Honest Opinion on Half-Life 2

[Stavrophore]

HL1 had more mysterious plot, albeit it takes a lot from king novel like Mist. HL2 on the other hand expanded on the social aspect of combine enslavement. Both games are very good and HL2 source engine was pretty much revolutionary when it released adding a lot of physics, the game was just enjoyable to play at the time.

 

[Borelli]

I played it much later so the new tech wow factor (and the waifu) was lost on me, but i liked it, very polished, levels are not too long, always a new setpiece.
I feel i could select any chapter from the menu and just play it and have fun, outside of a couple of cutscenes it does not waste your time.

 

[Kabas]

It's ok

 

[NecroLord]

HL1 had more mysterious plot, albeit it takes a lot from king novel like Mist. HL2 on the other hand expanded on the social aspect of combine enslavement. Both games are very good and HL2 source engine was pretty much revolutionary when it released adding a lot of physics, the game was just enjoyable to play at the time.

Yeah, you are right. Mysterious plot.
I remember going "What the fuck?!" when G-Man showed up. It had a good deal of variety too. Great sound design and soundtrack (Kelly Bailey), something which later Half-Life games also share.

 

[Spacer's Nugget]

I understand the appeal of HL2, I just can't get into it (doesn't help that I get varying degrees of motion sickness during playing sessions)

I do love and appreciate what the Source Engine brought to the table in terms of physics simulation, graphics rendering, facial animations, and so on.

 

[Average Manatee]

I try not to hold it against HL2, but the simping over the plot and characters (especially Gordon Freeman) by what you might call the "community" is cringe.

 

[Morenatsu.]

Every 'community' is cringe.

 

[Levenmouth]

I do love and appreciate what the Source Engine brought to the table in terms of physics simulation, graphics rendering, facial animations, and so on.

Yes, those are all very important, particularly for the vast volume of SFM porn out there.

 

[octavius]

Make the most advanced physics engine possible and what will devs and modders use it for?
Emergent gameplay or jiggling silicone breasts?

 

[janior]

good shooter, don't listen to edgelords

 

[Lyric Suite]

HL1 > HL2. The original had so much charisma it was off the charts. HL2 had too much stuff in it that felt it was made by committee.

HL2 still gets points for the fantastic visuals and presentation, but the original was just better in everyway in my book. Story was better, better use of cinematics (always unobtrusive), better gameplay with more satifying gunplay and bigger arsenal, better levels (yes, i went there). Even Xen was far better than the boring, empty limp shit that Citadel ended up being.

I also think HL2 was the actual precursor to Bioshock (muh deep and thought provoking cerebral masterpiece lmao), all though i'm not exactly sure i can blame the game for that.

 

[Louis_Cypher]

Thread title.
What is your honest opinion on Half-Life 2? Is it better than the original? Is it guilty of opening the way for scripted cinematic bullshit in FPS games?

Personally, I find it pretty good, not better than the original, of course, but it has some cool moments. The Grav Gun is OK, I can see how using tools found in your environments can be used to kill enemies. The scripted scenes do get on my nerves however. Voice acting is great, facial animations are really good, as per Source Engine (VTMB as well).

Anyway, what do YOU think?

My circle was mega hyped for it. I was a little suprised at the time, how much hype it got, because I felt bored by it. The Source engine was not my favorite, in terms of how things looked. The gravity gun was a gimmick that got old within a minute or two, and honestly didn't seem like the big deal it was made out to be. I also found the campaign less interesting. Now on the Codex, I finally find that other people felt this way too.

 

[RainWorld]

Good game, the mysteries of the beta are far more intriguing than the finished product. Oh, and remove Barnacles from the game.

 

[orcinator]

To expand a bit further:

- Delete the ~75% of levels reliant on gimmicks.
- Squish remaining content down to being the first 25% of the game and make new ones where non-FPS gameplay don't take up more than 10% of the game time.
- Add a few high tier enemies. Ideally for each enemy type (aliens/zombies/combine/antlions). One reason Ravenholm was good was that the fast poison zombie felt like the one enemy in the game that was actually threatening and scary.
- Add a few more high tech experimental weapons like HL1 had.
- Ramp up difficulty.

HL2 is now at least 8/10.

G-String, the REAL Half Life 2


(I ended up dropping it maybe a third of the way through and I wonder if anyone else played it)

 

[Levenmouth]

Let’s use logic and get the facts right here:

Lara Croft taking horse cock up her ass in 4K = Portal >> Team Fortress 2 >>>>>>>>> HL games

 

[Morenatsu.]

Being a coomer isn't an excuse for hating HL2

 

[Hag]

Being a coomer isn't an excuse for hating HL2

It is. Alyx is plainly and boringly unfuckable, although she looks the kind of girl to give you a shitty quickie in the back of the buggy, ruining your orgasm with weird eye contact and badly timed small talk.

 

[Goldschmidt]

I think you mean "revelation". Also no it wasn't. Just for those that are impressed by shiny graphics and other unimportant fluff. The actual game experience brought little new. Even elaborate physics were already a thing for a few years at the time. 14 year old me had more standards than most; was not impressed at the time. And playing it today...fuck that.

While you were playing Doom on your potato pc as a 14 year old, adults were playing F.E.A.R. in the engineering department of university.

 

[janior]

F.E.A.R is kinda bad, novelty of slow motion and "smart" enemies wears off fast, half life 2 is way better

 

[Ash]

I think you mean "revelation". Also no it wasn't. Just for those that are impressed by shiny graphics and other unimportant fluff. The actual game experience brought little new. Even elaborate physics were already a thing for a few years at the time. 14 year old me had more standards than most; was not impressed at the time. And playing it today...fuck that.

While you were playing Doom on your potato pc as a 14 year old, adults were playing F.E.A.R. in the engineering department of university.

Based Chad 14 y/o Doom enjoyer VS virgin adult engineering student with shit taste.

 

[Icewater]

I enjoyed it a lot at the time but in the long run it didn't hold up as well as the original.

Half-Life 2 and its episodes spawned a lot of really great mods, though. I have fond memories of Nightmare House, Underhell, Entropy : Zero, and MINERVA, among many others.

 

[staffofaesculapius]

I'm of the strong opinion that 9/10 times when a developer resorts to a cutscene then they've failed. They've had to resort to controlling every little aspect of the situation as much as possible lest a player not get their intended experience. For that alone, I like what HL2 was going for but I think they didn't do it well enough and it just comes off as a variation of a cutscene. Foundational film making talks about business and blocking to make boring dialogue/expositional scenes more interesting. Actors move around and interact with the set instead of sitting and talking with the camera doing shot-reverse shot even though that's most likely how people would talk in real life. Something like that principle should've been applied to HL2. There should've been a lot more gameplay during those expositional scenes. Running/jumping around the room whilst someone talks at you isn't any much better than a cutscene.

 

[Hag]

And Dystopia. A cyberpunk mod where you could use terminals to enter the cyberspace FPS-style to unlock or modify parts of the map. I did kill a lot of hours on this one.
Garry's Mod too. Prophunt was a great party game.

 

[Morenatsu.]

I think you mean "revelation". Also no it wasn't. Just for those that are impressed by shiny graphics and other unimportant fluff. The actual game experience brought little new. Even elaborate physics were already a thing for a few years at the time. 14 year old me had more standards than most; was not impressed at the time. And playing it today...fuck that.

While you were playing Doom on your potato pc as a 14 year old, adults were playing F.E.A.R. in the engineering department of university.

Based Chad 14 y/o Doom enjoyer VS virgin adult engineering student with shit taste.

You're 14? Explains a lot

 

[Nutmeg]

F.E.A.R is kinda bad, novelty of slow motion and "smart" enemies wears off fast, half life 2 is way better

Unbind the slow motion key! It's literally the best single player FPS (IMO, that I have played) w.r.t. fighting squads of decently intelligent enemies.

The devs just put it in there to trick reviewers and casuals.