In which I draw attention to an old article about level design published by Ken Birdwell of Valve Software about making great levels.

You should know that Half-Life is one of the best first persons shooters ever made. Much of what was done in that game is routine now, or has been ripped off dozens of times. Much of what they did in the game wasn’t even new to them. It had been done before in other places. But Valve put the pieces together in new and stunning ways.

The following article was written in 1999 and discusses how the game went from near failure to near perfection. It’s very worth reading.

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