In an alternate timeline, Ravenholm is a Half-Life 2 spinoff from Arkane Studios that we can gleefully download off of Steam. Sadly, real life is terrible, and the project never actually came out. Thankfully, we can finally see what it looks like in motion.
Noclip, a YouTube channel that produces excellent video game documentaries, got ahold of some footage of Ravenholm. More than an hour of it, in fact. Anyone familiar with Dishonored or Deathloop, Arkane’s other games, will probably recognize the studio’s sneaky style. It’s not what you typically expect from one of the best shooters of all time, but very cool nonetheless.
Watch the lengthy documentary on Ravenholm below. Definitely make some time for this if you have even a passing interest in Half-Life 2.
It’s certainly not lacking the gloomy vibes that the original Ravenholm section of Half-Life 2 had. The shambling undead zombies look slightly out of place, but those are undoubtedly placeholder models of some sort.
According to Polygon, there were several names for Ravenholm while it was in development. At one point, it was called Half-Life 2: Episode 4, and later Return to Ravenholm. The ‘final’ name probably works best, though.
Written by Kyle Campbell on behalf of GLHF.
