Ranking Every Half-Life: Source Main Menu Background

A few days ago was the 19th anniversary of The Orange Box, which is technically my favourite game of all time. Unfortunately, I couldn't think of anything to write about in time, as I already have so much in this blog. Recently, though, I remembered a very silly idea I had a while ago related to the Half-Life series, and I've decided to give it a shot: Ranking the games' main menu backgrounds.

For context, Half-Life 2 and its episodes have dynamic title screens which change depending on where you are in the game (at least until you beat the game, then it randomly selects one every time you boot it up), and I find these super cool, as they (mostly) do a pretty good job at setting the scene of the bit you're currently in!

That being said, there are quite a few in HL2 and its episodes, fourteen in total, and I wanna do a smaller ranking first just to test it out. After all, I just did a ranking with just ten items and it turned out to be my longest post ever, so I want to have a better idea of how that'll go before I do it.

Fortunately, I have a pretty good and fittingly silly solution: Half-Life: Source! The super buggy, mostly unplayable "remaster" of the original game in the Source engine — which I actually kinda love — has five title screens which also change depending on where you are in the game. I'm gonna rank them from worst to best based on my personal preference, but I will say from now that I actually like all of them quite a bit.

So without further ado, here is the ranking!

5. Anti-Mass Spectrometer (background03)

I don't think anybody has really talked about this topic before, but if I had to guess there is one background that is probably the most common pick for being the worst, and I originally thought I'd put it at the bottom too, but after giving it a bit of thought I don't think I will. Thus, my least favourite background in the game, admittedly by default, is background03, which shows the test chamber with the anti-mass spectrometer in the Anomalous Materials chapter.

I do think this is a pretty good background that works quite well for the game, the anti-mass spectrometer is an iconic set piece, it's quite bright and very orange (the series's signature colour), and so I think it works extremely well for it. I do have a slight problem with it, though, and that's that the droning sound emitted by the anti-mass spectrometer does get quite repetitive, as it's a pretty short and obvious loop. I do think this is an issue for some of this game's backgrounds, and it might be even worse for the next background, but I have reasons as to why I ranked that higher. I had to put this last by default, but again, I still really like it.

4. Blast Pit (background07)

Like I said, objectively-speaking this might be the worst title screen in the series, but I kinda love it in a bit of an ironic way, so it slightly edges out the previous one for me. Background07 features the titular Blast Pit from that chapter (my personal favourite), and shows a bottom-up view of the tentacle-infested missile silo.

As I mentioned at the start, Half-Life: Source is notoriously buggy, and this title screen is probably one of the best examples of that, as it's actually bugged. As the game got more and more buggy, the tentacles lost the ability to damage anything, including the player and — more importantly in this case — security officers. In actual gameplay this means that the bit in Blast Pit with the security officer doesn't work whatsoever, as the tentacles can't kill the him, so they stay perpetually attacking each other forever (at least until you activate the rocket engine). That is exactly what this title screen shows.

This is definitely the loudest of the entire series, even more than the anti-mass spectrometer, and this might make it more annoying in a vacuum, but it ends up being so hilarious due to everything else that I personally don't mind. I do want to bring up that if you have mods such as Half-Life: Source Fixed it does fix the issue, which makes it more eerie and slightly quieter, but I don't think that changes my opinion much. It's iconic and a perfect representation of this game's bugginess, but in terms of being a title screen I have to keep it somewhat low.

3. Black Mesa (background02)

Here is the background the game starts on, background02! It shows one of the halls inside the Black Mesa Research Facility before the disaster, as seen in Anomalous Materials. I think this is quite a good background to start with, it shows the place where you'll spend the start of the game on, and it's also easily the simplest and quietest, as the only sounds are from the faint walking of scientists and the humming of the equipment, and the scientists are also the only things that move around.

I really like how this is specifically one of the last bits you see before the resonance cascade, and so also one of the first bits you see after it once the facility starts falling apart. I feel like it makes a seemingly standard area seem much more notable, and fitting for representing the start of the game!

2. Surface Tension (background12)

I flipflopped between the top three a lot, and this is definitely a decision I could — and probably will — change my mind on a lot in the future, but for now I think background12 is second place for me. It shows the hydroelectric dam at the beginning of Surface Tension (probably the game's most iconic and popular chapter), and it also features two H.E.C.U. grunts guarding the dam, plus an Apache helicopter that occasionally flies by. Sadly there is no Ichthyosaur, but I guess that makes sense as it doesn't pop up that often in-game anyways.

I feel like this is a fantastic background! Most of the other backgrounds are indoors, and so having one outside feels extremely fresh. The dam itself is a very iconic set piece for the game, and it has a good amount of things moving around, while not being overly loud or busy. Also this background ends up showing two of the big graphical changes this version had, being the 3D skyboxes and more realistic water, and although I am not a big fan of the water I think it actually looks fine here.

Also this is a small detail, but I really like how the dam is to the right of the background, which leaves a good amount of white space for the text to go that isn't too busy. I think all backgrounds do this to some extent, but this and the next one are definitely the best at it in my opinion.

1. Xen (background15)

Like I said earlier, I constantly moved around the rankings of these top three backgrounds, but in the end I decided that background15 is my favourite. This remains an incredibly unique background, not just for this game, but even including HL2 and its episodes, as it focuses on Xen. There are no fully Xenian title screens in Half-Life 2, the closest we get is one of the backgrounds from Episode Two, but even that is only partial and uses elements that are new to that game.

This is a true Xen background, showing the island you spawn on at the beginning of Interloper. It features some smaller islands floating around, the iconic tall pillars, and some alien crafts who emit lasers and summon vortigaunts, my personal favourite Xenian creatures! This is an incredibly unique setting, and even if the Xen chapters are probably the weakest parts of Half-Life 1, it is one of my favourite settings in the entire series, as it feels truly alien in a way that no other place does.

Similar to the Surface Tension background, it also has the advantage of having a lot of things while not being overly busy. The crafts do make noises when they shoot out their lasers, but I feel like they're spaced out pretty well and not super loud, so they feel fine. It also does a very good job with the white space once again! I just find this background perfect for the game, even if it is from one of its not-so-perfect bits.

And that's it!

Yeah, turns out even just reviewing five items takes me over 1,500 words. To be fair, that number does count the introduction and this ending bit, so it's not that bad, but also HL2 and its episodes have almost three times as many backgrounds, so I might have to pace myself more when I do that.

I had a lot of fun with this! It was fun to look at another aspect of the game that a lot of people probably haven't thought about (not that people are thinking much about this version of the game lmao), and provide my thoughts on it. I hope you enjoyed it too, and feel free to share your own thoughts on these backgrounds or HL2's if you have any!

I'll leave a link to the HL2 background ranking once I do it right here.