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Half-Life (video game)

Half-Life is a 1998 first-person shooter game developed by Valve Corporation and published by Sierra Studios for Windows. It was Valve's debut product and the first game in the Half-Life series. The player assumes the role of Gordon Freeman, a scientist who must escape from the Black Mesa Research Facility after it is overrun by alien creatures following a disastrous scientific experiment. The gameplay consists of combat, exploration and puzzles.

Valve was disappointed with the lack of innovation in the FPS genre, and aimed to create an immersive world rather than a "shooting gallery". Unlike other games at the time, the player has almost uninterrupted control of the player character; the story is mostly experienced through scripted sequences rather than cutscenes. Valve developed the game using GoldSrc, a heavily-modified version of the Quake engine, licensed from id Software. The science fiction novelist Marc Laidlaw was hired to craft the plot and assist with design.

Half-Life received acclaim for its graphics, gameplay and narrative and won more than 50 PC "Game of the Year" awards. It is considered one of the most influential first-person shooter games and one of the greatest video games ever made. By 2008, it had sold more than nine million copies. It was ported to the PlayStation 2 in 2001, along with the multiplayer expansion Decay, and to OS X and Linux in 2013. Valve ported Half-Life to its Source engine as Half-Life: Source in 2004. In 2020, Crowbar Collective released an unofficial remake, Black Mesa.

Half-Life inspired numerous fan-made mods, some of which became standalone games, such as Counter-Strike, Day of Defeat, and Sven Co-op. It was followed by the expansion packs Opposing Force (1999) and Blue Shift (2001), developed by Gearbox Software, and the sequels Half-Life 2 (2004), Half-Life 2: Episode One (2006), Half-Life 2: Episode Two (2007) and Half-Life: Alyx (2020).

Gameplay

Half-Life is a first-person shooter that requires the player to perform combat tasks and puzzle solving to advance through the game. Unlike most first-person shooters at the time, which relied on cut-scene intermissions to detail their plotlines, Half-Life's story is told mostly using scripted sequences (bar one short cutscene), keeping the player in control of the first-person viewpoint. In line with this, the player rarely loses the ability to control the player character, Gordon Freeman, who never speaks and is never actually seen in the game; the player sees "through his eyes" for the entire length of the game. Half-Life has no levels; it instead divides the game into chapters, whose titles briefly appear on screen as the player progresses through the game. With the exception of short loading pauses, progression throughout the game is continuous, with each map directly connecting to the next, with the exception of levels involving teleportation.

The game regularly integrates puzzles, such as navigating a maze of conveyor belts or using nearby boxes to build a small staircase to the next area the player must travel to. Some puzzles involve using the environment to kill an enemy, like turning a valve to spray hot steam at their enemies. There are few bosses in the conventional sense, where the player defeats a superior opponent by direct confrontation. Instead, such organisms occasionally define chapters, and the player is generally expected to use the terrain, rather than firepower, to kill the boss. Late in the game, the player receives a "long jump module" for the HEV suit, which allows the player to increase the horizontal distance and speed of jumps by crouching before jumping. The player must rely on this ability to navigate various platformer-style jumping puzzles in Xen toward the end of the game.

The player battles alone for the majority of the game, but is occasionally assisted by non-player characters; specifically security guards and scientists who help the player. The guards will fight alongside the player, and both guards and scientists can assist in reaching new areas and pass on relevant plot information. An array of alien enemies populate the game, including headcrabs, bullsquids, vortigaunts, and headcrab zombies. The player also faces human opponents in the Hazardous Environment Combat Unit (a fictional special forces unit of the United States Marine Corps), and Black Ops assassins.

Half-Life includes online multiplayer support for both individual and team-based deathmatch modes. It was one of the first mainstream games to use the WASD keys as the default control scheme.

Plot
At the underground Black Mesa Research Facility, physicist Gordon Freeman participates in an experiment on a crystal of unknown origin. This triggers an explosion which severely damages the facility, and inexplicably causes alien creatures to appear. Many scientists are killed.

Gordon survives thanks to his hazard suit. Venturing to the surface for help, he discovers that hostile Marines have been dispatched to cover up the incident. Escaping below ground, he destroys a giant tentacled creature inside a rocket engine test facility.

Freeman travels by underground rail to the Lambda Complex, where scientists can stop the alien invasion. Along the way, he launches a space satellite to aid the scientists, and explores an abandoned older section of Black Mesa.

He is eventually captured by Marines and left for dead in a garbage compactor. He escapes through a waste treatment facility, and stumbles into a lab filled with alien specimens, seemingly collected before the accident.

The Marines are overwhelmed and withdraw. Scaling cliffs, navigating a bombed-out military base, and traversing sewers, Gordon arrives at the Lambda Complex. Inside, he restarts a nuclear reactor and uses mysterious teleportation technology to reach the last survivors of the science team.

They reveal that humans have been teleporting surveyors to an alien "border world". However, a hostile psychic entity opened an enormous portal back to Earth, triggering the invasion. The scientists send Gordon to kill the creature.

On the alien world Xen, Freeman encounters the remains of researchers who ventured before him, and crystals like the one in the catastrophic experiment. He defeats the monstrous Gonarch, and explores a factory manufacturing alien soldiers.

Finally, Gordon kills the Nihilanth, the entity maintaining the rift. He is then disarmed and summoned by the powerful and mysterious Administrator, who offers work for his "employers". If Gordon accepts, he is placed into stasis to await his next assignment.

Development
Valve, based in Kirkland, Washington, was founded in 1996 by the former Microsoft employees Mike Harrington and Gabe Newell. For its first product, Valve settled on a concept for a horror first-person shooter (FPS) game. They did not want to build their own game engine, as this would have created too much work for a small team and Newell planned to innovate in different areas. Instead, Valve licensed the Quake engine and the Quake II engine from id Software and combined them with their own code. Newell estimated that around 75% of the final engine code was by Valve. As the project expanded, Valve cancelled development of a fantasy role-playing game, Prospero, and the Prospero team joined the Half-Life project.

Half-Life was inspired by the FPS games Doom (1993) and Quake (1996), Stephen King's 1980 novella The Mist, and a 1963 episode of The Outer Limits titled "The Borderland". According to the designer Harry Teasley, Doom was a major influence and the team wanted Half-Life to "scare you like Doom did". The project had the working title Quiver, after the Arrowhead military base from The Mist. The name Half-Life was chosen because it was evocative of the theme, not clichéd, and had a corresponding visual symbol: the Greek letter λ (lower-case lambda), which represents the decay constant in the half-life equation. According to the designer Brett Johnson, the level design was inspired by environments in the manga series Akira.

Valve struggled to find a publisher, as many believed the game was too ambitious for a first-time developer. Sierra On-Line signed Valve for a one-game deal as it was interested in making a 3D action game, especially one based on the Quake engine. Valve first showed Half-Life in early 1997; it was a success at E3 that year, where Valve demonstrated the animation and artificial intelligence. Novel features of the artificial intelligence included fear and pack behavior.

Valve aimed for a November 1997 release to compete with Quake II. By September 1997, the team found that while they had built some innovative aspects in weapons, enemies, and level design, the game was not fun and there was little design cohesion. They postponed the release and reworked every level. They took a novel approach of assigning a small team to build a prototype level containing every element in the game and then spent a month iterating on the level. When the rest of the team played the level, which the designer Ken Birdwell described as "Die Hard meets Evil Dead", they agreed to use it as a baseline. The team developed three theories about what made the level fun. First, it had several interesting things happen in it, all triggered by the player rather than a timer so that the player would set the pace of the level. Second, the level responded to any player action, even for something as simple as adding graphic decals to wall textures to show a bullet impact. Finally, the level warned the player of imminent danger to allow them to avoid it, rather than killing the player with no warning.

To move forward with this unified design, Valve sought a game designer but found no one suitable. Instead, Valve created the "cabal", initially a group of six individuals from across all departments that worked primarily for six months straight in six-hour meetings four days a week. The cabal was responsible for all elements of design, including level layouts, key events, enemy designs, narrative, and the introduction of gameplay elements relative to the story. The collaboration proved successful, and once the cabal had come to decisions on types of gameplay elements that would be needed, mini-cabals from other departments most affected by the choice were formed to implement these elements. Membership in the main cabal rotated since the required commitment created burnout.

The cabal produced a 200-page design document detailing nearly every aspect of the game. They also produced a 30-page document for the narrative, and hired the science fiction novelist Marc Laidlaw to help manage the script. Laidlaw said his contribution was to add "old storytelling tricks" to the team's ambitious designs: "I was in awe of [the team]. It felt to me like I was just borrowing from old standards while they were the ones doing something truly new." Rather than dictate narrative elements "from some kind of ivory tower of authorial inspiration", he worked with the team to improvise ideas, and was inspired by their experiments. For example, he conceived the opening train ride after an engineer implemented train code for another concept.

Valve initially planned to use traditional cutscenes, but switched to a continuous first-person perspective for lack of time. Laidlaw said they discovered unexpected advantages in this approach, as it created a sense of immersion and enforced a sense of loneliness in a frightening environment. Laidlaw felt that non-player characters were unnecessary to guide players if the design had sufficiently strong "visual grammar", and that this allowed the characters to "feel like characters instead of signposts". An early version of Half-Life began immediately after the disaster, with the environments already wrecked. Laidlaw worked with Johnson to create versions of the lab environment before the disaster to help set the story. He said: "These were all economical ways of doing storytelling with the architecture — which was my whole obsession. The narrative had to be baked into the corridors."

Within a month of the cabal's formation, the other team members started detailed game development, and within another month began playtesting through Sierra. The cabal was intimately involved with playtesting, monitoring the player but otherwise not interacting. They noted any confusion or inability to solve a game's puzzles and made them into action items to be fixed on the next iteration. Later, with most of the main adjustments made, the team included means to benchmark players' actions. They then collected and interpreted statistically to fine-tune levels further. Between the cabal and playtesting, Valve identified and removed parts that proved unenjoyable. Birdwell said that while there were struggles at first, the cabal approach was critical for Half-Life's success, and was reused for Team Fortress 2 from the start.

Much of the detail of Half-Life development has been lost. According to the Valve employee Erik Johnson, two or three months before release, their Visual SourceSafe source control system "exploded". Logs of technical changes from before the final month of development were lost, and code had to be recovered from individual computers.

Mods
Half-Life received support from independent game developers, supported and encouraged by Valve. With the game, Valve included Worldcraft, the level design tool used during development, and a software development kit, enabling developers to modify the game and create mods. Both tools were updated with the release of the version 1.1.0.0 patch. Supporting tools (including texture editors, model editors, and level editors such as the multiple engine editor QuArK) were either created or updated to work with Half-Life.

The Half-Life software development kit served as the development base for many mods, including the Valve-developed Team Fortress Classic and Deathmatch Classic (a remake of Quake's multiplayer deathmatch mode in the GoldSrc engine). Other mods such as Counter-Strike and Day of Defeat (DOD) began life as the work of independent developers who later received aid from Valve. Other multiplayer mods include Action Half-Life, Firearms, Science and Industry, The Specialists, Pirates, Vikings and Knights, Natural Selection and Sven Co-op. Single-player mods include USS Darkstar (1999, a futuristic action-adventure on board a zoological research spaceship), They Hunger (2000–2001, a survival horror total conversion trilogy involving zombies), Poke646 (2001, a follow-up to the original Half-Life story with improved graphics), and Someplace Else (2002, a side-story to the original Half-Life).

Some Half-Life modifications received retail releases. Counter-Strike was the most successful, having been released in six different editions: as a standalone product (2000), as part of the Platinum Pack (2000), as an Xbox version (2003), and as a single-player spin-off, Counter-Strike: Condition Zero (2004), as well as in two versions using the Source engine. Team Fortress Classic, Day of Defeat, Gunman Chronicles (2000, a futuristic Western movie-style total conversion with emphasis on its single-player mode) and Sven Co-op were also released as standalone products. Half-Life is also the subject of the YouTube improv roleplaying series Half-Life VR but the AI is Self-Aware and Freeman's Mind.

In 2003, Valve's network was infiltrated by hackers. Among the stolen files were the unreleased Half-Life modification Half-Life: Threewave, a canceled remake of the mod Threewave CTF from Quake. The files were found by the independent reporter Tyler McVicker of Valve News Network on a Vietnamese FTP server in February 2016, and were unofficially released that September.

Release
Half-Life was released in November 1998. The revised version of Half-Life shown at E3 1998 was given Game Critics Awards for "Best PC Game" and "Best Action Game". Valve released two demos. The first, Half-Life: Day One, contained the first fifth of the game and was distributed with certain graphic cards. The second, Half-Life: Uplink, was released on February 12, 1999, and featured original content. A short film based on Half-Life, also titled Half-Life: Uplink, was developed by Cruise Control, a British marketing agency, and released on February 11, 1999. The protagonist is a journalist who infiltrates the Black Mesa Research Facility, trying to discover what has happened there.

Half-Life was censored in Germany to comply with the Federal Department for Media Harmful to Young Persons, which regulates depictions of violence against humans. Valve replaced the human characters with robots, spilling oil and gears instead of blood and body parts when killed, among other changes. In 2017, Half-Life was removed from the German censorship list. To acknowledge this, Valve released Half-Life Uncensored, a free downloadable content pack, that reverts the censorship.

Ports and remakes
Valve canceled a version of Half-Life for Mac, developed by Logicware, in 2000. Newell said the port was substandard and would have made Mac players "second-class customers". Rebecca Heineman, the co-founder of Logicware, denied this, saying that Valve cancelled the port as Apple had angered them by misrepresenting sales projections. She said the port was complete and three weeks from release. Valve released ports for OS X and Linux in 2013.

Captivation Digital Laboratories and Gearbox Software developed a port of Half-Life for the Dreamcast, with new character models and textures and an exclusive expansion, Blue Shift. Following the cancellations of several third-party Dreamcast games in the wake of Sega's decision to discontinue the console in March 2001, Sierra cancelled the port weeks before its scheduled release in June, citing "changing marketing conditions". Blue Shift was ported to Windows. The Dreamcast port became the basis of the Half-Life port for PlayStation 2, released in late 2001. This version added competitive play and a co-op expansion, ''Half-Life: Decay. ''

In 2004, Valve released Half-Life: Source, a version of Half-Life created in their new game engine, Source. It includes no new graphical elements, but adds new physics, water effects and 5.1 surround sound. Black Mesa, a third-party remake of Half-Life developed by Crowbar Collective in the Source engine, was published as a free mod in September 2012 and later approved by Valve for a commercial release.

Expansions
Half-Life was followed by an expansion pack, Opposing Force, on November 1, 1999, developed by Gearbox Software. Players control USMC Corporal Adrian Shephard, who fights a new group of aliens and Black Ops units after being split from his team. Gearbox developed a second expansion pack, Blue Shift, in which players control Barney Calhoun, a security guard at Black Mesa, as he attempts to escape the facility. It was developed as a bonus campaign for the Dreamcast port of Half-Life, but was released for Windows on June 12, 2001, after the port was canceled. Gearbox created a cooperative multiplayer expansion pack, Decay, exclusively for the PlayStation 2 port of Half-Life which is played through the perspectives of Gina Cross and Colette Green, two Black Mesa scientists.

25th anniversary update
In November 2023, for the 25th anniversary of Half-Life, Valve updated the game's Steam release to revert in-game content to its original 1998 state, fix long-standing bugs, and add additional content including the Half-Life: Uplink demo, four new multiplayer maps, Steam Deck support, rendering improvements, and support for 4K resolution monitors. Valve also released an hour-long documentary on the creation of Half-Life, featuring commentary from the game's original developers, designers and artists. Two days after the release, Half-Life reached 33,471 concurrent players on Steam, its highest-ever number.

Critical reception
The game has received critical acclaim. On the review aggregation website Metacritic, Half-Life has a score of 96 out of 100. Computer Gaming World's Jeff Green said it was "not just one of the best games of the year. It's one of the best games of any year, an instant classic that is miles better than any of its immediate competition, and – in its single-player form – is the best shooter since the original Doom." Next Generation wrote: "It is fast paced, it is dramatic, and it brings the very idea of adventure on a PC out of the dark ages and into a 3D world. All that and not a single Orc in sight." IGN described it as "a tour de force in game design, the definitive single player game in a first-person shooter". GameSpot said it was the "closest thing to a revolutionary step the genre has ever taken".

Several reviewers cited the level of immersion and interactivity as revolutionary. AllGame said, "It isn't everyday that you come across a game that totally revolutionizes an entire genre, but Half-Life has done just that." Hot Games commented on the realism, and how the environment "all adds up to a totally immersive gaming experience that makes everything else look quite shoddy in comparison". Gamers Depot wrote that it was the most immersive game they had played.

The final portion of the game, taking place in the alien world of Xen, was generally considered the weakest. Besides introducing a wholly new and alien setting, it also featured a number of low-gravity jumping puzzles. The GoldSrc engine did not provide as much precise control for the player during jumping, making these jumps difficult and often with Freeman falling into a void and the player restarting the game. Wired Julie Muncy called the Xen sequence "an abbreviated, unpleasant stop on an alien world with bad platforming and a boss fight against what appeared, by all accounts, to be a giant floating infant". The Electric Playground said that Half-Life was an "immersive and engaging entertainment experience" in its first half and that it "peaked too soon".

During the AIAS' 2nd Annual Interactive Achievement Awards, Half-Life was awarded "Computer Entertainment Title of the Year" and "PC Action Game of the Year"; it also received nominations for "Game of the Year" and outstanding achievement in "Art/Graphics", "Character or Story Development", "Interactive Design", and "Software Engineering".

Jeff Lundrigan reviewed the PlayStation 2 version for Next Generation, rating it three out of five, and wrote that "it may be getting old, but there's still a surprising amount of life in Half-Life". The PlayStation 2 version was a nominee for The Electric Playground's 2001 Blister Awards for "Best Console Shooter Game", but lost to Halo: Combat Evolved for Xbox.

In 1999, 2001 and 2005, PC Gamer named Half-Life the best PC game of all time. In 2004, GameSpy readers voted Half-Life the best game of all time. Gamasutra gave it their Quantum Leap Award in the FPS category in 2006. GameSpot inducted Half-Life into their Greatest Games of All Time list in May 2007. In 2007, IGN described Half-Life as one of the most influential video games, and in 2013 wrote that the history of the FPS genre "breaks down pretty cleanly into pre-Half-Life and post-Half-Life eras". In 2021, the Guardian ranked Half-Life the third-greatest game of the 1990s, writing that it "helped write the rulebook for how games tell their stories without resorting to aping the conventions of film".

Sales
According to Newell, Half-Life was budgeted with the expectation of lifetime sales of around 180,000 copies. However, it was a surprise hit. In the United States, Half-Life debuted at #8 on PC Data's weekly PC game sales chart for the November 15–21 period, with an average retail price (ARP) of $49. It rose to sixth place the following week, before dropping to position 10 for the week ending December 5. During the December 6–12 period, the game climbed back to sixth place; by this time, its ARP had dropped to $36. It placed between sixth and eighth on PC Data's weekly charts through the end of December,  and its ARP rose back to $45 by the week ending January 2. PC Data declared Half-Life November's sixth-best-selling PC game in the United States, a position it held for the month of December. While its US sales were below 100,000 copies by November 30, by 1999 it had sold 212,173 copies and earned revenues of $8.6 million in the United States by the end of 1998.

In January 1999, Half-Life debuted at #3 on Chart-Track's PC game sales rankings for the United Kingdom, and remained in PC Data's weekly top 10 for the entire month, peaking at #4. By January 19, after two full months of availability, global sales of Half-Life surpassed 500,000 units. In the United States, it was the fifth-best-selling PC game for the month of January. On PC Data's weekly charts, it rose to #2 from February 7–20, with an ARP of $35. Holding a position in the weekly top 10 for the rest of February, it climbed to fourth for the month. The game remained in PC Data's weekly top 10 until the week of March 21 and dropped to position 11 for March as a whole. In the United Kingdom, it placed second in February—behind the debut of Baldur's Gate—and fifth in March. In April, it claimed #3 on Chart-Track's rankings and dropped to #16 on those of PC Data. On April 23, Sierra announced that global sales of Half-Life had reached almost 1 million copies.

After maintaining the 16th place for May in the US, Half-Life exited PC Data's monthly top 20 in June. Half-Life became the fifth-bestselling PC game of the first half of 1999 in the US. Its domestic sales during 1999 reached 290,000 copies by the end of September. During 1999, it was the fifth-best-selling PC game in the US, with sales of 445,123 copies. These sales brought in revenues of $16.6 million, the sixth-highest gross that year for a PC game in the US. The following year, it was the 16th-bestselling PC game in the US, selling another 286,593 copies and earning $8.98 million.

The PlayStation 2 version received a "Silver" sales award from the Entertainment and Leisure Software Publishers Association (ELSPA), indicating sales of at least 100,000 copies in the United Kingdom. Half-Life's global sales reached 2.5 million units by July 2001. Edge noted in 2003 that "a significant number of the 7.5m copies of the PC version were bought because the game offered such potential for community-driven expansion". As of November 16, 2004, eight million copies of the game had been sold, by 2008, 9.3 million copies had been sold at retail. Guinness World Records awarded Half-Life the world record for Best-Selling First-Person Shooter of All Time (PC) in the Guinness World Records: Gamer's Edition 2008.

Sequels
Half-Life 2 was announced at E3 2003 and released in 2004. The player controls Freeman 20 years after the Black Mesa incident in the dystopian City 17, where he joins a rebellion against an alien regime. It was followed by the episodic games Half-Life 2: Episode One (2006) and Half-Life 2: Episode Two (2007). After cancelling several other Half-Life projects, Valve released Half-Life: Alyx in 2020.

title: Half-Life (video game)


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County Leitrim

County Leitrim is a county in Ireland. It is in the province of Connacht and is part of the Northern and Western Region. It is named after the village of Leitrim. Leitrim County Council is the local authority for the county, which had a population of 35,199 according to the 2022 census.

The county encompasses the historic Gaelic territory of West Breffny (Bréifne) corresponding to the northern part of the county, and Muintir Eolais or Conmaicne Réin, corresponding to the southern part.

Geography
Leitrim is the 26th in size of the 32 counties by area (21st of the 26 counties of the Republic) and the smallest by population. It is the smallest of Connacht's five counties in both size and population. Leitrim is bordered by the counties of Donegal to the north, Fermanagh to the north-east, Cavan to the east, Longford to the south, Roscommon to the south-west and Sligo to the west. Fermanagh is in Northern Ireland while all the other neighbouring counties are within the Republic of Ireland.

Leitrim has a hilly and mountainous landscape in its northwest and is relatively flat in the southeast, each separated from the other by Lough Allen in the middle of the county. Leitrim has the shortest length of coastline of any Irish county that touches the sea. At Tullaghan, the coastline is only 4.7 km long. The Shannon is linked to the Erne via the Shannon–Erne Waterway. Notable lakes include:
 * Lough Melvin
 * Lough Allen
 * Lough Gill is to the northwest of Dromahair; Parke's Castle is located on the lakeshore.
 * Belhavel Lough is also located in Dromahair, within the parish of Killargue.
 * Lough Scur, and Saint John's Lough, on the Shannon–Erne Waterway.
 * Glencar Lough which lies mostly in Leitrim is fed via Glencar waterfall made famous in the poem The Stolen Child by W. B. Yeats.
 * Rockfield Lake, just east of Carrigallen in South Leitrim, is popular with anglers; while part of this lake is in County Leitrim, most of it is in County Cavan
 * Other lakes include Upper Lough MacNean, Glenade Lough, Garadice Lough, Rinn Lough, Lough Scannal, Lough Erril and Lough Machugh.

History
In ancient times Leitrim formed the western half of the Kingdom of Breifne. This region was long influenced by the O'Rourke family of Dromahair, whose heraldic lion occupies the official county shield to this day. Close ties initially existed with the O'Reilly clan in the eastern half of the kingdom, however, a split occurred in the 13th century and the kingdom was divided into East Breifne, now County Cavan, and West Breifne, now County Leitrim. The Normans invaded south Leitrim in the 13th century but were defeated at the Battle of Áth an Chip in 1270.

Much of the county was confiscated from its owners in 1620 and given to Villiers and Hamilton. Their initial objective was to plant the county with English settlers. However, this proved unsuccessful. English Deputy Sir John Perrot had ordered the legal establishment of "Leitrim County" a half-century prior, in 1565. Perrott also demarcated the current county borders around 1583.

Long ago Ireland was covered in woodland, and five great forests are traditionally said to have stood in Leitrim, with a 19th-century county survey stating- "a hundred years ago almost the whole country was one continued, undivided forest, so that from Drumshanbo to Drumkeeran, a distance of nine or ten miles, one could travel the whole way from tree to tree by branches". Many of these great forests were denuded for the making of charcoal for iron works around Sliabh an Iarainn. Working of the county's rich deposits of iron ore began in the 15th century and continued until the mid-18th century. Coal mining became prominent in the 19th century to the east of Lough Allen at Sliabh an Iarainn and also to the west in Arigna, on the Roscommon border. The last coal mine closed in July 1990 and there is now a visitor centre. Sandstone was also quarried in the Glenfarne region.

Writing in 1791, the geographer Beaufort suggested the county housing population encompassed 10,026 homes with "upwards of 50,000 inhabitants", the primary agriculture being cattle production, and the growth of flax sustaining the linen industry. Leitrim was first hit by the recession caused by the mechanisation of linen weaving in the 1830s and its 155,000 residents (as of the 1841 census) were ravaged by the Great Famine and the population dropped to 112,000 by 1851. The population subsequently continued to decrease due to emigration. After many years, the wounds of such rapid population decline have finally started to heal. Agriculture improved over the last century. Leitrim now has the fastest growing population in Connacht.

The Book of Fenagh is the most famous medieval manuscript originating here. In the 19th century the poet John McDonald (of Dromod) lived in the county, and William Butler Yeats spent the turn of the twentieth century fascinated with Lough Allen and much of Leitrim. Glencar Waterfall, 11 km from Manorhamilton, inspired Yeats and is mentioned in his poem The Stolen Child.

Subdivisions
Geographically, the county is almost evenly divided along north–south lines by Lough Allen, the River Shannon and Sliabh an Iarainn. Uniquely among Irish counties, there is no way to cross from the north of the county to the south (or vice versa) by road without leaving its boundaries. North Leitrim is slightly larger than the south, comprising 51% of County Leitrim's land area. However, South Leitrim, with towns such as Carrick-on-Shannon, Ballinamore and Drumshambo, is significantly more populous, containing approximately 65% of the county's population as of 2016.

Baronies
There are five historic baronies in the county. While baronies continue to be officially defined units, they are no longer used for many administrative purposes. Their official status is illustrated by Placenames Orders made since 2003, where official Irish names of baronies are listed under "Administrative units". They are Carrigallen, Drumahaire, Leitrim, Mohill and Rosclogher.

Rural districts
Under the Local Government (Ireland) Act 1898, County Leitrim was divided into the rural districts of Ballyshannon No. 3 (later renamed Kinlough), Bawnboy No. 2 (later renamed Ballinamore), Carrick-on-Shannon No. 1, Manorhamilton and Mohill. The rural districts were abolished in 1925.

Largest towns in County Leitrim
As of the 2016 census:
 * 1) Carrick-on-Shannon*, 4,062 (A small part of Carrick-on-Shannon is in County Roscommon)
 * 2) Manorhamilton, 1,466
 * 3) Kinlough, 1,032
 * 4) Ballinamore, 914
 * 5) Drumshanbo, 902
 * 6) Mohill, 855
 * 7) Dromahair, 808
 * 8) Leitrim, 594
 * 9) Roosky*, 564 (Most of Roosky is in County Roscommon)
 * 10) Dromod, 555

Demographics

 * Leitrim has the fastest-growing population of any county in Connacht. As measured by the census, the population rose by 36% between 2002 and 2022 to 35,087.
 * 2005 HEA statistics identified that Leitrim has the highest rate of participation in higher education in Ireland with 75% of 17- to 19-year-olds being admitted to a higher course.
 * The county town is Carrick-on-Shannon (population 4,062). It is a highly developed, prospering river port on the River Shannon and many tourists hire cruising boats here to explore the Shannon and the Shannon–Erne Waterway, which is a 63 km canal linking the two river systems. It is amongst the fastest growing towns in Ireland and has grown by 25% in the past few years.

Local government and politics
Leitrim County Council is the local authority for the county. The county is divided into three local electoral areas, each of which is also a municipal district: Ballinamore (6 councillors), Carrick-on-Shannon (6 councillors), and Manorhamilton (6 councillors). Leitrim County Council has two representatives on the Northern and Western Regional Assembly.

2019 seats summary
The following were elected at the 2019 Leitrim County Council election:

National politics
Leitrim is part of the Dáil constituency of Sligo–Leitrim. This constituency existed from 1948 to 2007, and previously from 1923 to 1937 as Leitrim–Sligo. From 1937 to 1948, the county formed the Leitrim constituency. From 2007 until 2016, County Leitrim was divided between two constituencies: Roscommon–South Leitrim and Sligo–North Leitrim. This proved controversial, and at the 2007 general election there was no TD elected whose domicile was in the county. Sligo–Leitrim was recreated at the 2016 general election.

Transport

 * Supplementing the local and regional road networks are the N15 (Sligo-Leitrim-Donegal), N16 (Sligo-Leitrim-Enniskillen) and N4 (Sligo-Leitrim-Dublin) national roads.
 * Railway stations in Leitrim on the Dublin to Sligo line include Dromod and Carrick-on-Shannon.
 * The Cavan and Leitrim Railway opened on 17 October 1887. It consisted of two branches, meeting at Ballinamore which connected Dromod and Arigna with Belturbet. Services carried goods, passengers and coal from around Lough Allen. Although protested, the line finally closed on 31 March 1959. A revived heritage railway centre and transport museum with a running line has been based at Dromod since the 1990s.
 * Railway stations in Leitrim on the former Sligo, Leitrim and Northern Counties Railway (which ran between Sligo and Enniskillen) included Dromahair, Manorhamilton and Glenfarne.
 * The Shannon and Shannon–Erne Waterway give access to much of Leitrim by boat.

1400s

 * Charles Reynolds (1496-1535) – posthumously attainted of treason for convincing the Pope to excommunicate Henry VIII.

1600s

 * Turlough Carolan (1670-1738) – harpist.

1700s

 * Robert Strawbridge (1732–81) – American Methodist preacher born at Drumsna.

1800s

 * William Henry Drummond (1854–1907) – Mohill-born Canadian poet.
 * Anthony Durnford (1830–79) – Lieutenant-Colonel in British Army, served in Anglo-Zulu War.
 * James Gralton (1886–1945) – Socialist activist and only Irish person ever deported from independent Ireland.
 * Margaret Haughery (1813–82) – philanthropist, Margaret of New Orleans, known as "the mother of the orphans".
 * Thomas Heazle Parke (1857–93) – doctor, explorer, soldier and naturalist.
 * Charles Irwin (1824–73) – Victoria Cross recipient.
 * William Lendrim (1830–91) – Victoria Cross recipient.
 * Seán Mac Diarmada (1883–1916) – political activist and revolutionary leader executed following the 1916 Rising.
 * John McDonald (1846–1911) – poet and nationalist.
 * Patrick Rogan (1847–1912) – US Army soldier and Medal of Honor recipient.
 * John Willoughby Crawford QC (1817–75) – Lieutenant-Governor of Ontario.

1900s

 * Carole Coleman (b. 1966) – RTÉ broadcaster.
 * Victor Costello (b. 1970) – rugby player and Olympian, former resident of Keshcarrigan.
 * John Godley (1920–2006) – 3rd Baron Kilbracken.
 * Tony Hayden – Gaelic footballer.
 * James Kilfedder (1928–95) – member of parliament for North Down.
 * Katherine Lynch (b. 1972) – comedian.
 * Declan Maxwell (b. 1980/81) – Gaelic footballer.
 * John McGahern (1934–2006) – author and novelist.
 * Charlie McGettigan (b. 1950) – singer-songwriter and Eurovision winner; Drumshanbo resident since 1973.
 * John Joe McGirl (1921–88) – Sinn Féin TD and Chief of Staff of the Irish Republican Army.
 * Patrick McGoohan (1928–2009) – actor.
 * Paschal Mooney (b. 1947) – RTÉ broadcaster and senator.
 * Colm O'Rourke (b. 1957) – Gaelic footballer and sports broadcaster, originally from Aughavas.
 * Ray O'Rourke (b. 1947) – chairman and CEO of the construction multinational Laing O'Rourke.
 * Pat Quinn (1935–2009) – founder of Quinnsworth, Ireland's first supermarket chain.
 * Eleanor Shanley – singer.
 * Paul Williams (b. 1964) – journalist.
 * Gordon Wilson (1927–95) – peace campaigner and senator.

license: Creative Commons - Attribution Share-Alike - https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/

title: County Leitrim


text: Wikipedia talk:Naming conventions (abbreviations)


text:
County Londonderry

 County Londonderry (Ulster-Scots: Coontie Lunnonderrie), also known as County Derry (Contae Dhoire), is one of the six counties of Northern Ireland, one of the thirty-two counties of Ireland and one of the nine counties of Ulster. Before the partition of Ireland, it was one of the counties of the Kingdom of Ireland from 1613 onward and then of the United Kingdom after the Acts of Union 1800. Adjoining the north-west shore of Lough Neagh, the county covers an area of 2118 km2 and today has a population of about 252,231.

Since 1972, the counties in Northern Ireland, including Londonderry, have no longer been used by the state as part of the local administration. Following further reforms in 2015, the area is now governed under three different districts: Derry and Strabane, Causeway Coast and Glens and Mid-Ulster. Despite no longer being used for local government and administrative purposes, it is sometimes used in a cultural context in All-Ireland sporting and cultural events (i.e. Derry GAA).

Since 1981, it has become one of four counties in Northern Ireland that has a Catholic majority (55.56% according to the 2001 Census and 61.3% according to the 2021 Census ). The county flower is the purple saxifrage.

Name
The place name Derry is an anglicisation of the Old Irish Daire (Modern Irish Doire ), meaning "oak-grove" or "oak-wood".

As with the city, its name is subject to the Derry/Londonderry name dispute, with the form "Londonderry" generally preferred by unionists and "Derry" by nationalists. Unlike with the city, however, there has never been a County Derry. County Londonderry was formed mostly from the old County Coleraine (see below). British authorities use the name "Londonderry", while "Derry" is used by the Republic of Ireland.

Prehistoric
The county has a significant of megalithic structures from prehistoric times, including Ballygroll Prehistoric Landscape, as well as numerous others. The most significant site however is Mountsandel, located near Coleraine in County Londonderry is "perhaps the oldest recorded settlement within Ireland".

County Coleraine and the Plantation of Ulster
At an early period, what became the county of Coleraine was inhabited by the O'Cahans, who were tributary to the O'Neills. Towards the close of the reign of Elizabeth I their territory was seized by England, with the purpose of checking the power of the O'Neills, and was made the county of Coleraine, named after the regional capital.

A short description of County Coleraine is given in Harris's Hibernica, and also in Captain Pynnar's Survey of the Escheated Counties of Ulster, Anno 1618:

The county of Coleraine,* otherwise called O'Cahan's country, is divided, as Tyrone, by ballyboes and doth contain, as appeareth by the survey, 547 ballyboes, or 34,187 acres, every ballyboe containing 60 acres or thereabouts.

On 2 March 1613, James I granted a charter to The Honourable The Irish Society to undertake the plantation of a new county. This county was named Londonderry, a combination of London (in reference to the Livery Companies of the Irish Society) and Derry (then name of the city). This charter declared that the "City of Londonderry" and everything contained within the new county: shall be united, consolidated, and from hence-forth for ever be one entire County of itself, distinct and separate from all our Counties whatsoever within our Kingdom of Ireland-and from henceforth for ever be named, accounted and called, the County of Londonderry.

This new county would comprise the then County Coleraine—which consisted of the baronies of Tirkeeran, Coleraine, and Keenaght—and at the behest of The Irish Society the following additional territory was added: all but the south-west corner of the barony of Loughinsholin, then a part of County Tyrone, as it had sufficient wood for construction; the North East Liberties of Coleraine, which was part of County Antrim and the City of Londonderry and its Liberties, which were in County Donegal, so that they could control both banks of the River Foyle and River Bann.

The Irish Society was made up of the twelve main livery companies of London, which themselves were composed of various guilds. Whilst The Irish Society as a whole was given possession of the city of Londonderry and Coleraine, the individual companies were each granted an estimated 3210 acre throughout the county. These companies and the sites of their headquarters were:
 * Clothworkers, based at Killowen and Clothworker's Hall (present-day Articlave) in the barony of Coleraine;
 * Drapers, based at Draper's Hall, later called Drapers Town (present-day Moneymore) in the barony of Loughinsholin;
 * Fishmongers, based at Artikelly and Fishermonger's Hall (present-day Ballykelly) in the barony of Keenaght;
 * Goldsmiths, based at Goldsmith's Hall (present-day Newbuildings) in the barony of Tirkeeran;
 * Grocers, based at Grocer's Hall, alias Muff (present-day Eglinton) in the barony of Tirkeeran;
 * Haberdashers, based at Habberdasher's Hall (present-day Ballycastle) in the barony of Keenaght;
 * Ironmongers, based at Ironmonger's Hall (present-day townland of Agivey) in the barony of Coleraine;
 * Mercers, based at Mercer's Hall (present-day townland of Movanagher) in the barony of Coleraine;
 * Merchant Taylors, based at Merchant Taylor's Hall (present-day Macosquin) in the barony of Coleraine;
 * Salters, based at Salter's Hall (present-day Magherafelt) and Salters Town in the barony of Loughinsholin;
 * Skinners, based at Skinner's Hall (present-day Dungiven) in the barony of Keenaght;
 * Vintners, based at Vintner's Hall, later called Vintner's Town (present-day Bellaghy) in the barony of Loughinsholin.

19th century
As a result of the Local Government (Ireland) Act 1898, the city was detached from the county for administrative purposes, becoming a separate county borough from 1899. The county town of County Londonderry, and seat of the Londonderry County Council until its abolition in 1973, was therefore moved to the town of Coleraine.

Geography and places of interest
The highest point in the county is the summit of Sawel Mountain (678 m) on the border with County Tyrone. Sawel is part of the Sperrin Mountains, which dominate the southern part of the county. To the east and west, the land falls into the valleys of the Bann and Foyle rivers respectively; in the south-east, the county touches the shore of Lough Neagh, which is the largest lake in Ireland; the north of the county is distinguished by the steep cliffs, dune systems, and remarkable beaches of the Atlantic coast.

The county is home to a number of important buildings and landscapes, including the well-preserved 17th-century city walls of Derry; the National Trust–owned Plantation estate at Springhill; Mussenden Temple on the Atlantic coast; the dikes, artificial coastlines and the bird sanctuaries on the eastern shore of Lough Foyle; and the visitor centre at Bellaghy Bawn, close to the childhood home of Nobel laureate Seamus Heaney. In the centre of the county are the old-growth deciduous forests at Banagher and Ness Wood, where the Burntollet River flows over the highest waterfalls in Northern Ireland.

Subdivisions

 * Baronies

 * Coleraine
 * Keenaght
 * North East Liberties of Coleraine
 * North West Liberties of Londonderry
 * Loughinsholin
 * Tirkeeran

 * Parishes

 * Townlands

Settlements
(population of 75,000 or more with a cathedral)
 * Cities
 * Derry

(population of 18,000 or more and under 75,000 at 2001 Census)
 * Large towns
 * Coleraine

(population of 10,000 or more and under 18,000 at 2001 Census)
 * Medium towns
 * Limavady

(population of 4,500 or more and under 10,000 at 2001 Census) (population of 2,250 or more and under 4,500 at 2001 Census)
 * Small towns
 * Magherafelt
 * Portstewart
 * Intermediate settlements
 * Culmore (part of Derry Urban Area)
 * Dungiven
 * Eglinton
 * Maghera
 * Newbuildings (part of Derry Urban Area)

(population of 1,000 or more and under 2,250 at 2001 Census)
 * Villages

 * Ballykelly
 * Bellaghy
 * Castledawson
 * Castlerock
 * Claudy
 * Draperstown
 * Garvagh
 * Greysteel
 * Kilrea
 * Moneymore
 * Strathfoyle (part of Derry Urban Area)

(population of less than 1,000 at 2001 Census)
 * Small villages or hamlets

 * Articlave
 * Ballerin
 * Ballymaguigan
 * Ballyronan
 * Clady
 * Culnady
 * Desertmartin
 * Downhill
 * Drumsurn
 * Feeny
 * Glenullin
 * Gulladuff
 * Lettershendoney
 * Macosquin
 * Ringsend
 * Swatragh
 * Tobermore
 * Upperlands

Demography
It is one of four counties in Northern Ireland which currently has a majority of the population from a Catholic community background, according to the 2021 census. At the time of the 2021 census there were 252,231 residents of County Londonderry. Of these: 61.3% were from a Catholic background, 32.5% were from a Protestant and Other Christian (including Christian related), 0.9% were from other religions, and 5.3% had no religious background.

Administration
The county was administered by Londonderry County Council from 1899 until the abolition of county councils in Northern Ireland in 1973. They were replaced by district councils. These councils were: Londonderry City Council (renamed Derry City Council in 1984), Limavady Borough Council, and Magherafelt District Council, most of Coleraine Borough Council, and part of Cookstown District Council. After a reduction in the number of councils in Northern Ireland in 2011, County Londonderry is divided into three cross-county councils: Causeway Coast and Glens, Derry and Strabane, and Mid-Ulster District.

Transport

Translink provides a Northern Ireland Railways service in the county, linking Derry~Londonderry railway station to Coleraine railway station (with a branch to Portrush on the Coleraine–Portrush railway line) and onwards into County Antrim to Belfast Lanyon Place and Belfast Grand Central on the Belfast-Derry railway line.

There is also the Foyle Valley Railway, a museum in Derry with some rolling stock from both the County Donegal Railway and the Londonderry and Lough Swilly Railway, and is located on the site of the former Londonderry Foyle Road railway station. The Londonderry and Lough Swilly Railway continued as a private bus company based in the city but operating predominantly in County Donegal until it closed in 2014. Bus services are now provided by Ulsterbus.

Education
Government-funded education up to secondary school level is administered by the Education Authority (EA), sponsored by the Department of Education. The EA is divided into sub-regions:

 * Western region: Derry, Limavady;
 * North Eastern region: Coleraine, Magherafelt;
 * Southern region: Cookstown.

For Catholic grant-maintained schools administration is by the Derry Diocesan Education Office.

Two major centres of the University of Ulster are in the county, including its headquarters at Coleraine and the Magee Campus in Derry.

Sport
In Gaelic games, the GAA county of Derry is more or less coterminous with the former administrative county of Londonderry, although teams from the neighbouring counties of Tyrone, Donegal and Antrim have occasionally played in Derry competitions, and vice versa. The Derry teams wear the colours red and white. There are many club teams competing in up to five leagues and three championships. The county team has won one All-Ireland Senior Football Championship (in 1993) and five National League titles. Hurling is also widely played but is not as popular as football. However, the county team is generally regarded as one of the top hurling sides in Ulster and in 2006 won the Nicky Rackard Cup – the third tier hurling competition in Ireland.

In association football, the NIFL Premiership, which operates as the top division, has two teams in the county: Coleraine F.C. and Institute F.C., with Limavady United F.C., Moyola Park F.C., Portstewart F.C. and Tobermore United F.C. competing in the NIFL Championship, which operates as levels two and three. Derry City F.C. play in the Premier Division of the League of Ireland after leaving the Northern Ireland structures in 1985, having resigned from the Irish Football League at the height of the Troubles because of not being allowed play their home games at the Brandywell due to security concerns from other clubs.

The Northern Ireland Milk Cup was established in 1983 and is regarded as one of the most prestigious youth football tournaments in Europe and the world. The competition is based at Coleraine and involves several other towns and villages in the county – Limavady, Portstewart and Castlerock – and in neighbouring County Antrim – Ballymoney, Portrush, Ballymena and Broughshane. The event, held in the last week of July, has attracted teams from 56 countries around the world including Europe, the US, Africa, the Far East, South America, the Middle East, Australia, Russia, New Zealand and Canada. Some of the biggest teams in the world have entered including Premiership giants Everton, Liverpool, Manchester United, Chelsea, Tottenham Hotspur as well as top European teams such as Feyenoord, F.C. Porto, FC Barcelona, Benfica, Bayern Munich and Dynamo Kiev.

In rugby union, the county is represented at senior level by Rainey Old Boys Rugby Club, Magherafelt who compete in the Ulster Senior League and All Ireland Division Three. Limavady R.F.C, City of Derry Rugby Club, Londonderry Y.M.C.A and Coleraine Rugby Club all compete in Ulster Qualifying League One.

Cricket is particularly popular in the north-west of Ireland, with 11 of the 20 senior clubs in the North West Cricket Union located in County Londonderry: Limavady, Eglinton, Glendermott, Brigade, Killymallaght, Ardmore, Coleraine, Bonds Glen, Drummond, Creevedonnell and The Nedd.

In rowing, Richard Archibald from Coleraine along with his Irish teammates qualified for the Beijing 2008 Olympics by finishing second in the lightweight fours final in Poznań, thus qualifying for the Beijing 2008 Olympics. Another Coleraine rower Alan Campbell is a World Cup gold medallist in the single sculls in 2006.

Media
The county currently has four main radio stations:

 * BBC Radio Foyle;
 * Q102.9;
 * Q97.2;
 * Six FM (in the south of the county).

title: County Londonderry


text:
Resident Evil

Resident Evil is a Japanese horror game series and media franchise created by Capcom. It consists of survival horror, third-person shooter and first-person shooter games, with players typically surviving in post-apocalyptic urban environments infested with zombies and other lethal creatures. The franchise has expanded into other media, including a live-action film series, animated films, television series, comic books, novels, audiobooks, and merchandise. Resident Evil is the highest-grossing horror franchise.

The first Resident Evil game was created by Shinji Mikami and Tokuro Fujiwara for PlayStation, and released in 1996. It is credited for defining the survival horror genre and returning zombies to popular culture. With Resident Evil 4 (2005), the franchise shifted to more dynamic shooting action, popularizing the "over-the-shoulder" third-person view in action-adventure games.

The franchise returned to survival horror with Resident Evil 7: Biohazard (2017) and Resident Evil Village (2021), which used a first-person perspective. Capcom has also released four Resident Evil remakes: Resident Evil (2002), Resident Evil 2 (2019), Resident Evil 3 (2020) and Resident Evil 4 (2023). Resident Evil is Capcom's best-selling franchise and the best-selling horror game series, with 154 million copies sold worldwide as of December 2023.

The first Resident Evil action film was released in 2002, starring Milla Jovovich, followed by five further sequels and a reboot, Welcome to Raccoon City (2021). The films received mostly negative reviews, but have grossed more than $1.2 billion, making Resident Evil the third-highest-grossing video game film series.

History
The development of the first Resident Evil, released as Biohazard in Japan, began in 1993 when Capcom's Tokuro Fujiwara told Shinji Mikami and other co-workers to create a game using elements from Fujiwara's 1989 game Sweet Home on the Family Computer (Famicom) in Japan. When in late 1994 marketing executives were setting up to release Biohazard in the United States, it was pointed out that securing the rights to the name Biohazard would be very difficult as a DOS game had been registered under that name, as well as a New York hardcore punk band called Biohazard. A contest was held among company personnel to choose a new name; this competition turned up Resident Evil, the name under which it was released in the west. Resident Evil made its debut on the PlayStation in 1996 and was later ported to the Sega Saturn.

The first entry in the series was the first game to be dubbed a "survival horror", a term coined for the new genre it initiated, and its critical and commercial success led to the production of two sequels, Resident Evil 2 in 1998 and Resident Evil 3: Nemesis in 1999, both for the PlayStation. A port of Resident Evil 2 was released for the Nintendo 64. In addition, ports of all three were released for Windows. The fourth game in the series, Resident Evil – Code: Veronica, was developed for the Dreamcast and released in 2000, followed by ports of Resident Evil 2 and Resident Evil 3: Nemesis. Resident Evil – Code: Veronica was later re-released for Dreamcast in Japan in an updated form as Code: Veronica Complete, which included slight changes, many of which revolved around story cutscenes. This updated version was later ported to the PlayStation 2 and GameCube as Code: Veronica X.

Despite earlier announcements that the next game in the series would be released for the PlayStation 2, which resulted in the creation of an unrelated game, Devil May Cry, Mikami decided to make the series exclusively for the GameCube. The next three games in the series—a remake of the original Resident Evil and the prequel Resident Evil Zero, both released in 2002, as well as Resident Evil 4 (2005)—were all released initially as GameCube exclusives. Resident Evil 4 was later released for Windows, PlayStation 2, and Wii.

A trilogy of GunCon-compatible light gun games known as the Gun Survivor series featured first-person gameplay. The first, Resident Evil Survivor, was released in 2000 for the PlayStation and PC but received mediocre reviews. The subsequent games, Resident Evil Survivor 2 – Code: Veronica and Resident Evil: Dead Aim, fared somewhat better. Dead Aim is the fourth Gun Survivor game in Japan, with Gun Survivor 3 being the Dino Crisis spin-off Dino Stalker. In a similar vein, the Chronicles series features first-person gameplay, albeit on an on-rails path. Resident Evil: The Umbrella Chronicles was released in 2007 for the Wii, with a sequel, Resident Evil: The Darkside Chronicles released in 2009 (both were later ported to the PlayStation 3 in 2012).

Resident Evil Outbreak is an online game for the PlayStation 2, released in 2003, depicting a series of episodic storylines in Raccoon City set during the same period as Resident Evil 2 and Resident Evil 3: Nemesis. It was the first in the series and the first survival horror game to feature cooperative gameplay. It was followed by a sequel, Resident Evil Outbreak: File #2. Raccoon City is a metropolis located in the Arklay Mountains of the Midwestern United States that succumbed to the deadly T-virus outbreak and was consequently destroyed via a nuclear missile attack issued by the United States government. The town served as a critical junction for the series' progression as one of the main catalysts to Umbrella's downfall and the entry point for some of the series' most notable characters.

Resident Evil Gaiden is an action-adventure game for the Game Boy Color featuring a role-playing-style combat system. There have been several downloadable mobile games based on the Resident Evil series in Japan. Some of these mobile games have been released in North America and Europe through T-Mobile. At the Sony press conference during E3 2009, Resident Evil Portable was announced for the PlayStation Portable,  described as a new game being developed with "the PSP Go in mind" and "totally different for a Resident Evil game". No further announcements have been made, and the game is considered to have been canceled.

In 2009, Resident Evil 5 was released for PlayStation 3, Windows and Xbox 360, becoming the best selling game of the franchise despite mixed fan reception. Capcom revealed the third-person shooter Resident Evil: Operation Raccoon City, which was developed by Slant Six Games for the PlayStation 3, Xbox 360 and Windows and released in March 2012. A survival horror game for the Nintendo 3DS, Resident Evil: Revelations, was released in February 2012. In October of the same year, the next numbered entry in the main series, Resident Evil 6, was released to mixed reviews, but enthusiastic pre-order sales.

In 2013, producer Masachika Kawata said the Resident Evil franchise would return to focus on elements of horror and suspense over action, adding that "survival horror as a genre is never going to be on the same level, financially, as shooters and much more popular, mainstream games. At the same time, I think we need to have the confidence to put money behind these projects, and it doesn't mean we can't focus on what we need to do as a survival horror game to meet fan's needs." Resident Evil: Revelations 2, an episodic game set between Resident Evil 5 and Resident Evil 6, was released in March 2015. A series of team-based multiplayer games were developed beginning with the poorly received Umbrella Corps, which was released in June 2016. Resident Evil: Resistance was released in April 2020, followed by Resident Evil Re:Verse in October 2022, with both being available for free to those who bought Resident Evil 3 and Village respectively.

Using the new RE Engine, which would develop the next generation of Resident Evil games, the series continued to shift back towards more horror elements. The next mainline game, Resident Evil 7: Biohazard was released for Windows, PlayStation 4 and Xbox One in January 2017. Set in a dilapidated mansion in Louisiana, the game uses a first-person perspective and emphasizes horror and exploration over action, unlike previous installments. The first-person perspective continued in the eighth mainline game Resident Evil Village. Released in May 2021, the game, set in a mysterious European village, is a direct sequel to Resident Evil 7: Biohazard although it incorporates more action elements inspired from Resident Evil 4. The game also marked the franchise's debut on PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X/S

A new generation of remakes of older entries began in 2019 with a remake of Resident Evil 2, being released for the PlayStation 4, Windows, and Xbox One. The remake outsold the original game within a year, selling over five million copies. Following in the success of the Resident Evil 2 remake, Capcom revealed a remake of Resident Evil 3: Nemesis in December 2019, known as Resident Evil 3. It was released in April 2020. In June 2022, a remake of Resident Evil 4 was announced and released on March 24, 2023 for PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X/S, and PC.

Story overview
The early Resident Evil games focused on the Umbrella Corporation, an international pharmaceutical company that secretly develops mutagenic viruses to further their "bio-organic weapons" (BOW) research. The company's viruses can transform humans into mindless zombies while also mutating plants and animals into horrifying monstrosities. The Umbrella Corporation uses its vast resources to effectively control Raccoon City, a fictional midwestern American city. In the original Resident Evil, members of an elite police task force, Special Tactics and Rescue Service (STARS), are lured to a derelict mansion on the outskirts of Raccoon City. The STARS team is mostly decimated by zombies and other BOWs, leaving only a handful of survivors, including Chris Redfield, Jill Valentine, and Albert Wesker. Chris and Jill explore the zombie-infested mansion and uncover a secret underground Umbrella research facility. Wesker reveals himself to be a double agent for Umbrella and betrays his comrades. However, Wesker is seemingly murdered by a Tyrant, a special BOW that is the culmination of the Umbrella Corporation's research.

Chris and Jill escape the mansion, but their testimony is ridiculed by Raccoon City's officials due to Umbrella's influence. Meanwhile, a separate viral outbreak occurs in another Umbrella research facility underneath Raccoon City. Most of the city's residents are infected and become zombies. Resident Evil 2 introduces two new protagonists, Leon S. Kennedy, a rookie police officer and Claire Redfield, the younger sister of Chris. Leon and Claire arrive in Raccoon City amidst the chaos of the viral outbreak. Leon is aided by Ada Wong, a corporate spy posing as an FBI agent, while Claire rescues Sherry Birkin, the daughter of two prominent Umbrella researchers. At the same time, Jill makes her escape from the city in Resident Evil 3: Nemesis. She is relentlessly pursued by a new Tyrant, Nemesis, who is deployed by Umbrella to eliminate all surviving STARS members. The U.S. Government destroys Raccoon City with a missile strike to sterilize the viral outbreak. Leon, Claire, Sherry, Ada, and Jill escape the city before its eradication. Claire continues to look for Chris, whereas Leon is recruited to work for the U.S. Government. Resident Evil – Code: Veronica follows Claire as she escapes from a prison camp in the Southern Ocean and later reunites with Chris at an Umbrella research facility in Antarctica. Resident Evil 4 is set six years after the Raccoon City incident and focuses on Leon as he tries to rescue the U.S. President's daughter from a cult in Spain.

A government investigation into the Umbrella Corporation reveals its involvement in the Raccoon City disaster and leads to the company's dissolution. Despite the downfall of the Umbrella Corporation, the company's research and BOWs proliferate across the black market and lead to the rise of bioterrorism. Chris and Jill establish the Bioterrorism Security Assessment Alliance (BSAA) to combat these ever-growing threats on a global scale. Wesker is revealed to be alive and involved in the development of new potent viral agents and BOWs. In Resident Evil 5, Wesker seeks to unleash a highly mutagenic virus that will infect all of humanity. Chris and the BSAA confront and kill Wesker in Africa before he can fulfill his mission. Resident Evil 6 features Leon and Chris meeting for the first time in the video game series. The two work separately to triage bioterrorist attacks in the United States, Eastern Europe, and China. They are assisted by Sherry, Wesker's illegitimate son Jake Muller, Ada, and many members of the BSAA and U.S. government.

Resident Evil 7: Biohazard and Resident Evil Village introduce a new protagonist, Ethan Winters, who becomes entangled in a bioterrorism incident while searching for his missing wife. He encounters Chris and the BSAA, who help him rescue his wife and defeat Eveline, a powerful BOW. Ethan, Mia, and their newborn daughter, Rosemary, are relocated to Eastern Europe but are abducted by a cult. Ethan ultimately sacrifices himself to destroy a fungal colony being weaponized by bioterrorists and save his family.

Gameplay
The Resident Evil franchise has had a variety of control schemes and gameplay mechanics throughout its history. Puzzle-solving has figured prominently throughout the series.

Tank controls
The first game introduced a control scheme that the player community has come to refer to as "tank controls" to the series. In a game with tank controls, players control movement relative to the position of the player character, rather than relative to the fixed virtual camera from which the player views the current scene. Pressing up (for example on a D-pad, analog stick, or cursor movement keys) on the game controller moves the character in the direction being faced, pressing down backpedals, and left and right rotates the character. This can feel counter-intuitive when the character is facing the camera, as the controls are essentially reversed in this state. This differs from many 3D games, in which characters move in the direction the player pushes the controls from the perspective of the camera. Some critics have posited that the control scheme is intentionally clumsy, meant to enhance stress and exacerbate difficulty.

While the first three entries in the series featured this control scheme, the third, Resident Evil 3: Nemesis, saw some action-oriented additions. These included a 180 degree turn and dodge command that, according to GameSpot, "hinted at a new direction that the series would go in." Later games in the series, like Resident Evil 4, would feature a more fluid over-the-shoulder third-person camera instead of a fixed camera for each room, while Resident Evil 7 and Resident Evil Village are played from the first-person perspective.

Third-person shooter gameplay
Resident Evil 4 saw significant changes to the established gameplay, including switching from fixed camera perspectives to a tracking camera, and more action-oriented gameplay and mechanics. This was complemented by an abundance of ammunition and revised aiming and melee mechanics. Some critics claimed that this overhauled control scheme "made the game less scary." The next two games in the franchise furthered the action-oriented mechanics: Resident Evil 5 featured cooperative play and added strafing, while Resident Evil 6 allowed players to move while aiming and shooting for the first time, fully abandoning the series' signature tank controls.

First-person shooter gameplay and VR
Resident Evil 7 is the first main Resident Evil game to use the first-person perspective and to use virtual reality. It drew comparisons to modern survival horror games such as Outlast and PT. The eighth main-series game, Resident Evil Village, also features a first-person perspective. A VR version of Resident Evil 4 was released on the Oculus Quest 2 on October 21, 2021.

Other media
The Resident Evil franchise features video games and tie-in merchandise and products, including various live-action and animated films, comic books, and novels.

Live-action films
From 2002 to 2016, six live-action Resident Evil films were produced, all written and produced by Paul W. S. Anderson. The films do not follow the games' premise but feature some game characters. The series' protagonist is Alice, an original character created for the films portrayed by Milla Jovovich. Despite a negative reaction from critics, the live-action film series has made over $1 billion worldwide. They are, to date, the only video game adaptations to increase the amount of money made with each successive film. The series holds the record for the "Most Live-Action Film Adaptations of a Video Game" in the 2012 Guinness World Records Gamer's Edition, which also described it as "the most successful movie series to be based on a video game."

A reboot, Resident Evil: Welcome to Raccoon City, was released on November 24, 2021, with Johannes Roberts as writer/director.

Animated films
The first computer animated film for the franchise was Biohazard 4D-Executer. It was a short 3D film produced for Japanese theme parks and did not feature any characters from the game.

Starting in 2008, a series of feature-length computer-animated films have been released. These films take place in the same continuity with the games of the series, and feature characters such as Leon Kennedy, Claire Redfield, Ada Wong, Chris Redfield, Jill Valentine and Rebecca Chambers.

Television
Resident Evil: Infinite Darkness, a four-part CG anime series, premiered on July 8, 2021, on Netflix. Starring the Resident Evil 2 protagonists Leon S. Kennedy and Claire Redfield, the series features both uncovering a worldwide plot. The series released on July 8, 2021 on Netflix.

Resident Evil premiered on July 14, 2022, on Netflix. An eight episode live-action series, two plotlines set in 2022 and 2036 follow Albert Wesker and his daughters navigating Umbrella's experiments in New Raccoon City.

Merchandise
Over the years, various toy companies have acquired the Resident Evil license, with each producing their own unique line of Resident Evil action figures or models. These include, but are not limited to, Toy Biz, Palisades Toys, NECA, and Hot Toys.

Tokyo Marui also produced replicas of the guns used in the Resident Evil series in the form of gas blow-back airsoft guns. Some models included the STARS Beretta featured in Resident Evil 3, and the Desert Eagle in a limited edition that came with other memorabilia in a wooden case, along with the Gold Lugers from Code: Veronica and the "Samurai Edge" pistol from the Resident Evil remake. Other merchandise includes an energy drink called "T-virus Antidote".

Resident Evil Archives is a reference guide of the Resident Evil series written by staff members of Capcom. It was translated into English and published by BradyGames. The guide describes and summarizes all of the key events that occur in Resident Evil Zero, Resident Evil, Resident Evil 2, Resident Evil 3: Nemesis, and Code: Veronica. The main plot analysis also contains character relationship charts, artwork, item descriptions, and file transcripts for all five games. A second Archives book was later released in December 2011 and covers Resident Evil 4, Resident Evil 5, the new scenarios detailed in Resident Evil: The Umbrella Chronicles and Resident Evil: The Darkside Chronicles, and the 2008 CGI movie, Resident Evil: Degeneration. The second Archives volume was also translated by Capcom and published by BradyGames.

A Resident Evil theme restaurant called Biohazard Cafe & Grill S.T.A.R.S. opened in Tokyo in 2012. Halloween Horror Nights 2013, held at Universal Orlando, featured a haunted house titled Resident Evil: Escape from Raccoon City, based on Resident Evil 2 and Resident Evil 3: Nemesis.

Novels
The first Resident Evil novel was Hiroyuki Ariga's novella Biohazard: The Beginning, published in 1997 as a portion of the book The True Story of Biohazard, which was given away as a pre-order bonus with the Sega Saturn version of Biohazard. The story serves as a prelude to the original Resident Evil, in which Chris investigates the disappearance of his missing friend, Billy Rabbitson.

S. D. Perry has written novelizations of the first five games, as well as two original novels taking place between games. The novels often take liberties with the games' plot by exploring events occurring outside and beyond the games. This often meant that the games would later contradict the books on a few occasions. One notable addition from the novels is the original character Trent, who often served as a mysterious behind-the-scenes string-puller who aided the main characters. Perry's novels were translated and released in Japan with new cover arts by Wolfina. Perry's novels, particularly The Umbrella Conspiracy, also alluded to events in Biohazard: The Beginning, such as the disappearance of Billy Rabbitson and Brian Irons' bid to run for Mayor. A reprinting of Perry's novels with new cover artwork began in 2012 to coincide with the release of Resident Evil: Retribution and its respective novelization.

There are a trilogy of original Biohazard novels in Japan. Hokkai no Yōjū (北海の妖獣) was published in 1998 and was written by Kyū Asakura and the staff of Flagship. Two additional novels were published in 2002, To the Liberty by Sudan Kimura and Rose Blank by Tadashi Aizawa. While no official English translation of these novels has been published yet, the last two books were translated into German and published in 2006.

Novelizations of the films Genesis, Apocalypse, and Extinction were written by Keith DeCandido. Afterlife did not receive a novelization due to Capcom's decision to discontinue working with Pocket Books, who had been their primary source of publishing books up to that point, Capcom would later make Titan Books their primary publisher going forth. Retribution was written by John Shirley, while The Final Chapter was written by Tim Waggoner. Genesis was published over two years after that film's release and coincided with the publication of Apocalypse, Genesis being marketed as a prequel to Apocalypse, while the Extinction novel was released in late July 2007, two months before the film's release. The Final Chapter was published in December 2016 alongside the film's theatrical release. There was also a Japanese novelization of the first film, unrelated to DeCandido's version, written by Osamu Makino. Makino also wrote two novels based on the game Resident Evil: The Umbrella Chronicles. The books are a two-part direct novelization of the game and are published in Japanese and German only. The first novel, titled Biohazard: The Umbrella Chronicles Side A in Japan and Resident Evil: The Umbrella Chronicles 1 in Germany, was released on December 22, 2007. The second novel, titled Biohazard: The Umbrella Chronicles Side B in Japan and Resident Evil: The Umbrella Chronicles 2 in Germany, was published in January 2008.

Comics
In 1997, Marvel Comics published a single-issue prologue comic based on the original Resident Evil, released through a promotional giveaway alongside the original PlayStation game.

In 1998, WildStorm began producing a monthly comic book series based on the first two games, Resident Evil: The Official Comic Magazine, which lasted five issues. The first four issues were published by Image, while Wildstorm themselves published the fifth and final issue. Each issue was a compilation of short stories that were both adaptations of events from the games and related side stories. Like the Perry novels, the comics also explored events occurring beyond Resident Evil 2 (the latest game during the series' publication) and thus were contradicted by later games. Wildstorm also published a four-issue miniseries, Resident Evil: Fire & Ice, which depicted the ordeal of Charlie Team, a third STARS team created specifically for the comic. In 2009, Wildstorm reprinted Fire & Ice in a trade paperback collection.

In Hong Kong, there has been officially licensed Biohazard manhua adaptations of Biohazard 0 by publisher Yulang Group, Biohazard 2 by Kings Fountain, Biohazard 3 Supplemental Edition by Cao Zhihao and, Biohazard 3 The Last Escape, and Biohazard Code: Veronica by Lee Chung Hing published by Tinhangse Publishing. The Code: Veronica manhua was translated into English, formatted to look like an American comic and distributed by WildStorm as a series of four graphic novel collections.

In 2009, Wildstorm began publishing a Resident Evil comic book prequel to Resident Evil 5, which centers on two original members of the BSAA, Mina Gere and Holiday Sugarman. Written by Ricardo Sanchez and illustrated by Kevin Sharpe and Jim Clark, the first issue was published on March 11, 2009. On November 11, 2009, the third issue was released, and the fourth was released March 24, 2010. The sixth and final book was finally published in February 2011.

Plays
In the summer of 2000, Bioroid: Year Zero was performed in Japan. It was a musical horror-comedy but took the perspective of the infected. Super Eccentric Theater put on the production under the direction of Osamu Yagihashi. The stage play was performed from early July to late August.

Biohazard The Stage was released in Japan in 2015. The play focused on iconic characters, Chris Redfield and Rebecca Chambers, as Philosophy University in Australia is experiencing a bioterrorist attack. The production was handled by Avex Live Creative and Ace Crew Entertainment, under supervision from Capcom.

The following year, Musical Biohazard ~Voice of Gaia~ was released in September. It was produced by Umeda Arts Theater by director G2 and composer, Shunsuke Wada.

Biohazard the Experience was the second Resident Evil play produced by Avex Live Creative and Ace Crew Entertainment. The story is set in 2015 and follows a cast of thirteen survivors who were abducted and woke up in a mansion during an outbreak.

Reception and legacy
Most of the games in the prominent Resident Evil series have been released to positive reviews. Some of the games, most notably Resident Evil, Resident Evil 2 and Resident Evil 4, have been bestowed with multiple Game of the Year honors and often placed on lists of the best video games ever made.

In 1999, Next Generation listed the Resident Evil series as number 13 on their "Top 50 Games of All Time", commenting that, "Flawless graphics, excellent music, and a top-notch storyline all combined to make a game of unparalleled atmosphere and suspense." In 2012, Complex ranked Resident Evil at number 22 on the list of the best video game franchises. That same year, G4tv called it "one of the most successful series in gaming history."

Commercial performance
By December 2022, around 135 million Resident Evil games had been sold. The first two Resident Evil games had collectively sold approximately 11 million units worldwide by March 1999. By early 2001, the series had sold 17 million units worldwide, earning more than US$600 million. By 2011, it had sold about 46 million copies and was estimated to have grossed at least US$1.3 billion. It is recognized by Guinness World Records as the best-selling survival horror series, with Resident Evil 2 remake being the best-selling survival horror game. Seven of the top ten best-selling horror games in North America are Resident Evil games.

The 2023 Resident Evil 4 remake sold more than three million copies in its first two days of release. It sold four million copies in its first two weeks, making it one of the fastest-selling Resident Evil games. In Japan, it was the best-selling retail game in its first week, selling 89,662 copies on PlayStation 5 and 85,371 on PlayStation 4.

The Resident Evil film series was the highest-grossing film series based on video games by 2012. By 2011, the films had grossed over US$600 million at the box office, bringing the franchise's estimated revenue to at least more than US$1.9 billion in combined video game sales and box office gross up until then. , the films have grossed more than US$1.3 billion in box office and home video sales. The success of the video games and films have made Resident Evil the highest-grossing franchise in the horror and zombie genres.

Cultural impact
GameSpot listed the original Resident Evil as one of the fifteen most influential video games of all time. It is credited with defining and popularizing the survival horror genre of games. It is also credited with taking video games in a cinematic direction with its B-movie style cut-scenes, including live-action full-motion video (FMV) footage. Its live-action opening, however, was controversial; it became one of the first action games to receive the "Mature 17+" (M) rating from the Entertainment Software Rating Board (ESRB), despite the opening cutscene being censored in North America.

The Resident Evil franchise is credited with sparking a revival of the zombie genre in popular culture, leading to a renewed interest in zombie films during the 2000s. Resident Evil also helped redefine the zombie genre, playing an important role in its shift from supernatural themes to scientific themes by using science to explain the origins of zombies. According to Kim Newman in the book Nightmare Movies (2011), "the zombie revival began in the Far East" mainly due to the 1996 Japanese zombie games Resident Evil and The House of the Dead. George Romero, in 2013, said it was the video games Resident Evil and House of the Dead "more than anything else" that popularised his zombie concept in early 21st-century popular culture. In a 2015 interview with Huffington Post, screenwriter-director Alex Garland credited the Resident Evil series as a primary influence on his script for the horror film 28 Days Later (2002), and credited the first Resident Evil game for revitalizing the zombie genre. Screenwriter Edgar Wright cited Resident Evil 2 as a primary influence on his zombie comedy film Shaun of the Dead (2004), with the film's star and co-writer Simon Pegg also crediting the first game with starting the zombie revival in popular culture. The Walking Dead comic book creator Robert Kirkman cited Resident Evil as his favorite zombie game, while The Walking Dead television series director Greg Nicotero credited Resident Evil and The House of the Dead with introducing the zombie genre "to a whole generation of younger people who didn't grow up watching Night of the Living Dead and Dawn of the Dead."

The Resident Evil Apocalypse zombies were conceptualized and choreographed by Sharon B. Moore and Derek Aasland. Through script analysis and movement research a "scientific logic" was devised for the T-virus accounting for each Zombie behaviour envisioned in Paul W. S. Anderson's script. Sharon B. Moore and Derek Aasland then wrote the so-called Undead Bible - a Handbook for the Undead - used as the guide for the nearly 1000 cast under the choreographic department (stunt performers, actors, dancers, extras) to ensure the Undead physicality was performed in a unified way across the picture. The Stunt and Core teams participated in the "Undead Bootcamp". See also 2007 Documentary Undead Bootcamp starring producer Jeremy Bolt, director Alexander Witt, and choreographers Sharon B. Moore and Derek Aasland.

On the DVD Featurette Resident Evil; Game Over Apocalypse director Alexander Witt said the zombies needed to be "more aggressive and more dangerous" than the original film, so they were created by the film's choreographers Sharon B. Moore and Derek Aasland as "liquid zombie[s]' in terms of their relentless forward motion: unstoppable, flowing around any kind of resistance, and then rushing in on the final attack. This is also detailed in the University of Liverpool book Biopunk Dystopias Genetic Engineering, Society, and Science Fiction (Lars Schmeink, 2016, p.214)

Additionally, the first Resident Evil film adaptation also contributed to the revival of zombie films, with the success of the film and the games resulting in zombies achieving greater mainstream prominence and several zombie films being greenlit, such as the video game film adaptation House of the Dead (2003), the remake Dawn of the Dead (2004) and Romero's Land of the Dead (2005). The Resident Evil films, 28 Days Later and the Dawn of the Dead remake all set box office records for the zombie genre, reaching levels of commercial success not seen since the original Dawn of the Dead (1978). They were followed by other zombie films such as 28 Weeks Later (2007), Zombieland (2009), Cockneys vs Zombies (2012), and World War Z (2013), as well as zombie-themed graphic novels and television shows such as The Walking Dead and The Returned, and books such as World War Z (2006), Pride and Prejudice and Zombies (2009) and Warm Bodies (2010). The zombie revival trend was popular across different media up until the mid-2010s. Since then, zombie films have declined in popularity during the late 2010s, but zombie video games have remained popular, as seen with the commercial success of the Resident Evil 2 remake and Days Gone in 2019.

title: Resident Evil


text:
County Tyrone

County Tyrone is one of the six counties of Northern Ireland, one of the nine counties of Ulster and one of the thirty-two traditional counties of Ireland. Its county town is Omagh.

Adjoined to the south-west shore of Lough Neagh, the county covers an area of 3266 km2, making it the largest of Northern Ireland's six counties by size, and the second largest county in Ulster after Donegal. With a population of 188,383 as of the 2021 census, Tyrone is the 5th most populous county in both Northern Ireland and Ulster, and the 11th most populous county on the island of Ireland. The county derives its name and general geographic location from Tír Eoghain, a Gaelic kingdom under the O'Neill dynasty which existed until the 17th century.

Name
The name Tyrone is derived, the name given to the conquests made by the Cenél nEógain from the provinces of Airgíalla and Ulaid. Historically, it was anglicised as Tirowen or Tyrowen, which are closer to the Irish pronunciation.

History
Historically Tyrone (then Tír Eoghain or Tirowen) was much larger in size, stretching as far north as Lough Foyle, and comprised part of modern-day County Londonderry east of the River Foyle. The majority of County Londonderry was carved out of Tyrone between 1610 and 1620 when that land went to the Guilds of London to set up profit making schemes based on natural resources located there. Tyrone was the traditional stronghold of the various O'Neill clans and families, the strongest of the Gaelic Irish families in Ulster, surviving into the seventeenth century. The ancient principality of Tír Eoghain, the inheritance of the O'Neills, included the whole of the present counties of Tyrone and Londonderry, and the four baronies of West Inishowen, East Inishowen, Raphoe North and Raphoe South in County Donegal.

In 1608 during O'Doherty's Rebellion areas of the country were plundered and burnt by the forces of Sir Cahir O'Doherty following his destruction of Derry. However, O'Doherty's men avoided the estates of the recently fled Earl of Tyrone around Dungannon, fearing Tyrone's anger if he returned from his exile.

Geography
With an area of 3266 km2, Tyrone is the largest county in Northern Ireland. The flat peatlands of East Tyrone border the shoreline of the largest lake in the British Isles, Lough Neagh, rising gradually across to the more mountainous terrain in the west of the county, the area surrounding the Sperrin Mountains, the highest point being Sawel Mountain at a height of 678 m (2,224 ft). The length of the county, from the mouth of the River Blackwater at Lough Neagh to the western point near Carrickaduff hill is 55 mi. The breadth, from the southern corner, southeast of Fivemiletown, to the northeastern corner near Meenard Mountain is 37.5 mi; giving an area of 1,261 square miles (in 1900). Annaghone lays claim to be the geographical centre of Northern Ireland.

Tyrone is connected by land to the counties of Fermanagh to the southwest; Monaghan to the south; Armagh to the southeast; Londonderry to the north; and Donegal to the west. Across Lough Neagh to the east, it borders County Antrim. It is the eighth largest of Ireland's thirty-two counties by area and tenth largest by population. It is the second largest of Ulster's nine traditional counties by area and fourth largest by population.

Administration
The county was administered by Tyrone County Council from 1899 until the abolition of county councils in Northern Ireland in 1973.

Demography
It is one of four counties in Northern Ireland which currently has a majority of the population from a Catholic community background, according to the 2021 census. In 1900 County Tyrone had a population of 197,719, while in 2021 it was 188,383. At the time of the 2021 census, 66.49% were from a Catholic background, 28.88% were from a Protestant and Other Christian (including Christian related), 0.66% were from other religions, and 3.97% had no religious background.

Large towns
(population of 18,000 or more and under 75,000 at 2021 Census)
 * Omagh

Medium towns
(population of 10,000 or more and under 18,000 at 2021 Census)
 * Cookstown
 * Dungannon
 * Strabane

Small towns
(population of 4,500 or more and under 10,000 at 2021 Census)
 * Coalisland

Intermediate settlements
(population of 2,250 or more and under 4,500 at 2021 Census)
 * Castlederg

Villages
(population of 1,000 or more and under 2,250 at 2001 Census)
 * Ardboe
 * Carrickmore
 * Dromore
 * Fintona
 * Fivemiletown
 * Killyclogher
 * Moy
 * Newtownstewart
 * Sion Mills

Small villages
(population of less than 1,000 at 2001 Census)

• Altamuskin

• Altmore

• Ardstraw

• Artigarvan

• Augher

• Aughnacloy

• Ballygawley

• Ballymagorry

• Benburb

• Beragh

• Bready

• Brockagh

• Caledon

• Clady

• Clogher

• Clonoe

• Coagh

• Derryloughan

• Derrytresk

• Donaghmore

• Donemana

• Drumquin

• Edenderry

• Eglish

• Erganagh

• Eskra

• Evish

• Glenmornan

• Gortin

• Greencastle

• Killyclogher

• Loughmacrory

• Kildress

• Plumbridge

• Pomeroy

• Rock

• Stewartstown

• Tamnamore

• Trillick

• Tullyhogue

• Victoria Bridge

Subdivisions
Baronies

Parishes
 * Clogher
 * Dungannon Lower
 * Dungannon Middle
 * Dungannon Upper
 * Omagh East
 * Omagh West
 * Strabane Lower
 * Strabane Upper

Townlands

Future railway revival
There is the possibility of the line being reopened to Dungannon railway station from Portadown.

Sport
Major sports in Tyrone include Gaelic games, association football, rugby union and cricket:
 * Gaelic football is more widely played than hurling in Tyrone. The Tyrone GAA football side has had considerable success since 2000, winning four All Ireland titles (in 2003, 2005, 2008 and 2021). They have also won sixteen Ulster titles (1956, 1957, 1973, 1984, 1986, 1989, 1995, 1996, 2001, 2003, 2007, 2009, 2010, 2016, 2017 and 2021) and two National League titles (in 2002 and 2003 ).
 * Association football also has a large following in Tyrone. Omagh Town F.C. were members of the Irish Football League until they folded in 2005 due to financial problems. Dungannon Swifts F.C. compete in the NIFL Premiership – the top division. Other teams include NIFL Championship side Dergview F.C.
 * Rugby union is very popular in the county. Dungannon RFC, Omagh Academicals RFC and Clogher Valley RFC play in the All-Ireland League. Other teams include Cookstown RFC and Strabane RFC.
 * International Cricket is also played on the Bready Cricket Club Ground which is owned by Bready Cricket Club. It is Ireland's fourth venue for International Cricket hosting its first International Cricket match when Ireland played against Scotland in a series of T20I matches in June 2015. It was selected as a venue to host matches in the 2015 ICC World Twenty20 Qualifier tournament.

Notable people

 * Philomena Begley, Irish country music singer
 * James E. Boyd, seventh Governor of Nebraska
 * Paul Brady, musician
 * Conor Bradley, footballer
 * Colin Broderick, Author and Filmographer.
 * William Burke (1792–1829), grave robber and murderer
 * Peter Canavan, former All Ireland Tyrone captain
 * William Carleton (1794–1869), writer
 * Chipzel, musician
 * Darren Clarke, professional golfer
 * Tom Clarke, Irish Republican and leader of the 1916 Easter Rising
 * Jimmy Cricket, comedian
 * Sidney Elisabeth Croskery, doctor
 * Austin Currie, politician, founding member SDLP; Member of Parliament (MP) and later Teachta Dála (TD)
 * Janet Devlin, soul and pop artist and contestant on The X Factor (UK)
 * Ryan Dolan, Ireland representative at the Eurovision Song Contest 2013
 * Brian Dooher, former captain of the Tyrone senior football team
 * Hugo Duncan, singer and broadcaster on BBC Radio Ulster
 * John Dunlap (1747–1812), publisher of the first American daily newspaper the Pennsylvania Packet in 1784, also the printer of the American Declaration of Independence
 * Brian Friel, dramatist and theatre director
 * Sylvia Hermon, Member of Parliament for North Down, born in Galbally, County Tyrone
 * Aaron Hughes, captain of the Northern Ireland football team
 * John Hughes (1797–1864), first Archbishop of Roman Catholic Diocese of New York
 * Martin Hurson, Irish Republican
 * Ryan Kelly, singer with Celtic Thunder
 * Benedict Kiely (1919–2007), writer and broadcaster
 * Conor McKenna, AFL Player for the
 * Gerry McKenna MRIA (1953–), biologist; Vice Chancellor and President, University of Ulster; Senior Vice President, Royal Irish Academy
 * William McMaster (1811–1887), founder of Canadian Bank of Commerce and namesake of McMaster University
 * Mary Mallon (1869–1938), more commonly known as Typhoid Mary
 * W. F. Marshall (1888–1954), the 'Bard of Tyrone', Presbyterian minister, author and poet
 * Thomas Mellon, founder of Mellon Bank, now Bank of New York Mellon
 * Sister Nivedita (1867–1911), Irish social activist
 * Flann O'Brien (1911–1966), writer
 * Dominic Ó Mongain (c. 1715–1770s), poet and harpist
 * Arthur O'Neill (c. 1737–1816), travelling blind Irish harpist
 * Hugh O'Neill, Earl of Tyrone (Aodh Mór Ó Néill) (c. 1550–1616), Irish leader during the Nine Years' War
 * Thomas Porter, member of the Wisconsin State Assembly
 * Martha M. Simpson (1864–1948), educationalist
 * Victor Sloan, visual artist
 * Ivan Sproule, football player for Bristol City F.C.
 * Dennis Taylor, former world snooker champion
 * John K. Tener, former baseball player and Governor of Pennsylvania. Creator of Congressional Baseball Game.

title: County Tyrone