The opening tram ride is extended and refreshed with larger, fancier scenery. As you weave through Black Mesa's warehouses, railways and sewage systems, fighting ninjas and flipping switches, it will become clear that the world of game design has moved on, but that Half-Life's relatively simple horror tale holds up far better than most of its peers.Д«lack Mesa follows the beats of the original game exactly, through each of its now-famous moments. Its environment design is still evocative despite its visual shortcomings, its shotgun is still fabulous at right-click-exploding enemies in satisfying showers of alien body parts, and its storytelling methods are still the template for the twenty-two years of first-person shooters that followed it.

To be clear: Half-Life might have aged, but it is still a good game. You must fight your way back to the surface, contending with aliens and military clean-up crews, both of which are equally determined to kill you and every other scientist in the facility. You're there to conduct an experiment, which goes wrong in typical B-movie style: portals open, alien monsters are unleashed, and the facility descends into chaos. If you've never played Half-Life before, both it and Black Mesa cast you as Gordon Freeman, a 27-year-old scientist arriving for work at an underground research facility. To see this content please enable targeting cookies. But it remains, underneath, Half-Life - with all that that entails. It is a triumph on many levels, and in terms of scale and polish, the most impressive fan game ever made. Over 8 years since we first reviewed its earliest release, the project is now complete. What is the half-life of Half-Life? I would have long ago described Valve's first-person shooter as my favourite game, but revisiting it last month in preparation for Half-Life: Alyx made clear how many parts of its design have aged.Д®nter Black Mesa, a fan-made remake of the original Half-Life, inside Half-Life 2's Source engine.

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