HL2: EP3 is a cumming.

[Darth Roxor]

Oh, I have a good idea about FPS games.

And HL2 is still painfully mediocre and mind-numbingly boring at times, too.

Oh, you mean FPS games in the last decade. Sorry then.

 

[Tuco Benedicto Pacifico]

Right, you just made my point.
THEY, in fact, are painfully mediocre shooters.

 

[Darth Roxor]

Dude, it says right there on the box. Halo 3 is the game of the DECADE!

DECADE, I TELLS YA

 

[racofer]

Achievements: check
Health Packs everywhere: check
Ammo everywhere: check
Win Gun: check
Lowered Textures in comparison to predecessors: check (see HL2EP2, all textures have been reduced)
Aiming aid: check

There is more, but I think this says enough.

 

[Tuco Benedicto Pacifico]

Dude, it says right there on the box. Halo 3 is the game of the DECADE!

DECADE, I TELLS YA

Yes, maybe it is, if you can just play on an Xbox.

 

[racofer]

If you don't care it doesn't make it go away.

 

[Jim Cojones]

My sources are suggesting it will rather be next Left for Dead, not Half-Life.

 

[Achilles]

Oh fuck this L4D faggotry, I want a proper single player game damn it!

 

[Tuco Benedicto Pacifico]

My sources are suggesting it will rather be next Left for Dead, not Half-Life.

Your sources are probably trolling you.

 

[ScottishMartialArts]

Oh fuck this L4D faggotry, I want a proper single player game damn it!

I love L4D, but I'd be majorly disappointed if more L4D was the surprise instead of HL3/Episode 3.

Maybe the surprise won't be a game per se, but a new game engine? Source has it's strengths but it is starting to get a little dated.

 

[Gragt]

Maybe they resurected PowerPlay.

 

[poocolator]

J'aime principalement les putains vivantes.

 

[ScottishMartialArts]

Maybe they resurected PowerPlay.

Heh, I thought I was the only one who remembered about that. The widespread availability and use of broadband has kinda rendered the concept unnecessary, at least for gaming purposes. It was still an interesting idea, but I have no idea how they hoped to accomplish it.

 

[cutterjohn]

wait, I haven't even bothered to finish HL2 yet, let alone lost coast and ep2...

(I'm guessing pandering to crapple fanbois personally... make them feel like they're actually getting something recent rather than old, stale, left over windows shit at grossly inflated prices...)

 

[Konjad]

Health Packs everywhere

Try beating the game on hard and see for yourself if it's easy/handhelding/whatever.

Yes, it is easy even on hard Too bad, because it's awesome game.

 

[Rhalle]

HL2 is not consolised.

It's just painfully mediocre

HL2 isn't consolized. Arguably it is the last great PC FPS.

Episode 1 is about half consoltarded-- the whole thing is Valve in effect straddling the line between PC game and Consoltard game; Episode 2 is in many ways close to full-on consoltarded.

I mean, FFS, it has an introductory movie, and a character sits you down and actually explains a part of the plot to you. It's also cloying and full of base fan service, since the player is basically propelled through the plot by a concern for his virtual girlfriend.

Anyway...

I really hope that whatever form it comes in that the next episode is as much of a return to the old Valve as is possible nowadays.

And I would also love a new Counter-Strike that is awesome.

 

[Gragt]

Interesting idea, but I have no idea how they hoped to accomplish it.

That's the thing: they never really talked of it on a technical level and just gave some vague promises that they were gonna change internet play forever. Lots of companies decided to join them in this grand adventure even though no one had any idea of what Valve was going to do. As you said yourself, very few people remember it and I guess it is because Valve prefers it that way because it was only hype and no substance — kinda happened with HL2 and the alleged source code theft; that excuse for releasing an almost complete game one year late always felt dubious.

It's actually telling when you think about it: how they managed to hype a mediocre game like HL2 and make people see things that aren't there like depth or innovative storytelling (that's a classic: repeat something enough times and people will believe it without questioning it), or how the slaves now think that Steam is an indispensable piece of software with features they couldn't live without.

 

[Dny]

Health Packs everywhere

Try beating the game on hard and see for yourself if it's easy/handhelding/whatever. In fact I could name several really hard moments through HL2 and the episodes (some Nova Prospekt segments and the strider battles from HL2, the ambush and the final battle from ep.2 etc). Or perhaps I just suck at FPSes. Anyway, it's not that many, and I'd take health packs over health regeneration any day

You SUCK at FPSes dude. I beat it on hard and yes it is hand holding you a lot. The only time I've felt "ugh" was in Ravenholm because I'm so-so at close combat and used too much ammo. Strider battles are nothing worth mentioning once you get the pattern it's all cake.

Hell the fact that you felt it was difficult to beat HL2 on hard probably means that you wouldn't even be ABLE to beat Doom 3 on its nightmare setting. You'd give up after ten minutes of it.

Ammo everywhere

Then how is it possible that I leave Ravenholm without ammo every single time I play it? :mystery:

The plural of anecdote is not data. Ravenholm is a single level, the only one that doesn't drown you in ammo boxes. For most of the game you get so much ammo for all kind of weapons you will never even find the need to aim accurately. Hell it was the first FPS I've played where you had CRATES OF INFINITE AMMO FOR FUCK'S SAKE. Heavy battles featured infinite rockets, the scout car had infinite crate of smg bullets on its back and so on.

HL2 isn't consolized. Arguably it is the last great PC FPS.

No. It is the beginning of the end for PC FPSes. HL2 isn't the worst console-like PC game but it started the trend. Both HL2 and Call of Duty contributed to the killing of "resource management" (aka ammo and health) in FPS.
They opened the road to the popamoles. Once you cut resource management out of FPSes you only need to add a cover system to turn your game into an actual whack-a-mole simulation. Which is why a game like Mass Effect 2 even on its hardest setting feels more like "1/ sit back and relax while health regen, 2/ pop out of cover, 3/shoot 4/ go to 1/".

 

[madbringer]

Yeah, HL2 was definitely not as hard as many others, but it ain't a cakewalk either. You actually have to use your brain in combat, the game doesn't allow the player to just run around, guns blazing, cutting a bloody path through the retardo hordes, like many modern FPS games do.

I still consider it a solid game, despite it's numerous flaws and said handholding.

 

[Achilles]

HL2 isn't the worst console-like PC game but it started the trend. Both HL2 and Call of Duty contributed to the killing of "resource management" (aka ammo and health) in FPS.

You can't be serious. HL2 used health packs and armor, just like almost every other PC FPS, Call of Duty had only medikits. This means that you can't just hide behind a rock and wait for your health to recharge, you had to come out and find a medikit. Yeah, maybe you're some sort of FPS master who breezed through it but the game was anything but console-like.

Call of Duty, on the other hand, could be accused of being popamole because of the way enemies used to hide and pop their heads out every once in a while. But even so, the game didn't have a gay "cover system" that enabled you to shoot enemies while being invincible yourself. You had to come out of cover to shoot, exposing yourself (not in a sexual way of course) to the enemy. Also, when you were in cover, you couldn't see the enemies' movement and you could (and in fact would) easily be flanked.

So get your facts straight and understand what the term "console-like" means. It means regenerating health, gay cover system where you can see your enemies from behind cover and you can fire accurately without leaving cover, slow moving enemies to facilitate targeting with a controller, huge-ass crosshair that covers half the screen and registers a hit even when you clearly miss the enemy.

 

[Dny]

You stupid little piece of shit should get some reading comprehension straight. I said they were the prelude, the start, the beginning of consolization. Of course they didn't have all the features that defines the genre on next-gen platforms but they began the trend of dumbing shit down. They sparked the interest in "streamlining" (HA!) the shooter genre. I didn't say they had a cover system, I said they started the trend of dumbing down that led to games that featured cover systems.

HL2 initiated the elimination of resources simply by making it INFINITE. There are plenty of places in the game where you get INFINITE AMMO CRATES for fuck sake. And the health was rather plentiful. CoD1 and HL2 are the first steps in the dumbing down stairways, with the latest Call of Duty : Modern Warfare 2 and bastard games like Mass Effect being the last step.

"Consolization" or "Streamlining" didn't start overnight as a process. It's the result of a long anti-evolution of the genres. Shit games like Mass Effect aren't born in a vacuum, they are the fruit of a slow and painful process.

Btw as a process Call of Duty is the shiny example, it only took Call of Duty 2 to introduce HEALTH REGENERATION.

 

[Achilles]

Oh boy, I really don't know where to start. Let's see:

You stupid little piece of shit should get some reading comprehension straight. I said they were the prelude, the start, the beginning of consolization.

No need for name calling, I know it seems strange but I am trying to have an actual discussion here.

Anyway, HL2 had nothing to do with the rise of consolization. As a mainly PC franchise, it did not need to cater to the console crowd and it didn't. The whole "next-gen" shitstorm started with Halo and the like, when it was decided that consoles were a good platform to play FPS games on. All FPS franchises went multiplatform and 99% of them switched their focus to the consoles. All this happened in 2001 (maybe even sooner if we take Goldeneye into account). By the time HL2 was released, the decline was already kicking it into high gear, so it couldn't have started it. It's as simple as that.

HL2 initiated the elimination of resources simply by making it INFINITE. There are plenty of places in the game where you get INFINITE AMMO CRATES for fuck sake. And the health was rather plentiful.

It doesn't really matter though. There were indeed places with infinite ammo crates but you couldn't stockpile ammo. You had a finite amount of ammo you could carry at any one time (and a rather low amount as I recall, which often forced you to depend on the physics gun) and you were always moving from place to place. Your complaint would be valid if you could pick up, say, 5000 bullets. You couldn't, so I don't understand what the big deal is.

As for health, "plentiful" ammo packs is a matter of opinion. In any case, it's still better than health regeneration.

 

[Darth Roxor]

Here, have some ammo!

Here, have a medkit!

 

[madbringer]

Here, have some ammo!

Here, have a medkit!

In any given firefight, those assholes were the first to go.

Gordon fuckin' Freeman doesn't have time to babysit weaklings.

 

[Achilles]

Here, have some ammo!

Here, have a medkit!

Isn't that "resource management"? Try to keep them alive so that they can help you? I think it was more of a motivation to keep them alive rather than dumbing down.

 

[Darth Roxor]

Except that the moment they die, they're replaced by clones coming out of nowhere.

Here, have some ammo!