Background Art (Evolution)

Before the retail release, the background for the main menu was a texture image instead of a 3D background, different background textures was used throughout development

2003 Leak

Version 1: City 17

located in the leak under gfx/shell is a file named "splash.bmp", this image depicts a very early version of city 17, back when it took place in America, as the image depicts American-style buildings and skyscrapers. The image itself is from 1998 (based on the copyright info on Splash8bit.bmp), during the Pre-Pitch Era, and based on how it's formatted as the non-steam/retail Half Life 1 and how other files in this directory are pre-steam Half Life 1 menu remnants, this texture could've been used very early on, likely between 1999 to early 2000, during the Hyper Era. It should also be noted that the bottom right of the image could very well be the earliest logo for Half Life 2.

Oddly, Splash8bit.bmp, which is located in the same directory, depicts the same image, but with a copyright noticed on the left-hand side

This background art also has a loading texture as well located in gfx/status called "loading.bmp", which is also formatted as the non-steam/retail version of Half Life 1. The texture itself appears to be an almost exact copy of Splash, except now it's black and white, and has text that says "Loading" in yellow color

The first oddity, is the loading image, while appearing exactly the same as Splash (minus the obvious differences explained above), it does have 1 new difference, the "2" on the logo is much bigger than on Splash.bmp, which might suggest that these versions are earlier iterations of Splash.bmp

Another oddity is that 2 other background files exist in this directory as well besides loading.bmp. The first background is titled "gordon_loading.bmp" which, besides the new file name, appears to be an exact copy of loading.bmp. The second background, titled "Logo.bmp", appears to be the same image as loading.bmp but without the loading text

Version 2: Gordon Freeman

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Version 3: Citadel

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Retail

intro.bsp

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Final

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Other

Dark Messiah of Might and Magic: Blurred HL2 Logo

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