Northern Star
This article is about the City 17 location. For the Half-Life: Alyx chapter, see The Northern Star (chapter). |
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| Northern Star | |
|---|---|
| General information | |
| Constructed |
Before the Seven Hour War |
| Destroyed |
After the Uprising |
| Location | |
| Usage | |
| Era(s) | |
| Game information | |
| Map(s) |
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The Northern Star is a hotel in the Quarantine Zone featured in the fifth eponymous chapter of Half-Life: Alyx.
Contents
Overview[edit]
The Northern Star is a once grandiose hotel located deep within the Quarantine Zone, directly facing the entrance to Terminal Gardens. It is a six-story East European-style mansion with its name in large metal letters mounted on the top. On its front plaza are several news kiosks and a decapitated statue of Russian Communist revolutionary Vladimir Lenin at the center, with the head nearby. The hotel's affiliated restaurant, Northern Star Bar, is situated on the building's terrace.
The hotel is extensively modified by the Combine to accommodate one of the generator stations supporting the Vault. Its main gate is sealed off by blockades, leaving a window near the luggage room the only means of entering; the substation clings onto the left wing, with catwalks roughly extending from holes on the wall and two sets of elevators leading to lower levels. The underground sections are mostly demolished to create a large cavity filled with machinery and linked with the Terminal Gardens metro station, in order to facilitate the transportation of captured Vortigaunts via Razor Train. Other parts of the hotel appear to be under severe Xen infestation and complete disrepair. The darker rooms of the hotel are occupied by swarms of Poison Headcrabs.
In the basements of the Northern Star, Alyx Vance first encountered the Reviver, nicknamed the "lightning dog". It is an electricity-generating creature which can enter host bodies to create Revived Zombies. After navigating through the overgrown rooms and corridors, Alyx eventually reaches the substation keeping the Vault afloat, and discovers that each of them contains an enslaved Vortigaunt which is forced to channel its energy to the Vault to power it. Grateful for its freedom, the liberated Vortigaunt promises Alyx to rally its peers to take down the remaining substations.
Behind the scenes[edit]
The statue of Lenin located on the hotel plaza is based on an actual statue located in the Muzeon Park of Arts in Moscow,[1] the largest open-air sculpture museum in Russia. It consists of Lenin with one hand in his pocket and the other on a pillar, a variant first designed by sculptor Isaak Mendelevich and reproduced numerous times.[2]
The piano located in the main lobby can be played like a normal piano. If approached by the player, Alyx will let Russell pick a tune to play, which he replies with "Flight of the Bumblebee", an especially sophisticated piano piece. Interestingly, Russell will respond to any note played with "That's it!"
An alternate version of the hotel's exterior building is featured in the "Street Scene" lighting used by the game's ModelDoc. Instead of the hotel's sign above the building are the letters "THT", reused from Half-Life 2.
Related Achievements[edit]
| Half-Life: Alyx | |
|---|---|
|
Checking In |
| Reach the Northern Star. | |
|
Heart-Breaker Hotel |
| Get creative turning the power back on. | |
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Surface Tension |
| Escape the underground pit. | |
|
Unbonded |
| Collect the SMG. | |
|
Cord-Cutter |
| Shut down the substation. | |
|
Xen Lootism |
| Snatch a Xen grenade from its resting place. | |
Gallery[edit]
Concept art[edit]
Concept art of a corridor.
Concept art of the lounge.
Unused magazine cover art depicting Alyx in the hotel.
Ditto.
Alyx in the Northern Star in promotional Half-Life: Alyx artwork for the May 2020 issue of Edge.
Screenshots[edit]
The Northern Star sign seen from inside Terminal Gardens.
View of the street in front of the hotel.
Combine Barricades installed on a road near the hotel.
The terrace of the bar on street level.
The ruins of City 17 with two more substations visible.
The Vault floating with its cable attached to a substation.
Ditto, from below.
The same substation's cables transmitting the harvested power of Vortessence chants.
The control panel for the substation's cable shields.
Combine soldiers on a Combine bridge, with pods under it.
Ditto.
Combine Charger in the street in front of the hotel.
Combine Grunt throwing a grenade.
Combine Ordinal deploying a Manhack.
Luggage and mailroom.
Elevator and the first sighting of a Reviver.
A Zombie dangling from the ceiling tiles.
A Zombie in a Xen-infested room.
A Xen growth with something similar to a Reviver's heart in its center.
A Xen-infested living room.
A Xen-infested bathroom.
A Combine Prisoner Pod holding a Vortigaunt captive inside a substation.
The Vortigaunt freed from captivity.
A Vortigaunt explains to Alyx that the Combine drain their power to protect the Vault.
Main lobby.
Ditto.
Zombie in the main lobby.
A piano in the lobby of the hotel.
Grand staircase in ruin.
Zombie, Barnacle and Xen flora among collapsed floors.
A hotel room destroyed by Xen flora.
A hotel room containing a corpse engulfed in Xen flora.
A long, dark hallway inside the hotel.
A hotel room.
Another Combine Fabricator.
Basement storage room.
A Cleanup Solution tank inside a tenement, used to seal off Xen growths.
Ditto.
Pool tables in the hotel.
Kitchen with a dead zombie and Poison Headcrab.
Hallway connecting the kitchen to the laundry room.
Laundry machines and folded towels inside the laundry room.
Wide view of the laundry room.
Closeup of the Reviver.
"Street Scene" variant of the hotel and its street.
Models[edit]
Beheaded statue of Lenin featured on the hotel's plaza.
Head of the statue found nearby.
Sign of the Northern Star bar that had a terrace on the street.
Beer taps from the bar in the main lobby.
Matchbook.
Luggage tag, front.
Back.
Door hanger, "Please clean room".
Door hanger, "Do not disturb".
Ashtray.
Keychain.
Box.
Cocktail shaker.
Luggage cart.
Texture for a missing coaster model.
List of appearances[edit]
References[edit]
- ↑ Lenin statue on LeninStatues.ru
- ↑ Lenin Monuments on Rusmania
| Preceded by Terminal Gardens |
Half-Life: Alyx story arc journey | Succeeded by Holden Company Processing Plant |
