Digital Media Concepts/Black Mesa



= Black Mesa =

Black Mesa is a first-person shooter remake of the original Half-Life game that was released in 1998. It was first a free-mod used by the developers known as Crowbar Collective. Black Mesa first teased a trailer in 2008 of this remake until it was a known free mod in 2012. It gave permission from the company Valve to do this remake. It took 14 years for it to remake the whole original pc game. They reskinned the entire game with nice models, textures and NPCs with more added stories and dialogue. Xen, the last few chapters of the remake was not released in 2012 due to the fact that it would take several years to develop the whole thing. Crowbar Collective would later get permission from Valve to have it as it's first commercial product. It would later be released on Steam in 2015 as an early access.

Premise
The player controls a scientist named Gordon Freeman, a silent protagonist who shows up late into a facility in Black Mesa to his work at Sector C Test Labs and Control Facility. A test sample was then taken to the test chamber for further test. But it goes horribly wrong as it goes into overload and damages comes from all over the facility. Creatures appear via portals and kills scientists and security guards. It is up to Gordon Freeman to not only kill these creatures but also soldiers, by order of the government is to shoot and kill anyone associated with the test sample and even the Alien creatures. Gordon will stop at nothing to stop of the invasion of the Aliens by destroying the Entity that holds the portal open to the Border world known as Xen.

Development
It was developed by Crowbar Collective. They had the idea of remaking the original to an even better game.

Modifications
Crowbar Collective would remake the Surface Tension Uncut in which when Black Mesa was released in 2012 as a free download mod there was no full image of the Surface Tension with the soldiers and Alien creatures attack each other from certain perspectives’. The company would later hire a developer named Chon Kemp who was well known from the Black Mesa: Community Forums to remake the Black Mesa’s chapter Surface Tension Uncut to its release on Steam.

Xen
It released a trailer of the Xen levels in November 19, 2018 on its 20th anniversary of the release of Half-Life in the same month day 20 years ago. It took a little over a year to its completion as it gives the players to get there first taste at the first three parts of Xen on the public beta in June 25, 2019. If there were any bugs, Crowbar Collective would later fix it at a later date. Next it would later release the Gonarch’s Lair on the first day of August. They continue to put in the final arts and polish of the final 3 chapters, Interloper, Nihilath and Endgame. On September 30, 2019, they release the first 5 maps of the next chapter Interloper part 1 which would give the players of what they think of this next chapter if there are known issues or bugs. December 6, 2019 it releases the final two chapters Nihilath and Endgame to the public beta. And finally, on Christmas Eve of December 24, 2019 it was then released to the main game but still in early access. 2 months later, on February 25, 2020, they have announced that the completion of Black Mesa will be released out of early access on March 5, 2020, confirmed by Crowbar Collective.

Soundtrack
Producer of the soundtrack of Black Mesa was Joel Nielsen. He would release the soundtrack of Black Mesa in 2012 and release the Xen soundtrack 7 years later.

Software or Hardware
Hardware recommendation is required for Windows 7 32bit/64bit or better with the processor 3.2 Quad Core or better, 8 GB of RAM, Dedicated Video Card of 4 GB or better, DirectX Version 9.0c, Internet Broadband connection for the Network, and available space of 20 GB of Storage. For the Mac, it recommends a Ubuntu 14.0 or better, with the same Quad Processor as the PC or better, 6 GB of Ram, 3 GB Dedicated Video Card or better, Network connection of Broadband, available 20 GB of Storage and it does not support the display driver of Nouveau.