A Half-Life bug that went unchecked for a quarter of a century finally gets fixed

For the 25th anniversary of Half-Life, Valve not only released a documentary about the iconic FPS, but also sent out a pretty significant update to celebrate. While the Half-Life patch brought with it some bug fixes, there was one that it didn’t manage to iron out. Until now, that is.

In a short clip uploaded to Twitter/X by user @VinciusMedeiro6, another update that rolled out recently has fixed an issue with the Blast Pit chapter of the game. Anyone who’s familiar with Half-Life will be familiar with this section, and the bug in question concerns an unlucky scientist.

When Gordon Freeman steps into a control room, a giant, tentacled monster crashes through a window and grabs a panicked, lab coat-wearing NPC. Unfortunately, perhaps due to limitations at the time, the boffin is dragged off by the monster, but the off animation makes it seem like he’s floating in midair.

Argh! A flying scientist!

This little immersion-breaking hiccup has been part and parcel of Half-Life for the past 25 years. Even the big anniversary update didn’t fix it. But now, it seems Valve saw fit to finally give this small (but wholly iconic) cutscene some additional care.

You can see the result in the clip posted above. For a comparison, @VinciusMedeiro6 also uploaded the original. This way, you can really see the difference this little tweak has made to what must have been a terrifying ordeal for the bespectacled scientist.

Since turning a quarter of a century old, Half-Life has enjoyed something of a resurgence, reaching its highest-ever player peak, even without fixing this bug. It sort of cements just how significant the release was (and still is), both in the FPS genre and in gaming in general.