The Wasteland

The Wasteland, also known as The Wild or The Scrapland, is the area surrounding City 17, both being the two main locations of Half-Life 2.

Overview
The Wasteland is a desolate, barren and hazardous region, infested with Xen wildlife, such as Headcrabs, Antlions and Leeches. It is littered with car wrecks, shipwrecks and submarine wrecks along the coast, destroyed buildings and roads (such as the Highway 17) and other scenes of desolation. The only infrastructure that is maintained is the railway, being used by the Combine for the Wasteland Train, linking their outposts together and transporting Combine troops, Stalkers or Citizens. Several Rebel outposts can also be found, mostly in the Canals and along the Coast.

Half-Life 2
Although Gordon does not visit the Wasteland before leaving the City 17 parts of the Canals for their Wasteland part, the area can be first spotted during the teleportation failure caused by Lamarr in the second chapter, "A Red Letter Day". A desertic, sandy landscape with a wrecked car, a headframe, rocks, and a crow (that Lamarr attacks) are seen during a few seconds, among the other places quickly visited before Gordon is freed by the teleport.

Locations


The main Wasteland locations are:


 * The end of the Canals
 * Station 7
 * Black Mesa East
 * Ravenholm
 * The Coast
 * Nova Prospekt / the Depot
 * The Air Exchange (cut)

Half-Life 2 episodes
Given the very lively flora seen in Episode Two, it seems that not all Earth surface is a wasteland, the Combine having likely not finished yet their conversion of Earth to their needs. Therefore the Outlands, although located in the outskirts of City 17 and having also its human settlements quite desolated, is not considered to be part of the Wasteland.

Behind the scenes



 * The several names for the Wasteland are actually never given in-game but in Raising the Bar. Furthermore, a model folder found in the game files is named "wasteland_props". It contains props found along the Coast or Ravenholm, among others.


 * The area around City 17 has changed much since the first drafts of the storyline and was to be much more desolated than in the retail version, since the flora is still quite present in the game, three kinds of birds can be seen, insects and frogs can be heard in the Canals, and the train that brought Gordon to City 17 is mentioned to have stopped "in the woods" before reaching City 17. At one point, the Wasteland was to be a vast scrapland full of junked military machines. Another version was a completely dried seafloor, with the ocean draining away into a vast teleport "drain" and the seafloor full of beached ships and whale bones, recalling the real world Aral Sea. While the oceans are still abnormally low in the retail version, there is no in-game explanation for it. These old concepts survived in the Coast levels.


 * It was also to be filled with a much more diverse range of Xen creatures, such as Bullsquids, Houndeyes, Gargantuas, other undefined alien fauna, and a Synth Scanner specific to the area, the Wasteland Scanner. The sea level was also to be even lower and Portal Storms were still to be raging.


 * Old concepts show that Gordon Freeman was originally to see the Wasteland for the first time when the train he was brought out of stasis on was carrying him to City 17. On the train he was to encounter Samuel, a Citizen telling him some bits of information about his life and giving him some hints about what is going on. He was also to give him a spare gas mask, as the air was not always breathable because of the Air Exchange activity. Another nearby train was also to be seen being attacked by a Gargantua, but the monster was to be destroyed by the heavy engine, hinting that the train was to be a Razor Train and not a regular Earth passenger train which probably couldn't face a Gargantua attack. Then the Wasteland Train was to proceed inside the city, first through the Old City, which was almost all ruined, and then New City, the Combine-converted city, surrounded by huge concrete walls protecting it from the Wasteland hazards (it does not seem to be present everywhere in the final version, although some sort of wall can be seen at the end of Episode One ). Creatures were to be seen killing themselves on the barricades while trying to get in. Gordon was also to glimpse Citizens in their apartments. The train was at last to arrive at the station, and Cremators were to be seen cleaning around the train from Bullsquids or Headcrabs that managed to get inside the perimeter.


 * Like in the final version, Gordon was to go into the Wasteland itself while leaving City 17 through the Canals, instead of skipping it to reach Kraken Base by teleport. There he was to meet Eli Maxwell in his lab, go through Quarrytown, and travel along the Coast (for unknown reasons), following the tracks passing by the Depot and continuing in unknown directions. There, the Depot and the prison were to be a simple stopping-off point, the main Coast chapter being the Air Exchange, the destruction of its reactor triggering the uprising in City 17. Like in the retail version, many rebel settlements were to be spread along the Coast, the prominent Wasteland region to be seen. The railroad theme was also very important from the start, all the main Combine settlements of the region being linked by the railroad.


 * The maps of the early Wasteland were last worked on to at least May 2003, as an E3 map, "Depot 2003", was last edited on May 2003.

List of appearances

 * Half-Life 2
 * Half-Life 2: Raising the Bar
 * Half-Life 2: Lost Coast
 * Half-Life 2: Episode One
 * Half-Life 2: Episode Two