After discovering the teleporter had used its entire supply of batteries to transport Calhoun to Xen, Calhoun is again forced to go down to a power facility level and find the batteries and recharge them.
Calhoun fights through a team of HECU marines and aliens before he reaches the power generators.
Sorry, none for this chapter
- Skip the coolant system puzzle
- Break a button that’s not supposed to be breakable
- Get on top of the elevator
None for this chapter – sorry.
None for this chapter – sorry
Click on the thumbnails below to open a 1024 pixel wide image.
WARNING: The screenshots contain spoilers.
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This post is part of the The Replay Experience Experiment event. This is a chance to replay all the Half-Life games and discuss them based on our experiences since we first played them.
All text taken from the CombineOverWiki, a fan-supported, editable wiki covering the Half-Life series of games.
On the left is a complete text walkthrough for Half-Life: Blue Shift.
It has been written by Stanley E. Dunigan and updated with all the tricks and tips from PlanetPhillip.Com readers.
It is in PDF format, meaning you can open it directly in modern browsers or download it and print it.
(Left-click to open and right-click to save)
You can purchase Half-Life: Blue Shift directly through Steam and could be playing in within moments, depending on your internet connection.
For me this was the most enjoyable level so far. It had exactly the kinds of things I like in mods: large areas with experiments or industrial uses, plenty of foreshadowing and lots of movement within the same area.
I particularly enjoyed the walkway lift, which I have to admit I had completely forgotten about.
I experienced some strange textures, as can be seen from the early screenshots and I don’t know if that’s normal or not. It was around the time of the HL update and I wondered if it was related. Has anybody else had issues?
All in all an action packed chapter that really feels as though it is building up the tension.
– Skip the coolant system puzzle
– Break a button that’s not supposed to be breakable
– Get on top of the elevator
Bring it on Gearbox!
18 minutes
1
The texture issues was due to the update. It made textures corrupt sometimes in OpenGL mode.
Pretty awesome chapter, I remember how much I struggled to make it past the puzzles the first time I played this (hence the name of the chapter). I especially like the cutscene at the beginning that shows us exactly our goal without letting us know it would be THAT hard to reach. We also get to know what happened to the “others” that went down there. Nothing much to say, except that the barrel puzzle was extremely well made for the goldsource engine.
Challenges:
– Skip the coolant system puzzle
And the rest of the puzzles
– Break a button that’s not supposed to be breakable
incredible loss of time, but you can see how to do it here:
– Get on top of the elevator
didn’t have enough hp for it to be worth it, I wouldn’t have been able to grenade jump anyway. check the speedrun I mentioned earlier to see it.
Five words or less review:
Why I love Blue Shift
Deaths:
None 😀 going for no death blue shift 😀
Playtime:
3 minutes 15 seconds 125 milliseconds
Blue Shift’s version of Power Up.
– The sequence with the Guard defending the scientist from the slave
– The sequence where the soldiers torch through the door
– I liked how the tables were overturned and the soda machines were broken. Showed how the HECU was here before you
– The part where the wounded guard tries to get up but falls over was funny
– The broken pipes with flames coming out reminded me of Power Up
– There’s a hidden piece of dialogue from Rosenberg if you go back up the elevator after you went down it
– Skip the coolant system puzzle
Nothing to say.
– Break a button that’s not supposed to be breakable
I whacked every button I could find with my crowbar, but I couldn’t find it.
– Get on top of the elevator
Easy.
Playtime:
21 minutes
5 words or less:
Power is Progress
My images for this chapter: http://imgur.com/a/SDW4e
Yet another good mixture of puzzles and combat – I think that is what Blue Shift excels at overall. Here we get some fairly interesting puzzles in the Half-Life world, placing pushable barrels to the right place. Not unique, but overall well done and both puzzles are pretty clear to the player.
I really like the structure of this chapter, not only the layout but also the overall task. The layout is kind of a large loop, but you move through it more or less linearly. I also liked the way the smaller puzzles fit within the larger task of recharging the power cube and sending it back upstairs. Some nice sequences are also thrown in, I liked the way Barney was attacked by the vortigaunt, and then you find him later after he’s crawled across the floor leaving a trail of blood. Small touches like this go a long way.
This is one of the better chapters in Blue Shift. It’s all indoor action with a couple decent setpieces (moving walkway, coolant reservoir) providing memorable puzzle-like tasks for the player.
Playtime: 15 minutes
I found it a little amusing that the entire chapter was just about getting a new battery – somehow Gordon’s adventures seem a little more… glamorous? Anyway, the chapter was fun, despite the pretty mundane goal. I like the puzzle where you drain the coolant and position the barrels. In addition the way the level designers made the chapter feel non-linear made it more interesting. As Unq says all the puzzles actually fit with what we are trying to do which makes it seem a lot more meaningful than a lot of chapters.
Nothing else to say except that the spawning Vorts just before screenshot #14 scared the bejeezus out of me.
How do you “skip the coolant system puzzle”? Surely that is almost the whole chapter…
None at all! I am so proud.
Playtime: About 20 minutes
Power Struggle is a purely Black-Mesa style level with industrial areas, huge installations, experimental equipment and, curiously, offices.
Obviously this is an action chapter full of military and Xens fighting for controlling the whole area. That and the generators explain the title. There is also some littles puzzles. I remember that in my first play I didn’t solve the TNT one easily.
Personally I was surprised by those offices near the beginning, that a little weird in a so industrial zone. Other thing is the generators themself, they looks as so powerful as they are experimental. I really asked myself what fuel they use.
-Skip the coolant system puzzle Can We ?
-Break a button that’s not supposed to be breakable
-Get on top of the elevator
Ouch! This chemical is very dangerous! Where are safety signs?! And the bridge?!
14 minutes
Didn’t get any challenges and after 7 minutes I’m seeing chapter title again?..
I kinda got stuck not knowing how to empty the coolant so I watched a bit of the French playthrough for hints 🙁
But the moving catwalk part gave me a giggle. The entire chapter wasn’t that great for me, prolly cus I was frustrated from trying to get the brown barrel in the coolant area and of course the game wouldn’t let me but it didn’t say why..
Playtime: over 30 minutes