...although we have rather been sleeping on the job, haven't we? It's been a while. Our deepest apologies on that front: both myself and Ross have been dealing with some incredibly challenging obstacles in our lives, and it has unfortunately meant that we had to place the comic on a temporary hiatus. We realise we shouldve signaled this earlier, but events unfolded quickly. Still, its no excuse for having kept you in the dark.
I suppose the most pertinent question is: are we back? Barring catastrophe, we will be returning to production on Chapter 9 this autumn. A Place in the Westto the horror of some, were surewont ever die. Its just a question of when well reach the end. We've published 8 chapters so far, and there's going to be 15 in total. We have every intention of concluding the story. Thank you so much for sticking with us. It means the world. Every chapter has been discounted for the Summer Sale, so now might be a great time to jump in. We have a surprise coming in October, but more on that later In the meantime, thank you. Well see you up ahead.

Hey everyone! The spring sale just landed, and we've discounted every chapter of the comic. If you haven't picked up some of the later chapters, now is a great time to do it - we're about a month and change away from the next release: Interlude 8.5 - The Philosopher's Paradise. Expect sepulchral horror, cosmic mysteries, and a very resentful tumbler of whisky. Best wishes, Mike and Ross

Hey gang! First things first: we're sorry for the radio silence these past few months. We know you've had lots of questions on achievements - like, when will they work? - and when you can expect the next chapter, but we've had to dial our production schedule back. Unfortunately I've been really, really sick, and Ross and I decided the next thing to do was for me to focus on getting better. I'm still going through that process, but we have every intention of upping our game in 2023. And yes, that includes fixing Steam achievements and getting the comic Deck verified. These are our priorities outside of making more issues.
Right now, though, it's the Steam Winter Sale, and we've discounted every chapter! Although the year has been slow, we're super pleased with our release of Chapter 8 - Remnant, which we honestly think is our best chapter yet. If you haven't checked it out yet, it's on sale right now. We hope you've all had a wonderful year and wish you the very best for the next one. Merry Christmas, too, ya filthy animals. Mike and Ross

Hey everyone, We're just dropping a quick line (slightly late) because yesterday marked six years that we've been on Steam! In that time, we've released 8 chapters (two of them twice) totaling about 267 pages, plus the interludes for another 68 pages. It's been quite a journey, and there's much more to come.
To celebrate, we've discounted every chapter of the comic (including the recently released Chapter 8 - Remnant) as well as the soundtracks, and some by considerable margins. Pick 'em up now if you haven't already! We apologise for being a little quiet since the release of Remnant. There'll be some substantial updates to follow soon, both on Interlude 8.5 - Shing Optimacy and Chapter 9 - Echoes of Time in the City of Dreams, as well as achievements and translations. My Steam Deck is also slated to arrived later today, so hopefully we'll be able to make the comic compatible with that system before long, too. See you up ahead, Mike and Ross

Hey gang, We hope you're all enjoying Chapter 8 - Remnant. As you've no doubt noticed, the Steam Summer Sale is officially live. We've discounted chapters 2 - 7 and both volumes of the soundtrack, so if you haven't caught up yet, now's a great opportunity to do just that!
Coming up we'll have more information on translations, achievements (finally!), and, in a few months, Interlude 8.5 - Shing Optimacy, which contains flashbacks to both Leyla and Dreyfus' recent past... and a surprise new face. Best wishes, Mike and Ross

Hey gang! We are incredibly excited to announce the release of the eighth chapter of Half-Life: A Place in the West! You can pick up Remnant right now, with it being available to read via our Steam app or as a PDF in your Steam Directory. The art team have done an amazing job, producing what we honestly believe to be our best chapter yet. Yes, we say that every time, but we just feel so confident in our creative growth, and hope you will, too.
Next up is Interlude 8.5 - Shing Optimacy, which we'll be looking to release some time around our anniversary in September. Along with that we're planning to release some other things that have been in the works for some time - translations (both for Russian and for German!), an update to the quality of the comic images delivered, and hopefully a fix for achievements. We hope you enjoy the new installment as much we do, and can't wait to hear your thoughts on it. It's a game-changer. Mike and Ross

Chapter 8, Remnant has been released!

Hey everyone! We apologise for the radio silence so far this year. We've been busy! Chapter 8 - Remnant is close to completion and will release quite soon. The store page is officially live, so give it a wishlist to be notified of its release! What's the next installment about, then? Good question: Sejal Rajanis Opposition have captured City Hall and imprisoned Major General Long as well as Leyla Poirier and Albert Kempinski. As Rajani prepares to put Long on trial, the vortigaunt Dreyfus penetrates the mysterious edifice known as Remnant, determined to hunt down an ancient enemy. A shard of metal stripped from the lost Citadel, Remnants purpose and the fate of the kidnapped children is at last revealed.
I've also been working hard to get achievements up-and-running again. Expect to hear more about that soon. It's been a rough ride, and we apologise. But it really is drawing to an end - promise. At our next update, we'll also give some news on where the translations are - both for Russian, and for a new release of German. We'll see you up ahead. Mike and Ross

Hey gang! Happy New Year! Just a short update from us: For the past year Ross has been hard at work on a full-length prequel novel to A Place in the West called Half-Life: Phase Transition. It's not yet complete and won't start releasing until the summer, but as a taste of what to expect we have made the prologue available for reading.
You can find it right here: https://www.halflifenovel.com/chapter/prologue/ Let us know what you think and stay tuned for updates on Chapter 8 - Remnant very soon... ...very soon. Best, Mike and Ross

Hey gang! We hope you've all enjoyed Interlude 7.5 - Castle Okno! We just wanted to drop a quick word to say we've discounted every chapter of the comic for the Steam Winter Sale, as well as both soundtracks. If there's any chapters you're missing, now is a great time to pick them up. A very Merry Christmas to all of you - stay safe. Mike and Ross

Hey all, Were very proud to announce the release of Interlude 7.5 Castle Okno! Its eight pages in length and, as is our custom with the interludes, totally free: just boot up the app or check your Steam directory for the PDF.

Whats it about?

Whats up next?

Hey gang, We just wanted to drop a quick word to say that the Steam Autumn Sale is now live and we've discounted every chapter of the comic as well as both volumes of the soundtrack. If you haven't checked them out yet, go go go! We're also on the cusp of releasing interlude 7.5 - Castle Okno. It's an 8-page story that details a key event in Leyla's past. As a teaser, here's the first page.
See you in a couple of weeks! Mike and Ross

Hello gang, We hope youve had a stellar summer. As we head into autumn, we thought wed give you an update on where were at and what to expect for the rest of the year. We want to first take a moment to celebrate our five year anniversary of being on Steam! It's a huge milestone for us - Five years ago, Ross and I were huddled around a laptop together in Boston, pushing out the first build of the app, and preparing for the Steam Dev Days conference in Seattle.
A whole lot has changed in the world since then, and thats true of us, too. Five chapters, two remakes, several interludes its a lot of pages, and puts us squarely at the halfway point in our story. Wed prefer not to take another five years wrapping things up, but comics are an expensive business. Which brings us to the remainder of 2021. Whilst our original plan was to have Chapter 8: Remnant well into production by now, it sadly wasnt an affordable prospect. At present, Interlude 7.5: Castle Okno is partway through its production cycle, and will be released before the end of the year, with Remnant firing up in early 2022. In accordance with the big anniversary, weve discounted all chapters and both volumes of the soundtrack by a whopping 75%. The sale will run for the duration of the day, so if you havent checked out the later chapters, now is a great time to do so! Well see you in a few weeks. Thanks for sticking with us! Mike and Ross

The Steam Summer Sale is now live, which means chapters 2 through to 6, plus both soundtracks, are now sale! We hope youll take this opportunity to pick up any chapters youve yet to read. We're officially halfway through our story!
It's been a real honour to see Chapter 7 The Dark Between The Stars so positively received. Up next is Interlude 7.5 Castle Okno, which will be released for free later this year. Its a flashback to Leylas time in Eastern Europe, and takes us to a Combine weather station somewhere in the outlands Well have more details very soon. We are also still working on getting the Achievements fixed, and would like to apologize once again for the length of time that it is taking. Our friends Vsevolod Stepanov and Pavel Lapinsky are also hard at work on the Russian translations. In the meantime, do pick up the other chapters whether its for yourself, your significant other, your folks, your cat, your dog, whoever or whatever. Literally anyone. Thanks for reading. Mike and Ross

Hey folks! Were very pleased to announce that Chapter 7: The Dark Between the Stars has been released. It marks the halfway point in our story and features 38 pages of all-new artwork by Kristian Rossi, Ester Salguero, and DC Hopkins.
Its an incredibly exciting chapter that sees the comics setting, New Franklin, descend into civil war as Long, Rajani, and Banks fight for control of its future. Next up is Interlude 7.5: Castle Okno, which will be released for free later this year. Its a flashback to Leylas time in Eastern Europe, and takes us to a Combine portal monitoring station somewhere in the wilderness
But thats not all were working on. We know the wait between chapters is long. Its not ideal, but comics are incredibly expensive and are funded by our jobs. We can only make what we can afford. However, we want to introduce more content that expands the comics world and gives our readers something to enjoy in those months when were in production. First up is a prequel novel written by Ross. Its called Half-Life: Phase Transition and takes place a few years before the events of A Place in the West. The story follows a helicopter pilot called Ray who is shipped to Eastern Europe in the first weeks of the Combine occupation, where he meets a young Leyla Poirier and joins her on a journey into the heart of City 17. Well start releasing it for free, one chapter a week, towards the end of the year.
Secondly were putting a third soundtrack volume into production. It will once again come courtesy of the very talented Chris Jolley, whose work you can check out here. The third volume comes with a twist: it will feature a narrative component, exploring the life of a particular set of people in New Franklin. Were very excited about all of these projects and the comics future its going to be an exciting and surprising year! As ever, please do share news of the comic, leave us a review, and check us on Twitter and Discord. Mike and Ross PS: In case you missed it, we have Achievements currently disabled. You can read more about this in our news post from yesterday. We hope to have this resolved soon!

Hi all, I wanted to give a quick update because I know a few people have been having trouble unlocking achievements over the last couple of months. Unfortunately, there appears to be some kind of problem with the library that were using where it sometimes(?) cant seem to load the proper files. We're incredibly sorry that this has occurred. We know it's not acceptable, especially when half of those achievements are locked behind a paywall; we're meant to deliver the service we say we are, but right now we can't. That's just not okay, and we're going to try and make it up to our readers as soon as we can. Our plan is to hopefully work with the creators of the library to get this sorted out, but in the meantime, to keep the potential break from negatively affecting other functionality, weve disabled achievements within the app. In the interest of transparency, well also be posting this message on the discussion forums, and adding a disclaimer to the store page. We will keep you updated as we continue to try and get this sorted out, and thank you for your patience.
In better news, we're not letting this set-back stop us. As much as we wanted to have this resolved before release, we don't think delaying Chapter 7 is the right solution, so we're going to be going ahead with it. How soon? Chapter 7, The Dark Between the Stars, will be released both on the app and as a PDF tomorrow! If you haven't wishlisted it already, you can do so right here. Please do let us know what you think of it. Best, Mike and Ross

Hey gang! A super quick update from us: the store page for Chapter 7: The Dark Between the Stars is now live! Well be releasing this month, but in the meantime give us a wishlist! We cant wait to release this!
Mike and Ross

Hey gang, A short update carrying some very, very good news: production on Chapter 7: The Dark Between the Stars has been completed! We dont have a precise release date yet, but our plan is to have it to all of you by the end of this month. Were so excited with the completed product and it represents the halfway point in our story. Better yet, its 38 pages as opposed to the traditional 30, and at the same price a thank you from us for your patience over the last year of remakes!
Heres the synopsis: The Dark Between the Stars is the seventh chapter in the Half-Life: A Place in the West saga, and continues the story of New Franklin an American enclave with a mysterious cosmic tower at its heart. Leonard Banks, the power plant foreman, issues an ultimatum to Cormac Long and Sejal Rajani: relinquish control of the city or he will start deactivating its defences. When neither Long nor Rajani submit to his demands, Banks makes good on his threat, unleashing hordes of antlions on the city's borders. As Long scrambles to defend the breach, Rajani sees one last chance to capture Long and assume control of the city, and rallies the Opposition for an all-out assault on City Hall. Well see you in just a few weeks! And don't forget to join us on our new Discord server and follow us on Twitter for more updates! Mike and Ross

Hey gang, We just thought wed give you a quick update since it has been a bit. Were about to hit the halfway mark on Chapter 7: The Dark Between the Stars, which puts us in a comfortable position to release sometime in June. At 38 pages its a larger chapter than most, but thats befitting the scope of the story. It puts us at the midway point in our comic, so its a big deal for us! Were very excited as to how its coming together and the team are doing a stellar job.
We have also launched a Discord server for the comic. If youd like to chat to us, tell us what were doing wrong, or have suggestions for the app, come on over! Wed love to hear what you have to say. Beyond that, youll find a very pleasant and amiable community of Half-Life fans. Join our Discord! Thats it from us for the time being. We hope youve enjoyed the remakes and are looking forward to the future of A Place in the West. There are some big surprises in store Mike and Ross

Hey gang, Happy New Year! Were hoping you're all safe and well, given last years less than stellar global performance. Steams Lunar New Year event has just started, which means all chapters, including both soundtracks, are now on sale! As you likely know we have remade the first two chapters of the comic, so nows a really terrific time to check them out.
For better or for worse, do consider leaving us a reviewwere really keen to hear what everyone thinks of how the project is taking shape. At present were knee-deep in production on Chapter 7: The Dark Between the Stars, which is roughly the halfway mark in our story. We cant commit to a release window just yet, but as soon as we can, youll know about it.
In the meantime, do check out the rest of the comic and, as ever, thanks for sticking with us. Best wishes, Mike and Ross

Hey folks, Its time to ring in the end of the year. And what a year it has been. For us, it saw the completion of our plans to remake Chapters 1 and 2 of our comic, which we successfully released last week. It was an enormous relief, and were very excited to start making some real headway on our story, starting with Chapter 7: The Dark Between the Stars. Progress on 7 is already underway and is slated for a Spring release. Its the halfway point in our story which sees the battle between Long, Rajani and Banks reach its dramatic and explosive conclusion. Heres a small taster of whats to come:
Following up from last week's release, we also have some things we're working on behind the scenes. The Soundtracks have been converted into being actual Soundtracks, and will be made available within the app again. We're also having a chat in the discussion boards about the image quality & compression, feel free to drop by there and weigh in if you have any thoughts on it! We'll be making tweaks there shortly. Finally, we're also aware of an error that occurs when launching through Steam on Ubuntu (note that the app does work when launched from the folder, and that there are PDFs available). I'm going to be getting one of my machines set up with Ubuntu so I can properly diagnose & fix that. In the meantime, the Steam Winter Sale has just started, and weve discounted every chapter including both volumes of the soundtrack. It's a better time than ever to get into the comic if you haven't before. And if you have, gift it to someone you like. Thank you for your support throughout the year, and well see you in 2021. Mike and Ross

Hey gang, Were extremely excited to announce that the remakes of Chapters 1 and 2 have finally arrived! This release features many things, not the least of which is Chapter 1: Following Portents, Interlude 1.5: The Vortessence, Chapter 2: A Very Modern Major General, and Interlude 2.5: The Hand of Destiny (is charred). The new chapters can be read by using our app through Steam, or by viewing the PDFs in your Steam Steam Apps Common Half-Life A Place in the West folder. The original versions of these chapters can also still be accessed via the app. If you have already purchased Chapter 2, youll receive the new version for free, and if you havent, then when you do purchase it youll receive both versions. Chapter 1 and the other interludes are, of course, as free as they ever were.
OH, ITS HAPPENING, KEMP. ITS ALL HAPPENING. So, that would in itself be enough for celebration, right? But were not stopping there. Weve also added covers and new pages to all of the existing interludes - typically just one or two here and there that expand on the story. Still not enough? Alright. Weve also included Interlude 6.5: The Enemy in the Clouds as part of this release, which should help tide things over until the next chapter. Its a curious interlude, pulling back the veil on the cosmic nature of our story: "Close to a century prior to the Black Mesa Incident, two mysterious operatives are dispatched to an experimental Combine science station on a distant world to complete a secret mission. There they discover a hidden transmission that leads deep into the heart of the Combine regime, one which hints at an insidious plot to transform the very fabric of all reality
And finally, weve also rebuilt the app. Well leave you to discover some of the new features on your own, but in short it moves away from the Source-style menus and adopts more of its own identity. It finally has a two-page spread view, as well as support for Mac Catalina, and should in general be a lot smaller and more performant. (Weve also relaunched our website for anyone who checks those things.) With well over 100 new pages, this is by far our largest release to date. The only bad news is that weve temporarily dropped support for the Russian translations. Were working on getting everything over to Vsevolod Stepanov and Pavel Lapinsky but theres simply so much new content that it will likely take some time for them to get through. But let me follow that up with more good news - Chapter 7: The Dark Between the Stars is already in production! It will be 38 pages as opposed to the usual 30 (at no extra cost) and should be released sometime around March/April (but dont quote me on that). It raises the stakes quite a bit as we enter into the halfway point of the story. We just want to express once more how grateful we are for your patience as we spent this year correcting our past mistakes. We werent really sure what the reception would be, and now that the release is out, we hope you agree with us that it was the right decision. Its all forward from here. We hope youre excited about whats to come. We certainly are. Mike and Ross

Hey gang! Today is our anniversary. Its been exactly four years since we launched on Steam. Where that times gone we cant quite say for sure, but we think weve used it well: six chapters, not including the remakes, and several interludes, bringing us just shy of the halfway mark in A Place in the Wests story. Its a lot of content, and we couldnt be prouder of our team, past and present: Kristian Rossi, Ester Salguero, DC Hopkins, and formerly Javier Puga, Ivan Miranda, Heath Heil, and Rachel Deering. Were so privileged to work with such phenomenally talented people, and each of them, in their own way, have taken our little slice of Half-Life to places we didnt dare dream of when we set out. So, to them, thank you. And of course, thank you, all of youtheres no comic without readers, and were so grateful for your time and interest. We havent planned anything big for this anniversary because we are on the very cusp of completing the remakes. In the coming weeks we'll be pushing them out the door, as well as putting our entire catalog on sale. Were so excited about the remakes and cant wait to get em in your hands. Its something like 80+ pages, by far our biggest ever release.
That release will be accompanied by a new website and a new app, both of which were designed to be sleeker and more accessible. The sites done with the app close to following suit. Here's a preview of the new landing page of the app.
Additionally, weve added several pages to our interludes. We call them 'bookends'. Its something weve wanted to do for awhile, but it made sense to wait until the big release. Theyre a bit experimental, form-wise. Here, for instance, is a piece of text from Interlude 1: The Vortessence.
I know it must seem like weve been working away at these remakes for the best part of forever. And its true: we have. But its equally true that 2020 has been a trying and difficult year, and its delayed our plans somewhat. I think thats true of everyone on the planet. We are hoping for a better, brighter 2021. If were lucky we wont just be releasing Chapter 7 next year. But well see. Well see In the meantime, thank you. From the bottom of our hearts. And well be back very, very soon with the remakes. Mike and Ross

Hey gang, Just a quick update from us as we head into the summer. As ever we hope youre all keeping safe and well. As you know, the bulk of our efforts this year have been spent remaking Chapters 1, 1.5, 2, and 2.5. Right now were approaching the halfway point in Chapter 2s production, which like its progenitor is quite a bit larger than our standard chapters its 48 pages in total! But we couldnt be happier with how its coming together and we hope to be able to share it with you later this year. The team are doing an amazing job.
The Steam Summer Sale has just kicked off, which means Chapters 2 6, plus the soundtracks, are all on sale. We hope you take the opportunity to check them out. Again, if youve already purchased Chapter 2 or intend to purchase it before the remake is released, youll receive the remake for no additional cost. And, of course, Chapters 1, 1.5, and 2.5 will remain free.
Come the release of the remakes well also be launching a new app (sleeker, smaller, better), a new website, and a couple other things, too. Its going to be a big release for us (our largest to date!) and were pretty excited about it. And then, once thats done, its straight on to the end, starting with 6.5 and then Chapter 7: The Dark Between the Stars More on those to come. Thanks for reading. Mike and Ross

Hey gang, Firstly, we hope youre all safe and healthy during what is undoubtedly a very challenging and tumultuous time.
As far as A Place in the West is concerned, were still committed to seeing our plans through to fruition for a summer release. Chapter 1 and 1.5 have both been completed, and production on Chapter 2 will begin in a weeks time. Given summer is so far away and we havent been able to release any content since Chapter 6, we wanted to get something into your hands sooner rather than later. So, weve made the first ten pages of the Chapter 1 "Following Portents" remake available on the app! We hope you like them; the art team have done an incredible job and we couldnt be prouder of the final result.
We also have an update on the latest Russian translations! Our very talented translation team, Vsevolod Stepanov and Pavel Lapinsky, have completed full translations of Chapter 6 and the new prologue! Theyre now available on the app. We know this is something our Russian readers have wanted for a long time, and were excited to finally have them out there. Im sure we dont have to remind anyone that we are one week away from the release of a brand-new Half-Life game. Alyx is coming, and we at APW cannot wait. We imagine youre in the same boat. Stay abreast of our Twitter feed for some Alyx-related content! Thanks for reading, and take of yourselves. Mike and Ross

Hey gang,
As you may have noticed Steam is hosting a sale on its soundtracks from now until February 14th! This is in part driven by Valves desire to decouple soundtracks from their base games, allowing them to possess their own store pages. Once weve completed the remakes of Chapters 1 and 2 well be doing the same for both (and any future) volumes of our soundtracks. In the meantime, they are both available at a discount check them out here and here! Both volumes were lovingly crafted by the hugely talented Chris Jolley, who has written a blog post over at our website on the creative process. The track listings are as follows: VOLUME I 1) New Franklin Part I (2:33) 2) Amb I (1:33) 3) Modern Major General (4:44) 4) Missing Children (New Franklin Part II) (4:28) 5) Amb II (1:38) 6) The Ubdisha Part I and II (6:50) 7) This Winter (2:49) 8) Amb III (1:36) 9) Ghosts (4:14) VOLUME II 1) The City Dreams (3:55) 2) Kempinski and the Abyss (5:04) 3) The Pit (5:21) 4) Dr Cloven (3:48) 5) The Opposition (3:25) 6) Checkpoint Alpha (4:30) 7) The Abyss Stares Back (4:50) 8) Control (Long & Sejal) (4:42) 9) The Scientist & The Artist (Leyla & Hadley) (3:27) We hope you love these tracks as much as we do. They very much embody the world of our story. Well check back in with you all soon as the remakes gather in pace Chapter 1 is complete, and 1.5 is soon to follow. And theyre looking mighty special. Mike and Ross

Hey gang! Its been a spell since we last touched base with you all, so we feel an update is in order. First off, its the Lunar New Year event, which means all chapters, including both soundtracks, are now on sale check em out A lots happened since Halloween, not least the surprising announcement of a brand-new Half-Life game. If you'd told us back in October that come March wed be playing a VR prequel called Alyx wed have called you crazy, but here we are.
As for us, weve made some pretty serious headway on our plans to remake the first two chapters of A Place in the West. At the time of writing were on the verge of concluding production on Chapter 1: Following Portents. If youve been following us on Twitter or Instagram youll know were really excited about this one, and we can say with absolute confidence we made the right decision to go back and remake it. Next week sees production move onto the first interlude The Vortessence and once thats done well be moving straight into Chapter 2: A Very Modern Major-General.
The remake of the second chapter will be far larger than our standard 30 pages. We considered keeping it in line with the others, but given the original incarnation of chapter 2 was 50 pages, and we want to make sure the story has room to breathe, we'll instead be producing a whopping 48 pages for it! We'll be sharing production on social media as we move forward with it. A reminder that if you purchase the now non-canonical Chapter 2 before the remakes release, you will get the remade copy for free on release day. For anyone who purchases the new Chapter 2 after that, you will also receive the original version.
So, when will you see them in full? We dont want to commit to a date yet, but were confident theyll land around June of this year, meaning there will be plenty more Half-Life after youve properly digested whatever Valve has in store for us with Alyx. Its a really exciting time for the brand, and were looking forward to what it means for the wider Half-Life universe as a whole new generation of gamers discover these amazing games. Games you can now discover for free. Well see you up ahead. Mike and Ross

Hey gang, I just wanted to give a quick update on a couple tech things that have come up within the last few days! As you may have seen already, MacOS Catalina has come out and dropped support for 32-bit mac applications. There are also some other changes under the hood where apps require Signing, now, which is why A Place in the West is currently listed as incompatible with Catalina - we have a 64-bit mac build, just not the signing. I updated my mac to start testing my fix for this, and in doing so, unexpectedly ruined my ability to build the application for other operating systems. Our current build process uses Wine to create the executables for Windows and Linux, and Wine - as a 32-bit program - is not compatible with Catalina. And, of course, this came up at the same time as a bug where one of the achievements is not accessible. SO, here's the plan. 1. I'm going to set up a different mac with the ability to compile the app, and get out a fix for the achievement, ideally on Saturday. 2. Once that is dealt with, I am going to fast-track an app rewrite that I've been planning for a while. The bulk of what we have I wrote 3 years ago(!) and I can make improvements across the board. 3. Once that is all resolved, I'll turn my attention back to a proper fix for Catalina. I would like to also take this opportunity to remind everyone that A Place in the West installs do come with the PDFs for each chapter in your Steam Apps / A Place in the West directory. If you are someone who uses Catalina and are outraged at this process of events, please do let me know! I am not sure how many people have actually upgraded. And please feel free to reach out if you have any questions, and I very much appreciate your patience during this time. Best, Michael

Happy Halloween, everyone! First off, wed like to extend our sincere gratitude to our entire readership. We were a little (read: very) worried as to how the news of Chapters 1 & 2 being remade would be received and are genuinely taken aback as to how positively it was embraced. Honestly, we expected to be booed out of the room (admittedly, we still can be), so seeing readers not only accepting of the move but actively supporting it was incredibly heartening to witness. So thank you, from both ourselves and the real talent behind the scenes, our awesome art team.
Youve likely noticed the Halloween Sale is now live, and so, as is our custom, weve discounted every chapter as well as both soundtracks. If you havent checked out the latest releases, now is a great time to do so. As weve stated before and will continue to state until the day its delivered, if you purchase the now non-canonical Chapter 2 now or at any point prior to release, you will receive the remade copy for free on release day and retain the old one. As for said remakes, they are progressing very well indeed. We dont have too much to show at present, but heres a little something from the first page Ellen, looking anxiously, no doubt, to see if any purple space jellyfish are hiding under her bed
Well keep updating our Twitter with progress on production and look forward to a proper update come Christmas. Thanks for reading, Michael & Ross

We hope you all enjoyed Chapter 6: The Prisoner. Monday marks our third anniversary of being on Steam! Weve come a very long way since we initially launched A Place in the West and were proud of what weve produced, and more than that, incredibly grateful to all of you who have stuck by us and followed us on this journey. Were here because of you, and that means so very much to us. We have been very quiet this summer regarding what is coming next for us, and I imagine many of you are expecting the next interlude, or even some indication of when you might see Chapter 7: The Dark Between The Stars. We wish we had dates to give you for those, but we have some rather different news. Ill just get this out of the way: Were remaking Chapter 1: Following Portents and Chapter 2: A Very Modern Major-General. And with those remakes, introducing new interludes for them: 1.5 and 2.5, respectively. We understand that may not be the news you wanted to hear, but its something weve wanted to do for over two years now. We consider it to be of paramount importance that we remake them now rather than later. For a comprehensive explanation as to the whys and wherefores, I humbly point you in the direction of the latest blog post, where Ross has gone very in depth on a lot of our feelings.
The short version is simply this: The first two chapters are something we wrote 6 years ago, and were the first thing we ever wrote and produced. Were hugely grateful to the efforts of Heath Heil and Rachel Deering for bringing our vision to life, but the writing and composition of those chapters no longer represents the quality weve come to expect from our work. And I know you might be thinking, Wont you feel the same way about 3-5 in a few years? And, well, no. There are always going to be things we want to improve upon and change, its true, but Chapters 1 and 2 fall far beyond what we find acceptable. Chapter 3 is when we began to hit our stride, to settle into our world and characters, (both tonally and thematically) and to really get a handle on things like dialogue and pacing. As we get further in, the alienation and disconnection from Chapters 1 and 2 to everything else is only growing wider, and we cant ignore it any more. You all deserve better, and so do feature readers. The new chapters & interludes, totaling some 80 pages, will be released in the Spring of 2020. The first chapter and both interludes will continue to be free. As for Chapter 2, if you have already bought it, youll get the remake for free. If you havent bought it yet, youll still get both. The older versions of Chapters 1 and 2 and The Charnel House interlude will all continue to be available in the app, under the Extras section. We obviously dont want to take them away from people who have read them, and believe that there is probably some educational value. I expect some of you will find it interesting to compare them side by side.
To give you a sense of what were aiming to accomplish with the remade chapters, were releasing a new prologue today! Its ten pages in length (as compared to the original, which is only three pages!) and is designed to better introduce readers unfamiliar with Half-Life to Valves world. It comes courtesy of the amazingly talented Kristian Rossi, Ester Salguero, and Javier Puga. Its free. Itll be in your Steam directory. Its on the app. Or you can just go read it and download it here. Your call. But whatever format you choose, do let us know what you think. Were always aiming to be as transparent as possible about production, and your feedback is essential. It helps us to improve and hopefully make better comics for you to enjoy. On that note, we apologise for not having spoken about this sooner. Its not always easy to know what the right balance is between making the thing and talking about making the thing. But we know this will likely come with some push back. After all, were taking nearly a year out to remake chapters youve already seen, delaying the continuation of the story for some time. We know its something you might not all be interested in, and thats why we wanted to wait until we had more things ready, such as the blog post, such as the prologue. We want you to be able to see the difference, and hear why we think it is important. We are incredibly excited by this, and hope youll be on board for it. Well be listening very closely to what you all have to say, but we also hope you can trust us to do the best thing for A Place in the West. Were all feeling really energized by the new scripts for 1 and 2, and well be sharing as much of the production process with you as we can (hopefully more than we have done in the past). We hope that when you do finally get your hands on these chapters, youll feel like we do: That this is the best thing for the story. That it strengthens the narrative weve constructed. That it adds to, rather than detracts, from what comes after it. And that it does these characters we have become so very fond of justice. That were creating the story they deserve. Thanks for reading in every sense. Mike and Ross

Hello readers, friends, resistance fighters, children of the corn - we are incredibly proud to announce the release of Chapter 6: The Prisoner!
We know the production on this one has been long, and for that we want to apologise. Producing comics is an extraordinarily costly venture, but we hope in the future to avoid having such long delays between chapters. We truly appreciate your patience, and we're so honoured that you keep coming back to follow Leyla, Kempinski, Sejal and Dreyfus on their adventures through New Franklin. Chapter 6 really ups the ante, and sees the city on the brink of civil war. It's going to get bloody, violent, and more than a little weird going forward. Speaking of which...there will absolutely be more content this year, but what that is is something we're going to play very close to the chest. We've always striven to be as open and transparent about our production plans as possible, and come September we'll be in a better position to talk about what the rest of the year is going to look like with the release of something we consider very exciting indeed. We have also included the Russian translation of Interlude 5.5, courtesy of the wonderful Vsevolod Stepanov and Pavel Lapinsky! So, as ever, thank you so much for your support, and we hope you enjoy Chapter 6 - love it or hate it, please do leave us a review on the DLC page! Your feedback is essential to us. It's only going to get better from here on out. Mike, Ross, Kristian, Ester, and Javier.

Hey gang! It's been a long wait, but Chapter 6: The Prisoner is just around the corner, and we couldn't be happier with the result. Our art team - Kristian Rossi, Ester Salguero, and Javier Puga - have pulled out all the stops to make this the very best chapter yet. We are, at most most, a couple of weeks or so away from it landing.
As for what to expect, well - The Prisoner moves the story forward quite aggressively: With the execution of the Governor at the hands of Major-General Long, New Franklin is poised on the brink of chaos. Colonel White, Longs second-in-command, launches a devastating assault on the Opposition base in an attempt to capture the vortigaunt Dreyfus. In response, the leader of the Opposition, Sejal Rajani, lays the groundwork for a counterattack against City Hall, but faces unexpected resistance from Leonard Banks, the power plant foreman, who is harboring a dangerous agenda of his own. And in a secret prison beneath City Hall, Leyla Poirier meets Longs captive son, Kurt, and learns the dark truth about her journey to America.
We can't wait to share it with you all. See you soon! Mike and Ross

Hey everyone!
So, today we (Ross and Mike) planned to play through Half-Life: Decay together on our Twitch Stream, but sadly we weren't able to get the server up and running. It's something we hope to revisit in the future, but in lieu of that we're going to start playing through the Half-Life 2 series - with a slight twist. Instead of having one of us run through the game and the other commentate / heckle their progress, we're going to be playing the fabulous Synergy mod together! We won't be completing the game in one sitting -- we'll look to maybe reach the end of Water Hazard, with the potential for playing a couple more chapters tomorrow. If you want to watch us throw physics objects at one another, check us out at Twitch Stream.

Chapter 6: The Prisoner is officially over halfway through production! We'll have more details on what it's about & when you can expect it, but in the meantime, here's a glimpse of what's to come...

Hey folks, Happy New Year! We're going to be getting back into our Twitch Streams this year, because we had such a blast the last time (only with Ross, who can actually, y'know, crouch & jump...but not much else). We'll be going live in ten minutes, picking up with Opposing Force at The Pit Worm's Nest, and then moving onto Blue Shift and blasting through that. Join us! It could be fun. Maybe. The Clown Buffoon pair strike again etc. We can be found at http://twitch.tv/halflifecomic

Hey folks, A couple of weeks ago we hosted a live stream of Ross playing through Half-Life 1 for the 20th anniversary. Well, we had such a good time berating and mocking him we thought wed go through the entire series! Today, its Opposing Forces turn, and thats going to start in ~10 minutes or so. Mikes never been through Gearboxs expansions before, so it should prove relatively fun and interesting! If seeing Ross fail repeatedly sounds like a good time to you, please do join us at http://twitch.tv/halflifecomic!

Hey everyone, Happy 20 Years of Half-Life! As announced this past weekend, today we are releasing another content pack for A Place in the West! The app has been updated to include the Russian Translation of Chapter 5 (Thanks to Vsevolod Stepanov and Pavel Lapinsky), as well as adding Containment, our new interlude that takes us back to Black Mesa, to the place where it all began. Theres also a new Extra involving Containment, for which we give thanks to Rikki "Marphy Black" D'Angelo, that Ill let you explore for yourself Containment and the Chapter 5 Russian translation are both available in PDF form as well. Finally, were releasing Volume 2 of our soundtrack today, with 9 new tracks from Chris Jolley!

Celebrating Half-Life

What's Next?

• Chapter 6 is going into Production in December! We werent able to produce nearly as much this year as I would have liked because of financial reasons, and its great to be getting back to it. My hope is that we can have multiple chapters release next year.
• Weve also been working on getting everything down on paper. Often when were producing, we have the next chapter or two written, but now were extending our lens further. Ross has been hard at work over the last few months forging ahead into the later chapters. As production is approaching the storys halfway point(!), were spending a lot of time looking at wrapping up threads and character arcs. Currently we have up through Chapter 11 written (at least as rough drafts), with the plan being to finish the remaining chapters by the end of the year.
• Over the next month, I have some homework to do myself: Im going to rewrite the APW App to try and solve the Windows 10 problems that have been plaguing us for quite some time. Im also going to be getting back into the world of video editing - cutting the Stream Highlights video together for YouTube and getting back into making the Commentary Tracks. We have commentary audio for Chapters 2, 3, and 4 recorded, and the audio mixing for all of them nearly done, I just need to finish the videos themselves (and add subtitles, which was a popular request with the last Commentary video).
• Finally, Translations! These are something that I really dropped the ball on this year. We have translations for Chapter 2 that have been sitting around (largely due to financial strains) so the plan will be to get those lettered and shipped out, and then to do more prep with the published chapters and try to get the translators to help us out some more. I dont want to make any promises about how much will or wont be done, but I am going to make it much more of a priority than I have so far. Stay tuned for hearing more about that in early 2019.

Hi all! As most, if not all, of you already know, Monday marks the 20th anniversary of the release of Half-Life. Here at A Place in the West, were spending the weekend celebrating. As such, all of our content is on sale for the weekend, and up until Tuesday. We also will be Streaming a play-though of Half-Life on Sunday at 2pm GMT for anyone who wants to watch. Ross will be playing, and Mike will be mocking him and talking with the chat. If you too would like to laugh at Ross being bad at games, and talk about Half-Life, the comic, or anything else, come hang out! The link is twitch.tv/halflifecomic. If you drop in, let us know what you think! Maybe well do Half-Life 2 and the episodes at some point in the future. Maybe even Ross and Mike playing Portal 2 Co-Op and yelling at each other.
On Monday well also be releasing a new update! This will include Interlude 5.5 - titled Containment, where we go back to Black Mesa to see some familiar faces. Also included in this update will be the Russian translation of Chapter 5, thanks to our friends Vsevolod Stepanov and Pavel Lapinsky. Finally, we'll be releasing Volume 2 of our soundtrack, by the talented Chris Jolley. Chris has written 9 new songs based on the events from Chapters 3, 4, and 5. The latest update will also include a few other songs that Chris has written for us over the years so you can get a taste of his style if you haven't heard his music yet. Ill give another update later this week with more information on whats coming next for us!

Hey gang! This is just a short update on our current progress - a prelude to a fairly substantial content release in November! As many of you will know, Half-Lifes 20th anniversary is coming up in a few weeks, and its our intention to celebrate and pay homage to that in the broadest possible sense! So, right now one of the big things were doing is putting the final touches on the next interlude - Containment. Containment is a flashback to Black Mesa that will, as is our tradition with the interludes, be released for free! Heres a small preview
Our audio designer, Chris Jolley, has created a brand new soundtrack for Chapters 3 - 5, and what hes come up with is brilliantly electric - more on that soon. Were also going to be launching a Twitch Stream of Ross - & potentially Mike - playing through the entirety of Half-Life. This will be an excellent opportunity to jeer & heckle a pair of certified idiots. We hope thats something youll all be interested in, and were definitely excited to play it. More information on that as we get closer to the anniversary! In the meantime, the entire comic, and the soundtrack, is now on sale, so if you havent checked out the latest chapters nows a great time to pick those up!
Well see you in a few weeks! Ross and Mike.

Hi all, Chapter 5 has been released! Titled “The Eyes of the People”, it concludes the arc we began in Chapter 3, “The Pit”, in which Leyla Poirier and Albert Kempinski integrate themselves into the city of New Franklin and become embroiled in a conflict between the city’s centres of power. Chapter 6 will go into production later this year, with another interlude taking place between Chapters 5 and 6, and featuring a location that we have yet to see in “A Place in the West”! We’re going east, curling back towards the Combine capital… In terms of Chapter 6, “The Prisoner”, the key word would be “coup”. It’s very much a two-parter with Chapter 7, and they’re both incredibly action-packed! 5 is the tipping point into a much wider, more brutal conflict, which is something you’ll understand once you’ve reached its final pages!
This release also contains some wallpapers that we’ve put together using the original resolution images of the comic. We always optimise and shrink the images for distribution to try and keep the app size down, so we thought this would be a good way to share some of the more originally sized art. You can find them in the “Wallpapers” folder from your “A Place in the West” directory. (Fun fact: Even these wallpapers aren't full resolution...)
Though we still haven’t shipped the Commentary track for Chapter 2, (and for good reason that you’ll hopefully hear when it comes out!) Ross and Mike will also be recording commentary tracks for Chapters 3 and 4 in the coming weeks. Reach out if you have any questions about the production, or events or characters in either chapter. The plan is for all 3 of these commentary tracks to be released by the end of October. In the meantime, enjoy Chapter 5, and let us know what you think of it! Best, Mike & Ross

Hi all, The store page for Chapter 5 is now up! “The Eyes of the People” will be launching on Monday, but we wanted to give you an early taste of what it’ll be about and what kinds of things you can expect. This is the first time that we’ve put up a page ahead of time, so if you like it, please let us know!
Chapter 5 wraps up the “Masquerade” arc that began with Chapter 3, “The Pit”. When it goes live, we’ll also have an announcement that teases a bit about what the next arc holds. There will be other goodies coming with this release, so add it to your wishlist and check it out on Monday!

Hey gang! We just wanted to drop a line on where we’re at right now with the comic, and what you can expect over the course of the next few months. As most of you no doubt know, the Steam Summer Sale is in full swing, so we have accordingly discounted our entire library – Chapters 3, 4 and the Soundtrack are available at 25% of their regular price, with Chapter 2 reduced by 50%! If you haven’t already caught up with the comic, now is a great time to do so: Chapter 5, "The Eyes of the People" is scheduled for a July release. We’re very excited about this one – the artists have outdone themselves – and can’t wait to share it with you all. It wraps up a few of the arcs kicked off in Chapter 3 and represents a significant turning point in the story. So what’s it about? It’s the night of New Franklin’s annual masquerade banquet, and the city’s political rivals vie for dominance amongst a blind and debauched populace seeking shelter from a wicked blizzard. Governor Moore, aiming to install himself as the city’s leader, plots to assassinate Major General Long at the evening’s end, whilst Long himself prepares to move against Sejal Rajani’s Opposition in an effort to apprehend the vortigaunt Dreyfus. And on the fringes of the city, away from the lights of the masquerade, Albert Kempinski takes matters into his own hands to find his kidnapped daughter – with disastrous results…
As for our plans for the rest of the year, you can expect a new interlude, as well as for production to begin on Chapter 6, sometime in the fall. There may be some more Surprises coming, too. In the meantime, enjoy the sale, and keep an eye out for Chapter 5 in the next few weeks! Ross and Mike

Sometimes, even ~5 years in, you still make mistakes. It was brought to my attention that I forgot to release the Russian translation for Chapter 4.5, "The Vault of Saph". That's been released this morning, so please do check it out! Vsevolod Stepanov and Pavel Lapinsky continue to do wonderful work, which is hopefully not undermined by my stupidity. This release includes a PDF of the translation as well, as we've begun to do those regularly to allow everyone more flexibility in how they choose to read the comic (especially since you can take it with you on tablets or phones now!)
In other news, we're about halfway through production on Chapter 5, and we could not be more excited about it. Titled "The Eyes of the People", it takes place at a Masquerade, in which the Governor and his wife put in motion a plan to assassinate Major-General Long and have Sejal take the fall! Look for more information on it as we come closer to release, within the next couple of months.

Hey gang, Happy New Year! We’re excited to kick off 2018 with the release of Interlude 4.5: The Vault of Saph, a five-page short that is completely free! Saph sheds further light on the cosmic underpinnings of A Place in the West’s story, expanding the strange phantasmagoric dreamscape first glimpsed at the beginning of Chapter 3. As we’ve said in the past, the interludes are fundamental pieces of the story, and we think of them as “mini-chapters”, but something readers can enjoy for free during the wait between the larger entries. Speaking of which, where is Chapter 5? With its script complete, The Eyes of the People will enter production very soon. It concludes certain arcs set-up in Chapter 3, and revolves around a masquerade in which Governor Moore plans to assassinate the Major-General. It’s an exciting installment and we can’t wait to share it with you in the coming months. We're also proud to finally release the Russian translation for Chapter 4: A Spy in the House of Long, courtesy of Vsevolod Stepanov and Pavel Lapinsky. The Vault of Saph is soon to follow! This release also includes some bug fixes, including a particularly odd one where reading Chapter 1: Following Portents in German would randomly change to Czech! Finally, we are also very pleased to announce the inclusion of brand-new PDF files for each and every chapter, so that you no longer have to read the comic via the Steam app! It is something that readers have been asking for for a long time, particularly with wanting to read it on phones and tablets, and we’re happy to have added it! From now on, when you purchase a new chapter, the comic will immediately be made available as a PDF file in your Steam Directory, including all of the languages the comic currently supports. We hope you all enjoy this update, and as ever, let us know what you think! Ross and Mike

Hey gang, We're very excited to announce the release of Chapter 4 of our fan-made Half-Life comic, A Place in the West. Once again coming in at a total of 30 pages, Chapter 4 – titled A Spy in the House of Long – picks up immediately after the events of the third chapter. The fallout from the Pit disaster spreads throughout the city, bringing its competing factions into conflict. Fearing a loss of power, Governor Moore acts to quell Sejal Rajani's Opposition - a group of dissenters with a radical plan for the city's future - forcing Major-General Long to resort to extreme measures to reassert control. Chapter 4 was created by the same art team that delivered The Pit – Kristian Rossi (pencils), Ivan Miranda (inks), Ester Salguero (colours) and Javier Puga (letters) – and features some of the most visually arresting scenes from the comic so far. We couldn't be happier with the finished product, and we're convinced it's the best yet. Hopefully you will, too.

What's next?

Hi all, Chapter 4 was intended to be released today, and we’re unfortunately having to push that back to another day (to be determined) because of some poor planning on our part. Because of how we’ve handled delays in the past, I want to get out in front of this one and explain a bit about the process, and what we’ll be doing to fix it going forward. As you may or may not know, any time a new Store page is created (even for DLC), it goes through Valve for approval (as do pricing proposals). With what we believe to be the combination of Steam continuing to grow at a rapid pace, and the approaching holidays, our new store page hasn’t yet been approved. Ordinarily this process does not take long, and we were ill-prepared for a delay with it. We typically leave a few weeks gap between finishing the latest chapter and releasing it. This allows us to do several read-throughs of the issue for last minute changes, finish the Steam images, wrap up the store page, ensure that the app is set up to include the new chapter / is stable, and (ideally), have the translations at least for Russian already started. In this case, we committed to a date early (trying to coincide with the Half-Life / Half-Life 2 anniversaries), and were very late with making last minute changes. Our timetable as a whole suffered for it and we were later than we should have been getting the Store page to Valve. Going forward, our plan will be to prioritise the assets for the store page assets and move to get that through approval before we announce any kind of date. While we wait for that approval, we’ll be shipping an update to the app today that gives a short preview for Chapter 4, and we will keep you updated on a new release date as soon as the new page is approved. Our sincere apologies for dropping the ball on this, but trust us, it’ll be worth the few extra days wait!

Hey all! Today marks the one year anniversary of our initial release on Steam! To celebrate it, we’ve released a brand new interlude - formerly known as “shorts” - for free! Titled Nal Sidian, this five-page story delves into the vortigaunt Dreyfus’ past, and explores his relationship to the nefarious Combine. Our plan is to release a free interlude between every chapter going forward. Now integrated into the app’s chapter selection menu, these pieces are very much fundamental to the complete story.
Speaking of the app, this update also introduces some much needed tweaks and updates! We now have improved language support, and we’ve released Chapter 1 and the first interlude (The Charnel House) for the new languages as well! You can now read through the first section of the comic in Czech, German, Spanish, and Turkish! We will be bringing these languages to Chapters 2, 3, and Nal Sidian in the coming months, as well as continuing to add more languages to our selection. Brazilian Portuguese is next and should be out within a few weeks, with more to come!
The translations took us a bit longer to get out the door than we’d have liked, largely because we no longer had the original files for Chapter 1 and had to reletter it, as well as the looming size of Chapter 2. Our original plan was not to release the language updates incrementally, but we feel it’s important for our superb team of volunteer translators to see their work on the page! We’ll be forging ahead with the monster that is Chapter 2, and working towards a point where we’re releasing new chapters simultaneously (or at least nearly simultaneously) across all of our supported languages. The app also now includes integration with our soundtrack, so that you can easily listen to Chris’s ambient tunes while reading. We have a few other features in the pipeline (including controller support) and there will be more updates to come on the app soon as well!

What about Chapter 4?

What else?

Hey everyone! Today, we’re very pleased to announce the release of the Russian translation of Chapter 3: The Pit, provided courtesy of the very talented Vsevolod Stepanov and Pavel Lapinsky (translation and lettering, respectively)! Whilst we've been a little slow on the translation front, we are dedicated to integrating the comic with as many languages as possible, time and means permitting! For the time being, to our Russian readers, we hope you enjoy this next installment of Half-Life: A Place in the West! We've started doing lettering for additional languages and will have those available soon. So, where are we at in terms of production? We'll be doing an anniversary celebration for the 30th of September that will include the next "Interlude" (previously described as "shorts") along with a series of application updates. The interlude is called "Nal Sidian" and will explore a piece of the vortigaunt Dreyfus' backstory. Chapter 4: "A Spy in the House of Long" went into production a couple weeks ago, and is making great progress! After the debacle in The Pit, tensions within New Franklin reach boiling point, culminating in a confrontation between the Opposition and the Governor! We’re very proud of the script and can't wait to share it with you all. The story's starting to really move now (finally…!)

Hi everyone! Chapter 3 of the fan-made comic Half-Life: A Place in the West is now available! Titled “The Pit”, this chapter comes in at 30 pages. The Pit picks up where Chapter 2 left off: Leyla Poirier and Albert Kempinski go their separate ways after an intense dispute, but are both drawn to a gladiatorial arena in New Franklin. Known as “Kal’s Pit”, this seedy arena puts on a show of blood sport against captured aliens from beyond the city’s walls. But when an accident throws everyone into danger, an unlikely hero emerges… And back at City Hall, Major-General Long makes a discovery that will change New Franklin forever. We’ve made some changes in our team with this issue - Ivan, Ester, and Javier have continued on from Chapter 2 in the roles of Inker, Colourist, and Letterer, respectively, but our previous penciler, Heath, has had to step down due to family commitments - we will miss him, and are incredibly grateful for the wonderful work he did on Chapters 1 and 2. In his place, we’ve brought on Kristian Rossi, who has worked on such comics as Trespasser, The Temporal, and Moonshine. Kristian brings his own style, and we think you’ll love the new direction. As always, let us know your thoughts!

What’s Next?

What else is going on?

Hey gang, Just a short update today to let you all know that the release date for Chapter 3: "The Pit" is July 21st, which is just over two weeks from now! We've been steadily releasing a few of its pages on our social media platforms, and today we unveiled the cover page!
It's 30 pages in length and, in our opinion, is the best chapter we've produced yet. For an idea as to what it's about, here's the synopsis! After a heated disagreement, Leyla Poirier and Albert Kempinski go their separate ways in New Franklin, but are both drawn to a gladiatorial arena called "Kal's Pit". Here, the citizens of New Franklin engage in brutal blood sport against captured aliens. But when an accident throws everyone into danger, an unlikely hero emerges… And back at City Hall, Major-General Long makes a discovery that will change New Franklin forever. We'll be releasing a couple more previews this week, so stay tuned for those on Twitter and Facebook. And we look forward to seeing what you all think after the 21st! As ever, let us know your thoughts!

Hey gang! Just a small update from things on our end: We hope you’re enjoying the soundtrack. The team’s currently hard at work on Chapter 3 – it’s coming together very quickly, and we’re still on track for a release sometime this summer. We think it’s our best work yet. Hopefully you will, too! We can’t wait to share it with you all. In the meantime, we’re very eager to learn more about what you folks think and feel about the comic, and to that end we’ve put together a very quick survey we hope you’ll find the time to fill out. It’s important to us that we continue to deliver a product you actually want to read and invest your valuable time in, and for that to work, we really want to dig into your particular tastes and interests. You can complete the survey here: https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSfcWJ8DVxlQRt0AX3KvNViA2shzRanXi52l4ph1CSmPM3frfw/viewform?c=0&w=1 We’re also getting ready to record the commentary track for Chapter 2, which is scheduled to take place soon. If you have any questions for the team, please do send them on (either tweet us, email us at aplaceinthewest@gmail.com, or reply to this thread!). This commentary track will feature the whole team, so your questions can cover every aspect of the production process. Again, thanks for your time and patience, and we look forward to sharing the third chapter with you in just a few short months. Ross

Hey everyone, We hope that you’ve enjoyed Issue 2! We're very excited to announce that as part of the build being released on Monday, we'll have the Russian translations for Issue 2 available! We also want to take this time to share some more updates on our end, most notably about Issue 3 progress. But first, some extra things we’ve been working on...

New Website

Soundtrack

Issue 2 Commentary Track

Issue 3 Status

Hi everyone, We are incredibly excited to release the second chapter of the fan-made comic Half-Life: A Place in the West, titled “A Very Modern Major-General” today as DLC. We sincerely apologise to readers for the unexpected delay last month, but at the 11th hour we were taken by surprise when Valve granted us use of the Half-Life license. This means that, starting with the second chapter, A Place in the West will now move into a paid DLC model. The hopefully minimal price tag is intended to alleviate our production costs - for further elaboration on this point, do scroll down. We cover it quite extensively! We’d like to thank Valve for the opportunity, and we hope our readers will embrace the change, too. We have also made the first 5 pages of Chapter #2 available for free as a teaser. The app will automatically update to make those accessible. "A Very Modern Major-General" picks up where the first chapter left off - we rejoin Leyla Poirier, Albert Kempinski and the vortigaunt Dreyfus as they enter the strange city of New Franklin. Introducing a host of new characters and fresh intrigues, this chapter comes in at 50 pages and includes 5 new achievements! The second chapter has been the result of a year of work, and has involved several changes to our team. Our artist from Chapter #1, Heath Heil, has stepped back to focus on raising his daughter. While Heath still did the penciling for chapter #2, he was also joined in this chapter by Ivan Miranda on inking, Ester Salguero on colouring, and Javier Puga for lettering. We also had the pleasure of working with Jiedi Chen and Daniel Gerhard last summer on some additional art which makes its appearance in this chapter. So, please, go and read it, and as always, let us know what you think.

What are we working on now?

Restructuring Chapters

Going to paid DLC

Finally

Hi everyone, Whilst we had hoped to release our second chapter tomorrow, certain changes have come into effect over here at A Place in the West that will necessitate a short delay in that release. We understand this is disappointing to many of you, but rest assured there are very good reasons at play that we will be sharing with you all in detail over the coming week. Issue #2 is complete, we’re very proud of it, and are so excited to share it with you all. It’s very important to us that we remain open and transparent with you at all times, so it pains us to have to be so ambiguous. We ask you to hang in there with us for just a little bit longer! Thanks, Ross and Mike

Hi everyone, We hope you’re enjoying the Charnel House release. We just wanted to give a small update today. First of all, thank you to everyone who has left us comments about the video commentary. Per feedback we’ve received, this update moves the commentary video into optional DLC to keep the base app size more reasonable. Also included is a tweak to the code to make the achievement unlocks respond more appropriately, which should resolve issues with those as well. Additionally, we want to give an idea of what the next few months will hold. Ross is going to be leading production of Issue 2. We are currently at 30 / 50 pages inked, and ~25 of them are coloured. December holidays may slow us down somewhat, but we’re certainly still on track for a release in January! Ross is also continuing to write and edit and rewrite the script for Issue 3, which should be going into production in March/April. Meanwhile I will be continuing to work on Application improvements, as well as getting a new Translation team off the ground to work on localisation for the comic, app, and store page, which should expand our language offerings to 10+! I am still on the lookout for more people, so please do drop us a line at aplaceinthewest@gmail.com if you’re interested in helping out. We want to thank you for your continued support, and we look forward to bringing more content to all of you in 2017.

We are incredibly pleased to announce the release of Update 1.5, dubbed “The Charnel House”. In addition to containing application updates as the previous updates have, this release marks our first so far that contains additional content since we first launched in late September. We are still on track to release Issue 2 in January, and there will likely be more tweaks to the app in between, but we didn’t want to go for too long without giving you something new and interesting to tide you over. Hopefully this lives up! The Charnel House is a three-page short that focuses on the character of John Moore, taking place a few hours after the events of Issue #1, Following Portents. Pencilled and inked by Heath Heil, it introduces two new members of our team: Ester Salguero (colourist) and Javier Puga (letterer), so it should nicely bridge Issue #1 and Issue #2! This update also includes the following:

New Content

• The Charnel House: A new 3-page short story set in the world of Half-Life: A Place in the West!
• A 2+ hour video commentary about the making of Issue 1, including script excerpts, concept art, and comic pages in various stages of completion (rough sketches, pencils, inks)
• We’ve added a new background menu.
• Dreyfus’s speech bubbles in Issue 1 have all been changed in both the English and Russian to better reflect his alien nature.

New Features

• Six new achievements!
• The credits page has been remade, as our team has grown considerably.
• The options page now contains a volume setting for the background menus.
• The options page now displays all available keyboard shortcuts.
• Added more keyboard shortcuts.
• The zoom range has been expanded for further exploring the detail of the pages.
• Volume and Zoom Settings now save between sessions.
• Sounds for clicks and hovers have been added to the main menu.

Bug Fixes

• Scrolling via the keyboard is now much smoother.
• You should no longer be able to get into a broken state by interrupting animations.
• Background audio should now fade correctly.
• Resolved issue where arrow keys sometimes didn’t work.

Extras

A Quick Note on Virus Warnings

A Quick Note on File Size

Last thing!

Hi everyone, We have received a lot of interesting feedback in the three weeks since we've launched on Steam, and we believe that going forward, further openness and transparency can only improve the comic. To that end, we've opened up a thread on the discussion board where you can let us know what you'd like to see from the comic going forward, and more broadly, from comics on Steam. And of course, we will also keep you informed about what things we are working on. And speaking of things we are working on, we have an update planned for Halloween - in the form of new pages and more. We are also continuing to work on the remaining few bugs in the app itself, and we have a thread for reporting issues as well. We also wanted to share two wonderful pieces of fanart that have been sent into us. @RoyalSketchbook on Twitter has drawn a great Dreyfus, and Kenshi has made a really cool poster of the Ubdisha/Citadel.

Hi friends, Ross and I are getting prepared to leave tomorrow for Steam Dev Days in Seattle, but I wanted to push this update out before we do.

Changelog

Known Issues

The Future

Hi everyone, Ross and I are sitting down today to record the commentary track for A Place in the West Issue 1. We are thinking of including a Q&A section at the end of the track - if you have any questions that you'd like answered, please leave them in a comment and we will do our best to answer them. - Michael