The Half-Life series can be quite glum at times, especially with no resolution in sight for the series. Good thing we have the modding community to deliver us some light-heartedness. Here are fourteen off-the-wall mods hand-picked to help relieve those Episode 2 cliffhanger blues.

Team Fortress 2’s annual Halloween celebration is here, and it’s got the works!

As Halloween approaches, PlanetPhillip.com has today announced a new single-player mapping challenge for Half-Life 2: Episode 2 entitled “HorrorVille”.

The challenge will run from 12:00am Friday 17th October to 12:00pm (GMT) on Monday 3rd November, lasting 17 days.

The theme is obviously horror orientated and entrants are encouraged to make their maps as creatively scary as possible. The rules also require submissions to feature at least one weapon and enemy or one puzzle scenario, using only assets from the Half-Life 2 series of games.

The winner will be decided by a public vote and all maps submitted to a decent standard will have the chance to be included in a free HorrorVille mod after the challenge ends.

HorrorVille follows PlanetPhillip.com’s series of “ville” mapping challenges and competitions which compile publicly submitted single-player maps into free mods.

For more information, check out PlanetPhillip.com’s announcement post.

“Please, sir, I want some more.”

Valve was a big, healthy company; not usually easily astonished. But now they turned pale, and quiet. They gazed upon the little boy who had dared to ask for more.

“What” Valve whispered in complete astonishment.

“Please sir, I want some more Diretide…”

Hello and Happy Halloween!

For this week’s Community Spotlight we thought we would share some of the Halloween creations from around the community. Unlike usual though, we are going to be dynamically updating this post from now till the end of the week with anything sent in.

Man, what I love the most about Halloween is the spooky mood I get in. You know what I’m saying? Like, for instance, I feel spooky enough to pull of insane spooks that would be considered too spooky outside of Halloween.

It’s all good on Halloween though, because everyone has already been spooked by the Halloween event in Team Fortress 2, which is dubbed every year Scream Fortress. Yes, people. It’s that time of the year. The annual Team Fortress 2 Halloween update is live!

This might be a shock to you, because it certainly was to me: Halloween hasn’t actually started yet. We’ve still got about a day left, yet anything remotely Halloween-related has already been going on for a few days now. How will I be able to celebrate… uhh, the World Day for Audiovisual Heritage on the 27th of October, when people are just going around asking for candy while dressed as video game characters (some of them even appear to be dressed as homeless people, although they tend to ask for money instead)? That’s just not right, not right at all.

But what if cheap horror games are involved? Then… well, I suppose all sins are forgiven after all. Screw you, Audiovisual Heritage Day! It’s time to play Killing Floor with my friends!