When we think of the original Half-Life, the first thing that comes to mind is probably the speedruns of the game that are so popular today. Gordon Freeman, bunny hopping through Black Mesa with ease and ending the Cascade Event without breaking a sweat. But something that is always overlooked in Half-Life are the poor staff of Black Mesa that you leave behind unless you have them open a door for you.
Those scientists’ lives are just as important as Freeman’s life and they need to get out of the facility somehow. That’s where Abiotic Factor comes in. Although the game does not take place at Black Mesa, it does take place in a unground research facility similar to Black Mesa that is undergoing a similar disaster and tasks you to survive and escape. Unlike Gordon Freeman, you don’t have a suit to keep you safe and secure. All you have is your wits as a scientist and whatever office supplies you can scrounge up.
Abiotic Factor: Half-Life Meets Minecraft?
While you might not have the athleticism or the oddly competent military training like Freeman did, you do still have one thing that you can use for your survival: your smarts. What might seem like rulers and rubber bands to other people can be easily turned into a makeshift crossbow, while some simple planks and paper can be put together to make a barricade… somehow.
But you must not forget that you are not in a simple office; you are in a high-tech research facility that was working on opening portals to other dimensions. So the further you go the more high-tech stuff you will be able to find. Graduating from computer power supplies to high-tech power cells lets you up the quality of what you can craft. A makeshift crossbow can turn into a makeshift railgun with enough high-tech parts.
Alongside making high-tech gear for yourself, you can also make farm plots, stoves, and other furniture in order to turn your makeshift base into a proper home. You can even place down traps in order to make the outside of your base safe from any curious foes.
However, surviving is only half of the battle. You can spend time making a nice base and setting yourself up to live in comfort, but your true goal is to evacuate the facility. But this is no easy feat. All of the trams are gone, the doors and elevators out are either locked or broken and creatures from other dimensions are popping up all over the place ready to kill you.
With all the exits blocked, your only hope of escape is going to be going deeper into the heart of the facility and finding another way out.
Sadly, the game is not fully out yet but the roadmap on the store page places the full release of the game sometime this Winter, with two major updates between now and then. There is still plenty of content for you to experience right now in the game making it well worth the purchase. You can also buddy up with other scientists in order to make survival easier and not feel so alone in the giant facility.
If any of this sounds interesting, you can check out Abiotic Factor on Steam right now.
