Black Mesa/Unused Map Elements

This is a sub-page of Black Mesa.

This article is a work in progress. ...Well, all the articles here are, in a way. But this one moreso, and the article may contain incomplete information and editor's notes.

Black Mesa features a wealth of leftovers from level design elements that were never properly implemented. While some of these are present in the finalized maps, most can only be found in disabled visgroups within the official map sources.

In Compiled Maps

Office Complex

Executive Lounge Actbusy Routine

An Actbusy setup exists which causes the surviving scientist in the lounge to randomly walk around the room. The logic_relay set to activate it is never triggered, rendering this routine unused.

We've Got Hostiles

Orphaned Music Trigger

A trigger exists in the elevator transition between maps A and B which sends an input to a nonexistent ambient_generic to start playing a music track.

Questionable Ethics

Guard follow routine

An ai_goal_follow entity for the companion Guard of this chapter exists in map H, even though in the previous map he elects to stay behind with two of the scientists you rescued. It's possible that he once would have been able to follow you all the way to the end of the chapter and into Surface Tension.

Surface Tension

Scrapped Apache Encounter

A spawner for an Apache helicopter, named desert_heli_hostile_spawn, exists in map B of Surface Tension, likely intended to be the counterpart to the Apache that stalked the player in this area in Half-Life. Forcefully spawning it in simply causes it to fly along a short path before disappearing. An unused "patrol" path above the minefield in the same map was most likely to be used by this helicopter.

Headcrab Portal

A Xen portal in map C goes unused due to the trigger for it being improperly set up.

Interloper

Old Mine Route Leftovers

Behind this root-covered opening seen along the river after the Vortigaunt village is a lightly detailed back area and an inaccessible trigger intended to toggle several objects in the level for optimization. This has been confirmed by the developers as being part of a path leading out of the scrapped mine area.

(Source: Developer response on Discord)

Endgame

"Accept Offer" Cutscene

This cutscene was originally to be shown after the player accepted G-Man's offer, as opposed to the black screen in the final game.