Mr. Friendly

Mr. Friendly is an alien enemy cut from Half-Life. It lacked of convincing AI and gameplay goals but was scripted regardless. It can be found in the game files.

Depiction
One of Mr. Friendly's proposed attacks was to pound the ground and knock the player's weapon out of his hand. It was even suggested that Gordon's glasses fly off and leave the player stuck in combat with blurry vision - quite a challenge regarding the game technology used back then. He was also to have a very awkward, shuffling movement. He was to walk on spurs, creating the same noise as fingernails on a chalkboard as it moved around.

History


According to the book Raising the Bar, Valve member Ken Birdwell had a friend with a 12-year-old brother who used to draw. He always liked his work so he decided to ask him, several years later, to do a couple of sketches of possible monsters. He made several very sexual-oriented monsters to him and Gabe Newell, managing director, the kind of stuff Birdwell didn't expect. Among them was this "Mr. Friendly", with something that looked like a penis. The creature was literally to "rape" the player, holding them with its tentacled arms until the point of fatal copulation. Birdwell was quite disturbed by the concept and wondered if Newell would like it. He actually did. Then, they chatted about possible psycho-sexual alien behaviors and their relation with disturbed teenager sexual fantasies. Also, the sexual themes of some of the enemies was intended to appeal to the innate homophobia of 12 year old boys, who would most likely pursue purchase of the game. Mr. Friendly was to have a walking animation that resembled two lizards mating. Of course, none of these concepts were included into any games of the series, being obviously not suitable for younger audiences.

This also accounts for the Gonarch's testicular appearance and ability to expel a sticky white substance.

Trivia
Appears in the Half-Life mod Absolute Redemption, as well as the USS Darkstar mod.