Hello and welcome to the freshly relaunched LambdaGeneration.com! I am Darren “Daz” Weekes and I love talking about level design in games, so much so in fact that I’ve been doing it on my youtube channel for over a year now focusing on the Half-Life and Quake series of games. My videos aim to entertain and perhaps educate people on the design process behind game levels, so if you’ve ever had an urge to design your own level for a Half-Life title then hopefully I can provide that first stepping stone into the nebulous space that is game design. That’s quite enough about me because today I have something quite special to share with you…

This is a review/critique of Black Mesa: Source (a free fan-made remake of Half-Life), co-written by Mimaz (co-host of the Steamchat Podcast) and Vic (previous lead editor of LambdaGeneration).

Black Mesa is a difficult game to judge.

Update: This article has been updated with further information on the upcoming first release of Black Mesa: Source. Check it all out, within!

You may or may not know that the work I do, especially here, tends to demand some pretty crazy late night hours of me. Consequently, I might sleep in worse than Gordon Freeman himself (after all, we can all imagine why he was late for that faithful experiment).

And sometimes, it so happens that the universe itself will directly conspire against my sleepy ways.

Like now.

Gearbox’s infamous cancelled Dreamcast console port of Half-Life 1 (although it was also developed by Captivation Digital Labs) has been shrouded in mystery for many. Troubled by delays, it was originally slated for release in summer of 2000, then fall of 2000, then late 2000, then pushed back to early 2001 and eventually, mid-2001, then finally put out of its misery in a controversial cancellation. The ill-fated port was hilariously close to release – Prima strategy guides and other promotional materials were made available (and can still be found on online auction sites for various prices), and a near-complete beta build was leaked to the Internet. Concurrently, it seems that the only way to experience the port is to download this leaked build.

But, no longer! Dedicated modders have just released a mod port of the Dreamcast version for Half-Life 1, which means that right now, you can experience the unreleased Dreamcast port for yourself! Read on for more info on the release.

VMF’s and Vodka’s upcoming Half-Life 2 mod, Ivan’s Secrets, has been in development for quite some time now, and while their media posts are always amazing, August’s may be the very best so far.

The original Half-Life’s hype train first started rolling when an early demo of the first few chapters of the game, known as “Half-Life: Day One”, only meant for distribution with graphics cards, was leaked to the internet.

Immediately, gamers got fired up, and eventually, the game was released in November 1998.

However, there is another demo, an official one this time, not too many people remember. Released after the official game, Half-Life: Uplink is an underrated demo featuring some great levels that didn’t make it in the final game.

According to a post on the official Black Mesa Half-Life 2 mod forums, lead developer ‘natedgreat3’ claims that despite the lack of updates, the much anticipated mod will be released before 2011. Black Mesa has been in development since 2004 in an attempt to re-create the original Half-Life using Half-Life 2’s Source Engine. For those looking forward to the mod, this is great news!

The HL2 mod “Visage” has just released its first teaser trailer and its official site. Set for release in Q4 2010, the mod looks great and we’re looking forward to seeing more of it. Check it out after the jump.

After years in the making, the Source remake of the popular Firearms mod is available. Members from the original team along with new blood have put years of work and a re-code into this release. Find out more after the jump.

Fistful of Frags’s new release has just gone out the gates. More of a fresh start, large parts of code have been replaced and numerous things have been improved. Full changelog is after the jump.