Trying my best to keep this short, while (hopefully?) being informative & not sounding too rude.

So, first things first ... I would give you guys "A" for effort. Dedication, time & effort alone is more than admirable, I never expected this to become a full-scale project (nor that it would hold up on its own, beyond the first chapter or two). I also really, REALLY appreciate that you kept BM: Blue Shift as a free mod (rather than converting the whole thing into a stand-alone project & thus forcing us to buy the game, whenever we already own Black Mesa or not.

That being said, I've been playing the game over the last couple of days and despite the initial "WOW" factor, I have to admit that I'm somewhat confused, frustrated & disappointed. For something that's supposed to be a HD remake, it feels as if the story is getting sidetracked from the original Half-Life Blue Shift, filled with unnecessary puzzles, detours and events. Again, some of them are good (even funny), some of them just frustrating.

Levels can get confusing, misleading you in one direction (only to realize later on that you're supposed to progress in other direction) and puzzles frustrating & repetitive, ESPECIALLY with all the BUGS still present in the game ... I suppose I could try my best & count them all up, but there are just too many of them! From level geometry to scripted events which hadn't consider some of the player choices & previous actions (resulting with absurd, almost ridiculous situations - nothing bad ever happened just looked awkward).

And probably most frustrating thing of all, adding the false sense of final battle, a "real" ending if you wish. Because ever since I reached the final chapter (final for now that is, Focal Point), I've been getting that vibe just like in Black Mesa, "You're getting close, there's a bigger mind behind all this and you better be ready to fight it" when in fact the original Blue Shift never had a boss fight, other than fighting aliens & soldiers before escaping the facility. Those of you who may be too young to remember (or never played the original Blue Shift) I'm really sorry if you consider this to be a spoiler, but it's just the way things are. In fact, Blue Shift was the shortest game of all three Half-Life games (Half Life, Opposing Force, Blue Shift) and even had the shortest time period between the events in Half Life chronological universe - the entire game takes place between "Black Mesa Inbound" and "Apprehension" chapters of the original Half-Life (including Black Mesa).

I would also like to add that the game gets overwhelming at the times, not only confusing the player but adding unnecessary tension & frustration as I can't seem to understand what the f...ridge is going on around me. I'm referring to those energy blasts on Xen in particular - one moment there was nothing going on and the next my whole screen lit up like a Christmas tree, damage indicators from every directions, particles, smoke (or mist, or radiation ... whatever it is) ... just too much going on at once. At some point I gave up and instead of reasoning the situation I simply ran away from the whole thing, trying to find cover somewhere. To be completely honest, I was even ready to cheat if that hadn't worked out.

Sooo, yes ... A lot of feedback, I know. But then again, it was/is a huge project and so it deserved a proper analysis & comparison to the original game. I'm not going to disclose my personal information for everyone to see, but let's just say that I'm "old enough" to remember the original Blue Shift when it first came out in 2000 or was it 2001 ... I forgot. Therefor, all my feedback, expectations & comparisons will be influenced & biased by the real thing, from back in a day. And so because of that, I'm genuinely hoping that the game will remain TRUE to its original state, following the story as it originally unfolded, 25 years ago.


Edit (9/17/2025)

At the very end of "Focal Point", I can see what (any why) people got so frustrated.

Agreed - not only this chapter is already too long, tedious and frustrating as it is, but the last couple of events are beyond of what I would call absurd. My strategy was simple as it always was (and will be) - "shoot only when I have to, otherwise run for your life".

Unfortunately, this seems to be the problem for this game, as I have to kill all the mind controllers BEFORE entering the portal & returning back to Black Mesa complex. Again, completely unnecessary. Someone in the comment section wrote that the entire Focal Point is about to be redesigned, and the events changed (hopefully for the best?), so I'm hoping to see improvement in this area.

Because at this point I really don't care for the game. All the fun is gone, replaced with frustrations and hundreds of questions, to which I'll probably never going to get a definitive answer.