You'll find some curiosities in Gordon's locker. The two books, titled "The 37th Mandala" and "The Orchid Eater" are existing novels. The author, Marc Laidlaw, is also the writer of Half-Life.
The baby on the picture is Isabel, daughter of designer Harry E. Teasley.
After you take the elevater with headcrabs jumping from above, put the noclip cheat on, as well as the r_fullbright 1 cheat (to more easily find the isolated dark room). Go through the wall by the doorway and the metal barrels, look for pink cubic room below and enter it. All of the walls, ceiling, and floor is filled with Gabe Newell texture, co-founder of Valve. The room is actually used to spawn creatures before the player sees them.
By the door of the flooded kitchen in the office complex you'll find a board "Dr. Newell Chaos Theory R&D". This is a reference to Gabe Newell, co-founder of Valve.
In many places throughout the game, you can find walls which have Valve (the developer) vaguely displayed on them. The image below, for example, was taken in the ceiling space in the office complex. The name also appears in other places, such as shown on the second image, which is by the entrance of the freezer.
About a third of the way through the "On a Rail" segment (level c2a2c), there is a place where you can go under a ramp, break a box and a grate and drop down into a vent shaft. Follow it and eventually come to an army grunt body. On the left side against the back wall is writing in the texture on the wall. Toss a few grenades at it to see it more clearly on a blackened wall - you'll find the name "Riller" embedded in the wall. This is a reference to Dave Riller, level designer of Half-Life.
In the kitchen near the locker room in the beginning of the game, keep using the microwave until it explodes. A nearby scientist will say "My God, what are you doing?!"
TAGS
No tags
Egg id: 211
Designer lockers
In the locker room in the beginning of the game, the names on the lockers are the last names of the Half-Life design team. You'll find (Dario) Casali, (Greg) Coomer, (Ken) Birdwell, (Chuck) Jones, (Mona Lisa) Guthrie, (Douglas R.) Wood, (Steve) Bond, (T.K.) Backman, (Karen) Laur, (Dave) Riller, (Harry E.) Teasley, (Kelly) Bailey, (Brett and/or Erik) Johnson, (Jay) Stelly and (Marc) Laidlaw. The final locker, labeled Freeman, is of course the player's locker.
At the start of the game, when getting off the tram and waiting for the guard to open the door from the inside, another tram approaches. As it passes, you see Gordon Freeman, the protagonist of Half-Life, on it. In fact in the original Half-Life (released 3 years before Blue Shift), as you (as Gordon Freeman) are entering Black Mesa with the tram, you also pass Calhoun banging on the closed door.
Calhoun seeing Gordon Freeman (Half-Life: Blue Shift)
Another cameo of Gordon Freeman. Check out the cameras in the video surveillance room. One of them will show Gordon heading for the Anomalous Materials lab. Check the camera several more times and one of the scientists will perform a little dance.
Calhoun seeing Gordon Freeman on the video surveillance system (Half-Life: Blue Shift)
Calhoun seeing the dancing scientist on the video surveillance system (Half-Life: Blue Shift)
Again, this is taken directly from the original Half-Life, including the scientists that have a chat.
Gordon Freeman passing the scientists in the same room (Half-Life)
Check out the cameras in the video surveillance room. One of them will show Gina Cross (Half-Life: Decay and the Hologram in the Half-Life training room) bringing the specimen to the Anomalous Materials Lab.
One final appearance by Gordon Freeman occurs at the very end of the game. When Barney Calhoun teleports outside the Black Mesa Facility, he shortly is wrongly teleported to Xen and then to a room where he sees the captured Gordon Freeman being dragged away by grunts.
