Game:

Black Mesa (2020)

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Black Mesa is a 2020 first-person shooter game developed and published by Crowbar Collective. It is a third-party remake of Half-Life (1998) made in the Source game engine. Originally published as a free mod in September 2012, Black Mesa was approved for commercial release by Valve, the developers of Half-Life. The first commercial version was published as an early-access release in May 2015, followed by a full release in March 2020 for Linux and Windows.

Black Mesa was developed in response to Half-Life: Source (2004), Valve's port of Half-Life to the Source engine, which lacked new features or improvements. Two teams wanted to improve on the Source remake and eventually merged to become Crowbar Collective. The team originally targeted a 2009 release, but realized they had rushed to this point and reevaluated their efforts to improve the quality of the remake.

Adapting the game to an improved version of the Source engine and completely reworking the oft-derided final chapter of Half-Life (known as Xen) had lengthened the development efforts of the remake. Due to its long development time, the modification became notable for its delays on the status of its completion. Major changes include reskinned collection of textures, models and NPCs, a longer runtime, improved level and puzzle design along with different enemy artificial intelligence, and additional dialogue and story elements. Black Mesa received positive reviews, with critics praising the gameplay and attention to detail akin to that of an official Valve release.