Incline Half Life 2 is great and I love it

[Stella Brando]

Ok, play it without me then bro, I don't mind.

 

[schru]

The term ‘techdemo’ gets thrown around so much, but which games does it really apply to? I heard Unreal was supposed to show off Epic's new engine, but they still put a lot of work into the game, even if the combat system wasn't all that good. I think Far Cry was something along the lines of such a project? But even then, a good amount of care was put into it since the developers realized they had something unique to offer at the time.

Quake does have an introductory story in the manual and its amusingly telegraphic and generic given how unusual the game's setting is:

Background: You get the phone call at 4 a.m. By 5:30 you're in the secret installation. The
commander explains tersely, "It's about the Slipgate device. Once we perfect these, we'll be able
to use them to transport people and cargo from one place to another instantly.

"An enemy codenamed Quake, is using his own slipgates to insert death squads inside our bases
to kill, steal, and kidnap.

"The hell of it is we have no idea where he's from. Our top scientists think Quake's not from
Earth, but another dimension. They say Quake's preparing to unleash his real army, whatever
that is.

"You're our best man. This is Operation Counterstrike and you're in charge. Find Quake, and
stop him ... or it ... You have full authority to requisition anything you need. If the eggheads are
right, all our lives are expendable."

Prelude to Destruction: While scouting the neighborhood, you hear shots back at the base.
Damn, that Quake bastard works fast! He heard about Operation Counterstrike, and hit first.
Racing back, you see the place is overrun. You are almost certainly the only survivor. Operation
Counterstrike is over. Except for you.

You know that the heart of the installation holds a slipgate. Since Quake's killers came through, it
is still set to his dimension. You can use it to get loose in his hometown. Maybe you can get to
the asshole personally. You pump a round into your shotgun, and get moving.

Diablo actually has a pretty elaborate back story in the manual, with a description of the setting and each playable character and his motivation. Said motivations are the kind of thing one would expect, but I think relatively anonymous character worked pretty well for Diablo since most of its charm came from the horror-like style of the dungeons.

Not implying anything bad about Duke, of course. Duke's great.

 

[agentorange]

The visuals, music, and overall atmosphere of Quake speak for themselves. There is no need for an elaborate backstory or an endless series of contrived explanations for every single enemy and piece of equipment in the game.

 

[†††]

The visuals, music, and overall atmosphere of Quake speak for themselves. There is no need for an elaborate backstory or an endless series of contrived explanations for every single enemy and piece of equipment in the game.

I’d say lore-obsession is one of the many things that have ruined gaming (and specially RPGs).

 

[schru]

Indeed. Treat lore as a source for world-building for the development team, but leave out anything that can't be organically integrated into the game.

 

[Roguey]

Quake is the game I would describe as a 'tech demo.' All of its advances were technical. It was the opposite of Duke Nukem, which was full of flair, personality and humour. Who is the Quake guy? Why is he fighting demons?

'Lol who cares about dat bro just shoot sum shit.'

If Quake was an RPG it would be Diablo.

Quake follows the Carmack principle of "story in a game is like a story in a porn movie. It's expected to be there, but it's not that important."

It's one of the pinnacles of abstract level design.

Aside from the manual introduction, here's your story.

As the corpse of the monstrous entity Chthon sinks back into the lava whence it rose, you grip the Rune of Earth Magic tightly. Now that you have conquered the Dimension of the Doomed, realm of Earth Magic, you are ready to complete your task. A Rune of magic power lies at the end of each haunted land of Quake. Go forth, seek the totality of the four Runes!

The Rune of Black Magic throbs evilly in your hand and whispers dark thoughts into your brain. You learn the inmost lore of the Hell-Mother; Shub-Niggurath! You now know that she is behind all the terrible plotting which has led to so much death and horror. But she is not inviolate! Armed with this Rune, you realize that once all four Runes are combined, the gate to Shub-Niggurath's Pit will open, and you can face the Witch-Goddess herself in her frightful otherworld cathedral.

The charred viscera of diabolic horrors bubble viscously as you seize the Rune of Hell Magic. Its heat scorches your hand, and its terrible secrets blight your mind. Gathering the shreds of your courage, you shake the devil's shackles from your soul, and become ever more hard and determined to destroy the hideous creatures whose mere existence threatens the souls and psyches of all the population of Earth!

Despite the awful might of the Elder World, you have achieved the Rune of Elder Magic, capstone of all types of arcane wisdom. Beyond good and evil, beyond life and death, the Rune pulsates, heavy with import. Patient and potent, the Elder Being Shub-Niggurath weaves her dire plans to clear off all life from the Earth, and bring her own foul offspring to our world! For all the dwellers in these nightmare dimensions are her descendants! Once all Runes of magic power are united, the energy behind them will blast open the Gateway to Shub-Niggurath, and you can travel there to foil the Hell-Mother's plots in person.

Now, you have all four Runes. You sense tremendous invisible forces moving to unseal ancient barriers. Shub-Niggurath had hoped to use the Runes herself to clear off the Earth, but now instead, you will use them to enter her home and confront her as an avatar of avenging Earth-life. If you defeat her, you will be remembered forever as the savior of the planet. If she conquers, it will be as if you had never been born.

Congratulations and well done! You have beaten the hideous Shub-Niggurath, and her hundreds of ugly changelings and monsters. You have proven that your skill and your cunning are greater than all the powers of Quake. You are the master now. Id Software salutes you.

 

[Egosphere]

Finished Half-Life 1 and 2(not the episodes yet).
I found HL1 way better, straight to the action, no "boat/car" tedious and long part, so on. I'll wait to finish the episodes before I decide which one I liked the most.
However, it's quite sad to know how great the Source engine is in HL2 and it was not as good in Vampire.

Check out Opposing Force expansion for HL1 as well

 

[schru]

Quake follows the Carmack principle of "story in a game is like a story in a porn movie. It's expected to be there, but it's not that important."

It's one of the pinnacles of abstract level design.

Aside from the manual introduction, here's your story.

As the corpse of the monstrous entity Chthon sinks back into the lava whence it rose, you grip the Rune of Earth Magic tightly. Now that you have conquered the Dimension of the Doomed, realm of Earth Magic, you are ready to complete your task. A Rune of magic power lies at the end of each haunted land of Quake. Go forth, seek the totality of the four Runes!

The Rune of Black Magic throbs evilly in your hand and whispers dark thoughts into your brain. You learn the inmost lore of the Hell-Mother; Shub-Niggurath! You now know that she is behind all the terrible plotting which has led to so much death and horror. But she is not inviolate! Armed with this Rune, you realize that once all four Runes are combined, the gate to Shub-Niggurath's Pit will open, and you can face the Witch-Goddess herself in her frightful otherworld cathedral.

The charred viscera of diabolic horrors bubble viscously as you seize the Rune of Hell Magic. Its heat scorches your hand, and its terrible secrets blight your mind. Gathering the shreds of your courage, you shake the devil's shackles from your soul, and become ever more hard and determined to destroy the hideous creatures whose mere existence threatens the souls and psyches of all the population of Earth!

Despite the awful might of the Elder World, you have achieved the Rune of Elder Magic, capstone of all types of arcane wisdom. Beyond good and evil, beyond life and death, the Rune pulsates, heavy with import. Patient and potent, the Elder Being Shub-Niggurath weaves her dire plans to clear off all life from the Earth, and bring her own foul offspring to our world! For all the dwellers in these nightmare dimensions are her descendants! Once all Runes of magic power are united, the energy behind them will blast open the Gateway to Shub-Niggurath, and you can travel there to foil the Hell-Mother's plots in person.

Now, you have all four Runes. You sense tremendous invisible forces moving to unseal ancient barriers. Shub-Niggurath had hoped to use the Runes herself to clear off the Earth, but now instead, you will use them to enter her home and confront her as an avatar of avenging Earth-life. If you defeat her, you will be remembered forever as the savior of the planet. If she conquers, it will be as if you had never been born.

Congratulations and well done! You have beaten the hideous Shub-Niggurath, and her hundreds of ugly changelings and monsters. You have proven that your skill and your cunning are greater than all the powers of Quake. You are the master now. Id Software salutes you.

Those narrative texts written for Quake still feel like they just couldn't be bothered, while Doom's were appropriately poignant, either tastefully handling the tacky theme of ‘You're one man against hell's army’ or giving off this nice gloomy, hopeless feeling when you end up stranded somewhere or it turns out that the Deimos base was suspended in hell. Those in Quake feel so trivial that they actually take away from the strangeness of the setting and the enemies.

Check out Opposing Force expansion for HL1 as well

And Half-Life: Uplink!

 

[Viata]

Finished Half-Life 1 and 2(not the episodes yet).
I found HL1 way better, straight to the action, no "boat/car" tedious and long part, so on. I'll wait to finish the episodes before I decide which one I liked the most.
However, it's quite sad to know how great the Source engine is in HL2 and it was not as good in Vampire.

Check out Opposing Force expansion for HL1 as well

I did, it was great. Cool new guns, new aliens and so on. I really liked it. It was as good as the original campaign.

And Half-Life: Uplink!

This one I have not played it yet, I'll do it after finish the episodes.

 

[Egosphere]

And Half-Life: Uplink!

This one I have not played it yet, I'll do it after finish the episodes.

It was ok, but very short. I think it was a demo of the game released after the actual game, came bundled with some graphics cards or something. It might have been a level that was cut from HL1

 

[schru]

It probably is a cut section from the game, but it's very good, packed with nice set pieces.

 

[catfood]

Half Life Uplink is indeed the demo. It was really good too.

 

[Semiurge]

Quake is the game I would describe as a 'tech demo.' All of its advances were technical. It was the opposite of Duke Nukem, which was full of flair, personality and humour. Who is the Quake guy? Why is he fighting demons?

'Lol who cares about dat bro just shoot sum shit.'

If Quake was an RPG it would be Diablo.

Blood > Duke Nukem 3D

 

[Fronzel Neekburm]

As the corpse of the monstrous entity Chthon sinks back into the lava whence it rose, you grip the Rune of Earth Magic tightly. Now that you have conquered the Dimension of the Doomed, realm of Earth Magic, you are ready to complete your task. A Rune of magic power lies at the end of each haunted land of Quake. Go forth, seek the totality of the four Runes!

The Rune of Black Magic throbs evilly in your hand and whispers dark thoughts into your brain. You learn the inmost lore of the Hell-Mother; Shub-Niggurath! You now know that she is behind all the terrible plotting which has led to so much death and horror. But she is not inviolate! Armed with this Rune, you realize that once all four Runes are combined, the gate to Shub-Niggurath's Pit will open, and you can face the Witch-Goddess herself in her frightful otherworld cathedral.

The charred viscera of diabolic horrors bubble viscously as you seize the Rune of Hell Magic. Its heat scorches your hand, and its terrible secrets blight your mind. Gathering the shreds of your courage, you shake the devil's shackles from your soul, and become ever more hard and determined to destroy the hideous creatures whose mere existence threatens the souls and psyches of all the population of Earth!

Despite the awful might of the Elder World, you have achieved the Rune of Elder Magic, capstone of all types of arcane wisdom. Beyond good and evil, beyond life and death, the Rune pulsates, heavy with import. Patient and potent, the Elder Being Shub-Niggurath weaves her dire plans to clear off all life from the Earth, and bring her own foul offspring to our world! For all the dwellers in these nightmare dimensions are her descendants! Once all Runes of magic power are united, the energy behind them will blast open the Gateway to Shub-Niggurath, and you can travel there to foil the Hell-Mother's plots in person.

Now, you have all four Runes. You sense tremendous invisible forces moving to unseal ancient barriers. Shub-Niggurath had hoped to use the Runes herself to clear off the Earth, but now instead, you will use them to enter her home and confront her as an avatar of avenging Earth-life. If you defeat her, you will be remembered forever as the savior of the planet. If she conquers, it will be as if you had never been born.

Congratulations and well done! You have beaten the hideous Shub-Niggurath, and her hundreds of ugly changelings and monsters. You have proven that your skill and your cunning are greater than all the powers of Quake. You are the master now. Id Software salutes you.

Early id games had some of the most hilarious purple prose ever put in a video game.

I found HL1 way better, straight to the action

After the unskippable 5 minute "interactive" intro and 3 or 4 maps of dicking around (including the endless test chamber sequence).

Duke 3D is straight to the action. Quake is straight to the action. Half-Life the reason that nowadays every other shooter needs to cram a half hour or so of "story" in the form of scripted events down your throat before you're even allowed to pick up your first gun.

no "boat/car" tedious and long part

You must have slept through 'On a Rail' and 'Residue Processing'. Good on ya!

But yeah, HL1 is the superior game between the two.

 

[Viata]

I was comparing HL1 to HL2 when I said straight to the action. I'd take Blood over HL1 everyday, though.

 

[Morgoth]

Half-Life 2: Update was solid, so this is good news.

 

[Star Citizen]

The only thing that's memorable about HL2 is Ravenholm and the gravity gun.

This lol. Prolly still the biggest disappointment in gaming for me. Fuckin tech demo bullshit.

 

[Stella Brando]

I guess Half Life is not for everyone, but it's the kind of game I really enjoy.

 

[Sreggin Etah I]

i like both Half Lifes

 

[Morenatsu.]

Half-Life 2: Update was solid, so this is good news.

It was not solid, it was shit. He just took the Xbox 360 maps and turned them green, deleted lights, and fixed NOTHING ELSE. And then took credit for my work as some kind of unintended, super hilarious punch-line.

Half-Life 2: Greenmastered is gonna be great. It's gonna be great.

 

[Daemongar]

I guess Half Life is not for everyone, but it's the kind of game I really enjoy.

People forget that there was a big build up for Half Life 2 and Doom 3 - they came out within months. Even if Half Life 2 wasn't the greatest FPS ever, it was light years ahead of the sluggish, poorly optimized, flashlightless, jump-scare abomination that was Doom 3. From this comparison, Half Life 2 got a huge bump, and as someone who played both the same year, it's easy to see the difference in quality. People judge Half Life 2 stand alone don't get it.

 

[Ash]

hl2 has aged terribly outside of certain chapters (nova prospekt, city 17, antlion part), EP1 and EP2 are pretty solid

WTF? "aged" terribly? It was mediocre on release. Engine was really nice, physics were impressive, the game itself however was always inferior to HL1 and all the 90s classics. Age changed nothing. 7/10 then, 7/10 now. At absolute best.

 

[Latro]

hl2 has aged terribly outside of certain chapters (nova prospekt, city 17, antlion part), EP1 and EP2 are pretty solid

WTF? "aged" terribly? It was mediocre on release. Engine was really nice, physics were impressive, the game itself however was always inferior to HL1 and all the 90s classics. Age changed nothing. 7/10 then, 7/10 now. At absolute best.

Mediocre to shit I think. Unless you think boat section aged well?

 

[Ash]

hl2 has aged terribly outside of certain chapters (nova prospekt, city 17, antlion part), EP1 and EP2 are pretty solid

WTF? "aged" terribly? It was mediocre on release. Engine was really nice, physics were impressive, the game itself however was always inferior to HL1 and all the 90s classics. Age changed nothing. 7/10 then, 7/10 now. At absolute best.

Mediocre to shit I think. Unless you think boat section aged well?

stop with the aged crap.

Nah the boat section mostly sucks. And it did on release.

I reserve SHIT for stuff like modern military shooters where there isn't really even gameplay, but press x to blow something up in a cutscene then a terrible popamole shooting gallery, rinse and repeat. Or a game filled with bugs to the point of unplayable. Or storyfag/walking sim shit.

HL2 is utterly mediocre but not shit. It is still gameplay-oriented, technically well put together, and even fun at times. It's just really not very good overall.

 

[GrafvonMoltke]

The fact that HL2 has the codex all riled up is a sure sign that it's a great game.

Learn how to have FUN, nerds.