Recreating the original Half-Life in the Source engine, the Black Mesa project feels like it has been a part of Steam since the very beginning - which is not that far off the mark. Development started an impressive 14 years ago - and now Crowbar Collective LLC is now ready to release version 1.0 of the Black Mesa project.

In a new post titled Fear Not The Long Road, the Black Mesa team confirms that Black Mesa 1.0 is ready to launch Thursday March 5 on Steam.

In March 2006, two of my college classmates got onto the Black Mesa mod team. I applied as an artist, and they more or less vouched for me. The team “hired” me without even completing an art test. From there I became the art lead, a partner in the new “Crowbar Collective LLC”, project lead, and eventually owner of the company.

As I write this, I am realizing that we plan to FINISH Black Mesa exactly 14 years to the month from when I first joined the team. 14 years working on a single project, with a dedicated team, that had a vision, and saw it through.

There are probably a fair number of people who if you asked them “Do you want to own a video game company?”, would say “Yes! Absolutely. Whatever it takes!”, but it is easy to commit to something when it is guaranteed. If instead in 2006 someone said to me “This will be difficult. You will consider quitting multiple times, and it is going to take you at least 14 years to complete.” I am not sure I would have signed up for that.

Who would have blamed me if I didn’t? For the majority of its development, Black Mesa was a volunteer project. Even after we got the green light to sell the game, we still did not make any money until late June of 2015.

As per above Adam Engels notes that it wasn't until 2015 that the team got the blessing from Valve to sell the game on Steam - where the passion and hard work put into the project, that includes new assets, sound, music, animation, and even re-imagined levels, has payed off.

The fact is, all roads are long roads. If you fear that, you’ll shy away from choosing the one that excites you most, and has the biggest reward. Not everyone is going to have reliable friends to pull them onto projects, not everyone is going to have the opportunity to own a video game company, but if there is something you want to accomplish there’s nothing left to do, but to do it. You can not win the game if you don’t play.

Through luck, hard work, and maybe a bit of ignorance we didn’t shy away from our goal of bringing this game to completion. We are proud of what we built. We think this upcoming 1.0 release is the best, most polished, and most fun version of the game yet.