Proto:Half-Life (Windows)/Build 725 (Oct 19, 1998)

This is a sub-page of Proto:Half-Life (Windows).

To do: Document map differences, there are many. You can use this commit as a guideline for the entity differences in singleplayer maps.

  This prototype is documented on Hidden Palace.

A Half-Life prototype from October 19th, 1998 marked "Beta 12" and "Net Test 2" was found and dumped by tester Chad Jessup. It predates the US gold release by just 17 days. It contains an unused map and a few minor differences from the final game.

This build is protected with a CD check and a system date check, which requires the host machine's date to be set to October 1998. This can be circumvented by using a patcher or done manually with a hex editor; e.g editing hl.exe and changing the byte 81 to C3 at offset 271776 for the CD check and 22 to 6B at offset 277199 for the date check.

Documents

The CD installer comes with multiple documents for testers on how to give feedback for the game. These documents are transcribed in the following sub-pages:

Readme

readme Two readme files that detail general testing instructions.

Docs

Bugs Bugs Bugs Document for bug reporting.

Early Reactions Document for testers to write down their initial reactions.

Install and Setup Document for any issues during install.

Multiplayer Document for multiplayer setup and questions.

Overall Summary Document for testers' thoughts after completing the game.

Uninstall Document for uninstall methods.

Map Differences

To do: Replace placeholder images.

"We've Got Hostiles"

c1a3b

It is possible to go through the gaps in the electric fences (and survive with enough health and armor), making the outside area explorable. The final game has these gaps clipped off.

On A Rail

c2a2e

The elevator's top level has 3 tripmines "blocking" the exit, but they can be easily jumped through its gaps. The final game swaps these for a stack of explosives.

Prototype	Final

c2a2h

The rocket launch center still has its unaltered original sequence, where three scientists are hiding inside the computer room. The grunts outside must be killed first, the doors will then open and one of the scientists must be lead into the retinal scanner.

The player can crawl through the windows in the launch room, something not possible in the final game.

• 

  Corridor outside the computer room.

• 

  Prerelease screenshot.

• 

  The same room, as seen in the prototype.

Apprehension

c2a3e

The final game adds an invisible "box" that prevents movement for the first few moments of being teleported to the compactor, which breaks into gibs once the first crate is broken.

"Forget About Freeman!"

Unused Map

c3a1c is a cut map present in this build. It starts off in the hidden elevator from "Forget about Freeman!" (map c3a1) containing the red triangle, now to the left of the player. After exiting the elevator, the player goes through the starting area of map c3a1b. After that, however, is a dome with a satellite dish on it, similar to what's shown on the Uplink demo, albeit in a less finished state. The objective is the same: tune the transmitter to the US NRC.

A Stukabat model is seen at the very top of the dome. However, it is only a cycler entity, and as such, will cycle through its animations when shot at.

This map has no defined sky texture, and will fallback to the one used from the last loaded map or the default "desert" sky.

The map is also using an older version of the BSP file format, the same one present in the September 1997 prototype and Quake.

• 

  The starting elevator.

• 

  The radiation-filled room.

• 

  The satellite.

• 

  Satellite tuned to the US NRC.

• 

  The Stukabat.

Interloper

c4a1b

Item distribution is largely different here, mostly in secluded areas.

The last portion of the map has five tripmines as loot. The final game swaps these for a medkit, and adds a weaponbox and dead body near the teleport.

Prototype	Final

Multiplayer

All of the Deathmatch maps are named hldmX internally instead of the actual map name, where X is a number.

Monster Differences

Gargantua

Gargantuas fully play their death animation, without exploding, fading out once complete. This usually results in some major clipping during its intended death sequence in Power Up.

Unused Graphics

gfx.wad

• 

  XLAMBDA

• 

  XLAMBDA1

gfx.wad has two additional lambda icons not present in the final version. Purpose unknown.

Texture Differences

gfx.wad

Texture	Prototype	Final
PAUSED

The pause graphic is larger.

halflife.wad

Texture	Prototype	Final
PEPSI_SD
PEPSI_FT

The Pepsi branded vending machine textures are uncensored.

c3a1c

Curiously, some textures embedded into the unused map c3a1c differ from their final versions, as well as using textures that can only be found in the September 1997 build.

Texture	c3a1c	halflife.wad
C1A1_W1B
TNNL_FLR6B
TNNL_W12A
Texture	c3a1c	September 1997 prototype
+1~METALSTCH2
GENERIC041
OUT_HCW1

Model Differences

Player

Prototype	Final

Gordon's model is similar to his Day One demo counterpart, including all the different animations. The gender bodygroup has been replaced with a helmet bodygroup, and the weapons bodygroup has been removed entirely. The model is the same in Net Test 1.

p_crossbow.mdl

Prototype	Final

Texture	Prototype	Final
stock.bmp
sightcyl.bmp
recieverside.bmp
world_grip.bmp

The Crossbow's model as held by a player features less saturated, more natural looking wooden grips and a slightly less detailed scope. The model is the same in Net Test 1.

p_egon.mdl

Prototype	Final

The Gluon Gun's model as held by a player uses an older, much less refined design. The textures are the same as the early viewmodel, merely downscaled. However it uses a very basic mesh, with no backpack and poor UV mapping. The view model (w_egon2) for this version of the Gluon Gun is present in the Half-Life SDK with less detailed textures. The model is the same in Net Test 1.

p_rpg.mdl

Prototype	Final

The RPG as held by a player has its design as seen in the Day One demo and in some pre-release screenshots. The model is the same in Net Test 1.

v_crossbow.mdl

Prototype	Final

The Crossbow's viewmodel center has a unique texture, internally named recslide.bmp. The model is the same in Net Test 1.

Alien Slave

Texture	Prototype	Final
Toes1.bmp

Vortigaunt toes are a solid grey rectangle in the prototype, seemingly by mistake as the Day One models doesn't share this oddity. The model is the same in Net Test 1.

Multiplayer

There are only four multiplayer models in the models/player folder.
All four multiplayer player models are close to their final counterparts save for two major differences; their default textures feature much more saturated colors and use animations from the Day One demo.

Gina

Prototype	Final

Texture	Prototype	Final
DM_Base.bmp
DM_Face.bmp

Gordon

Prototype	Final

Texture	Prototype	Final
DM_Base.bmp
DM_Face.bmp

Helmet

Prototype	Final

Texture	Prototype	Final
DM_Base.bmp

Human Grunt

Prototype	Final

Texture	Prototype	Final
DM_Base.bmp

Text Differences

The Hazard course has no title. In fact, its entry in titles.txt is blank.

T0A0TITLE
{

}

The following blank entries are also missing:

OPENTITLE3
OPENTITLE4
C4A1BTITLE
C4A1CTITLE
C4A1ETITLE
C4A1FTITLE

Strings related to spectating, multiplayer scoreboards, teamplay and replays are not present here.

Menu Differences

• The "3D info site" button is missing entirely. This button was seemingly added in the very last days of development, as even Build 738 (4 days before release) doesn't have it.
• The "Content Control" button is called the "Gore reduction" button in this build.
• The button to view the readme has different capitalization, saying "View readme.txt" rather than "View Readme.txt"
• The "LAN game" button has wonky capitalization and instead says "Lan game"
• The WON logo is not present anywhere in the settings.

Player Customization

The player customization menu is unfinished; most options do not work, with only the player name and color actually being saved:

• The model preview is not displayed at all, although there is a box to display it.
• The spray preview is also not displayed, although there is a box to display it and the actual spray icons are identical to the final game.
• The UI here generally has rendering issues - the color customization box may not be completely displayed, if at all.

Product Previews

These do not exist at all; clicking the "Previews" button to view them causes an error as the HTML files displaying them are not present - the only HTML file packaged with the game is a list of driver websites for GPUs of the era.

Control Differences

• There is an additional control binding in this build inherited from Quake, "messagemode2", used for team chat. It has been completely removed for the final. This may relate in some form to the scrapped cooperative multiplayer mode.
• The "key descriptions" in the various kb_* files don't exist in this build - only the actual key names are listed.

Miscellaneous

• p_shotgun.mdl and p_9mmar.mdl appear as they do in the Day One demo.
• Sound settings are not set up in valve.rc
• joystick.cfg is not run by default.
• The German models are present in their own folders.
• The default value of gl_zoffset on Nvidia RIVA TNT cards (rivatnt.cfg) was changed from 0 to 0.1.

3DLabs GPU support

It appears that 3Dlabs GPUs had not been thoroughly tested with Half-Life as of this build, as various settings were tweaked by the final to work around buggy drivers and general poor support for 3D graphics techniques:

• Overbright is enabled by default (in the final game, it is disabled by default).
• Colored lighting is enabled by default (in the final game, it is disabled by default).
• Fullbright is always enabled by default (in the final game, it is disabled by default).
• Paletted textures are enabled by default. In the final game they were disabled because, according to a comment in the file, although the Permedia 2 GPU advertises support for paletted textures in its OpenGL driver, they show up as white when they are actually rendered by the game.
• "Amplitude of waves in GL (temporary)" comment removed