Does Nobody Else Remember The Half-Life Game Codename: Gordon?
It’s 2003. Hair gel is in short supply, double denim is all the rage, and Half-Life 2 is a year away from release. The beta has been leaked in its entirety, it’s slated by the community and pushes Valve back to the drawing board. Delays spark, faith dwindles, but anticipation is still incredibly high. The fans and the industry at large are eager to see what the sequel to the revolutionary ‘90s FPS will look like. Codename: Gordon, a flash sidescroller, debuts to market Half-Life 2. It’s a fun distraction but as quickly as it appears, it fades into obscurity, becoming a gem remembered by few.
I wasn’t born when the original Half-Life launched, but I remember sitting with my dad, watching him play it. Some of my earliest memories come from the second level, the calm before the storm. Only, I’d erase that calm with cheat codes by spawning zombies, vortigaunts, and alien grunts while layering corridors with trip mines to catch unsuspecting scientists off-guard. Around three years old, Codename: Gordon launched, and I remember it vaguely but vividly enough to leave a nostalgic imprint as extensive as the Half-Life games themselves.
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It was a stroke of Valve’s marketing genius, something that persists even today. Collaboration between studios to prop up titles is pretty rare. Marketing is typically done by dropping a trailer, pushing a social media campaign, or attending an event. Valve still does all of that, but for Half-Life 2, it went the extra mile.
Codename: Gordon started as a fan project for the DS but when Valve noticed, it brought the studio into the fold to make it a promotional tie-in. It was originally slated to launch on April
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