Whenever someone explains how mind-blowing Valve’s original Half-Life was, it’s an understatement. Released in 1998, just two years after Id Software’s Quake, the cinematic, story-based FPS was a masterpiece of narrative integration into gameplay while also having satisfying combat, a unique world, and mostly great levels. (Sorry, Xen.)
While Half-Life was released on GoldSrc, a heavily modified version of Id Software’s Quake engine, the game was originally built on the bog standard version of the DOOM developer’s software. Valve originally licensed the engine from Id, although GoldSrc would end up featuring just 25% of the original code by the time of release.
In a discussion with fans, DOOM and Quake designer American McGee—who later went on to create Scrapland and the Alice games—recalled the first time Valve showed off its work to the team at Id Software.
“There was this one time at id Software when we were working on Quake 2 and everyone piled into Paul Steed’s office to check out what Valve was doing was our tech,” the iconic game designer recalled. “And there was a cinematic scene with characters moving around while a crane operating and multiple cameras panning around to convey some element of the narrative. Proper cinematic storytelling using the Quake engine!”
It’s worth mentioning that, at this point, Id Software did not care for storytelling in games. IdSoftware co-founder John Carmack infamously told workers that “story in a game is like a story in a p*rn movie. It’s expected to be there, but it’s not that important.” Obviously, today, most video games also have some form of cinematic storytelling to them.
Upon seeing early versions of Half-Life in action, McGee recalled letting out an audible “wow”, which annoyed others at the Quake company. “The whole room turned around and scowled at me,” he recalled. “Ha. That was the moment I knew, ‘Okay, well. I want to tell stories with this tech. And these guys don’t.”
This led to the creation of American McGee’s Alice, which was built on the more advanced idTech 3 engine. After being fired from id, McGee remembers crying, “and then driving home with a box of my crap in the trunk of the cat, I began smiling. Then Laughing. And the first chance I was given to do something on my own with that tech? Well, I pushed it as hard as I could in relation to surreal visuals and cinematic storytelling”.
Valve would later push its own work on Half-Life even further with 2004’s Half-Life 2, built on the studio’s home-grown Source Engine. While the studio doesn’t release new games as frequently as fans would like, it’s not like Valve has stopped pushing cinematic gaming forward.
Half-Life Alyx, one of the few Source 2 games, is a VR monster with some of the best visuals and gameplay available in virtual reality. While fans still wait for an eventual Half-Life 3—and the tech advancements it would undoubtedly bring—it’s still worth appreciating the importance of that original game.
