A new Half-Life mod does for the original Valve, sci-fi FPS what Half-Life: Alyx does for Half-Life 2, providing a complete, fully voice-acted prequel, focusing on Gordon Freeman and his work at Black Mesa. We're still waiting – and dreaming, and hoping – for Half-Life 3 to eventually hit Steam. In the meantime, this looks like the perfect distraction.
Half-Life: Induction centres on a day in the life of our favourite, mute theoretical physicist. Immediately preceding the events of Half-Life 1, Kleiner, Eli, and Barney all feature heavily, as does Dr. Rosenberg from Blue Shift. It's a short episode, showing how the mysterious Xen crystal initially makes its way through Black Mesa, prior to the resonance cascade. Exploring all-new areas of the huge, underground laboratory, you get some extra details on Half-Life's backstory, as well as some smart little nods to the full, original game.
Sporadically in development since all the way back in 2009, Induction has just been substantially updated to feature a complete, English-speaking voiceover cast. It also has several new sequences, extra dialogue, and a bunch of fresh easter eggs. It comes from Hazard Team, which recently launched another unofficial Half-Life add-on, Field Intensity, that follows the HECU soldiers between their initial arrival at Black Mesa, all the way up to its destruction by nuclear bomb. Ten hours long, Field Intensity sits neatly alongside Half-Life: Opposing Force, and works as an ideal companion to the entire sci-fi series.
Both Induction and Field Intensity can be ed now from best FPS games on PC, including Titanfall 2 and Rainbow Six: Siege.