Hyper

[Витой]

Here I'd like to discuss everything related to the first HL2 storyline draft that Valve seriously worked on - the "Hyper".

Why hyper? It's the name of a batch file from the HL2 WC Map Pack, dated 1999. The name "Hyper" is short from "Hyperborea" - the earlier name of the "Borealis".

Here's what we currently know about it:

Information gathered from Marc Laidlaw's summary - this was retrieved from an answer he gave in response to one of my letters to him:

In that version, you started on the ice, on foot, near the ice-locked Borealis, and then you boarded it, made you way through the ship, the ship travelled out of the ice and you boarded a minisub that took you down to an underwater lab run by Dr. Mossman and an army of stalkers. The lab was flooded, you narrowly escaped in an escape pod, were rescued by rebels and fought your way to a weather station where you boarded a C40 that flew you to the city where you crashed into a skyscraper and worked your way down through the ruined building to ground level where...my memories become unclear because we never built most of this. We already felt it wasn't working and we were moving on to more compelling scenarios.

Here's another answer Laidlaw gave to one of my friends about the "Free TVs era", where he gave more info on the first map:

The Borealis figured in the story from very early on—in fact, for a while HL2 began there. You would start in the fog, on the ice, hearing a ship bell tolling, and make your way forward until it appeared from the mist and you’d clamber in through a hole in the hull and explore from there. Eventually you’d get into a submersible that would be lowered through the ice and down to Kraken Base, an undersea research lab where you’d meet Dr. Mossman.

What's interesting here is that the description he gave about how the game would start, with an ice-locked Borealis (except it was called "Hyperborea" back then) and how the player was to hear the ship's bell fits pretty well what we actually have on the "demo_arctic" map from the WC Map Pack. The Map was last edited on September 6th 2001, when the storyline was already changed and game wasn't meant to start near the Hyperborea/Borealis, so my idea about it is that it was built from some actual prototype they made back in 1999 for that "Hyper" draft.

This draft's confirmed chapters:

1) Hyperborea - We'd travel through an ice-locked icebreaker, find Odell, turn on the engine to free the ship from the ice and board the submarine, heading to the underwater "Kraken" lab.
2) Kraken - a secret resistance base set underwater. Was to be run by Dr. Mossman. We would find an "army of stalkers" there, however it's not clear what Marc meant by that. In one of John Grinn's sketches there were glass tanks with humanoid bodies inside; these bodies could be stalkers. At some point during our visit the lab was to be flooded, most likely by Dr. Mossman who was a double agent for the Combine and we would have to hurry to the escape pods.
3) Weather Control - When we'd get to the surface we were to be saved by some Resistance members. We would make our way to Captain Vance and his group of conscripts, and together we'd attack a Combine facility called the "Weather Control Station". After the battle we were to board a C-130 to get to City 17.

[DIAMOND]

Na Russki perevedi nichego ne ponatno! 

From Витой: Don't post in Russian language at English section, please.
We have Hyper thread there aswell.



Ладно больше не буду постить русское на английском :3

[Mister.K]

Im working to recreate this story

[(♮)0bs0l3t3_Pr09r4m(♮)]

Honestly, the "Hyper-Era" is one of the era's of  HL2's development that gives me the most confusion. Why would they start it where a mid point of a story would begin. Was it purposely confusing to disorient the player? This era leaves me confused. 

[FleshbangXD]

Honestly, the "Hyper-Era" is one of the era's of  HL2's development that gives me the most confusion. Why would they start it where a mid point of a story would begin. Was it purposely confusing to disorient the player? This era leaves me confused. 

I don't think it was supposed to start "midway" as this was near the beginning of hl2's development so the concepts of areas like Airex, the wastelands, canals etc were ideas implemented later and they probably realized that at some point that only 6 chapters wasn't enough for a game so they made city 17 the starting point then in 2001 incorporated new ideas to fill in the gap.

[(♮)0bs0l3t3_Pr09r4m(♮)]

Yeah, I am guessing that is the case. They probably knew they needed setup in the story for stuff like the Hyper-borea and other things.