[Pauly]

One thing I often still find with Half Life 2 and the episodes is I don't treat it like a typical FPS, I like to stop and admire the scenery or look at little details and not just run around guns blazing. I think it's a testament to the people at Valve that you can snoop around and find all these little details instead of half-assed areas where they didn't think the player would ever stop to look at. Also I only find the vehicle sections a little dry after repeated play-throughs, although I still always like to stop at every opportunity to check out the buildings and stuff.

Also check the HL2 commentary thread out!

Since there are a lot of Half Life fans here...

[TheMissing]

Ok, so last night I finished Half Life 1... And honestly, it didn't answer any of my questions about HL2

There really wasn't as much dialog as I thought there would be. I sorta got the ending with G-man, enough to understand what was going on. But unless I'm blind, I didn't find anything in the game about Dr. Breen (although I knew who he was anyway), I found nothing about the combine... Taking the game at face value only, the only thing the game really told me was you were part of an experiment gone wrong (perhaps rigged) and all of a sudden you're fighting baddies left and right trying to escape when you're attacked by the military, now you're trying to figure out what happened. You get further into the facility and realize they've been using the portals to trap and study aliens. Then you make your way deeper into the facility and they tell you you have to go to the alien homeworld and kill the head alien. Then bam you're talking to g-man.

Maybe the expansions tell more? Because HL1 seemed to lack the cinematics and story i've read so much about. o_0

[sakeido]

Its not like a really obvious story.. all the little scenes just set the tone, as time wears on and fewer and fewer other people appear before finally Black Mesa is totally empty of surviving humans except for you, some soldiers, and the G-Man. I get the feeling that HL2 kind of retrofit a story back in HL1.

The Combine came after you killed the Nihilanth at the end of the first one. The green lightning shooting aliens were slaves of Nihilanth and you freed them, so they are now on your side. The rest of Nihilanth's aliens had fled from the Combine and were followed by them through the portal to Earth.

If you want to fill out the story more, read Wikipedia. There is a lot of information in there that is very (Very very very) easy to miss while actually playing through the game, and then some additional info that was not in the game.

Even though its not a story like, say, Metal Gear Solid 3, I still get totally engrossed in it... for instance

At the start of Episode 2, when the Hunter appears for the first time and you are trying to get away, and then it totally fucks up Alyx right in front of you, I couldn't help but shout "noooooo!!" (with sudden sincere despair) Same thing at the end with Eli.

I felt like a geek but still, that is a standout moment in gaming for me right there. Catharsis, man, catharsis..

[Zoltta]

I CANT WAIT FOR EPISODE 3 AHHHHHHHHHH

[TheMissing]

Finally started on EP1. I'm already annoyed by some of the puzzles that give you NO CLUES as to what to do. Like when you're in a courtyard and Alyx is sniping antlions... I got the "Live bait" achievement from smacking them with the grav gun for 20 minutes before I realized I had to push the car ontop of the antlion hole........ If it weren't for me getting pissed off and flinging everything around to release my aggression, I would have never figured that out. Thanks Valve for giving me no direction whatsoever... >.<

But other than that little slip up, I'm enjoying it so far. The whole Citadel section in the beginning was great!

[sakeido]

Originally Posted by Naren

You let them blow up the sawmill? I didn't let them blow up any of the buildings. I felt like I failed if I did, so I just wasted most of the striders the moment I saw them on my screen.

So maybe I didn't get to see any of those "wow" moments.

I actually thought the sawmill blowing up was something that was supposed to happen and could not be stopped... it looked so crazy I thought "well that must be something I was absolutely supposed to see and cannot prevent" and never knew I could stop it until I read that post a couple days ago

Originally Posted by Naren

They said that the reason for the episodes is that fans were getting too anxious waiting for the next game which takes a long long time to make, but they could make episodes a lot faster because they're only about 1/3rd the size of a normal game.

They are making Half Life 2: Episode Three right now. I've never heard anything about a Half Life 3. My friend told me that Half Life 2: Episodes 1, 2, and 3 would pretty much BE "Half Life 3." I doubt they've started work on a Half Life 3 yet, but if you have any sources for this information, post the links. I'd be interested in it.

They said that Episode 3 will be the end of the current story arc. Hoepfully that means the story arc that began in HL1, and we would get some closure about the G-Man and all that (and I'm really hoping for a happy ending when all is said and done - but I somehow doubt that is going to happen). They also won't deny HL3 is happening, but I've got the feeling that HL3 will be broken up into episodes from the get-go as it seems that (this is my own conclusion based on their interviews) Valve is thoroughly commited to the new episodic model of releasing a game and are going to fine tune the process even further in the future. Which, hopefully, will mean they stick to the original time table they came up with. Remember when they said the episodes would be only about 6 months apart? HA

[TheMissing]

The way the story is going, if they really close the story arc, I don't know where they could go from there. Unless there are some loose ends, or some sort of catastrophe. I just don't know what they could do with the story once (if) the combine are destroyed.

[sakeido]

Originally Posted by TheMissing

The way the story is going, if they really close the story arc, I don't know where they could go from there. Unless there are some loose ends, or some sort of catastrophe. I just don't know what they could do with the story once (if) the combine are destroyed.

It will turn out that the opposition to the Combine's long expansion through the galaxy suddenly turns up on Earth and we take the battle to the Combine homeworld. That would be kind of lame. Really, all I want right now, is for Gordon and Alyx to run away together ahaha

[Zoltta]

They would probably start a new story most likley. I mean the Halo story ending in 3 and obviously they are going to continue but it wont be "halo" probably but a totally new series and story.

[TheMissing]

Originally Posted by Zoltta

They would probably start a new story most likley.

Maybe it'll involve the elusive G-man... My prediction for EP3 is that he really screws something up in the end... I wonder how far along with EP3 they are. I can't find any info about it. The only thing I found was from 2 years ago when it was 'announced'.