Citadel (Half-Life)

In the Series of video game Half-Life , the Citadelle is an immense structure since which the Cartel control surface the Ground. It is localized in the center of Cité 17 and resembles high a gigantic austere skyscraper of several kilometers.

Frontage

The Citadel, named thus by the Land ones, is a gigantic structure of more than three kilometers in height, with the form pointing out a prism narrow and very high, pertaining to the Trust. It shelters Wallace Breen, former administrator of Black Mesa indicated representing Earth by the Trust. It is also used as bond between the troops on Earth and unknown planet of the Trust.

The Citadel is heavily mechanized, it does not seem made up of a block, but of many metal plates which can move. Indeed, it has a “closed” position and an “open” position. In “closed” position, the opening of the medium is closed. To pass to the “opened” position, it carries out a series of displacements of plates which end in an opening of the center much larger to allow the airborne deployments of the units of the Trust such as the scanners or the Trust.

Imposing pillars hammer the ground at its base. One thinks that they are intended to move away to them Fourmillions, of seeing to destroy the city to take the raw materials of them. In the center of the structure an opening is in which one can see lines of metal stems to the unknown utility. Very thick metal cables leave the center of the building and are planted much further with the neighborhood of the building. At the top, one can see very many antennas.

The Citadel has two known “states”, i.e. of the configurations which the tower takes according to the situations. The first state is what can probably be qualified of dormant configuration, that maintained in normal condition in the city, when the Trust does not face any main issue. The configuration is meant by one.

However, little time after Gordon Freeman is transported by error in the office of Wallace Breen in top of the Citadel during malfonctionnement of the Téléportation of the Doctor Kleiner, the Citadel enters in state of alert. The Citadel can be seen changing configuration while Barney Calhoun gives to Gordon its Pied-de-biche. Barney indicates that it is a rare phenomenon and that it forever considering that “the citadel is in alarm, it forever be also enlightened. ” The shielding interns retracts then to the top, exposing a total of four units of whereas an alarm resounds in all the city. , and the Citadel remains in this configuration during all the remainder of the play. It is possible that there exist other types of configurations planned for other situations but only these two configurations are visible in the play.

As mentioned in the official guide Raising the Bar , from the whole districts of City 17 disappeared when the Trust installed the Citadel on Earth. There is a short mention of this event in the first speech of Breen in Half-Life 2 , in which it says that the Citadel was “”. The Citadel is embedded in an enormous pit where old aqueducts and drains of sewers at the destroyed ends arise from the walls while carcasses of cars lie at the bottom of the abyss, as if the Citadel were descended from the sky to be crushed brutally in the ground, and the building is completely encircled by the enormous mobile walls, which prevent the access to certain sectors of the city.

Lower stages

The Citadel is fed by an imposing core located in its underground part. It also distributes energy to the other installations external of the Trust. The building is mainly composed of tunnels in which is a complex network of rails. These rails are used with displacements as pods in which are locked up many the Stalkers manufactured by the Trust. The walls of these tunnels are covered besides with systems of parking of the pods.

At the beginning of Episode One , the player visits a good part of the lower stages of the Citadel. Although of appearance similar to the remainder of the Citadel, there does not exist any arms factory in this sector. At this time play, the Citadel is in critical phase, with an orange gleam sweeping all the structure contrary to the blue gleam used when the building is functional. Fires are propagated in all the structure and of many remains of the upper floors are crushed downwards.

A room of evacuation is located in these lower stages. The part is appreciably different from the remainder of the Citadel, giving off a worrying red gleam instead of the blue lights and oranges characteristic of the Citadel at this time. The room seems to be used as fluidic device, making it possible the Combine Advisers to quickly escape if the Citadel is in danger. The vessels of help are arranged under the floor of glass of the part and, to evacuate, move through a tube before positioning to the top and going up.

All in bottom of the Citadel is located its nuclear core, only accessible by an elevator which descends several dozen from stages. The room of the engine is protected by broad armor-plated door anti-breath carrying a stylized symbol representing the core. A big room of control dominates the room of the engine with in the center an elevator carrying out directly in the room. Three rooms are located around that of the engine and are specifically designed to help to stabilize the core in the possibility where this one would become unstable. The machines in these parts form triple system of containment which makes sure that the intensity of the reactions of in the engine remains within sure limits. This place of the Citadel is located roughly at a kilometer under surface and is prolonged in very Cité 17 and elsewhere.

Intermediate stages

At the end of Half-life 2 , the player at the time of visiting the interior of the Citadel. All the technology of the Trust is found in the Citadel: fields of force, technology anti-gravity, gigantic tubes of almost organic appearance transporting unknown fluids. The architecture of the Trust is omnipresent in the Citadel, the whole building is built with same dark blue metal, characteristic of the structures of the Trust. The “visitors” are usually made dislocate of their weapons by a field of force, to precisely avoid a situation such that which occurs at the end of Half-Life 2 and at the beginning of Episode One - ironically thanks to this field of force.

Railway systems leave and arrive of the Citadel to embark and unload material. Most of the cargo are new stalkers sent since Nova Prospekt. The Citadel includes an important transport system of the containers in which the stalkers are delivered. The tasks of Stalkers include/understand the basic operations on the panels of edges and the réparartion of the equipment and the units, always under the monitoring of and the Scanners.

The Citadel seems to include important arms factory where the equipment, the technology and weapons of the Trust its manufactured. The Synthetizers and Mortar Synth can be considering convoyed on travelators indicating that they are perhaps produced in the Citadel even if it can simply be a question of a means of moving the two products in all the gigantic complex one. Citadel is also nerve center of (soldiers of elites included/understood), which is present in very great number, and is the point of launching of the vessels.

Upper floors

In top of the Citadel the office of the Doctor Wallace Breen is from where this one retransmet its many speeches of propaganda, gives its directives and manages the organization. The office of Breen has an aspect more human than the remainder of the Citadel, even if the architecture of the Trust remains largely present in the part. The part contains an office out of wooden, a clock, a seat out of leather, a terrestrial sphere, a red carpet and busts with the effigy of Breen. Several monitors are also installed in the office so that Breen communicates with the inhabitants of City 17 or the Advisers of the Trust. The office is connected to the transport system of the prisoners used by Gordon Freeman, and there are several containers of prisoners beside the office. If not, the visitors can enter the office via an elevator connected to the engine to black energy. It seems probable that Breen lives as well in the Citadel he works there.

The top of the Citadel contains the engine with black energy of the Trust, which is used to actuate it and allow the opening of a gate towards another world or another dimension. At the end of Half-Life 2 , Freeman manages to destabilize and destroy the engine by using the spheres of energy.

Destruction

In One Episode, the consequences of the attack of Gordon Freeman on the Citadel are clearly visible. The overload of the engine with black energy shut off the current and seriously weakened the structure of the building. Moreover, Gordon must turn over inside in the lower stages to reach the nuclear core to reactivate the field of containment and thus to delay the entry in inevitable fusion of the engine.

At this time, the Citadel seems hardly occupied compared with before, undoubtedly because the majority of the soldiers evacuated the building and summer sent in Cité 17 to prevent the inhabitants from escaping the blast from the imminent explosion. However, some soldiers remain on the spot, and the stalkers deal with the machines. The interior of the Citadel is lit by an orange gleam, instead of the usual blue gleam, while remains fall from the top of the Citadel and that the bridges disaggregate.

Outside, a swirl of black clouds surrounds the top of the Citadel while green flashes streak a worrying reddish sky. The lines of high voltage connecting the Citadel to City 17 do not exist any more, and the explosion of the engine with black energy blew the top of the Citadel to far.

The epopee of Episode One retransmet the escape of Gordon and Alyx, and other inhabitants of City 17, before the fusion of the nuclear reactor of the Citadel which threatens all to destroy on a ray of several kilometers.

At the end of Episode One , Gordon and Alyx are pilot inevitable entry in fusion of the engine while it collects a colossal quantity of energy to send a last transmission to the remainder of the empire of the Trust.

Consequences

Having involved its own destruction to send a last transmission to the world of the trust, it is the totality of City 17 which is found in ruin and man exposed to atomic radiation. And actually, the contents of the transmission were only the data which will be used with the trust to try their ultimate chance to take the top: To open a superportail, such that which they used thanks to Black Mesa to be installed on ground. This superportail takes seat on the ruins of the Citadel, which emits its base (surrounded by the remainders of the structures of the building) an imposing ray towards the sky, surrounded by smaller rays whirling around largest and striking the halation with the top of the clouds, it is yet only the outline of the gate, which must take a certain time to open. And if this gate came has to open, it is, by taking again the words of Eli Vance, new a seven hour old war, except that this time, we will not hold seven minutes. This event will be avoided by the sending of the rocket by the scientific team of White Forest (Kleiner, Eli, Magnusson, Uriah etc…), which contains the data of the transmission, that Alyx previously concealed in the Citadel. This rocket, at the time of its entry in orbit, will close the outline of the gate, preventing the trust from bringing reinforcements on ground.

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