Despite the long delay, I continue to introduce you to the activities of the company that turned the FPS genre upside down – Valve. Although it would be more correct to say that today’s issue is dedicated to the activities of Gearbox, since Valve decided to try itself as a publisher, at the same time taking on a modification for Quake. Well, what will come of it – find out below. Enjoy watching/reading!
After the stunning success of Half-Life, Valve should think about producing a sequel to its debut hit. However, this did not happen and, instead, in April 1999, they released a Software Development Kit (or SDK), which allowed the community to create their own creations, that is, mods. And, in fact, this is where the times began when Valve made serious projects from fan modifications. And our patient today, although he is a modification, initially had nothing to do with Half-Life, since he was a mod for the game Quake. And this, let me remind you, is a game whose engine, at one time, was licensed and redesigned by Valve. But don’t think they’ve decided to shelve Half-Life right away. Quite the opposite. The company decided to try itself as a publisher, so let’s find out what three Australians and the new, newly founded company Gearbox will do. The second episode of Valve Company History is on air!
Team Fortress Classic
As mentioned above, Team Fortress is a free modification for the game Quake, developed by Australians Robin Walker (Robin Walker), John Cook (John Cook) and Jan Kofli (Ian Caughley) in 1996. The essence of the mod was as follows – there were two teams – red and blue (on some maps there were yellow and green). Each team had 9 different character classes – from Demoman to Medic. There were several game modes – Capture the Flag, Capture Points, the good old Deathmatch, and there was a mode in which one side had to be escorted, and the other had to kill a civilian, which was another playable class.
The modification was received well by the players and, at some point, became so popular that fans began to spread it across other parts of Quake, Enemy Territory, and even for Unreal Tournament. But that’s another story, not important for us. What was important was that three friends formed the TeamFortress Software company and decided to make a commercial sequel to Team Fortress for Quake II, but suddenly, in May 1998, Valve bought them.
As a result, Team Fortress 2 was remade into another game with a completely new engine and was called Team Fortress: Brotherhood of Arms. As for the original Team Fortress, they added modern (for those times, of course) graphics and generally released it as a modification to Half-Life, called Team Fortress Classic. And I think now we can talk about the game in more detail.
In fact, there is nowhere to go into much detail here, except perhaps for character classes. Well, they also removed the yellow and green team from the game, but otherwise they added new cards and, in principle, that’s all. The maps themselves consisted of two spawn points – the red base and the blue base. Inside them were cartridges, first aid kits and armor. And there were either flags on them, or there were control points on the map. But why am I telling this?? It’s like no one knows how standard multiplayer shooter modes work. I’ll tell you better about the classes. Each of them was unique not only in appearance and name, but also in a set of weapons and even abilities.
Demoman, aka Demoman, possessed a crowbar, a shotgun, a grenade launcher and a bomb launcher, as well as grenades – hand and cluster. The second ones, exploding, scattered several more small grenades, which… also then exploded.
There is no need to talk about the grenade launcher, but the bomb launcher was used to create traps and mine important objects.
Among his abilities, he had an explosive package with a timer for 5, 20 or 50 seconds, which could not only ruin a player’s life, but also open hidden passages on the maps. He could also bomb open and other spaces and jump on a bomb launcher, of course.
Engineer – had a wrench, a rail gun and a double-barreled shotgun. Also possessed hand grenades and EMP grenades. The latter could destroy all enemy ammo. Abilka – construction menu. He could build teleports, create ammunition, repair armor, and also install dispensers and turrets. And with a wrench you could not only hit someone on the head, but also fix all buildings.
Heavy, aka the Machine Gunner, had with him a crowbar, a single-barreled shotgun, a double-barreled shotgun and, of course, a machine gun. There was a cluster grenade, which worked like a cluster grenade, only instead of small grenades, it released mini-bombs. "Havik" is not blown away by a blast wave – this is its ability.
Medic had a first aid kit, a single-barreled shotgun, a double-barreled shotgun, a nail gun and a stun grenade. I think you understand that his ability was healing, but with the help of a first aid kit he could infect enemies, and his health was also regenerated.
Pyro, he is also a Pyromaniac or Flamethrower, had with him, believe it or not, a flamethrower, a crowbar, a shotgun, an igniting rocket launcher and a napalm grenade, the explosion of which set the entire area around it on fire. As for his ability, he, unlike the others, could not burn.
Scout, aka Scout, had with him a crowbar, a single-barreled gun, a nail gun, a stun grenade and wire hedgehogs with which he could slow down the enemy. Ability – neutralizing explosive packages upon contact with him and revealing the Spy’s disguise, again, upon contact.
Sniper. Believe it or not, he had a sniper rifle with him, which had a scope on it. He also had an automatic rifle and he also had a tire iron. In the Quake version he had an incendiary grenade. And yes, his ability is a sniper scope.
Soldier. Had a crowbar, both shotguns, a flare gun, and a nail grenade that could shoot nails in a circle until it exploded. Ability – Rocketjump.
Spy. He had a knife that instantly killed with a blow from the back, a tranquilizer that reduced the target’s running speed and turning for a while, a double-barreled shotgun, a nail gun, and a gas grenade. Abilities include masquerading as any class of another team, revealing the disguise of another Spy upon contact, and simulating one’s own death.
AND… Civil. Had to get to the evacuation point or… die. Could even fend for himself with an umbrella. And… that’s all. These are the characters. And this is how he is – the original (well, almost) Team Fortress.
A fun multiplayer game, with an emphasis on classes and playing different tactics for each of them, which gave varied gameplay and, in fact, the game became popular for good reason, so much so that it was included in the 10 most playable mods for the first Half-Life according to GameSpy in 2003. Naturally, we all know which mod was more popular than Team Fortress, but more on that in the next issue. I have nothing more to say about Team Fortress Classic. So we move on to Gearbox Software, and at the same time return to the Half-Life series.
Half-Life: Opposing Force
On February 16, 1999, five employees from the disbanded Rebel Boat Rocker studio founded Gearbox Software. Namely: Randy Pitchford (Randy Pitchford), Brian Martel (Brian Martel), Stephen Bal (how to pronounce his last name – write, please) (Stephen Bahl), Landon Montgomery (Landon Montgomery) and Rob Heironimus (Rob Heironimus). On April 15 of the same year, they announce their debut project, which, as it turns out, is an addition to the main hit of last year – Half-Life, commissioned by Valve itself.
It was called Opposing Force and https://pirate-spins.co.uk in it Gearbox planned to preserve everything that was in the original, but at the same time give a new experience from the game, without even changing or modifying the engine. At E3 1999, information appeared about new locations, characters and plot, and as development progressed, Gearbox needed help in the design of some aspects of the game, and they called in a level designer Richard Gray (Richard Gray) from 3D Realms, who is known for his work in Duke Nukem 3D. As a result, Richard helped in the development of multiplayer. Later, several more designers joined the team with experience in the development of Quake II, DOOM and Shadow Warrior. After a while, screenshots from the game appeared, and even later, the addon was released exactly a year after the release of the original Half-Life. Well, let’s see what Gearbox did in their debut project.
The game takes place in the same time period as the original, on the territory of the same Black Mesa research center. However, this time, we are Adrian Shephard – a corporal of the HECU special forces, sent along with his team to clear the center. Having almost reached the landing strip, our helicopter, like the others, is attacked by alien stingrays.
One way or another, Shepard loses consciousness, comes to his senses a couple of times, seeing his comrades die, but passes out again and fully comes to his senses in the infirmary. It turns out that he is the only surviving soldier in the area and while advancing he sees the corpses of people. Having reached the crash site, we contact our squad by radio, from whom we learn that the evacuation of soldiers is already underway and a new collection point has been appointed, where we go in a monorail car.
After the trip, we fight with several aliens and find a guard who is trying to get candy from a machine. Together with him, we make our way through the aliens and, behind one of the glasses, we see a completely new enemy – the Shock Soldier, who, apparently, collects people to study in his world, because he kills the guard, grabs the scientist and teleports with him to an unknown location. But, in the end, we get to the collection point, and the commander sends us to the runway, but, quite suddenly, G-Man appears, who closes the door right in front of the hero, which is why the helicopter flies away without him.
Now we have to look for another exit from the complex and, passing through the office premises, on the lower levels we notice that the assimilation of the Xena flora with the Earth has begun, and in the office we find soldiers who, like us, were unable to leave the complex. Now we will clear our way together with them and, in the end, we will get to the hangar.
In the hangar we find black operatives, men at that, loading a nuclear warhead into a truck and, upon seeing us, immediately attack. After the victory, having found friendly soldiers, we head towards the underground railroad.
Shepard ends up in a teleport room, where we can see Freeman jumping into the portal to Xen. We, fighting off the Controllers, jump into a new portal.
Interesting fact: you can jump right behind Freeman, after which you will receive a message that you created a time paradox. One way or another, after walking around Zen, we return to the complex and find ourselves in the flooded hydrofauna laboratories.
Here we save a scientist who ends up being electrocuted. After walking around the laboratory, we again find ourselves in Zen, and after another teleportation, we find ourselves back in the complex.
We appear in the premises of the Biodome complex, where the flora and fauna of Zena were studied. In some places, the nature of Xena is even recreated. Also, scientists here have been testing creatures for a long time and even with success – they were able to disconnect Barnacle from the ceiling. Well, having reached the old industrial zone, Shepard hears a radio transmission from soldiers fighting aliens.
Once in the waste processing area, we see this game called the Cave Worm. By turning on the acid supply, toxic waste falls into the water under the monster and it dies.
Shepard and his soldiers make their way through an area controlled by Black Operatives, and then through a nest of creatures called Voltigors. And once at the hydroelectric power station, we make our way to the other side, where our comrades are fighting with the aliens, and we detonate the dynamite, thereby overwhelming Gargantua. Jumping into the hole formed by the explosion, we find ourselves in a sewer pipe, the current of which carries us into a reservoir, where we again meet with the Black Operatives, who now also use helicopters and artillery. We continue to fight with the aliens and, in the end, we find ourselves in an underground parking lot, where we turn off the warhead. However, a little later, we see the G-Man turning it on again.
Well, Shepard goes down to the lower floors by elevator and ends up in an underground warehouse filled with black operatives. And having defeated them, he gets to a huge portal from which the Geneworm emerges. Having defeated this huge creature, we jump into the portal and..
G-Man appears before us, who, like Freeman, teleported to an unknown location during the dialogue. Only we are in the helicopter we flew on at the beginning of the game. Some time later, we see that the warhead in Black Mesa has exploded, and Shepard is blinded by the flash from it, after which G-Man sends him into stasis, where he “cannot harm himself or others”.
Just like in the original, we could go through the training. And, since we play as a soldier, and not as a scientist, the training location will be appropriate, namely, a training ground.
At the beginning we wake up in the barracks, the sergeant parodies Full Metal Jacket, and he also tells us to go and undergo advanced training. Along the way we can see a guy doing push-ups, who apparently did something wrong, and outside the window of one of the buildings you can see G-Man talking about something with a soldier.
As a result, we begin to undergo training, where we are taught to run, jump, squat as usual, and even once walk through a field filled with mines, dodging machine-gun fire. Of course, there were some innovations. Firstly, the ability to crawl and swing on ropes. During the game we will need this skill more than once.
It also turns out that we now have not a HEV protective suit, but a PCV vest, which is charged both by its own charger and by the HEV charger.
The flashlight was replaced with night vision, which, to be honest, I don’t really want to use because my eyes want to bleed out.
And we are shown command of soldiers, and if anyone is interested in the question – how does this differ from command of ordinary guards and scientists, I will answer – there is an engineer who can open a locked door and there is a medic who, believe it or not, can kidnap you.
And, in principle, nothing more new except weapons.
In addition to the good old MP5/M4 and Glock/Beretta, we now have a replacement mount – Spanner, which has two types of attacks – light and heavy.
There is also Knife, which can quickly and easily deal with the enemy.
Appeared Desert Eagle – a “powerful” pistol that replaced a revolver, which also has a laser sight for more accurate shooting.
Sniper rifle M40A1 for eliminating enemies at long distances, which appeared in the game to replace the crossbow.
A machine gun appeared M249, which can quickly take out a wave of opponents.
But the most interesting thing is probably, Portal Gun, which had two types of attack – the main one, creating a portal field, which, when sent to the enemy, caused damage to him. And an alternative one – teleports from Earth to Xen and vice versa.
By the way, if you use the gun at the place where you received it, you can get to the training location from the original Half-Life.
In general, the places in Xena that you can teleport to can be either useful or useless, but you will still waste the energy of the gun, fortunately, at each location there is a teleport back to Earth, so you can return without the energy.
Shock Cockroach – used by monsters and, if you do not pick up a cockroach when it dies, it will begin to move and attack the player. It shoots electric discharges, which themselves are restored, from which we conclude that this weapon is a replacement for the fly swatter from the original.
Spore thrower – is a Shock Soldier larva that feeds on spore fruits, absorbing all the useful substances and spitting these fruits back, but with acid. This weapon also had two fire modes – the first fired one spore, which immediately exploded upon impact, and the second fired a spore that ricocheted off any surface and either exploded itself after some time, or upon contact with something organic.
This weapon, by the way, was planned to be introduced in the original Half-Life and was supposed to be carried by Infantrymen, but things didn’t go beyond concepts then.
Well Hand Barnacle – could attract opponents to himself, and could also attract the player to special surfaces, which was used to cross certain places.
This addition provides us with such an unusual and interesting arsenal. But in addition to weapons, it also provided us with new opponents, or rather a certain Race X, which demonstrated the ability to work in a team, which is quite noticeable during skirmishes with Black Operatives. In principle, this is not surprising, because the artificial intelligence of these creatures was based on the AI of human opponents.
The intentions of this race are unknown, but they attack the player. This race is represented by the following species:
Cave Drone – a small bipedal creature armed with long claws. They were quite fast and smart, because they moved in the company of several creatures, and also flanked the player and surrounded him. In addition to striking with their claws, they could also attack from a distance, releasing spikes from their heads.
Shock Soldier – the smartest and most dangerous of the race. They looked like humanoids with four arms and had a body type similar to a Vortigaunt. Their skin has a unique pale blue color for the game with pink spots, like a cave drone. These creatures attacked with shock cockroaches, and at long distances they threw spores.
Voltigor – large creatures with six limbs with huge claws. These creatures are very aggressive and attack the player either by throwing special charges that cause heavy damage, or by striking with their claws if you get close to them. When killed, Voltigors explode into pieces, causing damage to everything in the area.
Cave Worm – a creature resembling a caterpillar, which was similar to the Tentacle and not only in appearance, because he, like the Tentacle, blocked the player’s path and was destroyed only with the help of special actions. In the case of Opposing Force, this is even more interesting, since in order to turn on the acid supply, you must activate the pump control device, which is called the Gearbox, and also turn the valve, called the Valve. I don’t think there’s any need to explain what these are references to.
Well Geneworm, which is the final boss coming from the portal. This huge creature could take any earthly resources, processing them into something suitable for aliens. If the invasion is successful, she could take the Earth under the control of the X race. This creature attacked with tentacles and also spewed a toxic stream from its mouth. This creature was guided by hearing, despite the fact that it had eyes. This becomes clear if, for example, you hit something in one place and then run to another. The monster will attack exactly the place where we hit. To kill this creature, it was necessary to shoot it in the eyes from turrets. After their destruction, the creature’s belly opened, and inside it there was a sphere that had to be dealt damage, after which it spawned a shock soldier and closed, and the eyes were restored. As you might guess, it was necessary to perform the same operation several times and the creature would be destroyed.
Among the interesting things about this creature is an audio file with the incomprehensible muttering of this creature. Turning the file backwards will show the phrase – To beat the game, you must kill me – Randy Pitchford. This was a reference not only to one of the developers, but also to a phrase from the game DOOM II. There, the final boss also uttered an incomprehensible phrase, and when played backwards, he said the same thing, only with John Romero.
This is what race X is like. As I already said, their intentions were not known, except perhaps to enslave the Earth. But, unfortunately, we will not see this race in any other game in the universe except Opposing Force. It, according to Mark Laidlaw, screenwriter of the original Half-Life, was invented by Gearbox itself and was conceived only for this and future projects of the company in this universe. However, they did not appear in either Blue Shift or Decay.
As for the monsters from Xena, they have nothing new, with the exception of one monster called Gon. This, judging by the design, is the next stage of transformation of a zombie infected with a headcrab. In this form they had another attack. At long distances they attacked the player with organic projectiles. Otherwise, nothing else new. Oh, and there are also new zombie designs – guards and marines. Apart from additions, they were not used anywhere else.
I’ll say a few words about the soundtrack, which I didn’t talk about in the last issue, as well as about its composer, Kelly Bailey, but I didn’t do that on purpose, since he is the main composer of the Half-Life series and I’ll talk about him in the issue about the episodes of the second Half-Life. Why am I bringing this up now because the composer of Opposing Force is Chris Jensen. He composed his own soundtrack for this expansion. Later it was all used in Blue Shift. Jensen did a good job and the tracks fit the events perfectly.
There is almost nothing from the content cut from the game, except for the Flash Grenade. It was found in the game files, and can also be seen on the belts of black operatives, but it is not used by them or the game itself.
Half-Life: Opposing Force was well received by critics and players. By the end of 1999, more than 100 thousand were sold. copies of the game, and over the entire period of its existence, more than 1 million copies were sold. Judging by the reviews, Gearbox was able to achieve its goal – to give players a new experience in a familiar shell. It’s hard to disagree with this. The game was just as fun, the plot was still perfectly woven into the gameplay and the game’s picture was still pleasing to the eye. Someone even noted the game not just as an addition, but as a successor to the masterpiece. The only thing people criticized the game for was its length. Opposing Force took only 3-4 hours to complete, but even so, the game had so many interesting things that it left almost no one indifferent and not only won the “Best Add-on” award in 1999, but PC Gamer magazine said that this is the first add-on in history that is quite a contender for Game of the Year. Everything was so good.
And after such success, Valve commissioned Gearbox and other additions to be made, but that’s not about today.
At this point there should have been a story about the difficult fate of the fan remake of Opposing Force on the Source engine, but it’s better to talk about this together with Blue Shift and Decay, so I’ll leave it for the fourth issue.
Well then. This is how Valve’s first attempt as a publisher turned out. As you can see, it turned out to be quite successful. And next time we’ll talk about how fan modification has become one of the most important eSports disciplines.
Jealous!
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