Honest Opinion on Half-Life 2

[Ladonna]

Gman

G man used to just mean "government man", internal investigator.

Was "G man" ever used in HL1? I can't remember it in the game. Where did it come from?

 

[Dave the Druid]

Was "G man" ever used in HL1? I can't remember it in the game. Where did it come from?

It's never said out loud but G-man is referred to as monster_gman and npc_gman in the actual code.

EDIT: He's also called a "g-man" by Adrian Shephard in a diary entry in the Opposing Force manual

 

[Nutmeg]

terrible enemy AI

AI are very poor

filled with bullet-sponge brain-dead AI,

What are you guys comparing the AI to?

There are only 3 FPS games with AI that go beyond the typical two state AI (passive, where they patrol or guard an area, or active when they bee line to the player to attack them) or scripted. These games are Unreal, F.E.A.R and the first Half-Life, and actually Half-Life 2 which uses the same AI as the first AFAIK.

So what are you comparing it to? Yeah maybe Unreal and F.E.A.R beat it but bronze medal still seems OK to me.

 

[Ladonna]

There are only 3 FPS games with AI that isn't guarding or patrolling, or bee lining to the player and attacking, or robotically following a script. These games are Unreal, F.E.A.R and the first Half-Life, and actually Half-Life 2 which uses the same AI as the first AFAIK.

Did Far Cry only use scripts? Some of the bad guys in that seemed to be sort of smart for an AI. On occasion.

 

[Morenatsu.]

* HL1 also gives you a bit more freedom in how you approach things. You can easily kill the first helicopter as soon as it appears over the dam if you save up enough heavy-hitting ammo. Might be more down to over-testing for HL2 (something that Valve seems to be proud of in the developer commentary) to and preventing "exploits" and make sure players experience everything as intended rather than a conscious design in HL1. Both are quite linear experiences but somehow HL2 feels even more scripted.

Real gamers don't destroy the helicopter because it's supposed to be the same one across all the maps. If you kill it, it's like playing Doom without pistol-starts. With HL2 Valve was just enforcing correct gameplay. Mega based. Smugface.

 

[NecroLord]

What about Episode One and Two?
I find Episode One to be really lacking. The Citadel Reactor does look pretty good, but there are many very tedious combat sections. Overall, not that great.
Episode Two I really like, however. Reminds me of Surface Tension from the first Half-Life. Introduces some new enemy types too.
I also liked the Cavern section where you team up with a Vortigaunt.

 

[Darth Roxor]

Gman

G man used to just mean "government man", internal investigator.

Was "G man" ever used in HL1? I can't remember it in the game. Where did it come from?

The multiplayer skin was called 'gman' iirc.

 

[retardgrand]

Episode 1 is probably the worst singleplayer game Valve has produced, it's really bad. Episode 2 is better but still very meh. They both continue in HL2's focus on setpieces instead of fun core gameplay, but now you have Alyx on your ass for most of the game. This also starts the classic Valve style of having some companion constantly dropping you quips or otherwise entertaining you cause the game itself probably can't.

The story also goes full retard (higher emphasis on gman is dumb, the vortigaunts are dumb, some quirky grumpy scientist that somehow has a working rocket silo not too far from humanity's capital and wants to somehow use it to disrupt the combine portal is completely retarded) and basically becomes unsalvageable (epistle 3 / HL alyx show that the story is completely fucked).

Few new enemies, no new weapons, quite a few dogshit setpieces (hold a flare so Alyx can shoot / cavern turret section). It's all just very meh.

 

[Falksi]

Hated it for reasons many have already mentioned.

It's indicative of what I call "Firework gaming", basically stuff which is build for kids reared on Nintendo who are happy to accept shite core game values over a few "wow" moments or "cool" things.

Also, the pacing was garbage too.

 

[Spukrian]

actually Half-Life 2 which uses the same AI as the first AFAIK.

I'm quite sure HL2 doesn't use the same AI as HL1.

 

[zwanzig_zwoelf]

I found it rather bland yet OK for a single playthrough, but I found it hilarious that the writer worked on the novelization of Gadget: Invention, Travel & Adventure, which has quite a few similarities in the setting.

IIRC the Xen crystals were heavily inspired by the mysterious crystals that you inspect in Gadget.

 

[Great Deceiver]

I remember that back on release there were basically 2 camps - one that preferred Doom 3 and one that preferred HL2. I thought both kind of sucked, even back then. In retrospect, HL2 is probably a better game than Doom 3, which I really can't stomach at all, but the worst elements of D3 were borrowed from HL (scripted on-rails sections).

HL1 is a vastly superior game in all respects and it was genuinely impressive on release, which I was also around for. Every once in awhile I replay HL1 but I never feel like replaying HL2 at all.

 

[soutaiseiriron]

it's mid. not bad, just nothing that i'd probably ever play for a second time in my life. half life 1 is only really fun if you're bunnyhopping through it and playing as fast as possible, hl2 doesn't allow for bunnyhopping, only speedrunner-tier ABH exists and the pace is much slower because it constantly throws unskippable cutscenes at you where there's nothing to do, which hurts replayability bad. movement is just generally nerfed hard and there's some blatantly shit design decisions like tying flashlight and sprint on the same bar.
at the time you already had generation defining games like call of duty and halo, which are much more cinematic, much more fun, much much much more challenging. hl2 just feels stale, easy and boring and other than the wow factor back in 2004 i don't think it has as much going for it today, definitely does not feel as fresh as halo does, i could easily do another playthrough of that and enjoy it as much as i did around 5 years ago.

 

[Ismaul]

Horrible game and a really bad sequel to HL1, which I loved. Very bland, empty, on rails.

Went in hyped for the "pick up the can" dystopia, turned out to be nothing at all. Explosive barrels near enemies everywhere, empty setpieces, senseless plot, NPCs you want to shoot dead. Technical achievements were worthless to me, kinda tacked on to show off the engine, far from a coherent whole.

Couldn't get myself to finish it. Never understood the positive reception at all.

No wonder Valve stopped making games and focused on their technical strengths.

 

[HumanTotemPole]

terrible enemy AI

AI are very poor

filled with bullet-sponge brain-dead AI,

What are you guys comparing the AI too?

There are only 3 FPS games with AI that go beyond the typical two state AI (passive, where they patrol or guard an area, or active when they bee line to the player to attack them) or scripted. These games are Unreal, F.E.A.R and the first Half-Life, and actually Half-Life 2 which uses the same AI as the first AFAIK.

So what are you comparing it to? Yeah maybe Unreal and F.E.A.R beat it but bronze medal still seems OK to me.

Always seen the HL2 AI compliant as a level design issue more than anything else. The Combine AI is actually pretty decent and similar to HL1 but you spend a lot of time fighting them in large open environments. If they're just hanging out at the side of the road waiting for Gordon's buggy to pull up and tag them with a charged gauss cannon blast A.I. doesn't matter. Can't use grenades effectively, limited cover and no possibility to pin down and outflank the player.

The turret defence setpiece in Nova Prospekt was a personal highlight because a designer actually thought about the interaction between the enemy AI and the environment. You're boxed in so some grunts actually start pinning you down with grenades whilst others advance to finish you off.

 

[ADL]

Would've been better if they stuck with the original much darker tone depicted in Raising the Bar from a world building perspective. Gameplay? Who the fuck knows how it would've turned out but I've always been fascinated by it. Anyone that has messed around with the WC map pack knows what we missed out on.
https://archive.org/details/half-life-2-raising-the-bar

If Half-Life 3 ever happens, I hope it's this version of the game where you wake up in a derelict Aperture Facility in North America with the much darker aesthetic after a major timeskip where everyone besides Gordon dies. Allegedly even Half-Life Alyx had the tone of the beta before the rewrite. It seems like something they keep going back to so they should just do it at this point.

 

[Nutmeg]

Always seen the HL2 AI compliant as a level design issue more than anything else. The Combine AI is actually pretty decent and similar to HL1 but you spend a lot of time fighting them in large open environments. If they're just hanging out at the side of the road waiting for Gordon's buggy to pull up and tag them with a charged gauss cannon blast A.I. doesn't matter. Can't use grenades effectively, limited cover and no possibility to pin down and outflank the player.

HL1 has the same problem, though perhaps to a lesser extent. There's what? Half a dozen combat arenas throughout the entirety of the game? These are the only places the enemies with more complex AI (HECU marines, Vortigaunts and Black Ops) have a chance to shine. Everywhere else the HECU marines are just standing around waiting for you to snipe them or manning a turret or playing their part in some kind of scripted event, likewise Vortigaunts. There are two fights with Black Ops from memory. They're amazing, amazing fights, especially on hard mode, but there's just two of them.

Both HL1 and HL2 are 3D hazard navigation games for 80% of their play time. I haven't played HL2 since release, while I finished HL1 last year, so I can't say for certain, but they are both roughly the same w.r.t this aspect of play with maybe HL2 holding a slight edge. I was certainly far from impressed with HL1s handling of combat against heavy equipment (compare tanks in HL1 to striders in HL2, or helicopters in both), and its janky ass gimmicks, whereas I don't remember feeling similar disappointment, especially with the former, when playing HL2.

So, pending a replay of HL2 I'd say HL1 holds the edge in combat arenas (of the kind you mention that gel well with the AI) due to quantity (6 or so vs 1 or 2), arsenal (HL1 really does have a great selection of weapons, though the crossbow is cheap and OP), and approach to game cinema (more minimal, less intrusive), while HL2 holds the edge in everything else.

 

[Nutmeg]

There are only 3 FPS games with AI that isn't guarding or patrolling, or bee lining to the player and attacking, or robotically following a script. These games are Unreal, F.E.A.R and the first Half-Life, and actually Half-Life 2 which uses the same AI as the first AFAIK.

Did Far Cry only use scripts? Some of the bad guys in that seemed to be sort of smart for an AI. On occasion.

I should play this game. I remember watching a video or two on it last year while looking for another FPS to play, and the player was fighting some kind of yuge mutant type enemies, and making them path into a doorway they couldn't walk through and then shooting them through the doorway. Got bad Quake 2 enemy design vibes from that.

 

[NecroLord]

Honestly, it would've been better without Alyx. Look, the voice acting is good, as are the facial animations, but Half-Life was always about one ANGRY scientist doing his own stuff on his own - Gordon Freeman. Imagine playing Doom, but you have some chick constantly boring you with her input. It would suck, wouldn't it? Then again, Half-Life was not Doom, it was its own thing.
Still, I'll take HL2 over any of the shit that comes out today anyday.

 

[Ladonna]

I should play this game. I remember watching a video or two on it last year while looking for another FPS to play, and the player was fighting some kind of yuge mutant type enemies, and making them path into a doorway they couldn't walk through and then shooting them through the doorway. Got bad Quake 2 enemy design vibes from that.

It's one of the few FPS (strictly FPS, not a hybrid like Deus Ex, System shock, etc) that I have finished and not gotten bored with. The others being HL1, HLOF, HLBS, Duke Nukem3d, Soldier of Fortune 1 and Call of Duty 1.

 

[NecroLord]

It's one of the few FPS (strictly FPS, not a hybrid like Deus Ex, System shock, etc) that I have finished and not gotten bored with. The others being HL1, HLOF, HLBS, Duke Nukem3d, Soldier of Fortune 1 and Call of Duty 1.

I guess we now know you are female.

 

[Morenatsu.]

Anyone that has messed around with the WC map pack knows what we missed out on.

While I do love me some moldy cold old Kingpin textures,

bottom text

 

[Levenmouth]

• It did a lot of cool things.
• Since then, other games did all things HL2 did, but better.
• The plot is boring and the characters suck, so it has no value in 2023 outside of being an interesting piece of history.

I remember that back on release there were basically 2 camps - one that preferred Doom 3 and one that preferred HL2.

Unironically, D3 has a more interesting story.

 

[Morenatsu.]

Since then, other games did all things HL2 did, but better.

So like where are all the games with great facial animations that aren't mocap
So like where are all the games with great physics that aren't literally just that
So like where are all the games with great visuals that don't look like they're glazed in fakesauce

 

[Lemming42]

Always seen the HL2 AI compliant as a level design issue more than anything else. The Combine AI is actually pretty decent and similar to HL1 but you spend a lot of time fighting them in large open environments. If they're just hanging out at the side of the road waiting for Gordon's buggy to pull up and tag them with a charged gauss cannon blast A.I. doesn't matter. Can't use grenades effectively, limited cover and no possibility to pin down and outflank the player.

HL1 has the same problem, though perhaps to a lesser extent. There's what? Half a dozen combat arenas throughout the entirety of the game? These are the only places the enemies with more complex AI (HECU marines, Vortigaunts and Black Ops) have a chance to shine. Everywhere else the HECU marines are just standing around waiting for you to snipe them or manning a turret or playing their part in some kind of scripted event, likewise Vortigaunts. There are two fights with Black Ops from memory. They're amazing, amazing fights, especially on hard mode, but there's just two of them.

HL1 was way better at masking it, IMO. There's almost always some kind of gimmick or twist to make the crap combat more interesting. The first encounters with the HECU make use of the vertical catwalks, for example (allowing them to throw grenades down at you), as well as stuff like having a barnacle on the stairs to lead them into. "On A Rail" is pretty much a masterclass in making crap combat mechanics shine - give the player a turret, have Vorts + HECU fighting when the player arrives so the player can choose to either ambush both sides or slip through, give the player a shitton of tripwires to lure enemies into traps, have the player see a mounted gun turret on the far side of an arena and give them the chance to rush it and gain control of it to deal with the others, etc.

There's also great use of setpieces - everyone remembers that bit where the vent gets shot away from under you in "Surface Tension", because it's conceptually really cool. The fact that you then plunge into a room where you fight two HECU guys with failrly unimpressive AI who are more likely to spend the fight planting grenades at their own feet and running into a wall doesn't hugely matter, since the scripted bit with the vent was so exciting that players will remember that, and see the combat as just a little extra thing. Same for stuff like the dynamite trap in "On A Rail". Even though the actual combat mechanics are poor, the game's presentation is so strong that you actually end up feeling as though you're fighting a dangerous guerrilla war against the HECU, where ambushes wait around every corner.

Meanwhile, way too many of HL2's combine encounters are just groups of combine standing in rooms, which always ends up highlighting the weakness of the gunplay and the limits of the enemy AI. Pretty much all of the chapter where you've got the rebel squad with you is just crap fight after crap fight, with almost no gimmicks or scenarios to spice it up. "Nova Prospekt" is boring as fuck for the same reason - the only real gimmick is the antlions, who overstay their welcome about three seconds after the concept is introduced. Otherwise, it's just a bunch of gasmask men with middling AI standing around in large rooms waiting for you to enter and shoot them.