Half-Life 25th Anniversary Update

worm · November 27, 2023

A bit late to announce this, but here we go!

Half-Life just got an update for its 25 years of existence, and boy, it is AWESOME! I will leave links for the official data with all features and stuff, but first, I want to add what I really enjoy about it based on my experience with it and not with a copy-paste from a random site.

The menu. You can't imagine the happiness on my face when I saw the old WON-style menu. Of course it is not 100% the same, but it got it right. The background, the title animation, the sounds when you click the different options... What a flashback.
The UI. It's the same but with a bigger font so it works better with bigger resolutions. Just a little detail but a great one.
The FOV. Same thing as the UI, works better with bigger resolutions.
Texture filtering. Now you can disable the filtering, making the game look like it's using the Software mode but without leaving OpenGL. I love this because I feel it looks so much better, the game was made in 1998 so I love the grit of the pixel-like textures, it makes it look more defined.
The new maps. They added some new multiplayer maps and they are completely awesome. After years and years of experience with the engine, they made them super fun and the environment is crazy, they use all that was available for the game from the start, but without the need to make them run good on computers from the 90's. The environments are as detailed as Black Mesa's.
The biggest one of them all for me - you can now host a server from the game and it will display on the master-server list for everyone to see and join. No more dedicated servers, hosting or third party apps like Hamachi. You can start a server, your friends will join, randoms will join, and it will be a blast.

There is so much more. New models, bug fixes, texture and animations corrections for the campaign, and a great 1 hour documentary about the making of this awesome game.

Read more about it here:

https://www.half-life.com/es/halflife25

https://store.steampowered.com/sale/franchise_half-life

Edited November 27, 2023 by worm

**Mike** · November 27, 2023

All of those updates sound amazing. Thanks for the breakdown, @worm!

I love the care Valve puts into their products, which is something that's remained a constant since day 1.

They offered Half-Life for free at some point in the last week or two as part of the 25th anniversary, which I was able to snag. I originally played it via the physical copy, so it's nice to finally have it in my library on Steam. It's only 99 cents now, though, as well as Half-Life 2.

P.S. For those who may have missed it, there was a great documentary Valve put out on YouTube for the anniversary.