Reviews - Operation Black Thunder - Remod for Half-Life

This is a perfect mod in many regarrds. The weapons, the level design, the enemy encounters, the graphical overhaul for military esque environments. Its just a perfect game-play in this total conversion mod.

Game kept resetting crouch button to C. Nothing else, just C.
And one of the buttons (still not sure which) would turn Host_Framerate to 0.1, speeding up the game x10 until I turned it off.

I have not played the original version. The Remod is not a bad mod. Some bugs here and there. On some map levels, players can find themselves stuck on a transport/lift ramp. Annoying problem that can be easily resolved by enabling Noclip via console. You play as a spec ops soldier tasked with an assignment to eliminate a dangerous group of terrorist. Plot twist, the ending was a surprise for me. Not going to spoil it for you. =)

An ambitious mod that failed to solve all the problem of the original while create more bug . It should have been an reskin addon
-The biggest flaw with this mod is the CTD with no error notification that prevent progression after blowing up the dam.Until this get fixed, my advice with be to stay away from this mod.
-the turret section are just bad design. Their dps seem to be higher then the original version, even on Easy. Also there is little cover,most of the time there is no alternate route to hit them from the back so you have to go frontal assault.The turret is always on is max range so you will get shredded before you even know .
-At map e1m9,when going into the warehouse with the ceiling turret. Their is an alternate route by the door with F-712DH. The modder failed to capture the intention of the original author and make this door only capable of open from the other side,
-Also,the elevator where you go to the container track control is somehow only able to go up.This problem is not in original.
-The map with where you have to turn off electricity of a fence , you could easily go the objective building with the valve and jump up to see skybox. Also at that section is nonsensical design there. Who the **** use a vavle to open a normal door a floor below them ? it not even a double door or an airlock .
-The section where you given rocket launcher to destroy the tank to advance is more problem. The tank when hit only show debris for like a second like broken glass then disappear.The tank still look intact.So it hard to tell if the tank are death or alive until they fire at your face.There are plenty of abandon tank around the game so and it make me really paranoid cause they all look intact.Should have just use the original Half Life tank and it give us more ammo for rocket launcher.
-The sniper rifle.What with all the complex user interface of the scope ? There is no bullet drop in this game so there no need for built in range finder and wind adjuster. It tried to mis-lim but the only thing it managed is to be is obstructing player view.
-The mp5. You got a scope you can not use while the enemy still have their grenade launcher with their mp5. What do you get for alt fire ? A ******* silencer ! What does it do ? Probably lower the recoil abit I assume cause I can't really tell the difference. The mp5 feel really underpowered now that there is no grenade launcher. Also the author managed to make the recoil worse than the original game.It shake up the screen while the recoil also go up like Counter-Strike. Apperantly the author didn't account that player will pull their reticle down to compensate for recoil. Also since this isn't CS so the aim reticle is really bad.Like big *** bad and it does not recoil like CS at all.
-It tried to be all tactical & commando like with the throwing knife and silencer. The human grunt AI is not designed with stealth in mind.You cannot one hit the enemy with a throwing knife from the back even when undeteced.Supressor is useless just as the throwing knife cause the AI operate as Squad and one guy spotted you and they all know where you are.
-Player cannot use the machine gun controlled by enemy & it somehow managed to look even more boxy and uglier than Half Life.
-Messing around with the crossbow. The killcam look nice but useless cause the player can't ******* move while the projectile is in the air.There is no point to it since you can't steer the arrow.
-The smoke grenade managed to have even lower throw range then the normal grenade.It also does nothing. AI could see through smoke.
-the part that 3 enemy dude got airstriked just before you go into the warehouse. I spent half my ammo count trying to kill them. I mean they are right infront of you. They are immortal. They just stand there ! MENACINGLY! Until the scripted sequence happen . there is really no airstrike notice and all I accompliced was waste ton of ammo.
-Also the beginning of the game where you hit the water and your got magically deleted because the game need a weapon progression. If you are going to do that at least do it in a believable fashion. IDK, like getting knocked out or captured like Half life maybe.
-The beginning part there is an enemy blowing up the bridge you are crossing. He fire a rocket from a mortal. You could have just use reuse the M202 Flash from the original game and it will still achieve the same effect.The same thing could be said about of most of this most. In fact recycle asset from Half Life might actually work much better.
-The shotgun have no altfire know and somehow everytime you take it out you also have to unfold the stock.Which is really time consuming cause you can't fire the weapon until the animation finnish, when you in a fire fight and to quickly pullout a shotgun cause the enemy pushing this really make the shotgun useless.
I wanted this mod to be good but I really can't give it a better rating.

So, here's how I'm gonna approach this, I'll go over what this Remod's goals were and rate it based on how it achieved them, and then I'll talk about the original version of Operation Black Thunder on its own. I looked at some playthroughs of the original on YT for comparison, because I'm not gonna play the whole thing again so soon just to make a comparison, I just wanted to make that disclaimer.

-HD Models: 9 - I love it!
-Detail texturing: 9 - I love it!
This mod already looked pretty good, now it looks even better.
-HUD Changes: 9 - I love it!
I noticed that the original hud an animated effect on the selected weapon, that looked cool, kinda wish this had something like that, but it's pretty good nonetheless, I like the font for the numbers better in this than the original, that's for sure.
-Music Changes: 7 - It works
I couldn't find a video of a part where the mod plays one of the copyrighted tracks, so I can't comment on that, but I think Zik probably made the right call replacing it. Personally I don't really like Opposing Force's music, in my opinion it sounds too droning and sterile, it isn't as exciting as the soundtrack to the original Half-life, I usually replace OP4 music with my own selection of stuff and I did that with this too, so it worked out fine. I have no criticisms about the music, it just isn't for me.
- Sound FX Changes: 7 - It works
Nothing stood out too much for me, but there wasn't anything wrong either, so it's fine. I will say that I noticed the MP5 in the original had a suppressor and it did this pleasant little "thump thump thump" sound when it fired, I kinda wish the SMG had that in this remastering, but maybe there was a suppressor somewhere and I just missed it, I don't know. Either way, sound FX is fine.
-Revised text-based stuff: 9 - I love it!
Okay, *this* is a big one, I noticed that in the original, the instructions from the advisor were at times these big chunk of texts, and this mod makes them more concise and straight to the point, that's really important to me. I was often in the middle of a firefight with a bunch of dudes, the very *last* thing I would have needed was to have to read a chunk of text that took its sweet time giving me important instructions, I just need to be told where I need to go and whether there is something in the way.

OVERALL: 8

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The following is about Operation Black Thunder itself, it isn't the responsibility of ZikShadow, since they did not develop it, I just figured I should include my thoughts about the gameplay and the experience itself here:

Operation Black Thunder takes us away from the setting of Black Mesa (which we have seen a hundred times in Half-life) and into a military setting that feels authentic (given the limitations of Goldsrc), with various military vehicles that are actually put in use by each faction, instead of remaining parked in a garage somewhere just as eye candy.

It's a really fun mod that does a lot of things that feel fresh, there were a few moments that made me go "huh, I don't recall ever seeing that in a Half-life mod", the weapons are also really enjoyable to use, for the most part, the assault rifle was too inaccurate for my liking, to be honest. Unfortunately it can also get a bit frustrating at times, with very challenging combat sequences, puzzles and intractable elements that aren't so clear and scarce supplies in some areas. Also I'm pretty sure I sequence broke a couple maps.

I'll give it a rating of 7, but with a big asterisk that says "you must play this, this is one of the best HL mods out there, just play it on an easier difficulty than you're used to or something. And maybe have a video walkthrough handy, if you absolutely need it."

Also be aware that you need to exit the game every time you change a setting in the options, due to a bug, or it will revert back to the way it was before. Changing your bindings via a userconfig.cfg also helps.

Would have been nice if I could have actually played it, maybe if it makes it to greenlight I'll be able to enjoy it and rate it properly. As it stands trying every trick in the book, and installing it literally everywhere for about an hour isn't a good mark, sorry.

Good Mod

NO

So-so mod. Sure not the best, below the mediocre.

awesome