Dr. Breen's Private Reserve

"Here. Let me buy you a drink."

- Alyx Vance

Dr. Breen's Private Reserve, written "Dr>Breens Private Reserve", is the brand of a drink manufactured by the Combine. Vending machines for that drink are seen around City 17.

Overview

 * Like the water, the ">B" drink probably affects the memory of Citizens ("Don't drink the water. They put something in it to make you forget. I don't even remember how I got here.").
 * As in Half-Life and its expansions, the vending machines deliver blue cans with ">B" written on them, although they don't give one health point to the player, being simple props. A view of the can model however in the Source SDK model viewer show alternate colors, red and yellow. It is possible the team considered at some point giving the cans the same properties as in Half-Life and its expansions, but it was scrapped for some reason, Health Chargers, Medkits and health vials being considered a sufficient health source.
 * The first vending machine is seen in the City 17 Trainstation, right after the turnstile.
 * After leaving Barney at the start of Half-Life 2, a Metrocop prevents Gordon from getting into the trainstation's food hall and will not let him go until he picks up a ">B" can he purposely threw on the ground with his Stun Baton, saying the words "Pick up that can", then laughing, saying "All right. You can go." and letting him pass. This was made to show the player the abilities of the "Use" key.
 * A vending machine hides the entrance to Kleiner's Lab. It was apparently converted to open itself with a specific code.
 * In the garage where Rebels are fixing cars near the Combine Autogun, a red ">B" can be seen lying next to a car being repaired. This hints that other type of drinks are made, likely all affecting the drinker's health; therefore the Rebel near the can probably did not drink it. Soon after the car is fixed, both red and yellow cans can be seen on tables near a Lambda cache under a nearby tree.

Behind the scenes

 * The vending machine was originally a brush. It can be found in several WC mappack maps, such as City 17 Trainstation, Ravenholm or Borealis maps. The first model, similar from the current one, was a Pepsi machine.


 * Two early can models bearing the brand "T Dog", a yellow and a red one, can be found in the playable Half-Life 2 Beta files.


 * In the E3 map, a vending machine spits out a copious amount of yellow T Dog cans when damaged or shot.

List of appearances

 * Half-Life 2
 * Half-Life 2: Episode One