Black Mesa

Black Mesa is an American research corporation whose headquarters are located in the Black Mesa Research Facility, in the New Mexico desert.

Fields array
Black Mesa undertakes research in various fields from standard scientific research to radiation, rocketry, theoretical physics, lasers, experimental propulsion, hydraulics, robotics, hydroelectricity, genetics, zoology, applied mathematics and a very wide spectrum of research into chemistry and all manner of physics research. The research is mostly conducted in the Black Mesa Research Facility and includes both pure research and applied science.

In addition to this legitimate research, several secret projects are also carried out at Black Mesa, which are deliberately left vague. A large amount of classified research is carried out, including the development of high-tech weapons and defense systems, research into extra-dimensional travel, teleportation, and the study of Xen. During the tram ride into the Black Mesa Facility that opens Half-Life, an announcement on the public address system states that the facility is seeking employees with backgrounds in theoretical physics, biotechnology, and various other high-tech scientific disciplines. It is also said that jobs in low-clearance security and materials handling are available. Black Mesa, as the same announcement states, is an equal opportunity employer.

Personnel
Black Mesa employs in its facility two main groups of civilian employees: science personnel and security personnel, along with various other inhabitants including administrative personnel, service personnel and occasionally the employees' families. The base also keeps a small military presence.

Competitors
Little is known about Black Mesa's competitors. It is known that Aperture Science was competing with Black Mesa on various government contracts, including the development of portal technology. In addition, according to potentially biased information from Aperture Science, Black Mesa received a much larger percentage of contracts than average. The effect that the Xen Invasion had on Aperture Science or any of Black Mesa's unnamed competitors is unknown as of now.

Behind the scenes



 * Series' writer Marc Laidlaw coined the name "Black Mesa Research Facility". He came up with other names during his brainstorming, including "Black Butte [unreadable] Missile Base" (located in Montana instead of New Mexico), "Sand Basin", "Diablo Mesa", "Mesa Diablo", "Diablo Plains", or "Fertile Plains". He states it is great fun for Valve to invent names for their creations, and then see them go out into the world and take on lives of their own. He also states he is very glad he decided to go with "Black Mesa Research Facility" rather than "Black Butte".


 * As with Aperture Science, the Black Mesa logo is directly based on the company's name, appearing as a stylized mesa mountain against the sky.

List of appearances

 * Half-Life: Day One
 * Half-Life
 * Half-Life: Uplink
 * Half-Life: Opposing Force
 * Half-Life: Blue Shift
 * Half-Life: Decay
 * Half-Life 2
 * Half-Life 2: Raising the Bar
 * Half-Life 2: Episode One
 * Portal
 * Half-Life 2: Episode Two