Half-Life: Source

From PCGamingWiki, the wiki about fixing PC games
Jump to: navigation, search
Half-Life: Source
Half-Life Source Logo.jpg
Developers
Engines
 
Release dates
Windows
June 1, 2004
OS X
September 12, 2013
Linux
September 12, 2013
Half-Life: Source at Steam Charts
Half-Life: Source at SteamDB
 Half-Life: Source at Wikipedia
Half-Life
Half-Life 1998
Half-Life: Opposing Force 1999
Half-Life: Blue Shift 2001
Half-Life: Decay (unofficial port/mod) 2001
Half-Life: Source 2004
Half-Life 2 2004
Half-Life 2: Deathmatch 2004
Half-Life 2: Lost Coast 2005
Half-Life Deathmatch: Source 2006
Half-Life 2: Episode One 2006
Half-Life 2: Episode Two 2007
Black Mesa (unofficial mod) 2012

This page is for the Source remake. For the original, see Half-Life. For the unofficial Source engine mod, see Black Mesa.

Key points

Information Includes various improvements over the original Half-Life including minor physics editions, better support for modern platforms, an FOV slider, Oculus Rift support, improved controller support, further console commands, and easier enabling of the High Definition pack.
Advantage Runs on low end hardware.

General information

More information GitHub Issue Tracker for Half-Life: Source and other Source-based games
More information Unofficial Half-Life Wiki
More information Steam Community Discussions

Availability[edit]

Source DRM Notes Keys
Steam Availability Table Icons - Steam.svg
Information All versions require Steam.

Essential improvements[edit]

Skip intro videos[edit]

Fix -novid

  1. Find Half-Life: Source in your Steam Library
  2. Right-click the game name
  3. Select Properties
  4. Select Set Launch Options...
  5. Input -novid
  6. Press OK
  7. Launch the game

Higher definition models[edit]

Information Higher definition models are available by ticking the "Load HD content if available" setting in Video Settings.

Game data[edit]

Configuration file(s) location[edit]

  Location 
Steam <Steam-folder>/SteamApps/common/Half-Life 2/hl1/cfg/
Disadvantage This game does not support the XDG Base Directory Specification on Linux.

Save game data location[edit]

  Location 
Steam <Steam-folder>/SteamApps/common/Half-Life 2/hl1/save/

Save game cloud syncing[edit]

System Native Notes
Steam Cloud Native
GameSave Manager Native

Video settings[edit]

In-game general video settings.
In-game advanced video settings.
Graphics option Option WSGF Notes
Widescreen resolution Native WSGF WS Gold.svg
Multi-monitor Native WSGF MM Silver.svg
Field of view (FOV) Native See Field of view (FOV).
Windowed Native
Borderless fullscreen windowed Hackable See Borderless fullscreen windowed.
Anisotropic filtering (AF) Native
Anti-aliasing (AA) Native
Vertical sync (Vsync) Native
Oculus Rift Native Available under Video Settings. See Oculus Rift for more information.
High frame rate Native

Field of view (FOV)[edit]

  • 75 FOV

  • 90 FOV

Borderless fullscreen windowed[edit]

Fix -window -noborder

  1. Find Half-Life: Source in your Steam Library
  2. Right-click the game name
  3. Select Properties
  4. Select Set Launch Options...
  5. Input -window -noborder
  6. Press OK
  7. Launch the game

Oculus Rift[edit]

Information By default VR mode will run full screen, to switch back to a borderless windowed set the vr_force_windowed convar.

Input settings[edit]

In-game key map settings.
In-game mouse/gamepad settings.
Keyboard and mouse Native Notes
Remapping Native
Mouse acceleration Native
Mouse input in menus Native
Mouse Y-axis inversion Native
Controller
Controller support Native
Full controller support Impossible Some menus do not work well.
Controller remapping Native
Controller Y-axis inversion Native

Audio settings[edit]

In-game audio settings.
Audio options Native Notes
Separate volume controls Native Over-all game volume and separate music slider.
Surround sound Native 7.1, 5.1 surround sound, 4 speaker surround.
Subtitles Native
Closed captions Native
Mute on focus lost Native "Silence the audio while the game window is in the background" check box.

Localizations

Language UI Audio CC Notes
English Native Native Native
Simplified Chinese Native Unknown Unknown
Traditional Chinese Native Unknown Unknown
French Native Unknown Unknown
German Native Unknown Unknown
Italian Native Unknown Unknown
Japanese Native Unknown Unknown
Korean Native Unknown Unknown
Spanish Native Unknown Unknown
Russian Native Unknown Unknown
Thai Native Unknown Unknown

Issues fixed[edit]

Purple and black broken textures[edit]

Information A generic fix for this issue can be found on our Source engine page.

Graphical glitches in the Residue Processing chapter[edit]

The glitches seem to have been introduced by a batch of updates in late 2013. An official fix is unlikely at this point, but disabling multicore rendering in the advanced video options seems to work.

Other information[edit]

API[edit]

Technical specs Supported Notes
Direct3D 6, 7, 8, 8.1, 9
OpenGL 2.1 OS X and Linux only.
Shader Model support 2, 3
64-bit executable Native OS X and Linux only.[citation needed]

Middleware[edit]

Middleware Notes
Physics Havok Heavily modified variant.
Audio Miles Sound System
Cutscenes Bink Video

Console commands[edit]

Information Games running on the Source engine can utilize Source Engine Console Commands for various tasks.

Fix Enabling the console in Source games

  1. Launch the game
  2. From the main menu select Options
  3. Select the Keyboard tab
  4. Click the Advanced button
  5. Check the box next to Enable developer console (~)
  6. Click Apply

Notes:

Information Press ~ to open the console.
Information Some commands may first require you enabling sv_cheats. You can do so with sv_cheats 1.
Disadvantage Users without a US keyboard may experience some problems.
Information You can also have the console open by default on launch by following this guide:

Fix -console

  1. Find the game in your Steam Library
  2. Right-click the game name
  3. Select Properties
  4. Select Set Launch Options...
  5. Input -console
  6. Press OK
  7. Launch the game

Launch options[edit]

Information View this Steam Support Article regarding launch options as well as the relevant Valve Developer wiki page for further information and a list of useful Source engine launch options.

Fix Enabling a launch parameter

  1. Find the game in your Steam Library
  2. Right-click the game name
  3. Select Properties
  4. Select Set Launch Options...
  5. Input your selected launch options and separate each command with a space
  6. Press OK
  7. Launch the game

System requirements[edit]

Windows
Minimum Recommended
Operating system (OS)
XP
Processor (CPU)
1.2 GHz
System memory (RAM) 256 MB 512 MB
Hard disk drive (HDD)
Video card (GPU) DirectX 7 compatible DirectX 9 compatible
OS X
Minimum
Operating system (OS) 10.5.8, 10.6.3
Processor (CPU) Dual core from Intel or AMD at 2.8 GHz
System memory (RAM) 1 GB
Hard disk drive (HDD)
Video card (GPU) NVIDIA GeForce 8
ATI X1600
Intel HD 3000
Linux
Minimum
Operating system (OS) Ubuntu 12.04
Processor (CPU) Dual core from Intel or AMD at 2.8 GHz
System memory (RAM) 4 GB
Hard disk drive (HDD)
Video card (GPU) NVIDIA GeForce 8600/9600GT
ATI/AMD Radeon HD2600/3600
(Graphic Drivers: nVidia 310, AMD 12.11)
OpenGL 2.1 compatible

References