This game always fascinated me as a companion piece to Half-Life. It cemented some things in the HL lore that have just become accepted, while at the same time existing in Schrodinger’s canon.

I’m considering giving it another playthrough and taking notes. How many people have actually played it? How many people who weren’t gaming when it released have actually played? Is there any interest in it?

  • Captain Aggravated@sh.itjust.worksEnglish
    5·
    3 days ago

    Which feels a little wild to someone who was “there at the time.” Op For was the one that got the praise at the time for having the cool new weapons and interesting new enemies and such, Blue Shift had normal Half Life weapons, basic armor pickups and I guess some cool level design. Plus I think there’s still backlash against the HD models that came with Blue Shift.

    I think it got easier to dismiss the Gearbox expansion packs as non-canon when basically the only thing they kept from them was Barney’s last name.

    It may be The Algorithm reacting to my search history but when it shows me Half-Life content it’s often centered around Half-Life 2 or Portal. I don’t get “Cut unreleased content from an old build of Opposing Force.”

    I think one thing that might be a factor is, Op For and Blue Shift don’t pose more questions than they answer. Half-Life still has some mystery to it, there’s a lot of intrigue to it, people want to know more about the setting.

    Tangentially related note: I had an idea for a video game but no one will ever make it. You almost have to glom onto an existing project. Imagine a normal open world sandbox game like GTA 4 or something, and the normal game is there, but if you pay close attention some of the NPCs are a little weird, and if you follow them there’s a WHOLE OTHER, BIGGER STORY.

    Problem with that is you have to make an entire game to hide the “real” game in, and what you want to bet it would be found by people going through the game files rather than playing.