Hunt Down the Freeman is a 2018 first-person shooter video game developed and published by indie developer Royal Rudius Entertainment exclusively through the Steam distribution platform. It is a fangame of the Half-Life series by Valve Corporation, and follows U.S. Marine Mitchell Shephard through several major events in the series canon as he attempts to find and kill Gordon Freeman.
The game was released to a negative reception, receiving criticism for its numerous bugs, perceived poor design, and allegations of copyright infringement.
Gameplay
Hunt Down the Freeman is a single-player first-person shooter in which players take control of Mitchell Shephard. The game features several mechanics from the Half-Life series, but also includes several elements unusual to the series, such as the ability to aim a weapon's sight, different running mechanics, and cutscenes, making it closer in design to typical first-person shooters. Uniquely, it uses a parkour mechanic, which the player can use to scale pipes, crates, and other large objects.
Plot
During the Black Mesa incident, United States Marine Corps Sergeant Mitchell Shephard (Mick Lauer), part of the Hazardous Environment Combat Unit (HECU), is deployed with his squad to the Black Mesa Research Facility to cover-up the incident and kill Gordon Freeman, a Black Mesa researcher resisting the cover-up operation. Suddenly, a person in an HEV suit, implied to be Freeman, ambushes and kills Shephard's squad members and severely wounds him. Shephard is recovered and rushed to a hospital in nearby Albuquerque, New Mexico; before he loses consciousness, Shephard is approached by the G-Man (Rick), who cryptically promises him an unspecified reward for killing Freeman "when the time comes".
When Shephard comes to, he finds the hospital abandoned and learns Earth is being invaded by the Combine. Shephard fights his way out of the hospital and through Albuquerque, linking up with National Guardsman Alex (Alexander Beltman) and Black Ops agent Adam (Vincent Cyr) along the way. In a transit station, they meet an Army Rangers unit led by Colonel Cue (Michael Green) and learn from a radio broadcast from the President of the United States (Keemstar) that the world's governments have surrendered to the Combine only seven hours into the invasion to avoid human extinction. The group decides to flee to Nevada; however, their train is attacked by the Combine, and only Shephard, Alex, and Adam survive. In Nevada, they link up with another Rangers unit led by Lieutenant Harvey (Jonathan Benlolo) and escape with them to the Pacific Northwest. Coming across a port, Shephard finds the container ship Avalon Vale and its captain, Roosevelt (Oliver Colton). When Roosevelt is killed in a Combine attack, Shephard takes control of the survivors and forms his own private army operating out of a series of oil platforms.
Three years later, in a Combine-administered Earth, Shephard travels to City 9 in Alaska and discovers a Combine factory operated with child slaves. After negotiating with the factory's administrator, Boris (Vincent Fallow), Shephard rescues the children and brings them back to his outpost to train as soldiers. Seventeen years later, the G-Man instructs Shephard to travel to City 17 and kill Freeman. Together with Adam, Shephard allies with the Combine and attacks the Resistance base at Black Mesa East. After the attack, he is captured by the Resistance before being rescued by Boris' daughter Sasha (Eli Walker). Adam suddenly appears and kills Sasha, urging Shephard to run. After escaping the Resistance, Shephard confronts the G-Man, who reveals that Adam was the one who attacked him at Black Mesa as part of a deal between the two. The G-Man goes on to explain that Shephard's actions have weakened the Combine, allowing Freeman to defeat them, the intended result of the G-Man's trickery. Shephard then proceeds towards a factory overseen by Boris, who mistakenly believes that he killed Sasha and orders a Combine force to kill him; however, Shephard defeats them and returns to the Avalon Vale. Discovering that Adam has attempted to seize control over his army, Shephard confronts and kills him before directing the ship to set sail for a stranded research vessel named the Borealis.
Development and release
Hunt Down the Freeman began as a modification for Half-Life 2. The game was initially pitched for crowdfunding through Indiegogo with a goal of , though only was raised. Despite this, development on Hunt Down the Freeman commenced, and a demo of the game was released in 2016. Following the game's full release in 2018, achievements were added a year later.