City 17

City 17, formerly titled City 17 Street, is a fan-fiction series created by Nathan Johnson, which takes characters and settings from the Half-Life universe (primarily its 2004 sequel Half-Life 2) by Valve Software. In the style of a serial drama, the series tells lives of citizens in the Combine ruled city - City 17.

After originally being based off Half-Life 2, the series began to turn into its own thing after the Combine were written out, and took many different tones over the years. The series primarily focused on Nathan Johnson and his adventures, which involves many things such as time travel, gangsters, traveling across different dimensions and universes, secret societies or sometimes "normal" day to day living. These episodes feature many familiar supporting characters and antagonists. As time went on, characters from the Half-Life games were dropped from the series with original characters replacing them, with only the G-Man carrying on, although he was reinvented as Frank Blackstone and acts as Nathan's archenemy.

The series celebrated its tenth anniversary during the summer of 2016. Following this, it was soft rebooted and re-titled City 17 Redux.

Synopsis
Details the everyday lives of citizens in the rundown alien dominated city named "City 17", the primary setting of Valve's 2004 hit video game Half-Life 2.

Continuity
The series takes place in an alternative continuity to the Half-Life universe created by Valve and features different timelines and changing events which hugely contradict the Half-Life games. When the series first begins, it takes place one year before Gordon Freeman's arrival. Although the gap between Half-Life and Half-Life 2 is supposed to be around 20 years, the Black Mesa Incident occurred only 5-10 years before City 17 Street began.

City 17 Street also takes place in "modern day", unlike Half-Life 2 which takes place at some point in the 2020s. So when the series began in 2006, it took place in 2006 and works in real time, although past stories have been retconned and move around.

With the help of time travel, a new alternative timeline was created, which prevented Gordon Freeman from destroying City 17 as depicted in the final Half-Life 2 chapter "Dark Energy".

Younger characters also exist in City 17 Street and did so in the earlier episodes, even though in the Half-Life 2 continuity a Suppression Field prevented the existence of children. This was averted in City 17 Street's continuity.

Cancellation
Plans to end City 17 Street has been going on for a number of years. Originally the 2014 "Epilogue" was to be the ending to the series, until it was given a quasi-reboot.

The series will end on its 10th Anniversary in August 2016, which will act as the "Grand Finale" to the series and bring it to a close. However standalone episodes set within the universe may still be written.

The series was discontinued on the 27th June 2016 with the episode "An End and a New Beginning".

Trivia

 * The series was created and first written in August 2006 and was an attempt to tide the author over until the next Half-Life release (due to Valve taking their time releasing installments).
 * Before the release of Half-Life 2: Episode Two, a few spin-offs were planned with titles such as City 17 Forest or The Daring Countryside which would carry on in the event City 17 may be destroyed to fit with Half-Life's timeline. But with some changes this was prevented.
 * The series was originally written as just a manuscript. In 2007 the series was drawn out by hand in order to create illustrations. With the help of Garry's Mod proper screenshots were made. Some comics were made using Garry's Mod and the series was almost done from scratch, but each episode was done randomly with little to no connection to the previous episode.

Continuity to the Half-Life series
Although the series was going to serve as a straight up prequel to Half-Life 2, it started to become its own entity and later became marketed as being set in an alternative universe. Elements from both the main game Half-Life 2 and its beta were used for the series, such as cut enemies and monsters from the beta making an appearance, or being alluded to in someway.

In the primary Half-Life timeline, the gap between Half-Life and Half-Life 2 is stated to be 20 years. In City 17 Street however this has been shortened, with the gap from the Black Mesa Incident to Freeman's arrival in the series being around 4-8 years (this changes depending on the episode).

Children are also present in the series, despite being absent in Half-Life 2 due to the supression field. This idea is taken from the beta in which children were present, but ended up being cut. As such varieties of animals are present, despite it appearing they are extinct by the events of Half-Life 2 (excluding birds).

Spin-offs

 * City 14 – A short-lived spin-off starring Nathan Johnson and Samantha Robertson.
 * City 17 Street Lost Episodes
 * City 17 Files
 * The Citizen Chronicles
 * The Toby Purnell Show
 * Blackstone