Definitive Edition clues

On October 30, 2020, Black Mesa Definitive Edition Beta was released. Listed in the patch notes was a line that read "Added further clues". On Discord, Stormseeker posted a Myon emoji and a gif that said "Look for clues".

Later on November 22, 2020, one of the final betas for the Definitive Edition was released. Around the same time of the release, Stormseeker changed his Discord status to feature an :AsuraGate: emoji and the text "OuO", which was a hint that further clues had been added.

This page is dedicated to collecting all the clues that have been discovered in these betas and in the final release of Black Mesa: Definitive Edition.

Secret room in On a Rail
A secret room (hideout) was discovered by the missile silo in On a Rail. The room is located in between the missile silo and the wall with the large lambda sign.

Obelisk, HEV suits and message in background16
A mysterious scene was discovered in the background map for Gonarch's Lair.

An obelisk with the letters spelling "ARCADIAN" is lying on the ground. A few days before the October 30 release, Stormseeker changed his Discord status to "Et in Arcadia ego.", no doubt a related clue.

All the letters on the obelisk are written in blue, except R and N, which are red. The letter R looks somewhat atypical for the type of font used. This is because it is actually made from a letter P decal and a number 1 decal, combined to look like an R, possibly because an R decal was not available.

On the side of the obelisk, there is a notch. It is placed in the middle of the space between the letters C and A, possibly indicating a separation of "ARC" from "ADIAN". When looking at the notch from the side, towards the HEV suits, it almost looks like it is pointing towards a point between Mirfin's HEV suit and the others, as if it is to indicate a gap between "M" and "YON", just like there is a gap in "M YONS" on a wall in QE (see section below). This is however speculation. It is also possible that the notch simply means that a piece of the obelisk has been chipped off due to the wear and tear of time.

Five HEV suit bodies are lying on the ground. They appear to have been placed in a deliberate and peculiar way. Their nametags are: Horn, Mirfin, Young, Olson, and Nielsen. Horn's HEV suit is lying opposite to the four others. The first letters of the names of the four other suits form the word "MYON". Another observation worth noting is that Horn's suit is facing upwards, while the four others are facing downwards, which could perhaps be indication of duality.

Above the HEV suits, a message is floating in the air (composed of two  entities):

This is a quote from Paradise Lost: Book V by John Milton.

Also, in the scene, footprints can be seen leading away from the HEV suit bodies.

A second HEV suit with Dr. Young's nametag has also been found in the same map, as well as Dr. Welsh's desk nameplate. It is not clear if these two findings are related to the other clues, or even related to the ARG.

HEV suits and message in background12
In the background map for Surface Tension, another scene with HEV suits and message was discovered.

The message is as follows:

This is another quote from Paradise Lost by John Milton, this time from Book II.

The way the HEV suits have been placed in this map is also an exact mirror of the way they have been placed in background16. Here, Dr Horn's suit is facing downwards, while the others are facing upwards. The names are consequently also in reverse order.

If an outline is drawn on the outside of the HEV suits, it takes on a shape of a slice of pizza, about 1/3 the size of a whole pizza. In a "full pizza", there would be in total 12 HEV suits, at least on the outside.

Myon wall in Questionable Ethics
A wall with "lies", 12 handprints, and the letters "M YONS" (note the gap between the letters) was found in Questionable Ethics.

Handprints, letter A and spiral in Crossfire
This was found in the MP map Crossfire, in the High Security Storage Facility. On the floor, 12 handprints placed to form the letter A, and the spiral from the conspiracy whiteboard. Footprints are leading away from the scene. Note that the letter A and the spiral were also found in the secret room in OaR.

Evolving gate in Dr. Horn's Xen Lair
Small changes occurring on the gate in the lair have been spotted over several updates since the Xen-Gonarch beta. In the November 22 update, the gate was emitting a sequence of blinking light patterns in different colors. A hidden code was found in the map file, encoded in the entity names of the sprites that give off the blinking lights. This code, when combined with the "Meet the Devs" code, was deciphered into the following message:

In numerical map coordinates: 54° 34' 51.14" N, 3° 8' 52.16" W

Google Maps link: https://goo.gl/maps/SDfAUmsJQdrVY2Wy7

The coordinates lead to a small island called St Herbert's Island in Derwentwater, Cumbria, England.

Paradise Lost

 * Paradise Lost
 * Paradise Lost
 * Paradise Lost: Book 2 (1674 edition)
 * Paradise Lost: Book 5 (1674 edition)
 * Paradise Lost introduction topics
 * Three different versions of Paradise Lost on Wikisource.
 * Page with "Long is the way and hard..." in the 1890 version
 * Page with "They eat they drink..." in the 1890 version

Arcadia

 * Arcadia (region)
 * Arcadia (utopia)
 * Et in Arcadia ego