One of our favorite Half-Life 2 mods is getting a stealth game prequel where you’re a Combine assassin preying on the human resistance

The cult classic Half-Life 2 mod series Entropy: Zero has another entry in the works, and speaking as a fan of Thief, Deus Ex, and all things immersive sim, Entropy: Zero 2 – Progenitors may be the most exciting one yet.

Entropy: Zero has always presented the bad guys’ side of things in Half-Life, but Progenitors trades the first two episodes’ standard Combine trooper for a super sneaky assassin type⁠—she strikes me as a riff on the black ops ninjas from Half-Life 1.

Progenitors takes place an indeterminate amount of time after the Seven Hour War where the Combine took over the Earth, and our assassin protagonist is charged with taking out the rogue Progenitor from which the Combine’s soldiers were first cloned or otherwise derived (or something). If Mr. P turns out to be Adrian Shephard from Opposing Force, I’ll think about eating my shoe.

It’s a neat take on the Half-Life lore bolstered by some great visual direction. All of the Entropies: Zero have done a great job of blending and homaging various eras of Half-Life⁠—Zero 2 took place in an Aperture Science facility and paired you with a snarky turret companion⁠—and Progenitors looks to be turning its gaze toward Opposing Force. I’m particularly fond of the evil Combine United Nations logo⁠—it’s giving the dark Nazi future gags from MachineGames’ Wolfensteins.

As for gameplay, developer Blixibon has been sharing clips of new weapons and mechanics on YouTube, and Progenitors looks incredibly ambitious⁠—practically an immersive sim, or at least a shooter-immsim hybrid like Dark Messiah or the aforementioned neo-Wolfensteins. Blixibon’s latest clip shows a player pickpocketing an enemy soldier then throwing a beer bottle to distract him. We have Dishonored 3 at home, god bless it.

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Progenitors does not have an estimated release date, and the latest blog post on its ModDB page alludes to development difficulties and creative burnout on the part of some team members.

But it sounds like the worst of it is behind them, and this is an incredibly exciting project. You can keep up with Entropy: Zero 2 – Progenitors via its ModDB page and Blixibon’s YouTube channel.

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