Hey all,

We are compiling release candidates of all 9 maps for deployment testing. Unless we find a truly game breaking bug, it will be set live on Steam public beta August 1st. Just one of our levels can take up to 20 HOURS to compile, so it can be quite the process to test final maps. Major issues found by community testing will either be fixed in a later hotfix, or with the release of the rest of the chapters. Before you are able to jump in and help us beta test this Xen thing, please take a quick look at some of our known issues (to help avoid duplicate feedback on things we are already aware of):

-Linux is launching, but we are still working on getting the graphics to display properly. We apologize for this taking so long.


-You will see large black voids in the levels if you look back the way you came. These are the areaportals (a technique used for optimisation) not interacting correctly with the fog/xog. We have a simple fix for this that will go in for later patches.


-Some props have the wrong material properties. This is most noticeable in Gonarch where it sounds like you are walking on boxes instead of rocks.

-We have greatly increased performance across all maps, but there is still a noticeable frame drop in the Xen swamps as you leave the door into the lower swamp.

-Beneathicles (underwater barnacles) dont respond to Gluon or explosive damage. This makes them a bit of a pain to clear, but will be fixed!

-Long jump sound effect sometimes plays on map load. We havent yet been able to pinpoint why this his happening or why it only happens on some computers.

-Knockback Houndeyes occasionally push you into and through walls, causing the player to get stuck.

-Occasional crash to desktop in Gonarch Chapter. We think it is something related to the mortar attack.

-In order to fix a crash, HEV crystal chargers temporarily do not have a dynamic light.


-Bebcrabs sometimes walk on 2 legs instead of 4 its hilarious.


-Gonarch can occasionally run past you in an important chase sequence. We have tweaked the map to fix this, but it may still happen.

We wanted to talk about these first, so players know what is out there before they dive in. As always, if you have any issues or crashes please go to our Discord or post them on the Steam forums (avoid questions in the news update as it is really hard to respond to them).

A personal thanks to all the devs who burnt some serious midnight oil getting this together. We will post another news update when the update goes live!

https://store.steampowered.com/app/362890/Black_Mesa/

Discord - https://discord.gg/PSZfh8N

Twitter - @BlackMesaDevs

Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/BlackMesaDevs