The layout was well thought out, the architecture kept the feel of Black Mesa without simply repeating it, and the monster placement was excellent. The few puzzles in it were hard enough to require a little thought without being so hard that they interrupt the flow of the game. The one exception being the garg/sci bug, which Dave has a fix for already.

For the most part ETC II is an extension of the original Hal-Life. I didn't see anything that looked like new code, and no new weapons or monsters. Not that this is a flaw, just no extra credit points . It did have a series of custom sentences used by various scientists during the game, but these were not really done very well - about the only thing in ETC II that I didn't like.

Overall a great map pack that was a lot of fun to play.

Download ECTII
Dave's Website

Combat is fairly challenging (on Difficult) without being impossible, the architecture is well laid out and believable, and textures and minor details were top notch. There's a City streets segment that is truly awesome. The puzzles were not too challenging, which is fine by me - I'm not fond of puzzles. They were also fairly innovative about giving the player instructions and clues. One other feature that I liked was that you could retrieve your undetonated explosives if you didn't like where they got placed.

That said, there were a few not-so good things to comment on. There were several places where they got a little lazy and used obvious clip brushes to keep players from wandering off track (Oh, so THAT's what an invisible barrier looks like). I also found it annoying that you could not pick up machineguns from fallen grunts (the nail guns were cool, but come on!). The only outright mapping mistake I found was one location where it was possible to climb over a wall - and run into the backdrop ( . . . for the Earth is hollow and I have touched the sky!). All very minor flaws that did not detract from game play.

This is one very nearly professional-level effort, and definitely a mod not to miss.

Download Poke646
Poke646 Website

The theme is essentially a B-Movie Hollywood vision of the wild west. It has helpless townsfolk, loyal deputies, murderous outlaws, vicious claim jumpers, snakes, scorpions, mountain lions, and grizzly bears, not to mention some definitely un-politically correct, bloodthirsty indians and banditos. They even have a - gasp! female character in the town. There are also a good selection of appropriate weapons: revolvers, Winchester rifle, bows and arrows, bombs, knives (throwable and retrievable!), pickaxes, double barrel shotgun, and the buffalo rifle. There were also a couple of really over-the-top weapons including the hand-held gatling gun (very Wild, Wild West), and the hand-held cannon (yes CANNON ).

The quality of the new models ranged from just so-so to really good. The best models, as you might expect, were the primary characters, while the animal enemies were less inspired. The weapon models were well done, and the new animations in general were good. I did find it disappointing though, that you could not ride the horses (you can kill them though - what can I say? the barn was dark). Voices were done quite professionally - most would be right at home in any John Wayne movie. Game play was excellent; well paced, and enemy placement was challenging. Some of the texturing was also excellent, particularly in the Mexican towns.

Mapping was one of the weaker points in this mod, however. In many places it was good, even very good, but in many others it was too linear and unconvincingly contrived. Towns in particular should have had some alternative routes for getting around, but there were no back streets or significant alleyways. There were also way too many canyons, caves and mines, or maybe it just seemed that way because they were all covered in a monotonous red sandstone texture.

One final flaw was that the main villain, whom you meet at the very end in fine B-Movie tradition, proved way too easy to kill. There is a quirk in the AI that can be exploited that renders him unable to defend himself. I won't say what it is here (you can email me if you really want to know), and if you don't use that quirk he actually is REALLY tough to defeat.

If you like the old western movies, then this mod will definitely appeal to you. Despite it's flaws I thought it was a blast to play, and if I can get the .fgd file (it's only on 3dDownloads) I may try to map for it myself.

Download Wanted! (don't try the 3dDownloads! link, use a mirror!)
The Wanted! Website

Hour-Glass is a fairly extensive modification of Half-Life, including several non-standard models, textures, and sounds. The story is a continuation of the events at Black Mesa, picking up with Gordon as a member of the Time-Travel Police. The G-Man continues as the primary villain.

Part of this mod features some soft-core pornographic material, including a nicely done naked girl model (by Kris Hauser). It is clearly labeled as such, and Grey Dog gives permission only for adults to download it (Well that ought to keep under-age boys from downloading it).

There are a number of new weapon models, some nicely done, but basically they are just new skins for the familiar ones. The sniper rifle, for example, is just the crossbow in disguise (which becomes apparent if you shoot something at a distance).

The maps were very well done with attention to detail and decent consistency. There were some nice special effects, and a fair amount of eye-candy. Combat was often quite challenging without being overwhelming, puzzles were fairly straight-forward, and there was only one major jumping puzzle (I hate jumping puzzles!).

There were, however two flaws that seriously detracted from these levels. First, he nearly drove me nuts with his use of cut scenes. Several of them occur in combat situations, and hold you helpless until the instant the shooting starts. I don't know about you, but when I'm being ambushed I like to be able to MOVE!

A lesser flaw was his invention of the invisible human grunt as your principle opponent when visiting the distant future. Of course those grunts of the future were still using ordinary sub-machine guns, shotguns, and grenades, but It did make them a lot more challenging than normal. Admittedly, some folks may consider these a wonderful innovation, but I thought totally and continually invisible opponents were a bit unfair.

There were several other parts that I really disliked, such as at one point being required to gun down an unresisting (but supposedly evil) scientist, and especially the "offer you can't refuse" ending. Despite this I did find that on the whole it was a reasonably enjoyable mod, and it was certainly worth the download.

Download Hour-Glass
Grey Dog's Website

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