I Miss black mesa :( :( :(

[Mechagodzilla]

At the end of Opposing Force, as the G-Man talks, you see a flash. This supposed to be the nuke G-man set to explode taking out Black Mesa. Well, you can't see a flash from a nuke set off underground unless it was near enough to the surface to blow the stuff above it apart, and if it was that close to the surface for that it's not going to be doing much damage to a complex that is almost totally underground.

Most of the blast of the nuke would have been absorped by the rock that Black Mesa was built into, much like US military's NORAD is built into Cheyenne mountain to withstand a direct nuclear blast.

Test footage of real underground nuclear explosions in systems of tunnels show that the ground collapses in a fairly small area around the explosion. That's what would have happened to Black Mesa as well, and it was far too wide for a single warhead to take it out.

The nuke wouldn't have destroyed Black Mesa, just collapsed the area around the explosion and filled the corridors first with extremely hot blast and then radioactive fallout. Doors which were shut would have kept out the blast but the fallout might have got through the air-conditioning.

So I think Black Mesa is mostly intact but with a big hole in it and filled with radiotive fallout. It'd be uninhabitable but mostly not destroyed.

I tend to think that is was totally obliterated. Black Mesa had a nuclear reactor in every room, practically.
That one nuke could have caused a massive chain reaction of several Chernobyl-esque explosions.

It certainly would explain the flash. :O

 

[Steve]

I tend to think that is was totally obliterated. Black Mesa had a nuclear reactor in every room, practically.
That one nuke could have caused a massive chain reaction of several Chernobyl-esque explosions.

It certainly would explain the flash. :O

Maybe somebody just took a really BIG picture?

 

[Hyperion2010]

I dont miss that hell hole one lick.

HL2 has much better and more interesting settings that BMRF... (and more that one at that...)

 

[Sulkdodds]

It certainly would explain the flash.

As would all the radioactive material, spare warheads, weird and very volatile experiments, etc...

While wandering through a post-accident, abandoned Black Mesa could make an incredible level (Thief's Cradle, anyone?) I doubt there's actually anything left. Since it was the G-Man who nuked it I doubt he left any of it intact.

 

[Dr. Freeman]

I have thought about this for a bit now and wanted to share my thoughts:
First of all, I really really miss BMRF. And I have found out what (for me) made Black Mesa so different from City 17 and what distinguishes HL1 from HL2.

Although you as the player visit BMRF for the first time, everybody knows you there. From the moment you step through the door, everybody knows who you are, and you somehow feel at home because the people welcome you and know what you are trying to achieve with your experiments.
This is similar in HL2, but with the difference that you don't feel at home. People know who you are, but they only "like" you because they hope you can help them. They are desperate of your help, not of your person.

Then at BMRF it is you (Gordon) who starts it all. It doesn't matter now if it was really Dr. Breen, the G-Man or whoever who might have started it before, because as a player you felt responsible for what happened. People trusted in you, and now they are all dying because you screwed up. This makes you feel really sad, and I always had the feeling that when a NPC died it was my fault. So you want to make up for it, really relieve the people because you created the mess.
This is where HL2 screwed it up a little IMO. You are not directly the one who caused the scenario (overall you might be responsible because of the Resonance Cascade, but the game just puts you in this fixed situation). When NPC's die, you might feel bad for them, but only because you know it's wrong. You don't blame yourself, and thus I didn't care about the NPC's as much as I did in HL1, although they are much more developed now. As the player, you of course still want to clear things up, but in the end you just have to because there is nobody else. You have no direct connection to the situation, as it was already like this. You just don't feel responsible for the things that happen, and this is where I think Valve should have put in more work. NPC's will die, you will feel sad, but in the end it is not really your fault, because they would have died anyway even if you hadn't shown up.


Another thing that makes the two games different, is the development. In BMRF, you always think things are going to get better soon. When you escape the champer, you think it is enough the get outside and everything is fine. When the marines show up, you first think "Phew, now we are save" but then again things only become worse, because now you have two enemies.
Things aren't going well in City17 either, but from the beginning you know that things aren't going to get pretty very soon. From the beginning you know that the whole regime will have to be stopped or there won't be an end to it, so there isn't really a development in your situation. From the start you know you are the one who has to stop the whole regime, and not like in HL1 where you should escape or just get some help.

i think part of the reason for this is that we know theres a HL3 coming in a few years.. had Valve kept shush-shush on that for a few years, i dunno.. maybe pple would have a different perspective of HL2.

and i did mention before this game's release that some pple would feel that HL1 is in a league of its own... and ya know its true because it changed fps-gaming on so many levels.

 

[Steve]

While wandering through a post-accident, abandoned Black Mesa could make an incredible level (Thief's Cradle, anyone?) I doubt there's actually anything left. Since it was the G-Man who nuked it I doubt he left any of it intact.

*shudder*...awwww...noooo! The Cradle scared the crap out of me! *curls into fetal position and begins to suck thumb*

 

[Wizenbane]

An observation...

Damn, guess I should have bought the exp packs as well, eh?

I'm kind of a lurker here, but....
Am I the only one who noticed that you can download Opposing Force through Steam?
I did it the other day... Codename: Gordon too.