Unforeseen Consequences: A Half-Life Documentary

Thanks for watching our documentary on the legacy of Half-Life! Before you ask, yes we have a number of break-out videos coming from this. We'll have a longer chat with Scott Smith about the history of Counter-Strike, a chat with Geoff about The Game Awards, Cory about God of War and a few more. Look out for those over the coming weeks. We also have a 40-minute behind-the-scenes feature available for Patrons and Channel Subscribers so if you want to watch that and help fund more docs like these, check out our Patreon: patreon.com/noclip - Thanks again for watching. Make sure to hit that like button, subscribe, spam your friends and tell your gran! (Caption inbound. We ordered them a week ago, still waiting. I guess this video was long.)

Man Geoff Keighley has a mean poker face. He said in the 'behind Closed Doors at Valve' video that he's been aware of project Alyx for a couple years now meaning that he would have known about it at the time of making this documentary.

The right man in the wrong place can make all the difference in the world.

hearing Randy Pitchford talking about how Valve was exploiting them and proceeded to say “we would never do that to any developer” makes me feel like i just drank a gallon of grease

50:30 back when I was playing Half Life, I went to get my wisdom teeth taken out The surgeon was Dr. Freeman (didn't notice the name, when I was awake); coming out of the anesthesia, I hear the concerned voice of the nurse "Tim, doctor Freeman needs you to wake up!" I thought I was dreaming, and didn't want it to end

This documentary is in desperate need of a sequel.

2:01 yoyo that's me

"The entire industry fundamentally shifted with the release of that demo..." might be the most powerful quote from a dev ever imo. Great interview.

I like how at 1:01:50 Jeff knows exactly that Alyx is around the corner, even smiles when saying he doesn't know.

Geoff avoiding talking about VR.. He knew!

"I dont think my kids ever played Half-life.... I have to go home and fix that." (1:43:30) Loving that sentence.

Alyx was so amazing, and showed ME personally that Valve still knows how to make a good SP game. It was definitely worth getting VR.

i feel ashamed to have always thought of geoff as some sort of figurehead for the game awards when in reality he's actually a super interesting guy

Thank you for doing this documentary. I was 8 when i came home from school one day to see my dad playing this new game on our family computer. From that day on my life changed. I couldnt stop talking about it at school. I used to draw new map outlines in my notebook and come home to create them in Hammer editor. When i was 15 i emailed Gabe about a "mod making book" for HL2 that was rumored to be released but never was. Another employee at valve answered my mail and asked for my adress. A few weeks later i got a package from valve with two half-life shirts in it, signed by Gabe Newell himself. Im 28 now and I still have them today.

Now... about that beer I owed ya.

Watching this in a post Alyx and post complete black mesa world is just...unreal

The term “unforeseen consequences” still sends chills down my spine

I was playing Half Life 2 at a friends house. I got to a puzzle where you're supposed to open a door by going around it and removing a plank that's stuck on the back with the gravity gun. After a few minutes running back and forth without figuring out the solution, I decided to throw something at the door with the gravity gun. The door moved, slightly.. I kept running back and forth grabbing a few more things, and then started to throw them at the door. When I ran out of stuff, I'd just hit the door with the gun's alt fire. Meanwhile, my friend laughed at my inability to solve the puzzle. The door started to swing wildly until it violently opened, the plank flying into the distance behind it. Then we both said "THAT WAS AWESOME", albeit for different reasons. I'ts been 14 years, but I'll never forget that moment.

Throughout the video, I've heard the developers say "I loved what we were doing" "We were having fun" "What do the customers want?". They were in an era where the passion and the community mattered.

A lot of this is like watching filmmakers admiring a great classic film that they all wish they had made, it's awesome to see the respect.