa Review: Nasty Bit Of Work

Right off the bat, Black Mesa is a great game. This is a group of amateur developers attempting to remake a game that is easily in the top 5 of all video games. Quite the task, this is similar to someone that started learning piano 6 months ago trying to write Mozart. I'd like to say all the music is phenomenal, except 1 track is not to my personal liking (I won't say which one though).

The gameplay is aggressive and fast-paced, the weapons feel satisfying to kill shit with, the story is fleshed out ever so slightly more than the original Half-Life 1, and soundtrack is better than the original in my expert opinion. Here's the problem, the graphics. The graphics? How are the graphics a problem, they are so good. And that's the whole conversation right there.

Are the graphics better, yes. They are more photorealistic and more appealing and interesting than the original. That being said, there are very subtle artistic techniques that go into great game design and art that equal more than the sum of its parts. One of these is lighting. "The lighting is great here!" I know, here's the thing. I played through Half-Life and Half-Life Source (same exact game in a different programming engine, essentially), and the only time I didn't know where to go or "got lost" was during the On A Rail chapter, because it's so big and expansive. Remember when Gordon had to electrocute the Goliath? That part, though, I got lost in Black Mesa several, several times.

Most notably, I personally got so lost in the Lambda Complex it was infuriating, but other times were in the Black Mesa offices, the blast silo, On A Rail, the city, and Xen. That's not good and I blame the poor artistic use of the great lighting these devs have access to. Lighting can gently nudge a player into going in the right direction without saying a single word, no marker on screen telling you what to do, not even making a straight line or corridor for the player to follow along with, but simply the art of scenery and what film people call "frame composition" can lead a player toward the next part of the story. This is something Valve were already masters of when creating Half-Life, and, adversely, Crowbar Collective collectively don't quite get. They know that one can use these artistic techniques to improve a game, but not how to implement them in specific ways and at will like Valve does. Don't even get me started on the story, Valve might have something to do with that one. I can't say much there, yet. There really isn't much else to nitpick about the entirety of Black Mesa other than that. And Xen sucked, but we all knew that and I think it was supposed to suck because everything in Xen except the Nihilanth sucked in the OG Half Life 1 in 1998, as well. To conclude, I had a great time with this title. Half-Life 1 is better though, lol.