Xen in total: map by map review

[alexUnder]

A lot of people complaining on Interloper. Some on Gonarch's Lair. At least it looks this way on these Steam forums. Anyway I thought it could be a more help if I tried to describe players feelings in the whole alien-world length rather than a separate chapter. Because Interloper is the result not the reason. When played separetely Interloper feels absolutely fine (I tried). Interloper feels bad only when you play alien-world all through. Anyway I'll try and maybe it will be some help...


Xen, bm_c4a1a
Very first map of the alien world and obviously devs did make it as appealing as possible. It is impressive in fact. Healing glowy blue waters. Jumping in space in betweet floating islands are giving that otherworldly feeling indeed. Perfect starting map for the alien world

Xen, bm_c4a1a1
Environmental storytelling is building up. People were here and established some labs, left some equipment. More of that they were using crystals, the alien source of power. Perhaps scientists were here because of those crystals? Not to mention teleportation techs. Anyway world is building up and playing it through is really enjoyable at this point
*What those big fishes are eating? Specifically at this lake at the beginning of the map

Xen, bm_c4a1b
Oh now as a player I experience Xen flora. Real flora not some rocks in space. And some fauna. So this is where all those barnacles, bullsquid, headcrabs and houndeyes came from? This is their homeland. Some sort of jungle marshes. Ok nice. Really nice! This is really interesting to know and experience. At this point of the game everything feels really engaging

Xen, bm_c4a1b1
This is the first Xen map that feels a little bit of a drag. All the same flora and fauna. All the same gameplay. Just one more map. Feels a bit unnecessary. Not really unnecessary, only a bit. This is still mysterious alien world. And the idea of giant tree and its roots connecting islands is nice obviously

Xen, bm_c4a1c
Going back to something new. Underwater flora and fauna. Nice for a change visually and gameplay wise. But on the other hand I am as a player becoming kinda tired of this particular boggy part of alien world. It could be perfect pacing wise if c4a1b1 and c4a1c were 1 single map not two

Xen, bm_c4a1c1
Basically this map is as impressive as the very 1st Xen map. This floating burger-island with alien power-teleport station is totally otherworldly. And that what impresses. Otherworldness. As for gameplay this is obviously cool not to fight but to interact with alien technologies via puzzles. Really memorable map, one of the best through the whole Half-Life: Black Mesa experience
* Total absense of human presense is kinda strange since this is obviously a center of alien technologies and surely scientists would try to establish if not lab but some outpost. A little one

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XEN CHAPTER IN CONCLUSION. Basically the only complaint is that c4a1b1 and c4a1c could be a single map not two. But this is not critical even closely. Being honest nearly all of original Half-Life chapters are a little bit draggy and this Xen chapter draggyness is all the same. Valve style. So this time no real complaints
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Gonarch's Lair, bm_c4a2a
Obviously devs tried to make this particular map as appealing as possible. And it is impressive in fact. The appearance of the Gonarch is really frightening. One of the most gorgeous maps through the whole game visually

Gonarch's Lair, bm_c4a2b
The appearance of human base is a little bit unexpected.There should have been more evidences on previous maps, that the people were all the way through to here. Nevertheless it's cool to realise scientists moved that far. As for the map itself it's interesting to play. And this is a nice twist that now I am the one who is not chasing but being chased. Obviously I could jump away and shoot Gonarch from afar on that plateau starting map, while here in closed spaces monster seized the initiative. It's cool. Really

Gonarch's Lair, bm_c4a2c
This map is the first one the part of which felt really as a drag. It starts with the Gonarch blocking my way. And that's exactly where water puzzles should have started. That way I could perceive them as a way around. Clear and fine and a change of pacement. But instead of that right after Gonarch blocked my way there is more of running and running on and on. Annoying and unnecessary in terms of environmental story-telling

Battle itself is not inventive, it's the same as bm_c4a2a. Jumping around and firing rockets. It could have been something else. Firing into the crystalls on the ceiling? In order to bring them down on Gonarch. Some Gonarch eggs and I should destroy them? I don't know. But it's no good to copy-paste the very same gameplay, very same jump-and-fire-rockets into Gonarch scene

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GONARCH'S LAIR IN CONCLUSION. Running section at the start of bm_c4a2c should have not existed. It's a drag. Gonarch blockes my way and that event starts a water-puzzles. Next it goes as it goes: I swim around and the flamey road to the final battle. That's it. Really

Final battle should not be the same as the starting battle (I mean c4a2a). Same mechanics: jump and fire rockets. It's no good. Not critical but could have been more inventive

Everything else is really well-thought-out in that chapter.
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Interloper, bm_c4a3a
One of the best maps overthere. I mean whole BM through. Story telling is really engaging. Finally as Gordon I come to the heart of the evil and realise vorts aren't bad actually. They're enslaved and mind-controlled. Vorts village is really cool. One of the most memorable place through the whole game. And that controllers fight is really great. 10 of 10 surely for this map in particular

Interloper, bm_c4a3a1
I like the idea of showing the natural habitat of Gargantuas. But as for me personally the decision to execute it as the chasing scene is wrong. As a player I am done with chasing at the Gonarch's Lair, I don't want it anymore. Also as for environment it's not right to go back to nature, non-biotech style. I am inside the factory. This feeling should not be interrapted while it is interrapted by this map. If I could I would delete this map completely while moving sewers pipes from the end of bm_c4a3a1 to the end of village bm_c4a3a map. Even visually sewers entrance looks like a part of vorts village, they fit together perfectly

Interloper, bm_c4a3b
Also one of the best maps through the whole game in terms of design. Alien factory of grunts production. Really interesting to look around. Plug puzzles are interesting. Controllers fight is kinda cool. Perfect map

Interloper, bm_c4a3b1
Well actually this map is also really cool. Partially. Like 80%. In terms of level design everything, the whole map is really gorgeous. Really interesting and engaging. Oh those naked grunts, it turns out they are grown from test tubes. That's cool. Those green-bombs puzzles are nice and new. But! While plug puzzle feel bad now! Yup. Really big and annoying plug puzzle. I am done with plugs on previous map. It could be like you jump out of the vent and there's something to explode with a barrel. That could be fine. Even a button push could be fine. But not plug puzzle again. No. Just no. Plug puzzle is out of place on this map

Interloper, bm_c4a3b2
Change of pacement is nice indeed. Fights with grunts are a welcome. On the other as a player I am tired now of RED already. More of that the world is not expanding anymore. Well I see this is a waste material part of a factory. But this is not really necessary to see. If I could I would cut this map completely. Feels like a drag and there is really nothing to lose with this map

Interloper, bm_c4a3c
This map is different visually and expands on environment story-telling. It should be the map right after c4a3b1. And grunt fights should be here too. As a resuly it could feel like new environment type - conveyors - is here; and a change of pacing with the introduction of grunt fights (if there would be no c4a3b2 map) is here too. That would be just perfect
By the way those web lights coming out of "eggs" is really cool. Appreciated

Interloper, bm_c4a3c1
This map is annoying. Fights with controllers are too well known already. More of that this map adds nothing in terms of environment story telling. All the same conveyors with eggs, but also with controllers. Boring. Annoying. Delete this tiny while greatly annoying map

Interloper, bm_c4a3c2
Nice map. Cool blood pressure puzzles. Controllers here could be just fine if there were no previous map. Perhaps one or two Gargantuas might fit too. Anyway the map on its own is fine to play. Just delete the previous one

Interloper, bm_c4a3d
Closure map. Riding up to the boss map. Well it's fine. Got tired of controllers but... If I could I would redo this map into observative. Just riding without a fight. But that's not critical. It's fine

bm_c4a3d1
Obviously nice pause. Visually the map is just applauseable. Really impressive little map with a final gorgeous portal

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INTERLOPER IN CONCLUSION. Delete bm_c4a3b2 and bm_c4a3c1 for sure. They add nothing while ruining the pacement completely. Therefore move grunts from c4a3b2 to the next bm_c4a3c map in order not to lose them

Also delete plug puzzle on bm_c4a3b1. It's out of place

Perhaps the deletion of the Garg chase bm_c4a3a1 map would be the good decision too, since it's more then enough of chasing thru Gonarach. Oh boy not again. But not critical

I would prefer to convert tower riding bm_c4a3d map into observative map without fights. Since there's goin' to be a big boss fight up ahead. But that's not critical too
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Nihilath is cool

[alexUnder]

I really hope it helps. Sorry if it won't. Thank you BM devs anyway, you're the best. You made one of my favourite games. While HL1 was not in the 1st place, subjectively. (I was way into Thief those times; perhaps that's why HL1 didn't knock me out at the time of release).

[Senor Cardgage]

I don't think they really 'Fixed' Xen, if that's even really a thing you can do. Certainly they made it very visually impressive, at least prior to Interloper, it perfectly hits that weird alien wonderland that the original game was going for but doesn't pull off. The music in particular is really, really good in the Xen levels and perfectly sets up the atmosphere. I almost wish the entire end of the game was just wandering around the gorgeous Xen scenery and not having to get stuck in that bloody factory.

But the problem is that its essentially the same platforming and shallow puzzles that plagued the original incarnation of Half-Life. Its more bearable but its still not good, its really not the strength of the game at all and their platforming and puzzle design is just not interesting enough to carry the game through too the end. Honestly I was really starting to get sick of the foibles of Source engine movement by the end of the factory and Gonarch fight, I'm sure lots of people disagree but most source engine games are just not very fun to move around in, I feel like you constantly get stopped dead in your tracks by the tiniest bits of geometry and the jumping in particular is janky and awkward, especially considering how important the bizarre concept of crouch jumping is. The conveyor belt sequences were the worst for this, especially when you had to fight on them, they seem to screw with the long jump and makes it that much harder for the game to register that you want to jump way the hell away. Then there's the way things like water and sloped surfaces are handled, to this day, through all of the half life games and thousands of hours in TF2 getting in and out of water in these games is the most bizarre experience in my time gaming and literally never felt smooth or intuitive. I really wish things like crawling and swimming were faster too, considering how much you have to do both.

I wouldn't mind so much, but Half Life 1/Black Mesa has an awful lot of platforming for a first person game, and unfortunately its just not really any good. And Zen gets the worst of it so it suffers as a result.

Still, especially in the first level there are lots of areas where the long jump is used well and actually feels a cool concept that significantly frees up the player movement and offers new tactical opportunities. Unfortunately that gets forgotten by the time of Interloper where fights are in places a lot less conductive to the long jump, as I said the conveyor belts make it a pain but just generally the places tend to be too cramped. The Nihilanth does encourage you to use it more though.

When you get to Gonarch I think things fall apart a bit from there. I don't know who's idea it was to drag this fight out as much as they did, but it makes no sense to me. You fight her twice, the second time she even has two phases, and both times she has a ton of health, at least on Hard. Between these you have an extremely extended sequence of scripted chases and hide and go seek with her. The whole thing must be at least ten times longer than her original encounter in Half-Life, and way more difficult from what I can recall (lordy I never liked bosses that spawn tons of annoying little enemies but at least in Half Life 1 that Gonarch wasn't as insanely aggressive as Black Mesa's one is). It feels weird to me that they are treating what is essentially a 20 year old testicle joke with such reverence as if its the most badass fight in history, the whole thing feels like they are overcompensating for something and I don't know what. They must have put tons of time into making this fight, its one of the most heavily scripted sequences in the game, and certainly ensure that the player puts tons of time into facing off against the damn thing, but it doesn't feel all that climactic to me personally. Like Headcrabs are basically just one of the many enemies you deal with in Half life, they're quite
iconic but compared to things like the Vortigaunts and Combine, they never felt as important to the overall story and setting, it feels weird that they are making what's basically just a particularly big headcrab such a big deal, its not like this is of particular import to Gordon specifically or the story overall, its just a big dumb animal, its not like it caused the black mesa incident or is coordinating the invasion of Earth. Whatever the case it far outstays its welcome and the Gonarch lair drags a lot as a result, I think this was a case where the Black Mesa team erroneously thought that making things longer and more bombastic was the way to improve the overall Zen experience.

Then we get to Interloper, I don't think things improve much here. What I really liked was getting an insight into the Vorts and their society, it was cool realizing that they are actually nice and peaceful, simply enslaved to fight against their will. I made a point of trying to make sure none of the Vorts died by my hand when I played. One did die of enemy fire in one area and when I went over one of his friends was crying over the corpse :( Also seeing the factory where the alien soldiers were made was also pretty cool.

But the Vort thing does remind me of something I don't like about the Half Life series in general, you just can't really interact that much with the world around you. I almost wish that I could hang around with the Vorts and talk to them, or help with some simple, optional tasks and such, or listen to their stories and find out more about their background (in 1998, the same year as HL1, Unreal actually kind of did this to a degree). But, possibly because of the limitations of silent protagonist, you can't really do that, you sort of just blaze through the Vort village and they only barely acknowledge that you even exist. All you can learn about them is in the absolute broadest strokes like the fact that they are poorly treated slaves. It feels like a bit of a missed opportunity, though I would never expect the Black Mesa devs to try and somehow turn the Vort village into an interactive hub area or anything, lord knows they had enough work already, still it makes think of how it could have been a bit more involved.

Unfortunately as you get further into the factory it gets worse, the Vort village was a short interlude, instead the vast majority of the time I was in Interloper I was getting bored by basic puzzles and tedious, fiddly platforming and marveling that they managed to find the dullest possible shade of brown to paint the entire place. This is something I guess can't be changed too much if they want to stay true to how the original Half Life envisioned this level, but as I said that probably speaks more to the fundamental problems with Xen that can't really be fixed by extending the levels and improving the Polycount. Unlike the earlier Xen stuff its so dull and ugly that the problems really start to get hard to ignore for me. One thing I particularly did not like, in addition to the platforming, was the way they just entirely stop giving you ammo for any weapons other than the Gluon Gun and Tau Cannon, you have a whole arsenal of weapons that you can't really use anymore and have to stick to two, (or three if you want to use the crappy Hivehand) weapons for the rest of the level. I guess its nice that Gluon gun is very powerful and just a cool weapon generally but it still feels like a tedious restriction to put on the player in a level that's already tedious and ugly. The controllers go down quick at least, but the alien soldiers have too much health in general.

I will give the game credit though, the Nihilanth is genuinely very well done, it's pure visual splendor for an engine this old and its great buildup to get to the top of the tower then go portal hopping to the place saw at the start of Xen. The fight itself isn't particularly hard (especially compared to the Gonarch), but doesn't need to be, it looks great and its cool having access to your full arsenal again and making full use of the long jump to dodge his attacks, great ending overall.

So I guess that's it for Xen, like I said I don't think they really pull it off in the end but I'll give them points for effort, which is undeniable, but pure effort can only go so far as I think the Gonarch shows. For my money I'd still say that Surface Tension is their best achievement, they made an already brilliant chapter even better and it has such good atmosphere and memorable, difficult encounters as you come to realize the extent of both the Marine's involvement and scale of the alien invasion. Its a shame they couldn't quite do the same for Xen.

[Cargo]

I really enjoyed Interloper, the only time I was frustrated was during the conveyor belt fight with the ludicrous amount of controllers and alien grunts.