I’m not sure whether or not I’ve mentioned this before, but there’s a cracking single-player episode for Half-Life 2 called MINERVA out that’s really worth a look if that’s your bag. It’s free to download - and there’s a handy Bit Torrent link on that website - and was made by a very talented chap called Adam Foster.

Map designers have always had to think about item placement, bottlenecks, chokepoints and so on but modern engines like Source, Doom and Unreal introduce other problems. Increased audio/visual fidelity makes producing all new content much more difficult and time-consuming - and, for commercial game developers, much more expensive - and ultimately mean that community-produced add-ons more often than not tend to be mediocre at best. All of these factors affect both single- and multi-player maps but single-player maps also have the added complication of having to move the player through the narrative as well as being coherent and consistent.

MINERVA, I’m glad to say, is one of those single-player maps - like The Widening Gyre, a community-produced map for Quake 2 that I’m still very fond of - that confounds expectations by being really rather good. It’s a follow-on from a map that Adam Foster produced for the original Half-Life (and which has now been updated to work with Steam) and centres around mysterious Combine activity on - and beneath - a remote island. Good stuff.

Two of the bestest games ever in the history of gaming are The Secret of Monkey Island and The Secret of Monkey Island 2: LeChuck’s Revenge (the other games in the series were pretty mediocre). These two games were created by Ron Gilbert, who recently made a tongue-in-cheek post on his blog to the effect that the new Pirates of the Caribbean movie rips off ideas from his games.

Now, anyone who is a dirty Monkey Island nerd (and frankly that should be everyone) knows that Gilbert ‘borrowed’ some of the ideas for his two Monkey Island games from the Disney ride that the Pirates… movies are based on. But despite that and the fact that his post is a pretty blatant joke, some people are still taking his ‘claim’ seriously. Fools!

Regardless, I can’t wait for the new Pirates of the Caribbean movie; the first one was fantastic and anything that makes me want to dig out my Monkey Island collector’s edition CD can only be a good thing…

As I mentioned below, I’ve been playing Half-Life 2: Episode 1 over the past few weeks - in fact, I completed it the other day.

For those that don’t know, Half-Life 2: Episode 1 (stupid bloody name) is the first release in a three part experiment in episodic gaming; Valve regard this trilogy of episodes as Half-Life 3 and HL2:Ep1 picks up right where Half Life 2 ended by revealing how Alyx Vance survived the explosion at the top of the Citadel. And it’s great: it’s been criticised by many as being more of the same and that’s true - but I don’t think that’s a criticism because I happened to like Half Life 2, gott damn it.

Alyx plays a much bigger role in this adventure than in HL2. Valve have described it as ’single-player co-op’ and she does indeed accompany you for most of the game, helping to dispense with baddies, offering hints about how to beat certain puzzles and generally helping to alleviate some of the tension, of which there is plenty.

Much of the middle third of the game is spent in complete darkness, the only light source your HEV suit’s built-in flashlight. Which, of course, can only run for a limited period of time before its battery needs to recharge - usually when you’re surrounded by zombies. Alyx needs your light in order to take out the baddies and quips about asking Dr. Kleiner to increase the battery life if you get out of this alive…

My only real gripe with the game is an entirely subjective one and that is that there are too many damn zombies! I’m not a fan of the ‘horror’ sections in the Half-Life games so the middle third of this wasn’t as enjoyable for me as it could have been but that’s not to say that I didn’t entirely enjoy it. It’s probably a compliment actually - I don’t like the horror sections because they freak me out so much, so the games must be doing something right. However, where some people would have savoured every moment, taking their time, I felt inclined to rush through as quickly as possible.

Can’t wait for episode 2. Oh, if you play this, make sure you watch the credits; otherwise you won’t see the teaser for the next installment and you won’t show up properly in Valve’s stats.