Black Mesa, the Half-Life remake made by fans and approved by Valve, is getting a massive update as the developers, Crowbar Collective, tease that they are working on something new.
The FPS game's remake has more than 100,000 reviews on Steam with a 95% positive rating and is generally praised as one of the most faithful remakes that can be played today. More than a decade since the Black Mesa remake was first released, a new patch has come, the Necro update.
Half-Life Black Mesa Remake
(Photo : Valve, Crowbar Collective / Screenshot taken from Steam)
It brings along with it some key changes, a lot of rendering improvements, controller support on PC, as well as UI changes. One of the biggest changes in improved performance and fixes cases where the game would crash during startup.
Another is a fix for UI flickering and artifacting and a potential crash in the first map of Interloper that players would sometimes experience. The update also improves controller support using Steam Input, fixed hitch when weapon decals are first applied to guns, and re-enables weapon decals by default, according to PCGamesN.
Fans of the franchise were also given a teaser update on the Half-Life Blue Shift remake, which has slowly come out in parts for some time now. It shows players what the team behind the remake has been working on with Chapter 5: Focal Point.
On top of the new Black Mesa Necro update, the remake itself is also 80% off on Steam until Monday, Apr. 22, 2024, so be sure to get it when you can. Another teaser that Crowbar Collective showed is via a very brief teaser on YouTube over the weekend known as "Incoming Signal."
The developers also invited fans to sign up for "future updates and beta tests." It took a lot of years to bring Half-Life's Black Mesa remake into the market. It evolved from a fan-made mod in 2012 to a Valve-approved commercial project.
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Working on Something New
The remake launched in early access in 2015 and finally was released in full in 2020 but fans were happy despite the long wait. This means that many players will take it as great news that Crowbar Collective is working on something new for the franchise, said PCGamer.
Unfortunately, however, fans have no idea yet of what this could entail and the latest teaser does not provide many details as well. In the background of the teaser, gunfire and shouting can be heard. There are also four colored neon lines that later merge into a four-color logo.
Some users on Resetera have theorized that the four colors shown in the teaser actually represent the Half-Life series as a whole. Orange is for the original release, green is for Opposing Force, blue is for Blue Shift, and purple is for Decay.
Half-Life was critically acclaimed and prompted the Steam publisher to develop sequels and even relate some of its other titles to the same universe, such as Portal and Portal 2. The game follows the story of Gordon Freeman, a scientist who is trying to escape the Black Mesa Research Facility. The building has been overrun by aliens after an experiment that went horribly wrong, according to GamingBible.
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