Cole Luke - Blog
Thank you old game enjoyers for keeping my childhood alive
Keeping the dream going one tossed toilet at a time
I am going through my yearly feverish Half-Life obsession. I replay all the games and fall madly in love with the series that changed gaming for me (and countless others) forever.
Each time I go through this fervent period, I am always pleasantly surprised to find players eternally launching toilets and radiators into their foes’ faces on Half-Life 2: Deathmatch. The last holdouts of an oft-forgotten game keep a huge part of my childhood alive.
It is a strange thing to go seeking the past and find it exactly how you left it. You don’t find this in the real world. Places decay, trees grow taller, buildings are built, sands shift – yet, HL2:DM just is.
Of course, there are mods and the like, but there is a small dedicated core player-base who play the game – and the same now iconic maps – in its original form. Hearing the constant thrum of gravity guns is like going back into the womb and hearing your mothers’ heartbeat (…maybe).
I want to thank those players, many of whom I suspect are just like me.
A special mention goes to those keeping The Sanctuary servers alive. My brother and I loved to play on these back in the day and it is utterly surreal to still hear The Cult’s She Sells Sanctuary ring out on connecting. I will truly mourn the day these servers are no longer with us.
I also want to thank them for putting up with my leaderboard-topping shenanigans as my neurons formed in the primordial gloop of BSP maps begin to wake up and take over as if I am some sort of Source Engine sleeper agent. These are the streets I cut my teeth on and I can walk down them any time I like. What a privilege.
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