Basic Details
- Title: Alternate Path
- File Name: hl1-sp-alternate-path.7z
- Original File Name: altrnate.zip
- Size : 1.62Mb
- Author: Subace AKA Matthew Ryder
- Date Released: 13 August 2000
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Meta Review Data
Statistics based on 3 comment(s) with meta review data.
Installed:
Using Gauge: Users
Manually: 3 Users
Time Taken:
Average: 0 Hours, 29 Mins
Shortest: 0 Hours, 13 Mins by Sheajay
Longest: 1 Hours by Avantgarde95
Total Time Played: 1 Hours, 28 Mins
Using Gauge: Users
Manually: 3 Users
Time Taken:
Average: 0 Hours, 29 Mins
Shortest: 0 Hours, 13 Mins by Sheajay
Longest: 1 Hours by Avantgarde95
Total Time Played: 1 Hours, 28 Mins
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This is not a “little map pack”. It’s an alternative way where Freeman was captured and a couple of Alien Slaves attacked the soldiers who retain him.
And it’s very, very good. The locations are very nice amd the mapping is very good. A must play “map pack” for me.
4/5
Ezequielhl@: 100% ACK. Small but not short in
playtime this gem is clearly a must play
Starts well. Quite tough battles. Then winds down into a trip along a train track. Average.
Short. 6 maps. No definite ending, nothing more to do.
Having trouble loading this in steem, can this be loaded in presteem?
Any help would be great.
Thanks IDM
Presteem, put all the bsb (map) files in the Half-Life/valve/maps folder. Run from console with the command
map outside.
Or from the HL shortcut with
+map outside
added
This is one of my favorite map packs although the loading piont that goes back to the original game is messed up. The game crashes every time I go throu it.
lol sorry, can’t remember much about it altho just played it yesterday, but it was one of many mods I played O:)
The only thing I remember in conclusion is that it was very good, lot of fun.. so go play it!
Alternate Path, by mapper Matthew Ryder (SubAce), is a short episode in the “what if” vein of Half-Life levels, which are becoming more common. Note that isn’t a complaint; on the contrary, it provides a simple and sometimes clever explanation for the episode, instead of having no story whatsoever. Of course, it also saves mappers from coming up with a convincing background from scratch as well. In this case, the author wondered what if, when you were captured by the military in Half-Life, they brought you topside for questioning instead of tossing you in that damned trash compactor.
Because it takes place in Black Mesa, this episode features architecture that is typical of single player Half-Life. Though fairly well-done, the areas you visit are not overly impressive either, but the r_speeds are certainly kept low. The locales in Alternate Path do indeed fit in well with the Black Mesa theme, and in fact at the end of this pack you rejoin the regularly scheduled program right at the beginning of the ‘Questionable Ethics’ episode, so you can just continue playing through Half-Life if you like. Of course, this pack won’t really mean that much to you if you have not played through the single player game.
The gameplay is pretty good in this pack – there is a good combination of combat and simple puzzles. But more of both would have been a welcome addition in my opinion. Some additional puzzles or expansion of some of the visited areas could have really improved this episode. My main complaints about this pack are that it’s too short, and the progression is too linear. Although it spans 6 maps, it’s over all too soon, but dropping you right back into normal Half-Life is a nice touch.
In general, Alternate Path is not too challenging. However, there are a couple of spots that may give you some trouble – the first being when the episode starts, since you begin unarmed and must deal with a couple of enemies immediately. But there is plenty of health and ammo, and in my opinion this is an episode best played on the difficult skill setting for better balance.
I recommend Alternate Path because it’s a short, fun pack that meshes well with the single player Half-Life experience. It’s a bit short and straightforward, but that’s really a minor complaint considering this is a first-time release by the author. His use of a familiar theme, as well as clever sequences and a good mix of enemies, make Alternate Path an enjoyable add-on.
Notes
This review is republished here by permission and was originally published Saturday, 6th January, 2001 by Unquenque.
This review was originally posted on the Ten Four Website, which is now offline. Permission has been granted to republish the full review and more details can be found on the About page.
Quite agreed with piledriver‘s review. Not too much interesting.
Now this is a very interesting concept, the idea behind Alternate Path is that alien slaves killed Gordon’s captors at the end of Apprehension which creates a new, short chapter that spans 5 maps before connecting into Questionable Ethics so you can continue playing the rest of Half-Life. I think this would be even cooler if the first map was somehow integrated into the game rather than it being something you have to load, but that would understandably be much harder to do. Now there’s an idea for a map series.
Since this is designed to be an alternative chapter to Residue Processing, you would expect the mapping to be of the same standard as the original Half-Life, unfortunately it falls short despite giving a very good attempt at it. There are areas that can be believed to be part of Black Mesa, the generator access and the rail sections being the best of the bunch, however the outdoor areas fall short from the likes of Surface Tension and it feels less like Black Mesa and more like a fan map series. Make no mistake though the mapping here is, for the most part, quite impressive and of a higher quality than the norm. There’s a lot of detail thrown into these maps, particularly the interiors, and the maps overall look pretty good.
This mod has a few minor annoyances that really bring it down. There was one part with some rubble that you can jump on and I ended up getting stuck and needed to noclip, in the original Half-Life this was avoided with a little extra clipping which this could have done with. There’s one bizarre part with a cheap tripmine up an enclosed ladder section which I didn’t notice until it blew up, however there’s also some light brushes that seem to stop the explosion from causing any harm despite being right next to it. Shortly after the tripmine, the ceiling caves in and if you’re standing close to it you immediately die, there’s not really any warning that it’s going to happen right there so that was quite frustrating. There’s a few brush/texture bugs around the generator section that causes hall of mirrors, it doesn’t bother me much but it does detract from the experience.
Overall though this mod is an enjoyable experience. The combat is quite fun, though it starts off fairly hard and gets easier the more you play, there’s some interesting fights to be had in the earlier parts. I fully recommend this.
Manually
Medium
13 Minutes
The intro is very tough since we have to fight the vortigaunts and many soldiers while we lack ammo and health. But after the first part, we get enough ammo so the mod becomes very enjoyable. And I like the concept of continuing to the original HL1 after the mod. (I found the meaning of the mod’s title after that.)
Manually
Medium
1 Hour
The vagons actually go into the wall slightly when it turns around the large corner. When you drop, both vortgauns spawns in your nose and one lightning removes big health with succession of receiving another lightning bolt killing you out. Sopposedly it’s another point where a played can die instantly like instant colacao. Well we keep on the track wich is not electrified. And another two vortgaunts, these one are electrified. You look to the right and say holy crap, I am damaged again. You take another vagon and it breaks, so there’re 2 ramps, one is closed and another one you have to climb yourself, by foot, get to the edge and apparently my legs has no break and we fall to the death again.
Manually
Hard
15 Minutes