Archive for July 2010

Do We Expect To Die?

Single Player First Person Shooter Maps and Mods for Half-Life 1, 2 and Episodes 1, 2 and 3

July 2010: I have reposted this article in the hope of generating some interesting discussion. It was originally published in April 2006.

A long time ago I started a thread on a gaming forum about expert SP FPS gamers. I asked if anybody had beaten a modern (HL1 or Unreal 1 onwards) Single Player First Person Shooter on the hardest setting without playing sections twice. Let me explain that a little. You are allowed to save a game but only to provide a natural break (toilet, food or sleep!); you are not allowed to quick load when you are running low of health or ammo.

25th July 2010 7 Comments

A Collection of Images – Real Theme

Single Player First Person Shooter Maps and Mods for Half-Life 1, 2 and Episodes 1, 2 and 3

I’ve had a lot of hard drive failures over the years and lost plenty of stored images. I became jaded to their loss but I recently came across a few photographs that I think are mildly inspirational for mappers and I have decided to create this post to act as a holder for all the individual images I find that I like.

Obviously, each one may not astound you and they don’t deserve their own post but as the collection grows it may become useful. Please feel free to send me your images and I will add them if I like them.

I will not be sorting them in any way, they are posted in the order I find them. Enjoy.

25th July 2010 3 Comments

A New Approach to Headcrabs?

The City 17 Times has received reports that Dr. Kleiner and a small group of resistance commanders have left the city on what has been described by one Resistance member as “A bold move”.

Apparently Dr. Kleiner and his team have gone to met Cesar Millan, a renowned Dog trainer. You may know him as the Dog Whisperer.

25th July 2010 5 Comments

Poll Question 182 – Has Steam changed your purchasing habits?

Single Player First Person Shooter Maps and Mods for Half-Life 1, 2 and Episodes 1, 2 and 3

This week’s question is another that started as a forum thread called: The Power of Steam. MikeS noticed he had 94 games on his Steam account but thought of himself as a casual gamer.

I only have 30 games but I doubt I have even finished half of those. That’s not as bad as it sounds because a lot of those games came free when I bought something else; games like TF2, DOD: Source etc.

23rd July 2010 24 Comments

Rainmeter and a Half-Life 2 style desktop

Single Player First Person Shooter Maps and Mods for Half-Life 1, 2 and Episodes 1, 2 and 3

I received an interesting email from Joe Albericci AKA ThePengu a few days ago and I thought I’d share the content with you.

He told me about a a desktop customization platform called Rainmeter, whilst I had never heard of that particular application, I was aware of these types of applications. The whole thing looks pretty cool and I am running it as I type, although I am yet to find the right skin for me.

18th July 2010 6 Comments

The 7 Year Cycle?

Single Player First Person Shooter Maps and Mods for Half-Life 1, 2 and Episodes 1, 2 and 3

I was recording Podcast17 yesterday and was speaking about a mod I added a few days ago called Minimicus.

There’s nothing remarkable about this mod, although it is good fun and well produced, but the interesting things is that it is 7 years old. In gaming, that’s a loooong time.

18th July 2010 14 Comments

Poll Question 181 – Should mod makers be expected to support and update their mods over a number of years and engines updates?

Single Player First Person Shooter Maps and Mods for Half-Life 1, 2 and Episodes 1, 2 and 3

You probably are aware that a recent engine update by Valve caused a lot of mods to stop working. At the time of writing and to my knowledge Valve had neither acknowledged the issue nor apologized. Fine, that’s how they treat the people who put bread on their table, that’s their choice. I don’t like it but there’s nothing I can do about it.

However, the community, lead by gorpie, a PP and Steam Forum regular, have worked very hard to find fixes, patches, solutions and hacks to get the mods working again.

16th July 2010 35 Comments

Minimicus

for Half-Life

Single Player First Person Shooter Maps and Mods for Half-Life 1, 2 and Episodes 1, 2 and 3

The scientists at Black Mesa have invented a shrinking machine. They are shrinking Xen creatures in order to make them easier to control.

Two shrunken Gonarchs have escaped and are breeding in the civilian community. The Marines have once again been called in to

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Total Downloads: 2,82114th July 2010
18 Comments and 12 recommendations, most say "Play It Now!"