This video is a focused look at Half-Life's worst add-on, and why its negative aspects only add to its charm. Hope you enjoy it! Another reminder that patrons who donate just 3$ a month on Patreon were able to watch this video one week ago, and they're already able to watch next week's video. If you're interested, consider becoming a patron as well! Thank you :)
man the title already got me hocked on this. even tho ill miss tf2 i like that you switch games. i can recommand some games that well... at least i would like to watch on your channel: postal 2 and 4. CS. Payday: the heist and Payday 2.
I always took it that the guard at the start of the game just missed the tram, prolly saving his life later on. If anyone ever made a co op mod for blue shift they should remove him.
I always liked the existence of blue shift and other half life games. They really help to flesh out the incident from different viewpoints the staff were experiencing
If I could choose another Half-Life add-on, I'd love to have one about playing as one of the scientists. Now THAT could have focused entirely on puzzles and no combat!
My favourite parts are A. The armour mechanic is completely changed to scavenging non-shot vests from other guards B. That Barney's story ends long before Gordon and Adrian's and, as small as it is, he gets a victory. Gordon and Adrian are pawns of a higher power and their perceived use/threat gets them put on ice while Barney who's only where he is because he wore a helmet when the place came tumbling down gets to walk away after some legwork and goes on to use his unimportance to great effect in Half Life 2 by infiltrating the Combine.
Let's also not forget that Barney continued fighting for TWENTY YEARS after the Resonance Cascade disaster. Gordon saved the day for sure, but Barney never stopped doing it, always helping out in any way he could. That's only commendable.
@@GermanPeter he is also no doubt putting himself in very high risk by beeing a known important rebel leader at the frontline of the uprising, respect for barney, altho he never gets us that beer he promises so i guess that cancels out the respect he deserves
@@Helperbot-2000 Well it is hard to schedule a peaceful moment to drink a beer with a friend when said friend gets kidnapped by some mysterious guy every time he does something big and also always on the move because the world itself is after him.
The Xen levels really are leagues better than the ones from Half-Life 1. Maybe it's because they had an actual clear vision for Blue Shift's levels instead of having to cut 90% of the original ideas and stapling everything left over together.
when i saw this momment myself on my first time playthrough i immedately thought "damn, that could have been me!" before taking his stuff to finish his adventure
It was GearBox and Randy Pitchford behind Blue Shift though. If you look through their track records then you'll see that their successes were generally accidental, and that they mostly undo their contributions with something irredeemably shitty -- like lifting the good versions of Duke Nukem 3D off Steam.
I know the final battle against the soldiers in the teleporter room may have been kind of anti-climatic but in retrospect, that final stand shows Barney's commitment to making sure as many of his colleagues and friends get out alive before he makes his own escape. I think if they had kept this whole final sequence and combined it with the whole idea of making the majority of the game about puzzle solving and only giving you a very small arsenal, it would've given the teleporter room a much higher sense of desperation as you fight off wave after wave of soldiers with comparatively basic weaponry
Half-Life Blue Shift was always my favorite game, short and simple. You're just a security guard, you don't end up like Gordon or Adrian in the hands of Gman, you just survive and escape.
I really enjoyed Blue Shift under the context of, essentially, Half Life DLC. The short story about Barney isn't world changing in any aspect, but it is a fun, short, sweet little expansion that doesn't overstay its welcome.
I guess in a funny way, Blue Shift kinda “Understayed” it’s visit- Had the game had more time to transition from an average day of Barney to suddenly finding himself having to escape black mesa alive, it would’ve been a much more immersive experience.
This game also kind of explains why Barney hated headcrabs so much. In every tunnel a headcrab is ready to jump on you, whether on xen or on earth. Sometimes its so sudden Barney might have had to fend of with arms. No wonder he hates them so much.
I think my favorite moment in Blue Shift is when you walk through one of the many tunnels of Black Mesa. It's quiet and dark, but in the distance you see a pair of red lights. As you approach, you see a car. It's still quiet, the only sound you hear being your own footsteps and clicking of the emergancy lights in the car. Next to the car lays a guard, who died/got shot whilst trying yo get out of the car. You expect a big moment, like the storm after silence, but nothing happends. No music, no enemies, nothing. Just you, a car and a corpse of your former colleague. This moment is just so personal, you have seen and made so many corpses, but never really looked back. But moments like this make you realize the little tragedies that happen behind the scenes, the lives that were lost. It's a little thing, but i dont think any of the half life games managed to execute this feeling with a comparable success
I loved that part! It's especially emotional because like you said, there's no enemies around. The soldiers aren't making any big deal out of whoever they're executing on the way. They just saw this guy trying to escape in a car, shot him, and moved on. Like he didn't mean anything whatsoever.
I like how you write about how you feel, and Black Mesa: Blue Shift also has this sort of subtle feelings! I suggest you play that aswell, or watch a good gameplay walkthrough, SexyNutella is recording nice ones
@@dustypaint Aww, thanks man And i might try it out when I'll have the time! Firstly i gotta finish the half life 2 stuff though, since i never actually got around to playing it. Also school is kicking my ass atm so maybe during the summer I'll finally have the time for it. But thanks for the recommendation either way!
5:54 Honestly, this pretty much reminds me of what I am going through this week. For the first time in years, I attend a new school and I had to figure out how to get there by train, which one to take, when to leave home, so I am not late nor wasting too much time on just waiting around for things. But then, just this *Friday*... Construction work, so now no train will stop at my town, Bönen, so now I had to look at plans and everything to figure out how to get to school by bus, since trains don't work.
8:50 On this one we should give him a break. Like if i were working in secret government facility that does weird science stuff i would start to ask questions of how deep it is, and how much more there is, too.
Haven't started watching the video yet im going to say what i've been telling people for years. I love blue shift because even though it's the smallest half life game it has the least i dont like about it. It's a really neat short story and it feels like half life without all the fat.
Thanks for showing this to me in a new light. I'm right in the middle of the game and got stuck wondering how I'm supposed to cross the pit of blue coolant, and then I find this. I just kind of chalked a lot of the game up to being rushed. (I mean... the crosshair is still orange and the full title doesn't even appear on the main menu. It just says "Half-Life"... TWICE!) But now I can see a lot of this was intentional... or at least the result of happenstance, cobbling together what they got, and making the most of it, much like preparing the teleporter in "Old Black Mesa". This is a game made from cobbling together old parts from another, bigger game, and it absolutely OWNS that fact, realizing there's nothing to be ashamed of. This all reminds me of the mindset that went into making The Mandalorian, as the thought process was very similar (at least for the first season or two), being likened to being the little brother, having to share the same Star Wars toys with him, but he takes all the "cool forefront" stuff, keeping Luke, Han, Leia, Vader, Yoda, etc. while you're left to make up your own adventures with the background characters. Heck, on a similar note, I always kind of perceived Doomguy this way, going by what little is described about his background and situation in the manual. In a way, I'd argue he's closer to Barney than Gordon. (The recent "Doom-Slayer" rebranding is far more "Gordon" though.) Dude was about to be court-martialed, but they changed their minds and more or less forced him to be a janitor (I think that's what it's implying) on the Mars Division of the UAC, which is considered at the absolute bottom of the UAC totem pole, as it's only used for toxic waste disposal, while all the other planets do more important things with greater prestige. He's not deemed important enough to deal with, so he's just dumped onto the most boring position in the solar system. Even when the demonic invasion happens, he's left behind for guard duty while everyone else takes the better weapons with them. Many of them are wearing the same armor he is. Everything about his situation has him set up as a background character, but he breaks through it all and stands out, not because he is given any distinguishing power or has any visible distinguishing features, but through sheer tenacity. He's not ALLOWED to be important, but he defiantly does it anyway. I've actually been on-again-off-again writing a Doom show script. I even made a sort of "Audio Drama Pilot" based on Knee-Deep in the Dead. I already had this kind of mindset for his characterization in the back of my mind, but now I can see it is absolutely something that should be at the forefront. th-cam.com/video/HkXS-8UGSAg/w-d-xo.html
You know, this really recontextualizes the game in an interesting way. I still may not like it that much, like with the environments and not much new content, but I really appreciate this because it made me think about the game a bit differently.
When put into the context of what we know happened elsewhere, it amplifies the fun of being unimportant to the *main* story ... you are important to your own story.
Barney is my 2nd favorite HL character, the first being Kleiner. i've always had a softspot for the badass everyman, someone who isn't as cool or given the most important roles as the main character, but someone who's got your back, and when the long day is over, he still remembers that beer he owes you, after you've both been through so much
The closest game I can think of that’s like Blue Shift is Halo 3 ODST. Instead of being the one man army himself; Master Chief. You take the role of an Orbital Drop Shock Trooper referred to as “The Rookie”. Now ODSTs are the closest thing to being spartan without any of the enhanced abilities. Stronger than a marine but nowhere near as powerful as a spartan. The fights aren’t as big as past games and the scale of everything is nowhere near the spectacle of past games either. The game overall makes you feel small and insignificant as you trudge your way through an abandoned city all alone at night.
I never played Blue Shift, but that didn't stop me from enjoying this video! Good job on it, it almost made me wanna check it out and almost inspired me at making such a game lol (which would've failed). Good job on it! Love your video essays!
Kind of a big brain move to make a console spin-off to your game that makes you feel like a nobody while the game tells you that the MC from the computer game is much more important and doing cool stuff
💛💙💛 Another banger as usual!! Makes me regret not getting into the series years ago tbh. I agree that there should be more just "average joe" games. I love when you can get another viewpoint of a series, fron the eyes of a non "super important protagonist/sidekick." It really helps flesh out the environment and make it feel so much more immersive (?) (Also love the switch to blue this video)
blue shift kind of felt like a round of engi in ss13 made into a game all of your problems are so mundane and there just happens to be disastrous events going on near you
Great video, I also suggest you check out Half-Life: Echoes. It's a mod made with so much polish that it actually feels like an official addon. It doesn't necessarily lean into the whole "you're a cog in the machine and an insignificant speck in this entire situation" thing, but it's more so a "shit going horribly wrong right in front of you from the pov of a random scientist trying to do his best to escape" kind of thing. It has a lot of heart, humour, and it feels like it fleshes out Black Mesa even more as a facility.
Bist jetzt seit 2 tagen ständig in meinen Recommendations hab dir gleich mal ein Abo reingedrückt ,und ich finde es erstaunlich wie gut dein Englisch klingt :)
Ngl if they made a whole game just making normal tasks of a security guard in black mesa and on the last day was the incident I'll play the hell outta it.
I love Blue-Shift. Feels like a "greatest hits" album for Half-Life. One great set piece after another. And it's just as long as it needs to be. Whenever I get the craving for some good old fashioned HL I can just dive right in and be home in time for dinner. Also: as others have mentioned in the comments, it's the only game in the series with an unambiguously happy ending.
That mounted gun is the vanilla half life mounted machine gun, not the M249 from Opposing force. looks like a M2 browning from what I can tell from the low poly.
Old Black Mesa reminds me of a story my father once told me, from his days working for the government. The building was too big for the agency in its modern form, so they just shrunk the available space. Like, they put vending machines in front of the doorway to one of the older dining rooms to block access.
it's a strange thing i like too, where just the simplicity of a day-to-day thing is something i want to see. how they work their job. i've always replayed the beginning of black mesa over and over wishing it was kind of the entire game bc of just how, well, mundane and "home"-y it felt to me. like i was apart of their world. another example would be SCP containment breach, simply i'd love to work as a black mesa researcher or an scp scientist. really, its strange but i love the concept of it.
When I first played Blue Shift and Opposing Force, I definitely liked Blue Shift much more than the other game. The way it felt was more interesting to me (Maybe because I played Half-Life 2 before playing Blue Shift and just was interested in Barneys story). I didn't like Opposing Force so much, though I can't tell that it's a bad game, it just doesn't feel like a Half-Life game, it was too long, and I was kinda bored while playing it. In conclusion: Blue Shift - Short, cool, Barney is awesome as always. Opposing Force - Long, difficult, but Shephard is a great character.
THANK YOU! Finally someone else likes Blue Shift as much as I do. Maybe it's because Barney is my favorite character in the series, but I truly love the expansion.
I don't know why folks are soooo shity about this game, personally I always enjoyed it, its easy and comforting to play and underrated. Barney is a great character.
Mainly its shortness I would say. I played it this week on Hard and according to Steam it took 103 minutes. That includes 5 minutes being stuck for completely missing a ladder in a dark corner or leading Rosenberg to the elevator. Blue Shift's storytelling is actually pretty close to Half-Life 2's. Actual characters (well... one :D) and lots of dialogues. But this also leads to only maybe 45 minutes of actual gameplay. I think it was priced at 30€ at release in Germany, maybe 25?! Compared with Opposing Force it sure felt like a ripoff. If you ignore that, Blue Shift is actually a pretty good game. Nothing to complain there. I liked the Xen level a lot and the old abandoned parts of Black Mesa are interesting. Again something Valve later also did in Portal 2. The train-yard was somewhat questionable. Killing ten marines with a mounted machine gun or picking another squad off from a distance in the area with the tank - because their AI can't deal with that - sure felt off. But ff someone liked the original Half-Life there is absolutely no reason to hate on Blue Shift.
Enjoying the half-life content, because at some point I would eventually like to learn German. Seeing how media gets altered for Germany is very interesting, and in the case of video games, important to video game history. I’m curious to see more.
Blue shift and, to a greater extent, Black Mesa and Black Mesa: Blue shift, do an excellent job at making the facility feel lived in. It makes you kind of wish you worked there, and the catastrophe of the resonance cascade and how it affected the people who worked at Black Mesa makes you feel the pain that someone like Gordon or Barney must have felt when they saw the aftermath of the Resonance Cascade.
If I can say anything positive about the really uncanny HD models that came with Blue Shift, it's the weapons that got changed. Though some of them are cursed looking, namely the MP5 getting changed to an M4, some of them are legitimate improvements. The glock didn't look that great in the original game, but the M9 Beretta looks surprisingly good. The Colt Python may be the best weapon in the game, but that barrel just looks wrong. I know it didn't look right with an accurate model in testing, but the Colt Anaconda it was changed to actually looks accurate. And then there's the shotgun. The new model is pretty take it or leave it for me, but that sound effect when you shoot it makes it feel amazing. Otherwise, Blue Shift isn't that great to me. I get the appeal, but it's not what I'm looking for in a game.
Someone’s gotta have a Half Life mod that’s just simulating life before the resonance cascade in as realistically boring detail as possible. Call it “Half Life: Control Group” or something. The entire time, it keeps hinting at the resonance cascade happening at the end, but then at the end there’s just an announcement that the experiment got postponed lol.
Thanks, this puts my question about the game "just ending" to rest. To be fair, I probably shouldn't play Blue Shift right after Opposing Force, it kinda mashes everything together, especially on the hardest difficulty (the game flow certainly didn't have difficulty settings in mind). By the way, Barney does get an alien (weapon) right before the end, it's just super easy to skip if you figure out the puzzles instead of scouring every notch and crany for hidden path :D.
Black Mesa Blue Shift is definitely beefed up in respect to the original, in both spectacle and length, rather in the same way Black Mesa is for HL1. But I do still think they everyman angle shines through, you still get trapped in the same back alleys and sewers and offices, you aren't even the sole hero of the story, you're just the most successful member of a ragtag group of survivors who are all just trying to make it out alive. And the beginning, the average 'going about your day' dialed up to eleven. Scientists on laptops hang about the place, guards just doing their jobs, the elevator scientist complaining about how 'working here was not all it's cracked up to be'. Despite the BM:BS version of the Black Mesa Research Facility being outwardly more techy than the one from Half Life, its still the same boring old workplace it's always been.
Banrey has to be the Hal-life character with the most hard character development, from the average and boring security guard that G-man even ignored, to the military commander of the rebellion against the combine.
I got stuck at the stupid puzzle where you have to climb a ladder after moving boxes. Then moving cranes and then it just kept falling me off the ladder. No matter what I do I couldn't f****** finish the puzzle and I just quit. And then I played opposing forces.
Even in half life 2, barney is still someone who is just there, trying to survive whatever hell has happened. Yea, from blue shift, in HL2(and episodes) Barney has gained a bit more of a heroic status, taking a pretty big leader role, but he don't have a HEV suit. Has to live by what he can get. Gordon comes up and everything is given to him without question. I like Adrian since it shows that the human military really was ineffective at containing the whole thing, not to mention painting a darker picture than what original half life depicted the HECU. Though to be honest, I really dig this blue shift video. Always ignored blue shift, not because I didn't like it, but it just felt a bit boring. Still pretty badass to survive this whole ordeal, with only a vest and helmet.
Without blue shift how would we know properly about Barney in the Half Life 2 series and forward “Without the past there would be no present and future.”
You're like me when it comes to Opposing Force - I used to have this huge elaborate theory about the themes of the game extrapolating from the meaning of the title and running all throughout Adrian's adventures, wish I could remember it because it was really fun to think up but I never wrote it down other than in scattered TH-cam comments which I hope are lost to time and space by now. Anyway, I kinda realize now that the disparate threads that seem to connect to an overall tone or a set of themes probably came last in the development of these first few HL titles. Like, they had a premise, they did a bunch of game dev stuff, THEN found ways to incorporate larger themes that meshed with the already extant gameplay sections in a way that could be used to diffuse potential criticisms and build towards a more cohesive product in keeping with that initial premise. The game devs were working backwards from how you and I interpret their work, basically. There almost certainly was no grand design in which breadcrumbs were seeded in order to lead the observant to a better understanding of whatever Valve's thesis happened to be for that game. It's a little more like someone was eating a sandwich and sloppily dropped crumbs everywhere, then said it was a trail of breadcrumbs - which is technically correct, the important distinction is time-order. It is fun to dream though.
Back for round two I fucking love blue shift. I don’t know how anyone can play this and say it’s BAD. It’s SO perfect, from the tram ride alone they show you what life is like in black Mesa. You get to see the scientists and security guards partaking in mundane tasks, it makes black Mesa feel so real. And ofcs Barney’s characterization itself, he’s no different from any other guard in the facility, but through sheer luck and willpower he’s able to cut his way through the military and actually escape black Mesa. That’s another thing I like Barney doesn’t GET the g-man ending he doesn’t have a big boss to fight, it’s him fighting marines and headcrabs with the occasional vortigaunt through the old decrepit past of black mesa. It’s the only way someone like him WOULD survive. It’s literally the perfect game for the backstory of the Barney Calhoun we see in hl2. The gameplay is so unique compared to any other of the expansions, gearbox had a STORY to tell. It’s also by far the least scummy thing with randy pitchford’s named attached to it. Ppl who say it’s bad bc it doesn’t add weapons don’t have any taste. Imo it is so much more solid than opfor, it feels perfect for the era it came out in. You feel so badass, and it’s incredibly rewarding to see him again in hl2 after you’ve played this.
It was even prophesied in hl1. There’s a wall texture with a orange blue and green stripe, in that exact order. Obviously what Mr Teasley and Ms Mark meant by this is that half-life is the best one, blue shift comes in second, and opfor is last. They didn’t know decay was gonna happen they can’t predict everything
But yeah, Barney is a tough cookie. He’s just a man but he survived the resonance cascade, the 7 hour war, and he continues to fight during the confine occupation. He did this with just Kevlar vests and helmets, there weren’t batteries and chargers scattered across the whole facility for him to replenish. His armor is RARE. I truly love this character he is willpower personified, he’s been working a 20 year shift and he can still joke around and smile with his friends.
When it comes to games that have you trying to survive as an irrelevant everyman in a crisis situation, many people might suggest the Raw Danger/Disaster Report series. I have another suggestion though: Have you ever heard of a PS4 game called "City Shrouded In Shadow"? Look it up, I think you'll find it interesting.
Blue Shift is perfect the way it is, much as I liked Opposing Force it risked being non-cannon with the amount of stuff it added and its canonicity is still debated to this day. Blue Shift being not so different to Half Life and not adding anything new made it so that there’s no real discussion about its canonicity because nothing big happened in it that would start that conversation. Which also makes me wonder how they managed to convince the higher-ups to have faith in an expansion where nothing spectacular happens and not outdoing the previous expansion, we really do need these types of expansions that serve to build the world of the original game rather than only be spectacular set-pieces being more bombastic!
I agree that it is neat to look at the intimacy of the personnel, the details of their lives. All that is great. But all that is five minutes long and the rest of the game is just a low effort fanmap campaign which doesn't add anything to the already-existing game with already-mechanically-familiar players that already had the chance to experience both Half Life and Opposing Forces. I cannot agree that it 'adds to the charm,' because we could have had a mechanically satisfying game AND a narratively satisfying game, and we got neither, and just the loose attempt of it.
I liked Blue Shift more than Opposing Force simply because it was short and sweet and had less bullshit moments in it. (I'm talking about you, sewer full of aliens.) Opposing Force is everyone's favorite but I've only beaten it once while I've completed Blue Shift multiple times.
I mean, to be honest, four people is probably still more than Gordon or Adrian ended up saving! Gordon didn't save anyone 'cause the aliens ended up overrunning the whole planet anyway, and Adrian was just lucky to miss the part where he was actually sent there to kill everyone.
Adrian did shockingly little in his adventure, honestly. I mean, did he even make any impact, other than killing people? He didn't even stop the nuke from going off. If he hadn't appeared, nothing would have been different.
@@GermanPeter In my own headcanon even Otis's mom did more :) Could say that's the nature of having a follow-up story take place during the events of the original -- you can't change the outcome. Except Opposing Force did, and they made it even worse XD
This video is a focused look at Half-Life's worst add-on, and why its negative aspects only add to its charm. Hope you enjoy it!
Another reminder that patrons who donate just 3$ a month on Patreon were able to watch this video one week ago, and they're already able to watch next week's video. If you're interested, consider becoming a patron as well! Thank you :)
man the title already got me hocked on this. even tho ill miss tf2 i like that you switch games.
i can recommand some games that well... at least i would like to watch on your channel: postal 2 and 4. CS. Payday: the heist and Payday 2.
What about hunt down the freeman?
I always took it that the guard at the start of the game just missed the tram, prolly saving his life later on. If anyone ever made a co op mod for blue shift they should remove him.
Needed more game footage
Now that BM: Blue Shift chapter IV has been released, do you think the remake has done the original justice?
I always liked the existence of blue shift and other half life games. They really help to flesh out the incident from different viewpoints the staff were experiencing
If I could choose another Half-Life add-on, I'd love to have one about playing as one of the scientists. Now THAT could have focused entirely on puzzles and no combat!
@@GermanPeter
I'd put _money_ on that.
@@GermanPeter Why not check half life echoes? Is a mod that lets you play as a scientist, athoulght is not that filled with puzzles
@@GermanPeter Well Half-Life as a series is an FPS game first and foremost. Check out Portal series if you want story+puzzles only.
@@GermanPeter Isn't that kinda portal lol
My favourite parts are
A. The armour mechanic is completely changed to scavenging non-shot vests from other guards
B. That Barney's story ends long before Gordon and Adrian's and, as small as it is, he gets a victory. Gordon and Adrian are pawns of a higher power and their perceived use/threat gets them put on ice while Barney who's only where he is because he wore a helmet when the place came tumbling down gets to walk away after some legwork and goes on to use his unimportance to great effect in Half Life 2 by infiltrating the Combine.
Underdogs are always more than they are originally perceived
Let's also not forget that Barney continued fighting for TWENTY YEARS after the Resonance Cascade disaster. Gordon saved the day for sure, but Barney never stopped doing it, always helping out in any way he could. That's only commendable.
@@GermanPeter he is also no doubt putting himself in very high risk by beeing a known important rebel leader at the frontline of the uprising, respect for barney, altho he never gets us that beer he promises so i guess that cancels out the respect he deserves
@@Helperbot-2000 Well it is hard to schedule a peaceful moment to drink a beer with a friend when said friend gets kidnapped by some mysterious guy every time he does something big and also always on the move because the world itself is after him.
now i want hl3 to be about Barney
Despite how simple and "boring" Blue Shift may seem, it actually does have some good looking Xen levels.
The Xen levels really are leagues better than the ones from Half-Life 1. Maybe it's because they had an actual clear vision for Blue Shift's levels instead of having to cut 90% of the original ideas and stapling everything left over together.
for half a second I thought I commented this
@@mr.k4918 probably just the logo.
@@EnclaveSOC-102 yup
I can’t wait to see them in the Black Mesa version
I love how you changed everything to blue. Like your intro.
Well, the video is about *Blue* Shift, after all. It's not a permanent change though.
@@GermanPeter should’ve changed your nose to red tho. >:c
(This is a joke-)
Dare i say he "shifted" everything to blue
@@limeangelo6019 now this pun blue me away
when i saw this momment myself on my first time playthrough i immedately thought "damn, that could have been me!" before taking his stuff to finish his adventure
Finally someone who stands against the Blue Shift slander.
It was GearBox and Randy Pitchford behind Blue Shift though. If you look through their track records then you'll see that their successes were generally accidental, and that they mostly undo their contributions with something irredeemably shitty -- like lifting the good versions of Duke Nukem 3D off Steam.
@@RdTrler I'm not here to praise Randy Pitchford, I am just saying I like blue shift.
Barney Calhoun Last seen: 2006.
The dude never makes it to White Forrest and not a single damn character asks where the hell he is.
he was sleepy
I know the final battle against the soldiers in the teleporter room may have been kind of anti-climatic but in retrospect, that final stand shows Barney's commitment to making sure as many of his colleagues and friends get out alive before he makes his own escape. I think if they had kept this whole final sequence and combined it with the whole idea of making the majority of the game about puzzle solving and only giving you a very small arsenal, it would've given the teleporter room a much higher sense of desperation as you fight off wave after wave of soldiers with comparatively basic weaponry
I think the guard running at the start is actually running because he just missed the tram ride, which is another relatable experience :P
Half-Life Blue Shift was always my favorite game, short and simple. You're just a security guard, you don't end up like Gordon or Adrian in the hands of Gman, you just survive and escape.
I really enjoyed Blue Shift under the context of, essentially, Half Life DLC.
The short story about Barney isn't world changing in any aspect, but it is a fun, short, sweet little expansion that doesn't overstay its welcome.
I guess in a funny way, Blue Shift kinda “Understayed” it’s visit-
Had the game had more time to transition from an average day of Barney to suddenly finding himself having to escape black mesa alive, it would’ve been a much more immersive experience.
This game also kind of explains why Barney hated headcrabs so much. In every tunnel a headcrab is ready to jump on you, whether on xen or on earth. Sometimes its so sudden Barney might have had to fend of with arms. No wonder he hates them so much.
I think my favorite moment in Blue Shift is when you walk through one of the many tunnels of Black Mesa.
It's quiet and dark, but in the distance you see a pair of red lights.
As you approach, you see a car. It's still quiet, the only sound you hear being your own footsteps and clicking of the emergancy lights in the car.
Next to the car lays a guard, who died/got shot whilst trying yo get out of the car.
You expect a big moment, like the storm after silence, but nothing happends. No music, no enemies, nothing.
Just you, a car and a corpse of your former colleague.
This moment is just so personal, you have seen and made so many corpses, but never really looked back. But moments like this make you realize the little tragedies that happen behind the scenes, the lives that were lost.
It's a little thing, but i dont think any of the half life games managed to execute this feeling with a comparable success
I loved that part! It's especially emotional because like you said, there's no enemies around. The soldiers aren't making any big deal out of whoever they're executing on the way. They just saw this guy trying to escape in a car, shot him, and moved on. Like he didn't mean anything whatsoever.
I like how you write about how you feel, and Black Mesa: Blue Shift also has this sort of subtle feelings! I suggest you play that aswell, or watch a good gameplay walkthrough, SexyNutella is recording nice ones
@@dustypaint Aww, thanks man
And i might try it out when I'll have the time! Firstly i gotta finish the half life 2 stuff though, since i never actually got around to playing it.
Also school is kicking my ass atm so maybe during the summer I'll finally have the time for it.
But thanks for the recommendation either way!
5:54
Honestly, this pretty much reminds me of what I am going through this week.
For the first time in years, I attend a new school and I had to figure out how to get there by train, which one to take, when to leave home, so I am not late nor wasting too much time on just waiting around for things. But then, just this *Friday*...
Construction work, so now no train will stop at my town, Bönen, so now I had to look at plans and everything to figure out how to get to school by bus, since trains don't work.
8:50 On this one we should give him a break. Like if i were working in secret government facility that does weird science stuff i would start to ask questions of how deep it is, and how much more there is, too.
Haven't started watching the video yet im going to say what i've been telling people for years. I love blue shift because even though it's the smallest half life game it has the least i dont like about it. It's a really neat short story and it feels like half life without all the fat.
Thanks for showing this to me in a new light. I'm right in the middle of the game and got stuck wondering how I'm supposed to cross the pit of blue coolant, and then I find this. I just kind of chalked a lot of the game up to being rushed. (I mean... the crosshair is still orange and the full title doesn't even appear on the main menu. It just says "Half-Life"... TWICE!) But now I can see a lot of this was intentional... or at least the result of happenstance, cobbling together what they got, and making the most of it, much like preparing the teleporter in "Old Black Mesa". This is a game made from cobbling together old parts from another, bigger game, and it absolutely OWNS that fact, realizing there's nothing to be ashamed of.
This all reminds me of the mindset that went into making The Mandalorian, as the thought process was very similar (at least for the first season or two), being likened to being the little brother, having to share the same Star Wars toys with him, but he takes all the "cool forefront" stuff, keeping Luke, Han, Leia, Vader, Yoda, etc. while you're left to make up your own adventures with the background characters.
Heck, on a similar note, I always kind of perceived Doomguy this way, going by what little is described about his background and situation in the manual. In a way, I'd argue he's closer to Barney than Gordon. (The recent "Doom-Slayer" rebranding is far more "Gordon" though.) Dude was about to be court-martialed, but they changed their minds and more or less forced him to be a janitor (I think that's what it's implying) on the Mars Division of the UAC, which is considered at the absolute bottom of the UAC totem pole, as it's only used for toxic waste disposal, while all the other planets do more important things with greater prestige. He's not deemed important enough to deal with, so he's just dumped onto the most boring position in the solar system. Even when the demonic invasion happens, he's left behind for guard duty while everyone else takes the better weapons with them. Many of them are wearing the same armor he is. Everything about his situation has him set up as a background character, but he breaks through it all and stands out, not because he is given any distinguishing power or has any visible distinguishing features, but through sheer tenacity. He's not ALLOWED to be important, but he defiantly does it anyway.
I've actually been on-again-off-again writing a Doom show script. I even made a sort of "Audio Drama Pilot" based on Knee-Deep in the Dead. I already had this kind of mindset for his characterization in the back of my mind, but now I can see it is absolutely something that should be at the forefront.
th-cam.com/video/HkXS-8UGSAg/w-d-xo.html
Even if we're all Barneys together we can make an unstoppable army of Barneys
A Barmy if you will
So real
You know, this really recontextualizes the game in an interesting way. I still may not like it that much, like with the environments and not much new content, but I really appreciate this because it made me think about the game a bit differently.
When put into the context of what we know happened elsewhere, it amplifies the fun of being unimportant to the *main* story ... you are important to your own story.
Barney is my 2nd favorite HL character, the first being Kleiner. i've always had a softspot for the badass everyman, someone who isn't as cool or given the most important roles as the main character, but someone who's got your back, and when the long day is over, he still remembers that beer he owes you, after you've both been through so much
The closest game I can think of that’s like Blue Shift is Halo 3 ODST. Instead of being the one man army himself; Master Chief. You take the role of an Orbital Drop Shock Trooper referred to as “The Rookie”. Now ODSTs are the closest thing to being spartan without any of the enhanced abilities. Stronger than a marine but nowhere near as powerful as a spartan. The fights aren’t as big as past games and the scale of everything is nowhere near the spectacle of past games either. The game overall makes you feel small and insignificant as you trudge your way through an abandoned city all alone at night.
ODST was a great game :)
Odst was absolutely fire
I never played Blue Shift, but that didn't stop me from enjoying this video!
Good job on it, it almost made me wanna check it out and almost inspired me at making such a game lol (which would've failed).
Good job on it! Love your video essays!
i absolutely adore blue shift for the boring worldbuilding it does, this vedio is the perfect description of everything i love about it
Kind of a big brain move to make a console spin-off to your game that makes you feel like a nobody while the game tells you that the MC from the computer game is much more important and doing cool stuff
I thought this would be absurd logic leaps, but in the end you're actually right. It's remarkably unremarkable! :D
💛💙💛 Another banger as usual!! Makes me regret not getting into the series years ago tbh.
I agree that there should be more just "average joe" games. I love when you can get another viewpoint of a series, fron the eyes of a non "super important protagonist/sidekick." It really helps flesh out the environment and make it feel so much more immersive (?)
(Also love the switch to blue this video)
blue shift kind of felt like a round of engi in ss13 made into a game
all of your problems are so mundane and there just happens to be disastrous events going on near you
Absolutely charming. And I agree-the world-building sections before the proverbial hits the fan are always my favourite parts of games like these.
I love that you're looking to work on stuff other than tf2
Gj and I hope you thrive in the change!
Of course a German likes the dull one about someone doing his job 😂 Is Germany just wildin’ and the normal is fantastical over there?
We take comfort in the mundane :)
Blue Shift is just the perfect thing for when you need just a little more vanilla Half-Life.
I always thought a huge full model of black mesa you could just explore woukd be awesome
Great video, I also suggest you check out Half-Life: Echoes. It's a mod made with so much polish that it actually feels like an official addon. It doesn't necessarily lean into the whole "you're a cog in the machine and an insignificant speck in this entire situation" thing, but it's more so a "shit going horribly wrong right in front of you from the pov of a random scientist trying to do his best to escape" kind of thing. It has a lot of heart, humour, and it feels like it fleshes out Black Mesa even more as a facility.
Yes, absolutely this! It was excellent.
"blue shift is awesome because it is awesome"
damn peter you truly are a genius (and german) with this one
hearing the word "passport" in a half life video triggered my fight or flight instincts
You would need it to fly
0:11 my dumbass ears cant tell if intentional reference or accent im going to be thinking about this for a week
Judging by the subtitles this is a reference to how the scientists pronounce it.
@@timurtheterrible4062 thank you youve saved the back 30% of my mind a week's worth of deliberation
@@cardboardturtle5470 👍
Bist jetzt seit 2 tagen ständig in meinen Recommendations hab dir gleich mal ein Abo reingedrückt ,und ich finde es erstaunlich wie gut dein Englisch klingt :)
This has such an amazingly high production quality, especially for a small channel. Großartig, weiter so.
Blueshift was definitely my favorite game and not because I happen to be a Security Guard myself...
Ngl if they made a whole game just making normal tasks of a security guard in black mesa and on the last day was the incident I'll play the hell outta it.
While I didnt really enjoy it gameplay wise, I really did love the intro for all the reasons you described.
I love Blue-Shift. Feels like a "greatest hits" album for Half-Life. One great set piece after another. And it's just as long as it needs to be. Whenever I get the craving for some good old fashioned HL I can just dive right in and be home in time for dinner. Also: as others have mentioned in the comments, it's the only game in the series with an unambiguously happy ending.
That mounted gun is the vanilla half life mounted machine gun, not the M249 from Opposing force. looks like a M2 browning from what I can tell from the low poly.
The slick animations are quite a good add to the videos!
Maybe Black Mesa needs a Ethics Committee
You gave me a new perspective on a game I already loved it didn't make me feel like a super soldier
Old Black Mesa reminds me of a story my father once told me, from his days working for the government.
The building was too big for the agency in its modern form, so they just shrunk the available space. Like, they put vending machines in front of the doorway to one of the older dining rooms to block access.
it's a strange thing i like too, where just the simplicity of a day-to-day thing is something i want to see. how they work their job. i've always replayed the beginning of black mesa over and over wishing it was kind of the entire game bc of just how, well, mundane and "home"-y it felt to me. like i was apart of their world. another example would be SCP containment breach, simply i'd love to work as a black mesa researcher or an scp scientist. really, its strange but i love the concept of it.
first Half Life game I played along with HL2.
but small theory, people don't like Blue Shift because it brought the HD pack to the PC.
I like the HD pack a lot actually (as evidenced by the video), especially the weapon models and the new sounds. The SMG sounds actually good for once!
Augh yea, an Half-Life video. Never expecting you to talk abt it
I've always wished that the game had the balls to only give you the pistol
Honestly? This has given me a real new appreciation for ya boi Barney
i wouldn't have mind Blue Shift being a slice of life game honestly
Duuuude DUDE! You struck a cord in me with this. Thank you for putting in words the feelings I have with this game.
I enjoyed all the little nods to Wayneradiotv's "Half-Life, but the AI is self-aware" series :)
Bei gott ich hab als kind blue shift noch mehr als half life gesuchtet
0:12 - Unknown origin? It's called a _Xen_ crystal, specifically sample "GG-3883".
Interessantes Video! Mach weiter so.
When I first played Blue Shift and Opposing Force, I definitely liked Blue Shift much more than the other game. The way it felt was more interesting to me (Maybe because I played Half-Life 2 before playing Blue Shift and just was interested in Barneys story). I didn't like Opposing Force so much, though I can't tell that it's a bad game, it just doesn't feel like a Half-Life game, it was too long, and I was kinda bored while playing it.
In conclusion: Blue Shift - Short, cool, Barney is awesome as always. Opposing Force - Long, difficult, but Shephard is a great character.
Found your channel randomly. And glad I did. I enjoy your videos.
Awesome video as always!
-"just following instructions on my own" most german sentence ever
Most underrate youtube channel to date
THANK YOU! Finally someone else likes Blue Shift as much as I do. Maybe it's because Barney is my favorite character in the series, but I truly love the expansion.
Honestly, I absolutely loved the introduction to the old 70's side of black mesa, made me consider thier past a lot more
I don't know why folks are soooo shity about this game, personally I always enjoyed it, its easy and comforting to play and underrated. Barney is a great character.
Mainly its shortness I would say. I played it this week on Hard and according to Steam it took 103 minutes. That includes 5 minutes being stuck for completely missing a ladder in a dark corner or leading Rosenberg to the elevator. Blue Shift's storytelling is actually pretty close to Half-Life 2's. Actual characters (well... one :D) and lots of dialogues. But this also leads to only maybe 45 minutes of actual gameplay. I think it was priced at 30€ at release in Germany, maybe 25?! Compared with Opposing Force it sure felt like a ripoff.
If you ignore that, Blue Shift is actually a pretty good game. Nothing to complain there. I liked the Xen level a lot and the old abandoned parts of Black Mesa are interesting. Again something Valve later also did in Portal 2. The train-yard was somewhat questionable. Killing ten marines with a mounted machine gun or picking another squad off from a distance in the area with the tank - because their AI can't deal with that - sure felt off. But ff someone liked the original Half-Life there is absolutely no reason to hate on Blue Shift.
12:42 fun fact: even if yore was corrected, it'd be the wrong your/you're.
Keep in mind this was originally made for the Sega Dreamcast.
Enjoying the half-life content, because at some point I would eventually like to learn German. Seeing how media gets altered for Germany is very interesting, and in the case of video games, important to video game history. I’m curious to see more.
Blue shift and, to a greater extent, Black Mesa and Black Mesa: Blue shift, do an excellent job at making the facility feel lived in. It makes you kind of wish you worked there, and the catastrophe of the resonance cascade and how it affected the people who worked at Black Mesa makes you feel the pain that someone like Gordon or Barney must have felt when they saw the aftermath of the Resonance Cascade.
If I can say anything positive about the really uncanny HD models that came with Blue Shift, it's the weapons that got changed. Though some of them are cursed looking, namely the MP5 getting changed to an M4, some of them are legitimate improvements. The glock didn't look that great in the original game, but the M9 Beretta looks surprisingly good. The Colt Python may be the best weapon in the game, but that barrel just looks wrong. I know it didn't look right with an accurate model in testing, but the Colt Anaconda it was changed to actually looks accurate. And then there's the shotgun. The new model is pretty take it or leave it for me, but that sound effect when you shoot it makes it feel amazing. Otherwise, Blue Shift isn't that great to me. I get the appeal, but it's not what I'm looking for in a game.
Someone’s gotta have a Half Life mod that’s just simulating life before the resonance cascade in as realistically boring detail as possible.
Call it “Half Life: Control Group” or something. The entire time, it keeps hinting at the resonance cascade happening at the end, but then at the end there’s just an announcement that the experiment got postponed lol.
Me, myself, thought that blue shift was boring too, but after playing it, i changed my mind. It felt like my regular life
About that beer I owe ya.
Thanks, this puts my question about the game "just ending" to rest. To be fair, I probably shouldn't play Blue Shift right after Opposing Force, it kinda mashes everything together, especially on the hardest difficulty (the game flow certainly didn't have difficulty settings in mind). By the way, Barney does get an alien (weapon) right before the end, it's just super easy to skip if you figure out the puzzles instead of scouring every notch and crany for hidden path :D.
Black Mesa Blue Shift is definitely beefed up in respect to the original, in both spectacle and length, rather in the same way Black Mesa is for HL1. But I do still think they everyman angle shines through, you still get trapped in the same back alleys and sewers and offices, you aren't even the sole hero of the story, you're just the most successful member of a ragtag group of survivors who are all just trying to make it out alive.
And the beginning, the average 'going about your day' dialed up to eleven. Scientists on laptops hang about the place, guards just doing their jobs, the elevator scientist complaining about how 'working here was not all it's cracked up to be'. Despite the BM:BS version of the Black Mesa Research Facility being outwardly more techy than the one from Half Life, its still the same boring old workplace it's always been.
Banrey has to be the Hal-life character with the most hard character development, from the average and boring security guard that G-man even ignored, to the military commander of the rebellion against the combine.
I got stuck at the stupid puzzle where you have to climb a ladder after moving boxes. Then moving cranes and then it just kept falling me off the ladder. No matter what I do I couldn't f****** finish the puzzle and I just quit. And then I played opposing forces.
Love the oxymoron in the title
Even in half life 2, barney is still someone who is just there, trying to survive whatever hell has happened. Yea, from blue shift, in HL2(and episodes) Barney has gained a bit more of a heroic status, taking a pretty big leader role, but he don't have a HEV suit. Has to live by what he can get.
Gordon comes up and everything is given to him without question.
I like Adrian since it shows that the human military really was ineffective at containing the whole thing, not to mention painting a darker picture than what original half life depicted the HECU.
Though to be honest, I really dig this blue shift video. Always ignored blue shift, not because I didn't like it, but it just felt a bit boring. Still pretty badass to survive this whole ordeal, with only a vest and helmet.
Without blue shift how would we know properly about Barney in the Half Life 2 series and forward
“Without the past there would be no present and future.”
The Black Mesa remake really makes this story shine
You're like me when it comes to Opposing Force - I used to have this huge elaborate theory about the themes of the game extrapolating from the meaning of the title and running all throughout Adrian's adventures, wish I could remember it because it was really fun to think up but I never wrote it down other than in scattered TH-cam comments which I hope are lost to time and space by now.
Anyway, I kinda realize now that the disparate threads that seem to connect to an overall tone or a set of themes probably came last in the development of these first few HL titles.
Like, they had a premise, they did a bunch of game dev stuff, THEN found ways to incorporate larger themes that meshed with the already extant gameplay sections in a way that could be used to diffuse potential criticisms and build towards a more cohesive product in keeping with that initial premise.
The game devs were working backwards from how you and I interpret their work, basically. There almost certainly was no grand design in which breadcrumbs were seeded in order to lead the observant to a better understanding of whatever Valve's thesis happened to be for that game.
It's a little more like someone was eating a sandwich and sloppily dropped crumbs everywhere, then said it was a trail of breadcrumbs - which is technically correct, the important distinction is time-order. It is fun to dream though.
I just found you today Peter and you make good half life as a half life fan content keep it up! Hope you get to 1 millon subs!🎉
agree, Valve should make another Half Life VR game where you play as Barney
In the end of hl2 ep1 during the end, we don't know where barney went or unknown safe place location.
German gamer loves security guard simulator...what a surprise
Back for round two I fucking love blue shift. I don’t know how anyone can play this and say it’s BAD. It’s SO perfect, from the tram ride alone they show you what life is like in black Mesa. You get to see the scientists and security guards partaking in mundane tasks, it makes black Mesa feel so real. And ofcs Barney’s characterization itself, he’s no different from any other guard in the facility, but through sheer luck and willpower he’s able to cut his way through the military and actually escape black Mesa. That’s another thing I like Barney doesn’t GET the g-man ending he doesn’t have a big boss to fight, it’s him fighting marines and headcrabs with the occasional vortigaunt through the old decrepit past of black mesa. It’s the only way someone like him WOULD survive. It’s literally the perfect game for the backstory of the Barney Calhoun we see in hl2. The gameplay is so unique compared to any other of the expansions, gearbox had a STORY to tell. It’s also by far the least scummy thing with randy pitchford’s named attached to it.
Ppl who say it’s bad bc it doesn’t add weapons don’t have any taste. Imo it is so much more solid than opfor, it feels perfect for the era it came out in. You feel so badass, and it’s incredibly rewarding to see him again in hl2 after you’ve played this.
It was even prophesied in hl1. There’s a wall texture with a orange blue and green stripe, in that exact order. Obviously what Mr Teasley and Ms Mark meant by this is that half-life is the best one, blue shift comes in second, and opfor is last. They didn’t know decay was gonna happen they can’t predict everything
Also it objectively has the best vision of xen across every game. Maybe even black Mesa
But yeah, Barney is a tough cookie. He’s just a man but he survived the resonance cascade, the 7 hour war, and he continues to fight during the confine occupation. He did this with just Kevlar vests and helmets, there weren’t batteries and chargers scattered across the whole facility for him to replenish. His armor is RARE. I truly love this character he is willpower personified, he’s been working a 20 year shift and he can still joke around and smile with his friends.
I like In the english version of blue shift barney sounds more tired
and he stills owes gordon a beer
And then Barney leads the resistance
When it comes to games that have you trying to survive as an irrelevant everyman in a crisis situation, many people might suggest the Raw Danger/Disaster Report series. I have another suggestion though: Have you ever heard of a PS4 game called "City Shrouded In Shadow"?
Look it up, I think you'll find it interesting.
Blue Shift is perfect the way it is, much as I liked Opposing Force it risked being non-cannon with the amount of stuff it added and its canonicity is still debated to this day. Blue Shift being not so different to Half Life and not adding anything new made it so that there’s no real discussion about its canonicity because nothing big happened in it that would start that conversation. Which also makes me wonder how they managed to convince the higher-ups to have faith in an expansion where nothing spectacular happens and not outdoing the previous expansion, we really do need these types of expansions that serve to build the world of the original game rather than only be spectacular set-pieces being more bombastic!
I agree that it is neat to look at the intimacy of the personnel, the details of their lives. All that is great.
But all that is five minutes long and the rest of the game is just a low effort fanmap campaign which doesn't add anything to the already-existing game with already-mechanically-familiar players that already had the chance to experience both Half Life and Opposing Forces.
I cannot agree that it 'adds to the charm,' because we could have had a mechanically satisfying game AND a narratively satisfying game, and we got neither, and just the loose attempt of it.
Barney just go through pain and stuff
Someone needs to buy Barney a beer.
This disscusion reminded me of Papers Please
I liked Blue Shift more than Opposing Force simply because it was short and sweet and had less bullshit moments in it. (I'm talking about you, sewer full of aliens.) Opposing Force is everyone's favorite but I've only beaten it once while I've completed Blue Shift multiple times.
I mean, to be honest, four people is probably still more than Gordon or Adrian ended up saving!
Gordon didn't save anyone 'cause the aliens ended up overrunning the whole planet anyway, and Adrian was just lucky to miss the part where he was actually sent there to kill everyone.
Adrian did shockingly little in his adventure, honestly. I mean, did he even make any impact, other than killing people? He didn't even stop the nuke from going off. If he hadn't appeared, nothing would have been different.
@@GermanPeter In my own headcanon even Otis's mom did more :)
Could say that's the nature of having a follow-up story take place during the events of the original -- you can't change the outcome.
Except Opposing Force did, and they made it even worse XD