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Comment by doublerabbit | Hacker News Reader

To those who are unhappy with the graphics of HL1, you can download Black Mesa which is an remake of the original.

https://www.moddb.com/mods/black-mesa

Black Mesa is definitely a beautiful experience – especially for "younger" folks like me who missed the HL1 boat by a few years.

Mind, though, that development appears to have ceased on Black Mesa; and while it's basically 99% complete, I encountered a few show-stopping crashes and performance blackouts requiring some intense googling to bypass. I'd still recommend it, though.

It’s pretty but it’s not an exact reproduction. It’s the remake of a classic movie that keeps some scenes, changes some, and adds new ones.

It is a mistake to just play it and think you have had the HL1 experience.

For me as someone that played (and modded) the original when it first came out, it’s Jackson’s Hobbit movies vs the book when your first of many reading was years before.

Black Mesa has an extended Xen portion of the game. Otherwise it's a faithful reproduction of the original with better graphics.

For anyone who wondered "WTF was supposed to be the story behind Xen?" this guys spent way to much time piecing it together and came up with a pretty solid proposal: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tpp0Jh5514g

The Black Mesa Xen levels are one of the best things I've played recently, and sucha monumental improvement. I loved the whole sequence to bits and got stuck thinking about it for days after I finished it: it just feels so right now.

No, it's a reimagining not a reproduction and takes liberties with encounter and enemy design throughout the game. I don't mean to disaparage Black Mesa but if you want to play HL, play HL instead of pretending that some other similar game is the same.

Graphics do not make a game better. A good story is a good story whatever the graphics, and for me HL1 passes that test.

Exactly. I do enjoy good graphics, but the obsession with graphics over everything of both the gaming industry as well as many gamers is absurd.

worth every minute of playing. However for me gameplay of the original is still worth a try. I think it forces you to plan, explore and look for alternatives more. Black Mesa has more "modern" gameplay.

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