Happy New Year! Okay, it might be a little late for that, but things have been a bit quiet in Source modding lately. But never mind, because here’s a great mod to keep you entertained during these cold winter’s evenings (or summer if you’re in the southern hemisphere, I guess).

The year is 1998. A previously unknown group of game developers known as Valve Software has just released Half-Life. Of course it becomes an instant hit, entertaining a generation of gamers worldwide. But beyond that, buried away on the CD-ROM inside that ridiculously big cardboard game box is a program called “Worldcraft”. According to a note at the back of the instruction manual (remember those?) this program would allow fans to “create a replica of their garage or a fantastic alien world”. And create they did. With this tool, now known as Hammer, at their disposal, the possibilities have been almost endless. From Counter-Strike to Ricochet, from Black Mesa to deep space to World War II France, the community created a tidal wave of new adventures, far beyond what anyone might have anticipated. Fifteen years later, we show no sign of stopping.

Update: According to Deniz Sezen on the Black Mesa forums, the rumors about Black Mesa being ported to Source 2 are false: “Just to dispel a large rumor (and I know I’ll be viewed as the grinch that stole christmas): We are NOT on Source 2. It wouldn’t make sense for a company to license tech they haven’t proven yet with a released title to a mod team. Our [visual] however, WILL be improved. Don’t get me wrong though, we’d love a Source 2 license but our fans would be waiting another 9 years if we had to port again.”

Can’t say I didn’t warn ya.

Since I am sure many of you will have mixed feelings about the news mentioned in the title, I just want to make it clear right out of the gate that an updated Black Mesa will still be available for free and will be supported!!! Now, onto the details…

It’s no secret that I am terrible at multiplayer games. Whether it’s Counter-Strike or Team Fortress, I’m often that noob at the bottom of the scoreboard, so it should be no surprise that I stick to the single player side of modding. I occasionally make an exception to that rule though, and I’m glad I did for this mod – because Pirates, Vikings and Knights II is a lot of fun.

Isn’t it always the way – you have no Half-Life 2 maps to play and then nine come along all at once!

It can be hard to keep track of things in the modding community. Unlike the multi-million dollar marketing campaigns of triple-A releases, us mappers have to rely on word-of-mouth or places like ModDB to have our creations discovered.

A result of this is that a lot of brilliant releases slip “under the radar” and fade into obscurity. To help rectify this, here is the first of what (we hope) will be a series of articles highlighting smaller maps and mods released recently which we think you should download and try out for yourself. They’re free!

What exactly is The Stanley Parable? It is an indie remake of a Half-Life 2 mod of the same name, but what was that? A story? A game? A serious commentary on the nature of free will, or just an amusing mod? Even the developers make a point of not explaining themselves, preferring to provide one whimsical contradiction after another. One thing that is certain about The Stanley Parable is that it is coming soon on Steam, and you can download a demo right now.

G string is one of those mods that leaves a lasting impression after you play it. The world you are thrown into is so compelling and rich that at times I found myself just sort of standing there in an open street as the polluted acid rain slowly ate away at my health, just basking in this hopelessly depressing cyberpunk dystopia laid out before me. G string manages to take elements of cyberpunk from films such as Blade Runner and Ghost In The Shell and splice it with the feeling of abandonment and hopelessness I felt while playing Stalker : Shadow of Chernobyl. Together it is a very potent mix.

Zombie Panic: Source will most certainly live on as its successor, Contagion, because its Kickstarter campaign has surpassed its goal! Thankfully, Contagion has joined the ranks of the 50% of campaigns that actually succeed on Kickstarter and should be ready for release this fall. But just because the game has reached its goal, doesn’t mean the adventure’s over.

As much as mods like No More Room In Hell and Zombie Panic: Source have captivated fans across the Half Life spectrum, and as much as I have put my support behind Contagion, it’s nice to see a multiplayer mod that doesn’t involve killing zombies. Hell, even something that’s not a first person shooter! …not that I have any problem with first person shooters. It would be quite ironic if I did. But still, it’s nice to see something different. There are a slew of Half Live 2 mods that have turned the first person genre on its head. From experiments in story telling that we’ve seen in Dear Esther and the Stanley Parable. To projects that can rival some triple A experiences like Black Mesa or Underhell. But there don’t seem to be enough Half Life 2 mods that break the ‘perspective mold’ and give us a different way to ‘view’ games.