Half-Life 3: Return to Black Mesa



Half-Life 3: Return to Black Mesa is the fourth main installment in the Half-Life series, following Half-Life, Half-Life: Alyx and Half-Life 2.

It is followed by a sequel Half-Life 4: Return to City 17, which spawned the Half-Life: Return to... subseries.

Synopsis
Dr. Arne Magnusson and Eli Vance realise that the only way to get rid of the G-Man is to go back and time and prevent the resonance cascade from occurring. Gordon Freeman, Barney Calhoun and a deaf woman named Sarah Lawson go on a trip to the Borealis, where a captured Alyx Vance - now working for the G-Man - is being sent to. Sarah is revealed to be the daughter of Wallace Breen and wanting revenge for his death, and shows that he is now a baby grub. Sarah is killed and Freeman hijacks the Borealis and travels back in time, where he is back in the Black Mesa Hazard Course.

Racing through the Hazard Course the G-Man attempts to stop him by setting up deadly traps, but Freeman makes it to the tram. He arrives earlier for work and attempts to reverse the Black Mesa Incident, only to find that Judith Mossman is now in Gordon's place as being responsible for pushing the sample into the beam. This triggers the resonance cascade and Freeman is caught in a blast. G-Man communicates with Freeman, revealing that he had "nudged" time again which has placed Mossman in Freeman's place, although G-Man has no further use for her. He states that his employees "plans" must always go ahead. G-Man stashes Freeman aboard an osprey which is located outside of time and space, and is residence to Adrian Shephard.

Freeman and Shephard manage to escape through G-Man's portal and back to Black Mesa. They avert G-Man destroying the facility and discover the Borealis. They fly it into Xen and then into the future, where the Combine are still in control of earth. Guiding it to the Combine Overworld, they plan to plunge it into their main base of operations. But Freeman and Shephard discover that the Combine have multiple dyson spheres, thus proving that the Combine is way too big for them. They decide to use the Borealis anyway, but Freeman gets plucked out by the vortigaunts and Shephard is left to die.

Freeman wakes up in the distant future, where he is trapped on an island and wonders if their struggle against the Combine actually meant anything in the end.

In a post-credit scene, obese security guard Otis Laurey manages to climb out of Black Mesa, and makes his way to an uncertain future.

Sequels

 * Half-Life 4: Return to City 17