Wait a second... Isn't Half-Life: Absolute Zero dead?
Yes; in a way you could say it still is.
Back on October 11th, 2020, the mod's fate was sealed and Half-Life: Absolute Zero was no more. At least, as the story was told and I believed it! I had no intentions to return back to mod, but the itch would return. I personally started toying with the project files sometime in Spring of 2021 and started to attempt to finish up certain parts of the mod with the possible idea of releasing them as bite sized experiences. But, the odds of me fully committing to the idea was quite low. I would later find out that LeonelC (another HLAZ developer) was also toying around with the same exact idea. I floated the idea that we should collaborate again and he agreed. Since we were planning on doing something HLAZ related again, we asked ZedMarine610 (another HLAZ developer) to join in and he agreed. So from that point, we started working together again with no real end goal in mind besides the potential of some sort of HLAZ release; whether bite sized or full fledged. The internal name for this version of HLAZ was known as "Post-Mortem."
Then in June of 2021, the atom bomb was dropped.
Brett Johnson, one of the level designers for Half-Life, was showcasing his work on TikTok. This provided so many answers to questions we had and opened up even more questions in some regards. But one thing was for certain... Half-Life: Absolute Zero was back, in some regard.
We agreed upon that point that we should be finishing Half-Life: Absolute Zero as a full experience. We decided to keep it under wraps until we were ready to release it. I got a little cocky and decided to set the deadline for Half-Life's 25th anniversary.
Thus... Half-Life: Absolute Zero is releasing in an active development state on November 19th, 2023.
*groans* Active Development, again?
Yeah... As stated, I got cocky.
Keep in mind, we aren't teenagers in high school anymore. In fact, we're not even college aged anymore. In my mind, I was thinking we were working at a really good pace and that a November date was realistic. Forgetting that anything could stop our momentum.
Thus, our momentum was ruined. One of the chapters we've struggled with ever since the original Day One demo release, Screams and Whispers (Blast Pit,) stopped us dead in our tracks. Ruined our plans for an incognito demo release and stopped any real progress for a few months. Lucky for you, we started making good progress on the chapter again.
We at this time, have no idea what we will ship with the initial Early Access release as we currently have to finish up a few chapters (Screams and Whispers, On a Rail, Abandoned Silo, Cliff Hanger, and the unnamed chapters: a3a3 and a3a4) to get them into a playable state. Rest assured we intend to make it so you don't have to use the developer console to skip over what can't be completed. Right now, the only chapter that for certain won't be available with the release is On a Rail. We have a concrete plan for the chapter, but it was one of the largest chapters in the original Half-Life story.
Right now, the goal is to roll out what we can to the public for testing and keep using our "Post-Mortem" branch for the rougher bits so we can push out more definitive updates to the main branch. Currently the "Post-Mortem" branch is only available to a select number of testers, but could be subject to change in the future.
...and why should we trust that you will finish the mod this time?
Well... for starters, the original team is back together unlike the original 2020 Active Development release. Plus with the break we took, we're no longer entirely burnt out and as long as we pace ourselves instead of pushing ourselves this should be a realistic goal.
But, you don't have to trust us! You can wait until we truly hit 1.0 or just watch us crash and burn into a ditch again. I can at least promise you that the build that is on Steam will be less busted after this.
Is there a road map or a game plan for this Active Development release?
Yes! But we aren't willing to discuss this right at this second. Expect a pinned thread to appear in the Steam Discussions to be created around the November 19th release.
The previous assets were released under "Creative Commons" once the mod ceased development, will this be the case with the new content?
Correct.
The "Post-Mortem" assets will be released under the "Creative Commons" license (where applicable, as you still have to respect Valve's copyright) when the mod is complete or if the mod dies again.
Selected Screenshots:
