What’s your favorite Half-Life fan work?
Okay, let’s acknowledge this: the Half-Life series was mechanically and narratively transformative for the first-person shooter genre and gaming as a whole. Many among us loved the first two games, are still bitter about the loss of Half-Life 3, and are tentatively optimistic about the upcoming Half-Life: Alyx, the first full-length game in the series since 2004. But now that we’ve gotten those plaudits out of the way, let’s talk about Half-Life’s other glorious afterlife: the fan works.
Half-Life 2 was extraordinarily extensible. Its modding system was an accessible way to learn game design, and the popular Garry’s Mod let people pose and move characters to make videos and comics. Half-Life was moddable as well, and over time, fans have...