> Freeman's Bizarre Adventure
## Why
- The no cutscenes/environmental storytelling very much holds up
- Weapons all have their niches and feel good to use
- Fun sorta-puzzles to break up the shooting, exploration rewarded
- Half Life's Xen may not be great but Black Mesa's is fantastic
- Feels very 'designed'; if you can't decide what to do just look carefully
## Why Not
- You don't want compulsory breaks every hour or so when it crashes
- You hate shooters with a passion
## Impressions
I never played the original Half-Life, but if the only differences to Black Mesa are a shorter Xen section and more 'era appropriate' graphics I can definitely understand why its one of the classics. The 'no cutscenes, always in control' gimmick is a solid starting point, helped by some excellent environmental storytelling and scripted events. It's a game which trusts you to figure things out yourself and makes sure you can do so with much subtler signposting than the ubiquitous yellow paint of modern games. The extended Xen sections do a fantastic job of letting you peek behind the curtain at what were previously faceless enemies and provides some fantastic vistas to boot.
The shooting is pretty great too; you're handed a roster of weapons which continues expanding right until you're thrown into Xen. Each of them fills their own niche, though you'll likely stick to a few favourites most of the time. Not sure if it's a common system because I don't play many FPS, but assigning weapon categories to numbers and cycling through your options with repeat presses is a pretty great system. Felt like I was using Neovim in a game by the end, at least when I wasn't panicking and hitting the wrong keys. Enemies are (fairly) smart, attempting to flank or rush you rather than just standing at a distance waiting to be shot.
I really enjoyed my time with Black Mesa and I'd recommend giving it a go (as long as you save frequently, a 9070 XT should not go OOM every hour or so). I'm eager to pick up Half-Life 2 now, even at risk of becoming one of those people obsessed with Gabe's inability to count to 3.
