Archives for December 2006

• Please note that these are publication date on this site, NOT the actual release date of the maps and mods

This article will look at reviews. All I want to do is explore some questions, I will not be telling you how to write reviews because I am not qualified to do that. The purpose of this article is to be the catalyst to a deeper discussion. I don’t intend to provide answers, just ask questions.

It seems that almost everybody wants to read reviews about almost everything! In fact if you look at the majority of gaming websites you will find that reviews are a significant part of the content, and, in many fansites, they are the total content. What is it about reviews that people find so interesting?

I’ve decided to use this question as poll Question 11. Not because I couldn’t think of anything else but because I thought it deserved a wider audience. So, the question is 1 Great or 3 Average?

Lessons Learnt I try to keep PlanetPhillip as focused as possible on its primary content. I have a personal blog for other subjects, so it’s not too hard to keep things separate. However, sometimes things crossover and today is time for one of those “things”! I’ve had a difficult last two months and I want [...]

Author’s Note “This is a little something that I made the weekend before Christmas Day. It’s short and sweet. If you liked playing H-L 2 then you’ll like this map.” Reader Recommendations1 recommendation, average score: 5 (out of 5), standard deviation: 0

About My second entry for the HL2Files.com contest. You can visit that page and see the other articles. You can’t vote for this one yet because it hasn’t been added. Half-Life is too accurate a name! Back in 2001 I was a big Unreal fan. I had downloaded as many maps as I could find [...]

About This is the sequel to one of the best known Half-Life mods. It continues the original storyline. If this mod is new to you (What part of Mars were you on?) you can find the original here: Poke 646. Reader Recommendations17 recommendations, average score: 4.82 (out of 5), standard deviation: 0.15

After last weeks very successful poll I thought I would continue the theme of “Most Anticipated..”. This week we have Mods. Now a quick look at Moddb.com’s filtered list shows a lot of mods, so I had to make a choice about which ones to list. If you feel I missed one you can add your on choice in the comments. Below is a small selection of what I think are interesting mods.

About Here’s my entry for the HL2Files.com contest. I may write more depending on how much time I have. If you like it be sure to vote for it, once the voting starts. VOTE NOW! Gordon Freeman’s Blog The ramblings of an under-appreciated scientist!

Author’s Note “Well I love night of a million zombies so damn much I thought id make a quick map called “Day of a million soldiers” which takes place in a little maze like or like fy_iceworld style. Ill admit it, I didn’t put a lot of work into it at all but I did [...]

Author’s Note “Outpost Xen is a small single-player campaign mod for Half-life 2. You are a nameless person who has awoken to find the Xen Outpost empty after everyone has already evacuated leaving you behind. Vortigaunts lurk the hallways of the Outpost and there is no sign of any friendly life. Luckily, there is a [...]

About “You are the Corporal Daniel Shephard, trying to escape an infested research facility with aliens and black ops. Stress on “black ops” yeah, there are a ****-load of them. You control Adrian’s brother! for more information read the readme file (if you understand japanese that is.)” Well, that could be a brief description of [...]

With 2007 only a few days away I present 7 questions that I hope to be answered next year. I probably could have written 70 questions but that would have been a very long, and probably boring, article! Read on to see if your burning questions are included. At the bottom is a short list of questions I didn’t include.

About A simple map that allows you to spawn enemies etc. Not exactly the most exciting mapo in the world but I’m sure some readers will enjoy it. Reader Recommendations1 recommendation, average score: 3 (out of 5), standard deviation: 0

This week’s poll moves away from the recent trend of discussing the actual gameplay and instead tries to find out exactly what game you are most anticipating for 2007.

As with all polls the answers are nearly always “It depends!”. and this one is no different.

Imagine, for whatever reason, you can only buy one FPS game next year, which one would it be?

About DayHard is a single player adventure set before the events narrated in Half-Life 2. You play as Gordon’s brother, Morgan Freeman. He’s not timid like Gordon: he’s able to talk to people, and even to make comments on the situation! Unbelievable, huh? What’s the story? Well, let’s just say that one day Morgan finds [...]

From the screenshots this one looks like a few rooms and a lot of zombies. Enjoy! Basic Details Title: Deadly Darkness File Name: hl2-sp-deadly-darkness.rar Size : 732.99Kb Author: Hemuuuli Date Released: 16 October 2005 PlanetPhillip Download Servers PlanetPhillip.Com Screenshots Click on the thumbnails below to open a larger image. WARNING: The screenshots contain spoilers. Reader [...]

I’m an only child. This means I have no brothers or sisters.

I developed the ability to play on my own. Perhaps that’s one of the reasons I play SP games, who knows.

One aspect that was introduced into Half-Life 2 that I didn’t like was the Squad feature. I recognize that having a squad around you varies the style of gameplay but I prefer to play alone.

About Here’s a quick story outline for a Half-Life 2 mod. It’s not the deepest or most imaginative story or setting but it might provide some fun and interesting gameplay. Citizen There you are minding your own business when along come the Metro Police and start harassing the other occupants of your building. You normally [...]

Introduction PS3, Halo 3 and Gears of War have been in the news a LOT recently and now that wii has been released we will no doubt be urinated on with more coverage. (that’s a small play on words there in case you missed it!). Anyway, I don’t own a console for a number of [...]

About This is a single player half life 2 map. It does not support HDR. This map includes an autosave system, so if you ever get stuck, just load up the most recent auto save. The map consists mainly of puzzles, although you will probably be shot at. Reader RecommendationsCurrently there are no recommendations

Author’s Note “This level was created as coursework for my Games Engines & Physics module at Staffordshire University as part of my Computer Games Design degree. The brief was to create a level in the source engine (we had created a level in the Unreal engine in the first semester) based around Staffordshire University, Beaconside [...]

I recently came across a mapper called Captain Amerika who has been making base maps for FarCry. What are base maps you ask? Well read on to find out!

introduction Throughout the world many millions of children will be writing letters to Santa Claus, listing the present they want, well here is my wish list for gaming in 2007. Can you guess what they are?

About This warehouse by the waterfront was obviously a storage area for container crates and of miscellaneous storage crap before the infestation now it has been converted into a stronghold by resisters, plentiful in ammo and weapons. It�s quite easy to hide from the hordes here, but in doing so you run the risk of [...]