Lots of great things coming down the line for Half-Life Fans.

Previously we released a Fall '24 Update as a Public Beta. With good feedback and insight from the community, we are making some necessary changes, and hope to push the update out to the mainline branch in the coming weeks. Stay tuned for an announcement on that.

You can find more info on that here:
Fall 2024 Public Beta

In the meantime, Black Mesa is on sale for 75% off, from 11/14 - 11/18
https://gtm.you1.cn/storesteam/app/362890/Black_Mesa/

In case you missed it, we announced our new upcoming title Rogue Point
Check out the trailer, and be sure to Wishlist it on Steam Now!
https://gtm.you1.cn/storesteam/app/1843840/Rogue_Point/


Their team has been hard at work getting the latest chapter in Black Mesa: Blue Shift ready for release. You can see their latest trailer here:
https://youtu.be/VdtIAzJdChQ

November 16th marks 20 YEARS since Half-Life 2 released. It's been a long journey, and Half-Life 2 inspired us to create Black Mesa in the first place, so we can't wait to celebrate 20 years with the rest of the community!

For some related news, check out this new video from NVIDIA and the Half-Life 2 RTX team!
https://youtu.be/5FZ49Ou8zAE?si=6rbWLACR7BCMaGDZ

More soon. Hope your November is going great!

We are incredibly excited to share with the community what we've been working on...


Our new game will be a rogue-lite tactical co-op shooter that offers a strategic approach to high-octane combat.

But that's not all...


We've partnered with Team17 as our publisher, to bring you Rogue Point!

Over the last couple of years, our team has been working on this title. It's been very difficult to not be able to share it with you all until now. While we will continue to support and cherish the work we did with Black Mesa, we wanted to take what we learned as a studio, and apply it to something new and exciting.

Rest assured we'll have more info to share with you all soon. We hope you'll take this next step in our journey with us. We couldn't have done it without you all!

Wishlist Here

here
Follow the Rogue Point socials:

Facebook[www.facebook.com]
Instagram[www.instagram.com]
Twitter/X[x.com]
TikTok[www.tiktok.com]
Reddit

HECU Collective have shared a new recording from Xen and it contains... the Focal Point chapter release date! No more Xen When™ for this mod too! If you're interested, watch the announcement video now!

Along with the fifth chapter, their new release will also include a lot of great improvements and content for previous chapters as well!

• New and improved scenes for Living Quarters Outbound and Insecurity chapters;
  
• Improved skybox textures, lighting and Post Processing in all earthbound surface maps;
  
• Added responsive surface sounds to some environments that will be played with nearby explosions;
  
• Improved all explosions SFX and added distance attenuation to them;
  
• Added completely new surface properties for certain props with unique physics sounds. (E.g. barrels, tarps, monitors, crates);
  
• Updated many BM and BM:BS textures/materials;
  
• Various other visual improvements.

The updated mod will be available for download on Steam Workshop here: (https://gtm.you1.cn/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2424633574)

and will also be available to download ModDB

Hello everyone,

Welcome to Fall, and a Black Mesa beta patch post! We have pushed a build to public-beta that includes a bunch of fixes to some lingering issues, and WAY better Linux/Steam Deck support.

___________________________________________________________________

• Improved game start up for a smother first time launch and improved stability
  
• Fixed an issue that caused the game to crash to the menu when changing video settings during gameplay
  
• Fixed performance issue with moving wires (Thanks to npc_pigeon, narkvic, and the community)
  
• Re-added DXVK for Windows as a launch option
  
• Significantly better native Linux implementation and Steam Deck support

___________________________________________________________________

• Reintroduced DXVK support on Windows.
  
• Upgraded DXVK to version 2.4.1 and removed the redundant custom Vendor ID from the configuration file.
  
• Improved the Qt runtime setup in the Windows Launcher to preload necessary libraries for ANGLE if needed.
  
• Restored throttling policies and their application to game processes under power management.
  
• Updated the launcher icon on Windows

• Resolved an issue that caused the settings to crash due to concurrent exclusive access to the internal game save file during gameplay.
  
• Fixed the missing "_back" cable texture set, addressing visual inconsistencies.
  
• Thanks to npc_pigeon, narkvic, and the community for their efforts in identifying the solution. These additional files effectively mitigate the engine's error messages about missing VMT files, enhancing overall performance in scenarios featuring moving ropes. This is particularly noticeable during the rocket elevator sequence in "On A Rail."
  
• Aligned the Vertex Format in the Skin GBuffer shader with that of the Prop GBuffer shader to ensure consistency across shaders handling similar data.
  
• Updated backup code for statically lit bump-mapped props, ensuring that props are marked as non-statically lit if the static lighting checksum does not match, preventing lighting artifacts.
  
• Recompiled all Inbound Tram models using the newer Studio Model Compiler to resolve tangent-related issues and improve visual fidelity.
  
• Enhanced the Job Pool to support more than 16 threads, optimizing performance for multithreaded tasks.
  
• Updated DX Support Autoconfig to align Intel/AMD GPUs with NVIDIA, ensuring that the game launches at 1080p by default instead of a low 4:3 resolution like 640x480.
  
• Introduced functionality to automatically run auto-configuration if the configuration version differs, ensuring that every installation reconfigures itself on the first launch after an update.
  
• Addressed various issues within the game, resulting in improvements in several areas. Feedback from players who opted into previous beta tests indicates that the sporadic crashing they experienced has been resolved.

• Updated ToGL/Linux shaders with the latest GBuffer changes to ensure the application of up-to-date rendering techniques.
  
• Cleaned up the shadow filter state in ToGL/Linux, resulting in more accurate and stable shadow rendering.
  
• Migrated ToGL/Linux to use the OpenGL 3.3 Compatibility Profile, enhancing compatibility with a broader range of hardware and driver configurations while maintaining access to modern OpenGL features.
  
• Introduced an optional experimental Binary Shader Cache for ToGL/Linux, accessible via the -glusebinarycache command line option on Linux and native Steam Deck builds, which improves shader load times on supported platforms.
  
• Resolved a half-pixel halo issue in the ToGL/Linux rendering pipeline, improving visual accuracy in rendered scenes.
  
• Added per-triangle and optional per-vertex validation for studio models to resolve issues in ToGL/Linux related to static and dynamically lit models. A second pass for per-vertex validation can be enabled via the +r_studio_validate_vertices 1 command line argument.
  
• Improved lighting buffer quality on ToGL/Linux to resolve a red hue in specular highlights, ensuring consistent visual output across platforms.
  
• Added a missing window icon on ToGL/Linux to address a minor visual issue.
  
• Configured default arguments for the Linux launcher to optimize display settings on Steam Deck, ensuring a better out-of-the-box experience for AMD/Intel GPU users.
  
• Fixed debug assertions in Havok that leaked into the release build on Linux, preventing potential crashes during runtime.

• Forced the shipped DXVK configuration on Proton if no overrides are provided, enhancing compatibility with Proton 9.x and newer versions.

• Implemented proper support for mirrored UVs in the Studio Model Compiler, ensuring that newly compiled meshes do not introduce visual bugs due to incorrect tangent data.

___________________________________________________________________

• Is the game getting flagged by any antivirus (Such as BitDefender)?
  
  
• On AMD GPUs (7 Series) is the game still crashing on public-beta when players go underwater?
  We have not been able to replicate it on a number of machines with AMD GPUs, and people who have switched to our new test branch have not had the crash happen!
  Please file a support log on Discord if you touch the water in Unforeseen Consequences and the game crashes
  
  
• How is Steam Deck and Linux Working?
  Is the “out of memory” crash still happening?

___________________________________________________________________


If you have Virtual Desktop and the game will not launch, please try the following:

• Check for a Windows update
  
• Validate the game files
  
• Install the following redistributables:

MSVC 2013

• https://download.microsoft.com/download/2/E/6/2E61CFA4-993B-4DD4-91DA-3737CD5CD6E3/vcredist_x86.exe
  
• https://download.microsoft.com/download/2/E/6/2E61CFA4-993B-4DD4-91DA-3737CD5CD6E3/vcredist_x64.exe

MSVC 2013 Update

• https://download.microsoft.com/download/C/C/2/CC2DF5F8-4454-44B4-802D-5EA68D086676/vcredist_x86.exe
  
• https://download.microsoft.com/download/C/C/2/CC2DF5F8-4454-44B4-802D-5EA68D086676/vcredist_x64.exe

DirectX Redistributables:

• https://download.microsoft.com/download/1/7/1/1718CCC4-6315-4D8E-9543-8E28A4E18C4C/dxwebsetup.exe

The game should now launch on the regular desktop.
___________________________________________________________________

Some information on the launch options and what they do.

Black Mesa Default - This is the main option for people to use. This launch option uses DirectX 9C to render the game, and uses DirectX 11 to render the menus. Splitting the way we render the game gives a bit more performance, and gives us more support for rendering the menus.

Black Mesa No Workshop - This will not mount workshop content to help rule out issues or crashes. Note: it is not foolproof. The best way to rule out mods causing issues with the game is by uninstalling the game, deleting local files for Black Mesa in the Steam directory, unsubscribing from mods, then reinstalling the game.

Black Mesa DXVK - Renders the game through the DirectX to Vulkan conversion layer. This is a good option for certain cards that do not have great DirectX9 support.

Note: Some issues are not 100% solved.
Windowed fullscreen still acts as regular fullscreen
It is possible to lose your mouse while in the menu. Pressing the console button (`) twice will fix this

Black Mesa DX9 Fallback - There may be a situation where a specific hardware setup needs to be run in full DX9 (for both the game and UI in DirectX 9). We included this as a launch option to make troubleshooting even easier.

Intel Arc Cards
We have been testing on an Intel A750. The game seems to run fine on the card, but for some reason the new UI does not draw. You can hear the buttons when you roll over them with the mouse, but it is not displayed on screen. We will look into this to get the game 100% on Arc cards, but for the short term use -oldgameui as a launch command and let us know if there are any other issues that appear on Arc cards.
___________________________________________________________________

• The monitor in AM is displaying four screens again :(
  
• DXVK Windowed full screen still acts as regular full screen
  
• In DXVK, it is possible to lose your mouse while in the menu. Pressing the console button (`) twice will fix this
  
• Linux does not have sun lens flares

The best place to post feedback is in the Discord server[discord.com] so that our community manager, Cybrfox, can sift through it and get it to us for fixes!

Thank you for all your support. Happy Halloween! 🎃

Black Mesa is now on sale for a limited time—it's the perfect chance to dive into Gordon Freeman’s epic journey. Whether you’re a new player or revisiting the chaos of the Black Mesa Research Facility, now’s the time to join the fight!
But that's not all! The amazing HECU Collective team have just dropped a BRAND-NEW TRAILER for Black Mesa: Blue Shift's highly-anticipated Chapter 5: Focal Point.

If you haven’t checked it out yet, make sure to download Black Mesa and experience the first four chapters of Black Mesa: Blue Shift. Dive into the action with Barney Calhoun, as he takes his battle to XEN!

Watch the Trailer

Trailer recorded and edited by ALLAN

Soundtrack for trailer composed by Pawel Perepelica

Happy Summer, fellow scientists! Hope the axial tilt is finding you well.

Black Mesa is discounted for the Steam Summer Sale, so tell all your friends!
https://gtm.you1.cn/storesteam/app/362890/Black_Mesa/

We also wanted to give a quick update on what we are up to.

There is a known crash with certain AMD cards when you reach the water in UC. We are going to deploy a beta so we can get proper crash reporting and then fix the crash. In the meantime, you can use the two launch commands below to fix the issue:

+nr_gbuffer_for_secondary_cams_enabled 0 +cl_mdldetailfx_enable 0

Details in our sticky post here.

We have re-implemented DXVK on the developer side of things. We’ve got to do another round of testing, then put it up for public beta.

We are also exploring ways for Linux to launch DXVK directly for a better Linux experience that is more in line with the Windows build of the game.

We now have an Arc card to test on, so we test on that to make sure the game works properly. We thought we had it all sorted on a previous patch, but we want to recheck it with proper hardware.

If you encounter issues with ARC cards, you can use these launch commands to fix them:

force_vendor_id 0x10DE -force_device_id 0x1180 -dxlevel 9

We did a bunch of work with the last patch to make sure the game started and closed properly. We’ll look into these again (specifically the game startup) to make sure there are no lingering issues or that we didn't introduce new ones.

We’ve been very busy solving Unforeseen Consequences from our last patch and other things. Our community is extremely important to us and we want to be more consistent with patches, updates, and communication in general. We are very excited for what the future holds. We have been working tirelessly to get it out to the community. Soon™.

Again, we hope everyone is having a great summer (or winter, if you are down south). May your Steam backlog be plentiful!

Some exciting updates from our friends over at HECU Collective! If you're not familiar with them, their team has been hard at work developing the Black Mesa: Blue Shift mod.

They recently sat down with LambdaGeneration for an interview, diving into the technical aspects of their development, and sharing some screen shots and game play footage.

Check out the interview here:

Also take a look at:

ModDB "Focal Point" Article

Focal Point Gameplay footage

And be sure to grab their mod in the Black Mesa workshop HERE. We can't wait to see what they have in store next!

Hello again, scientist!

Well this has been excruciating. We apologize for any scares and the inconvenience of having the game get reported as a virus.

We have fixed the issue and also put up a number of other patches! Here are the patch notes:

We’ve implemented a temporary fix to stop antivirus programs flagging bms.exe as a false positive. We have a permanent fix in the works, so that this issue will not happen again.

Downloading the update is all you need to do to have the game NOT get reported by your antivirus or Windows Defender (sometimes you have to restart Steam).

As a result of our antivirus hotfix, we had to temporarily disable DXVK as a launch option. We plan to bring this back online as soon as possible in a future patch.

• Fixed an issue which prevented some Steam Deck users from climbing ladders or using trams
  
• Fixed an issue where custom controller bindings were not persisting
  
• Fixed an issue where controller camera movement would not obey iron sights sensitivity
  
• Reworked Gyro Aim which is now handled separately in accordance with Steam Input best practices
  
• Also added “in_gyro_look_yaw_sensitivity” and “in_gyro_look_pitch_sensitivity” console commands for controlling gyro sensitivity.
  
• Revamped default controller layouts:
  
• Official Layout for Black Mesa - Standard Controls. Our official bindings for devices without gyro support
  
• Official Layout for Black Mesa - Standard Controls. Our official bindings for devices with gyro support
  
• Official Layout for Black Mesa - Steam Deck Controls. Our official bindings for Steam Deck, adding trackpad support for the main menu
  
• New Steam Input Game Actions:
  
  • “Quick tripmine” - for quickly placing tripmines.
    
  • “Quick frag” - for quickly throwing frags.
    
  • “Use crowbar” - for quick crowbar switching.
• Added a console command, “steam_input_show_bindings” which will bring up the Steam Input configurator via the Steam Overlay.
  
• A helpful guide on controller troubleshooting with Steam can be found here

• Fixed an issue where auto-aim would aim at items the player was holding (like ground sentries)
  
• Adjusted auto aim values in skill.cgf to have a longer range and be more magnetic

• Still testing internally but we did fix:
  
• Build process for dedicated servers (a compile switch was missing)
  
• This should resolve some crashing issues with dedicated servers

As mentioned in the patch notes, we completely overhauled the auto-aim feature within the game. This can be configured by changing console settings in the game. Details here.

If you would like to change the settings for the auto-aim permanently, all you have to do is go to Black Mesa\bms\cfg\skill.cfg and edit the numbers at the bottom of the text file.
We are interested to hear what people think of the auto-aim (most of us are terrible at playing the game with controllers).


We are aware that if you change certain video settings WHILE in game, it can crash the game to the main menu and not let you resume the autosave it just created. We are looking into this!

New HUD elements and controller options need to be localized

If you get a message like below, simply restart Steam and re-launch the game.
Previous Necro Patch Notes:
https://gtm.you1.cn/storesteam/news/app/362890/view/4174347361777844150

Thank you for your patience and understanding. Thanks to everyone who helped us test AGAIN.

We’re investigating why some antivirus software and Windows Defender pick up the game or one of the tools as malicious. We’ve had tools flagged by different antivirus programs in the past, but never the .exe of the game itself. Needless to say, there are NO viruses within Black Mesa. We’re a little worried that this false positive is due to new detection methods beyond our control, but as we said, we keep looking into the issue!

(As of writing this we may have a lead as to what is tripping antivirus. We may have a workaround to fix it)

We apologize if this spooked anyone. The last thing you want to see after buying a game is that type of alert.

We updated the launch options to default to the game running in DirectX 9 and the UI running in DirectX 11. This helps ensure maximum compatibility across various target hardware.

There is still the option to run the game using Vulkan DXVK. If your computer is having trouble running the game in certain spots, this is a good option to try. It does have drawbacks: it does not like alt-tabbing from the game, and it cannot do borderless fullscreen correctly (the game will run fine, but it will act like regular fullscreen).

Finally, there is the DirectX 9 fallback, which runs both the game and UI on DirectX 9, in case your hardware setup requires it.

So now when launching the game you will see:
-Play Default
-Play Performance Option (DXVK)
-Play DirectX 9 (Legacy)

If you have already set the launch option and want to change, simply right-click the game, go to properties, General, and click the drop-down under “Launch Options”.

Soon, we will release a patch with the following fixes:

• Upgrading Black Mesa to use Steamwork V1.52 for better input implementation
  
• [TO CONFIRM]: Fixed custom controller bindings not persisting
  
• Fixed an issue that prevented some users from climbing ladders and using trams on Steam Deck
  
• Lowering controller deadzone for better feel
  
• [NOTE]: A helpful guide on controller troubleshooting with Steam can be found here

We are aware that if you change certain video settings WHILE in game, it can crash the game to the main menu and not let you resume the autosave it just created.

We are looking into this.

• Fixed build process for dedicated servers (a compile switch was missing)
  
• This should resolve some crashing issues with dedicated servers

As mentioned in the patch notes, we completely overhauled the auto-aim feature within the game. This can be configured by changing console settings in the game. Details here.

If you would like to change the settings for the auto-aim permanently, all you have to do is go to Black Mesa\bms\cfg\skill.cfg and edit the numbers at the bottom of the text file.
We are interested to hear what people think of the auto-aim (most of us are terrible at playing the game with controllers). We may be increasing these values to be more magnetic with the upcoming patch.

A lot of community members have asked about Steam Deck verification. We don’t think we’ll be able to meet the requirements to get officially verified. We’re very happy with the progress that we have made, but full verification was never our goal (the main blockers being true full controller support, and performance in our more demanding levels).

For now, using Proton’s latest version or latest beta is the best way to run the game on Steam Deck. Proton has solved a number of issues we had in the native Linux version, so give that a try with our newly implemented Steam Input (right after we put out the ladder fix above)

If you get any drifting using gyro aiming, try calibrating the Steam Deck’s gyro. (tom’s guide article on how to do this[www.tomsguide.com])

We’ll keep an eye on Steam Deck and see if there is anything we can do to help make it even better going forward.

There are some other issues we'll be follow up with with the community. Thank you, again!