Half-Life / Hλlf-Life
Released: 1998
Published by: Sierra Studios
Developed by: Valve
Author(s):
Ted Backman, Kelly Bailey, Yahn Bernier, Ken Birdwell, Steve Bond, Dario Casali, Marc Laidlaw, Jay Stelly, John Cook, Greg Coomer, Wes Cumberland, John Guthrie, Mona Lisa Guthrie, Michael Harrington, Monica Harrington, Brett Johnson, Chuck Jones, Karen Laur, Randy Lundeen, Yatzse Mark, Lisa Mennet, Gabe Newell.
Half-Life is a first-person shooter released by Sierra Studios in 1998, and developed by Valve Software. While it didn't break any new ground in a technical manner, the immersive storyline being told as you progress and customisable engine was enough to propel it as one of the best FPS ever created.
The Black Mesa Research Facility is an ultra-secret laboratory under a government contract to conduct top-secret and extremely volatile experiments. The scientist Gordon Freeman is a Black Mesa employee. One morning, as usual, he pits his way to the research facility for a run-of-the-mill experiment. However, Gordon comes to realize that it might not be as ordinary as he thought. Odd things happen as he makes his way to one of the Black Mesa test chambers. Even stranger things happen when he begins to move the test sample towards the anti-mass spectrometer.
At that moment, everything goes horribly wrong. Aliens from the dimension Xen suddenly invade the facility, injuring or killing many of the employees. Soon afterwards, marines arrive to contain the situation by killing the aliens as well as the surviving human witnesses. Gordon understands what that means: he will have to fight his way through both aliens and marines to get to the top of the Black Mesa complex and to freedom.
The game is somewhat unique in that the introduction is interactive and uses actual game graphics - it begins with you on the monorail travelling into the Black Mesa facility. You can control where your character looks with the mouse. When you arrive, you take full control - it works really well and through other employees of the facility talking to you when you get close, you are given an idea of what to do.
The game featured both a full one-player storyline as well as multiplayer options with dedicated maps. Multiplayer supported up to 32 players simultaneously playing over a LAN or over the internet.
An unofficial mod was created for Half Life, called Counter-Strike. This originated as a mod for Quake called Navy Seals, and ran on the later GoldSrc engine (a heavily modified version of the Quake engine) which superceded the original Source engine on which Half-Life was based with better gameplay and graphics.
Half-Life was succeeded by Half-Life 2 in 2004 (which isn't in DOS Days as it post-dates the DOS era by some years).
System Requirements
System Requirements | Intel Pentium 133+ (P166 recommended), Windows 95/98/NT4 with 24 MB RAM (32 MB recommended), 2x CD-ROM. Graphics support: VGA or SVGA Hi-Color (16-bit), DirectX 6.0, Glide, or OpenGL. Software rendering resolutions: 640 x 480 up to 1152 x 864. Hardware rendering resolutions: 320 x 240 up to 1280 x 960. |
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Original Media | CD-ROM (577.1 MB used) - 27 CD Audio tracks (360.7 MB) + Game (216.4 MB) |
Installed Size (MB) | 420 MB |
From where can it be run?
Half Life must be installed to your hard disk.
Copy Protection
Game versions up to and including 1.1.0.1 require the original game CD to be present in your optical drive. There is a 'No CD' patch available - simply put the executable in the same folder as HL.EXE and run it. It will update the HL.EXE file directly to skip over the check - a backup of this file is made beforehand (HL.BAK) if you wish to undo the change.
The negative aspect of this is that no game audio will play (it's in CD audio format), since it plays this directly from the CD-ROM. I am not aware of any way to have the game look somewhere else for the game audio data.
How to Setup
The game can only be run in Windows 95, 98 or NT 4.0. To begin the installation, insert the CD-ROM and run SETUP.EXE or let the autorun start it for you:
You should hear a klaxon going off.
If you didn't hear anything, exit the setup program and make sure you are getting the usual dings and other sounds in Windows.
If you don't have sufficient free space on the chosen drive, you will see this message:
Problems
Symptom: The game runs very slowly even with decent system specs.
Cause: If using OpenGL hardware rendering, you may have it set to use the 'default' driver.
Resolution: Go into Configuration -> Graphics setup -> Mode. Be sure you are using the OpenGL Mini Driver, not 'default'.
Symptom: I'm trying to run the game using OpenGL hardware rendering, but it's not available.
Cause: If running the game on Windows 95 pre-OSR2 release, you need a fix applied.
Resolution: Download the file opengl95.exe, provided by Microsoft.
Symptom: I'm trying to run the game using hardware rendering (OpenGL or DirectX), but it's not available.
Cause: Half Life only supports software rendering on some graphics cards.
Resolution: Cards that only run in software rendering mode include S3 ViRGE and 3dfx Voodoo Rush.
Symptom: I'm playing the game using hardware rendering (OpenGL or DirectX), but the graphics don't seem right.
Cause: Half-Life requires a compatible OpenGL or DirectX 3D accelerator to run in hardware mode.
Resolution: There are known problems with certain card manufacturers' drivers so be sure you're running the latest version. The nVidia RIVA 128 is not supported in Direct3D. OpenGL works with the latest nVidia reference drivers. Matrox G200 does not support OpenGL without a 'GL mini-driver' provided by Matrox. S3 ViRGE cards are not supported in hardware mode.
Symptom: I don't hear any sound when playing Half Life.
Cause: Another Windows program may have control of your audio device.
Resolution: Be sure no other applications are running and restart Half Life.
To Quit the Game
To exit Half-Life, press ESC while in-game to display the menu and navigate to 'Exit game'.
Supporting Documents
Additional Files, Drivers & Utilities
Half-Life has possibly the most third-party mods (modifications) of any first-person shooter. If the graphics of the original game are looking a little too dated for your liking, try Half-Life : MMod version 2 over at ModDB. According to the author, Gunship_Mark_II, this includes:
-A countless amount of bug fixes, stability improvements and proper Linux support, thanks to SamVanheer Half-Life: Updated fork of the original game.
-Monster specific gibs for every single enemy in the game, now they don't throw generic pieces of meat, instead they throw appropriate pieces belonging to actual monster.
-Brand new explosion effects for every single type of explosives, brand new muzzle flash effects and monster effects.
-Much fancier glow effects for weapons and monsters, Tau Cannon, Gluon Gun, Hivehand, RPG, Displacer and more emit actual accurate source of light.
-A work in progress Shooting Range map made specifically to test Half-Life 1: MMod weapons and features. Made using props from community creators, such as SV BOY from THWL, they made making this map quite a bit easier and enjoyable.
-Much more reactive and snappier monster AI.
-Crowbar got a swipe function, dealing x1.5 of the base damage, but taking slightly longer to re-fire, perfect way to smack those pesky headcrabs mid-air.
-Brand new fixes for character models, more security guard variations, texture and animation event fixes/additions.
-Updated and reworked map edits, especially at Unforeseen Consequences and Residue Processing chapters.
-Countless amount of small polishes and touch ups.
Save Games
Press ESC while in-game to display the menu. From here choose "Save/Load Game". You can also do a 'quick save' by pressing F6 during gameplay, and reload from it using F7.
Versions of the game known to exist
Version | Date | Comments |
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1.0 | 30th October 1998 | First release. |
1.0.0.9 | 7th April 1999 | Added Team Fortress Classic. |
1.0.1.3 | 18th August 1999 | Minor updates and bug fixes for Team Fortress Classic. |
1.0.1.5 | 31st October 1999 | Patch provided with Opposing Force - not released separately. |
1.0.1.6 | 15th February 2000 | Two more deathmatch maps added and server problems fixed. |
1.1.0.0 | 8th June 2000 | Team Fortress Classic updated to v1.5 with new maps and interface, improved network code for multiplayer, and added Worldcraft 3 editor. |
1.1.0.1 | 28th June 2000 | Several bugs and exploits fixed. |
1.1.0.4 | 25th October 2000 | Three more maps added to Team Fortress Classic as well as a few gameplay changes. |
1.1.0.6 | 14th March 2001 | One new map added to Team Fortress Classic. |
1.1.0.7 | 11th July 2001 | Deathmatch Classic added, along with a new game update system. |
1.1.0.8 | 19th September 2001 | Multicast Spectator added as well as voice communication. |
1.1.0.9 | 24th April 2002 | Anti-cheat protection added, improved HLTV and more bugs fixed. |
1.1.1.0 | 12th June 2002 | Final release. Added the ricochet mod and improved the anti-cheat system. |