In Half-Life, it is actually possible to kill Black Mesa guards and collect their ammo.
When PasserbywhoplaysHL asked the question “Have you Crowbarred Barney for his ammo?” I was shocked. Partly because I didn’t know you could and partly because it seemed pretty heartless.
I know it’s “just” a game but I feel that my actions within the game (within certain limits) should reflect my behaviour in real life. I don’t have fun just running around killing and shooting stuff. I want to play as part of a story etc, which is why MP has never appealed to me.
What about you?
You can find the original poll here: Poll Question 001 – Have you Crowbarred Barney for his ammo?
Loading ...Back in 2006, I started a weekly poll. Each question was designed to encourage discussion, rather than simply “Yes!” or “No!” answers. Well, 2006 is a long time ago (11 years at the time of posting this) and the readership has changed. People have come and gone, as they always do, so I thought it might be fun to ask the same questions again.
Perhaps, the different readership will answer differently based on the years that have passed or perhaps they are simply different types of players. That in itself is an interesting question – a bit like new players to the franchise often prefer Black Mesa to the original Half-Life, simply because they never experienced HL when it was first released and have a completely different frame of reference.
Anyway, I plan to re-post all the questions in the same order, although not necessarily every week. So, if a new interesting question appears I will miss a week of the re-poll.
I always try to keep fellow fighters like Barney alive, because they have unlimited ammo to support me and this is much better than killing them for a single clip…
Nope, Barney owes me a beer….
Well, the more mods you’ve played, the more likely it is for you to have killed him at least once. I don’t think I killed barney in my original playthrough as far as I can remember though.
I was always different to other people, so I can say yes, I always killed him, because I was an outsider from age of 7 years and had to fight my way alone. Moving to another village/town as a young kid can be the hardest thing. Coming to a new school in a village as a cityboy and being more open to some things was hard, because the other kids were mostly farmers kids and mobbing me.
OK…enough of my life.
Killing Barney was fun…hehe
I wish you all a nice weekend!
In the official games not.. I found em to be more useful killing things with along side with me and if lucky they would’ve died eventually anyway granting me their ammo but saving me a lot more while taking care of things for me especially in the earlier levels.
In mods that did depend on my mood usually I didn’t kill them only sometimes when I lacked a certain weapon or I was in “don’t care” mood.
Never, but always coerce him to use his ammo first and then kill whatever he doesn’t before they kill him. As said before, he has unlimited ammo. Very valuable.
I did it like once when I first played half-life out of curiosity, after that I never done it anymore.
I did it all the time when I played Opposing Force. The guard and later the marines never managed to follow me properly, so I thought why leave behind a source of ammo?
I usually kill the second Barney you see after the incident, the one shooting the zombies. This gets you the pistol a little earlier than usual, but it makes me feel like the worst person alive!
Voted yes, but only had to do it in a couple mods
I usually killed almost everyone in Half Life 1, because why not? After they’re dead i could explode their body with my crowbar and that would amuse me as a kid, i only didn’t killed then when i was in the second half or past 1/3 of the game, because that crowbar glitch stoped being fun and having them alive was more useful than killing them for a single 9mm clip, then when i got older and discovered Opposing Force, i would never kill a team mate because my ammo was always full and having someone with a good piece along side me was usefull,
I’ve never killed Barney intentionally, only if I was too slow at backing him up or he’d just got in the way of friendly fire. Generally, depending on either the original game or a mod, he was far more use to me alive than dead..and the company was good as well. I don’t enjoy mods however , where you are forced to keep someone alive or you lose then have to start all over again..to be honest I play most mods in God mode, because I can’t stand having to re-do things…for me it’s about the adventure and the story line, not some of the almost impossible puzzles, jumping feats or other weird stuff that finds it’s way into it.
…every time I submit a comment on something it gets deleted…somebody out there not like me or something ?
I just approved a comment for you.
Thanks, I was beginning to wonder what was happening..
I had the same problem recently. Can it be that longer guest comments don’t appear until they have been checked by Phillip?
I only did it for experimentation and I think they attack you if you hurt them, so I was aware they would leave a few bullets on the ground, but like someone else observed, the tradeoff is nothing like keeping them alive.
For my first experience with Half-Life I didn’ even taught about it not thinking it could have an interest killing a guy that could help you progress or perhaps could cross your route after.
When replaying the game or several mods I did it even if it sounds unfair to kill the guy that help you just for his ammo
The first time I played Half Life i did. It was pretty frightening, and I wanted a gun. I saw that this security guy had one, and thought well maybe I could just take his. I never kill the Barney’s on repeat playthroughs, except for that specific Barney sometimes. It’s like a tradition.
ive killed barney through friendly fire quite often
in OP4 a barney and i was fighting a zombie and i got the security zombie and the barney mixed up whoops