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Honestly, one thing I do remember about half life 2 was arsing about ignoring the dialogue during cutscenes because fuck this twat I want to go shoot things. If I urged for dialogue options it was only for a 'Thanks for thinking I give a damn, but just shut the fuck up and let me go kill whoever you want me to kill' option so I could skip the 'Let me explain to you why it's ever so important that you shoot peoples faces off' plot. Why any developer thinks that being imprisoned for several minutes is considered a worthwhile 'reward' for progressing through a game is beyond me.
Should we agree a game should have as much story as it needs? One of my favourite games is Serious Sam. Which flat out tells you that they're making the plot up as they go along, and that it's all an excuse to shoot guys.
HL2, though... it too itself so seriously. Like it wanted to try and tell a serious grown up story.
And those unskippable uninteractive scenes.
And I thought the fighting there was was pretty uninspired anyway. Gr.
I think I was cold on HL2 when I first finished it because it just kind of ended. Playing it in the context of Episode 1 and (FUCK YEAH) Episode 2 makes it a whole lot better.
If Valve had known at the time they were going to go the Episodic route I think they could've ended HL2 better
i.e. don't have the G-man intervene, just have the nuclear flash, time freeze and the G-man walk in and make his "here we are again" facial expression - then tell me Episode 1 is coming.
Finish on a "holy fuck" moment like they have been since Ep 1.
I absolutely loved that bit
where everything slows down, the G-Man finishes Alyx's sentence, and appears. I've seen so many complaints about it being a 'non-ending' or whatever, but I love it to bits. It shows how he's been watching and guiding things the whole way (lol illusion of control!), and the speech is brilliantly delivered
Its not really so much hate, but the game has a lot it can improve on. Valva is in the position to do some really awesome stuff, but it just seems like they are playin it safe.
Lern2Portal
Yes because thats half life and not a totally different game made by a completely different team.
Try looking at the credits for Portal sometime. Then compare them with the credits for Episode 2. And TF2 whilst you're at it. You're going to see a lot of names common between the two. Portal wasn't just made by the few people who Valve hired off of seeing Narbacular drop.
But even then, the REAL risk that Valve took was in hiring an entire team of students in the first place (literally, the whole group that worked on ND, not just one or two), based off of the game they showed and a 15 frigging minute interview. That is not what you would call "playing it safe".
But OK, if you want to count that as separate for some reason, and focus purely on HL2, fine, let's look at some of the things I would consider VERY risky that they did with Half Life 2
- Dedicated an incredible amount of time and effort to facial animation. In the genre of FPS's, nobody had ever bothered with this before, but they saw the necessity of making clearly emotive characters that the player could relate to. If you had asked someone before HL2 how important facial animation and expression was in an FPS, they'd have said "not very". It simply wasn't thought about, who cares, you're blasting things right? But this is something that they've done that's extended way beyond HL2 now, even to the online only Team Fortress 2. One of the most brilliant aspects of the game that gives it real character is the facial expressions and animations you see. When a Spy is stabbing you, or a Heavy just got his Uber on or tearing you to shreds, you can clearly see how awesome it looks. It's one of the reasons that all those TF2 screencaps are so frigging hilarious.
- Focussed on making physics a central mechanic of the gameplay. Havoc made it, but it took Valve to make it a real part of the game. I'm not even talking about the gravity gun here, I'm talking about even simple things like being able to pick up and drop items and have them react realistically. Dedicating so much time and effort to getting it to work and feel right when nobody else was really bothering with that stuff at the time. And it's something that has pretty much become standard now. Other games do it better today, without a doubt, but Nobody really cared to think that a reactive world that obeyed physical rules to any significant degree was important for an immersive game.
- STEAM STEAM STEAM. Really I'm surprised I even need to point this one out. This is probably the single BIGGEST risk that Valve took with HL2, requiring online registration with a central system, and allowing players to buy and download their purchase online. They used HL2 to propel Steam into common usage. It was an incredible risk at a time when fully downloadable games of any sort were still considered crazy talk. Even if you disagree with the facial animation, or the physics, there's not denying that creating an entire online publishing mechanism from scratch was an incredibly dangerous move that could have lost them everything. It was only through HL2 that they had the chance to establish such a mechanism and they took it. Now Steam is arguable the forefront of digital distribution. They have more active subscribers than the entire installed Xbox Live userbase, and it's still growing.
I'm sorry, I just can't agree that Valve "plays it safe". They've taken some phenomenal risks over the years.
Ah, but what about the development of the Half Life 2 franchise? SURELY they haven't introduced massive changes to HL2 itself with their episodic content? You'd be right if you were to say that. Their policy has been more one of refinement with the episodic content, than outright innovation. You know why? Because the fans don't want a different game, they want Half Life 2. They've been improving and perfecting the formula, but they've been sure to stay true to what the fans love about the franchise. They save the really crazy innovations for other titles, like Portal, or Team Fortress 2, or even the upcoming Left 4 Dead.
It's like I remember one time in a previous thread about HL2, someone said to me that Half Life 2 sucked because there wasn't any Stealth in it (hardcore Thief fan). Stealth? STEALTH?! Why throw in some half-arsed "new" game mechanic into the mix when that's not really what the game is about? Nobody sane wants something like that. So far, instead Valve have been attempting to improve and define what they made in Half Life 2. And given the massive improvements of Episode 2 over Episode 1 and even the original Half Life 2, I'd say they're far from stagnation yet. Maybe when that day comes, it might be time for some more, some really different stuff to enter the franchise. But for the time being, they're giving the fans what they want, and we're loving it.
Really? Is it not believable to you because video games (and fiction in general) don't regularly force ordinary characters into extraordinary situations, making it interesting to a likewise-ordinary audience by exploring what actions Joe Schmoe would take when faced with overwhelming circumstances? Because that hasn't been my experience. That happens pretty often in fiction, whether it's writing, movies, games, etc.
Right but there's usually some sort of point that's established as to why. HL2 still fails to deliver this considering the very conduit that thrust you into the situation you're in currently has not been defined.
Yeah, who knows why you're meeting up with people who have formed an underground resistance to the oppressive forces that have subjugated the human population? Why would any heroic character want to get involved in something like that? And why use a few characters that you're actually familiar with from the game's previous installment? That won't allow the player to feel any kind of connection to the original game, after being jolted into this new reality so long after Half-Life came out.
Sorry, that was me being sarcastic.
Right and being someone in some sort of suspended animation you wake up and smell the ashes. Thing is, you were never really briefed unless you bothered reading some sort of synopsis for it. That's my point. For someone who's been out of the loop since Black Messa people sure are quick to kiss your ass and send you on your way without any underlying motive or explanation being present. The combine's just fucking there and your old boss happens to be helping to run the show? Come on. I've read fortune cookies that offer more insight then the narratives in this game ever did.
1) G-man. You see him recur multiple times if you look hard enough. There is a scene through a pair of binoculars that is of particular interest. If you had played Episode 2, you'd know that all he can do is watch you.
And it took them 2 fucking episodes to say that? Thanks for proving my point that the mechanism in which you're deployed, and thus your whole reason for being and doing what you're doing, is weaksauce.
2) You're in City 17 because you're meant to be there. It's the hub of the combine rule and, through general information, one of the very last outposts of what's left of humanity. If anything is going to get done, it'll get done here. Meeting Barney is deus ex machina but that makes sense because G-man put you there.
Yet when the fuck is that ever conveyed by Barney or the professor? All they do is give you some sort of destination away from that hub. Why? Because it doesn't make sense and they can't tell a story.
3) If you think Barney is nothing more than a security clerk you didn't play blue shift.
I played HL1 and HL2. I'm definitely not going to play fucking blue shift as a result. If there's any difference in him being a useless twat that keeps promising me alcohol, I didn't see it.
4) It's not laziness. They took five years to make this game. They wrote a fucking engine for it. They have scripts and voice actors for everyone else. You really think that they just thought "nah, voicing Gordon is too much work"? Seriously? Come on now.
And it shows. The engine is excellent. Too bad the story in itself is conveyed in such a weak manner.
5) Again, you realise that you're kind of a big deal? Of course he gets in touch with Kleiner. If Jesus showed up to a Priest you think he'd just sit around for a couple of hours? And, additionally, if you're going to take that as an issue, then you're going to have issues with pretty much every game made ever. And the venom you put into 'scripted' makes no fucking sense. You'd prefer the first fully responsive AI ever to be in a videogame published in 2004?
Your points are all based in the same petulant tract of attitude.
Yeah, you're a big deal, but why is that exactly? Never established.
The other stuff you mention, well I can't really wrap my head around it, it's lunacy. Doesn't even address my points. Hell none of it really does.
Also, I like how you're using your mighty pseudo intellect to try to demean my character and question my line of reasoning. That text I've bolded doesn't even make any fucking sense. Try speaking proper English or simply googling nonsense you chose to spew to see if it works. If you apply yourself perhaps your points won't come across as blathering.
For fuck's sake, you had to go and post whilst I was writing that and just ruin everything.
You need to learn how to keep debate and personal insults seperate. I'm in the second best University in the country for English. I have never scored lower than an A in an exam. I write on a first class level. I have never scored lower than a first for style, rhetoric or linguistic skill. Don't you ever fucking dare call me a pseudo-intellectual.
But let's tackle this from a strictly Q&A point of view.
1) It's the sense of mystique that makes G-man such an interesting character. That is hardly a discredited technique. Kurtz, Heart of Darkness.
2) Eli Vance, Black Mesa East: "Let's get you out of that suit and back in your lab clothes where you belong". They want you to work on their new portal technology - the thing that is going to win the war against the combine. They would have teleported you right there but, plot device, the teleporter malfunctions, because gameplay needs to occur. "There are few MIT graduates around these days" - they wanted you in your capacity as a scientist. The rest was everything going wrong.
3) So, wait, you choose to remain ignorant, and that is the game's weakness? Okay, sure, that would stand up in court.
4) Opinion stuff, I'm not going to argue that. Entitled, &c.
5) You're a Big Deal because you survived Black Mesa, rescuing or saving dozens of people who are now at the heart of the resistance; you have important scientific knowledge they need; you freed the Vortigaunts who are now of vital importance... etc.
That and my previous post = that's it. Go ahead and continue with your personal insults if you must, seeing as you apparantly cannot that and argument seperate.
Flippy_D on
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Vargas PrimeKing of NothingJust a ShowRegistered Userregular
Using a bad example of a talking protagonist in juxtaposition to a mute one shows just how weak your argument is.
Obviously I'm exaggerating a point here
So your point is you can't make a valid point without being facetious?
I thought you were doing that when you started complaining about how it made no sense that you hooked up with Barney and were subsequently sent to meet up with Dr. Kleiner. They explained why these people want to help/be helped by you. It was called Half-Life.
You're seen as a "big deal" by these people because you almost single-handedly stopped the aliens in the original HL, and you were just a research scientist. So yeah, these guys respect you. Why is that hard to grasp? These people have formed an underground resistance to thwart the Combine, and the guy who saved the world the last time around shows up, they're going to get pretty excited.
I'm gonna try and communicate an inarguable epiphany as concisely as possible to get us all on the same page.
1) Plot versus story. By all accounts, the Half-Life franchise has an excellent story, it's just that we know so little about it. The plotting itself revolves around vague or ambiguous references, a dash of fish-out-of-water feel, and witholding information to maintain a sense of mystery. These are all viable tactics. I feel it's reasonable to argue about them here because some people enjoy this presentation and some people don't. Same as with Lost. I love Half-Life 2 but hate Lost because Lost is based around witholding vital information over the course of several years. Although info is withheld in HL2, I get to kill shit in the meantime.
2) Gordon as silent protagonist. Obvious design choice, not laziness. If he wasn't silent, he'd be constantly asking the obvious questions that we as the player keep wondering about in our head. This would alleviate the sense of mystery that the developers wanted. But since Gordon's silent, the developers were free to carefully craft what NPCs say and how they say it. Again, all about presentation.
3) Player as Gordon: Another design decision that is a presentation. You either get it or you don't, try not to despise those that feel differently than you. A developer has the capability to force certain things on us. Immersion through Gordon isn't one of those things. It's an attempt, nothing more. YMMV. If your mileage sucks, wait out the convos and then go and kill shit.
4) The NPCs themselves. Strictly comes down to personal preference and opinion whether you like them or don't. FFS, try not to argue about this since it's so subjective. I'm freaked out by those of you who are actually in love with Alyx. She's a digital NPC, for chrissakes. However, by Ep 2 I personally came to enjoy the sheer amount of emotions she elicited in me: mostly annoyance, tbh (especially in Ep 1), but I couldn't help but smile at her reaction to getting our hands on the Dodge Charger. Yes, my cold, heartless self smiled and I appreciated that. If you didn't, I guess it's your loss, but again, subjectivity! Some people can be emotionally reached this way, some people can't. Single biggest case of YMMV.
Well, shit, so much for conciseness. Anyway, I know this is the Intertubes and all, and we need something to argue about, but Jesus, can we at least civilly debate the merits or meritless nature of developer design decisions instead of shrieking "THE STORY IS STUPID!" or "I HEART ALYX!"?
As for gameplay mechanics, I figure that one's up for grabs.
When people are saying "I ALYX," I don't think there is anyone here who is actually in love with her, because that would be exceptionally silly, but as a character she has levels. I think they're responding to a well-developed character in a videogame more than anything else. You don't see that sort of thing often enough, and it's something Valve have become very good at over the past few years.
Honestly, one thing I do remember about half life 2 was arsing about ignoring the dialogue during cutscenes because fuck this twat I want to go shoot things. If I urged for dialogue options it was only for a 'Thanks for thinking I give a damn, but just shut the fuck up and let me go kill whoever you want me to kill' option so I could skip the 'Let me explain to you why it's ever so important that you shoot peoples faces off' plot. Why any developer thinks that being imprisoned for several minutes is considered a worthwhile 'reward' for progressing through a game is beyond me.
Should we agree a game should have as much story as it needs? One of my favourite games is Serious Sam. Which flat out tells you that they're making the plot up as they go along, and that it's all an excuse to shoot guys.
HL2, though... it too itself so seriously. Like it wanted to try and tell a serious grown up story.
And those unskippable uninteractive scenes.
And I thought the fighting there was was pretty uninspired anyway. Gr.
Yeah, I'll agree with that. Although I'd also want it noted that the core game play itself should hold up in the absence of the storyline. If the story line is great and the game is shit, I'd be better of reading a book or watching a movie, because even if it's an average book or movie, at least I'm not having to put up with crappy game play.
But I think you probably already agree with that. I'd rate everything in HL2 at least above average. The story line was a good effort, as was the shooting (although I've definitely played better), graphics and sound were top notch, the robot dog thing was a pretty good catch, I'd certainly have him on my team in a game of rounders.
Yeah, "I Alyx!!" isn't as in "I actually want to track down the woman they modelled her face on, then tape Meryl Dandridge (or however it's spelled) to her face, so I can recreate Alyx Vance that I may marry her". If that's what you're thinking, seek help.
I empathise with the character far better than I have done with a lot of previous characters in games. This is in line with the design of the game, and the intent of Valve, therefore I attribute this to the skill of the writers and designers.
Part of me really wants to see a Half-Life movie, but I know that they'd only screw it up by making Gordon Freeman a beefed-up action hero, giving him a bunch of cheesy one-liners, and casting Eddie Murphy as his bumbling sidekick, or something.
Part of me really wants to see a Half-Life movie, but I know that they'd only screw it up by making Gordon Freeman a beefed-up action hero, giving him a bunch of cheesy one-liners, and casting Eddie Murphy as his bumbling sidekick, or something.
Part of me really wants to see a Half-Life movie, but I know that they'd only screw it up by making Gordon Freeman a beefed-up action hero, giving him a bunch of cheesy one-liners, and casting Eddie Murphy as his bumbling sidekick, or something.
Well Gabe Newell said they've had plenty of scripts in and they've all been crap. Really I don't think they're keen on going that route unless they can ensure it's a brilliant movie. One of the main problems of course is simply the fact that one of the things that makes the game so awesome is the player involvement as the character, to the extent that the main character doesn't even say anything (and you never even see his reflection for example). That's something that plainly wouldn't work on the big screen, and they'd have to focus on other things, like screwing up the film by replacing Alyx with a transvestite soul talkin' Eddie Murphy.
I'm gonna try and communicate an inarguable epiphany as concisely as possible to get us all on the same page.
Ninjacratic policy follows.
1) Plot versus story. By all accounts, the Half-Life franchise has an excellent story, it's just that we know so little about it. The plotting itself revolves around vague or ambiguous references, a dash of fish-out-of-water feel, and witholding information to maintain a sense of mystery. These are all viable tactics. I feel it's reasonable to argue about them here because some people enjoy this presentation and some people don't. Same as with Lost. I love Half-Life 2 but hate Lost because Lost is based around witholding vital information over the course of several years. Although info is withheld in HL2, I get to kill shit in the meantime.
There's a maxim for new writers which is something like "if you don't mention it, it doesn't exist". There might be a Secrets of Half Life bible at Valve, or they might be making up on the spot, but I don't think it matters much if they don't use what they know in the story. Personally, I think breaking the backstory up and hiding behind trees is tacky and sort of bad taste. It doesn't make things deeper but gives an illusion of depth, and it wastes lot of people's valuable time.
2) Gordon as silent protagonist. Obvious design choice, not laziness. If he wasn't silent, he'd be constantly asking the obvious questions that we as the player keep wondering about in our head. This would alleviate the sense of mystery that the developers wanted. But since Gordon's silent, the developers were free to carefully craft what NPCs say and how they say it. Again, all about presentation.
If Gordon were me, I would definately ask questions. If Gordon isn't me, I want to know why he's such an incurious person.
In any case, I don't believe Gordon's silent for artistic reasons. I think he's silent because the developers have this belief that a player character must never do anything without extremely immediate prompting from the player. And they draw the line in some pretty weird places (clicking on person to shoot them is ok, but clicking on a line of dialogue to say it is verboten) but at least they're consistent.
Hence, no Gordonspeech until they invent the Valve Speech Comprehender Machine(tm). Then the plot will act as if he were always vocal. Silly guys.
3) The NPCs themselves. Strictly comes down to personal preference and opinion whether you like them or don't. FFS, try not to argue about this since it's so subjective. I'm freaked out by those of you who are actually in love with Alyx. She's a digital NPC, for chrissakes. However, by Ep 2 I personally came to enjoy the sheer amount of emotions she elicited in me: mostly annoyance, tbh (especially in Ep 1), but I couldn't help but smile at her reaction to getting our hands on the Dodge Charger. Yes, my cold, heartless self smiled and I appreciated that. If you didn't, I guess it's your loss, but again, subjectivity! Some people can be emotionally reached this way, some people can't. Single biggest case of YMMV.
YMMV for sure, but for me nothing makes a videogame character feel realler than two-way conversation.
[edit: wow. that took too long to write for its length.]
Seeing a well-developed Half-Life movie is one of my biggest hopes right now, although it has yet to surpass my desire to see a movie of Another World which features nearly no dialogue.
I think HL1 would make a great movie honestly. I mean yea you'd have to make gordon talk, but he could still be 90% silent. Some of the action scenes like fighting the Pit monster and teh Nihilist would be pretty f-ing sweet. And you'd have other charicters join and leave, like Barney and Kliner and all that. As long as they don't attach him to one charicter I think it could be awesome.
1) It's the sense of mystique that makes G-man such an interesting character. That is hardly a discredited technique. Kurtz, Heart of Darkness.
Well for that I'd have to have read Heart of Darkness in order to make some analytical reference to it. All I can say is that the protagonist more then likely has dialog and having that to enforce the events within that novel. Not to mention that it's a fucking novel and by nature has the leverage of using prose to establish a plot and build a story. Moot point.
2) Eli Vance, Black Mesa East: "Let's get you out of that suit and back in your lab clothes where you belong". They want you to work on their new portal technology - the thing that is going to win the war against the combine. They would have teleported you right there but, plot device, the teleporter malfunctions, because gameplay needs to occur. "There are few MIT graduates around these days" - they wanted you in your capacity as a scientist. The rest was everything going wrong.
Right, a goal which you never accomplish, nor do you ever get back to anything else you started. You just keep running around being oblivious to anything and everything in the construct of the story that's unfolding. That makes it weak.
3) So, wait, you choose to remain ignorant, and that is the game's weakness? Okay, sure, that would stand up in court.
The game never conveyed that message otherwise and you're not making an effort to develop it further. I still don't see how a mid-ranking security officer becomes an undercover operative that has the ability to infiltrate the combine. It's not believable and the mechanism in which they used to convey it never made any attempts to explain. Moot.
5) You're a Big Deal because you survived Black Mesa, rescuing or saving dozens of people who are now at the heart of the resistance; you have important scientific knowledge they need; you freed the Vortigaunts who are now of vital importance... etc.
Right but you've also been missing long enough for the Combine to gain a foothold and occupy. The first, I'll give you. The second, never established. The third, weakly presented.
As for personal insults, I don't enjoy people making shit up or throw a lexicon in order to make a point. First of all saying something like " Your points are all based in the same petulant tract of attitude." that doesn't make any sense not to mention it's a blatant attempt to simplify my position with a straw man argument. How else did you expect me to react other then bringing the very statement into question?
Seeing a well-developed Half-Life movie is one of my biggest hopes right now, although it has yet to surpass my desire to see a movie of Another World which features nearly no dialogue.
Crap, somebody else actually played and enjoyed that game? That reminds me, I really need to pick up the 15th anniversary edition some time.
I love how, when everyone is standing around talking about combine portals, saving people, blah blah blah, me, Gordon Freeman, is swinging his crowbar at every damn thing in the room.
Really, if Gordon could talk, imagine what he'd say:
" Guys, Guys, there is a man in a ugly blue suit controlling EVERYTHING! "
" Yep, it was me folks, i started the resonance cascade that brought the Combine to Earth. "
" How the hell do you reload this damn gun? They didn't teach this in Advanced Physics. "
" Breen? My beard is 10 times more awesome than yours. "
Seeing a well-developed Half-Life movie is one of my biggest hopes right now, although it has yet to surpass my desire to see a movie of Another World which features nearly no dialogue.
I agree with this, although I don't have so much of a soft spot for Another World, simply because I've not played it.
Vargas PrimeKing of NothingJust a ShowRegistered Userregular
edited January 2008
Meiz, I think you yourself are simplifying your argument. You're claiming that things in HL2 are never explained, like why Barney is not just a inept security guard, or why Gordon is so respected, or why these resistance scientists think Gordon can help their research, when they ARE explained by the events in HL1 and its expansions. Which isn't entirely unreasonable for a game that's intended to be a sequel.
I'll agree that the fact that it's not clear where Gordon has been in the interim between games is a sticking point, but I hardly think the rest of the story is as incongruous and indecipherable as you're making it out to be.
I found pointing a gun at something and shooting was a lot easier then looking for crap on the ground, picking it up and hurling it only to have to look for more crap on the ground personally.
Really, I noticed crap on the ground all the time. Especially the bright red barrels with flame symbols on them.. or generally anything else that was lying around.
Yeah, again, shooting at them makes them explode. It's not like you ever need to shoot or hurl barrels anyways. At least I didn't, to finish the game that is.
Making them explode is pointless if there's noone around them. Much faster to toss it towards your enemies than try to lure them close.
Also, you didn't need to use it to finish the game? What on earth kind of complaint is that? You don't need to use the crossbow to finish the game either; or any of a number of weapons or situations. Hell, you could probably get away with not fighting 80% if you were dedicated enough. I really don't see the point of that complaint.
It's rather simple really. The firearms you are provided with, along with the ample munitions that come with it make the whole functionality of the gravity gun pointless.
Except, as I originally pointed out, the Gravity Gun is one of the most powerful weapons in the game (The ones that are more poweful have extremly limited ammo) and one of the more useful. It often results in an instant kill (which, on the hardest difficulty, the shotgun can even reliably do), and if can be used to take out multiple enemies in one hit.
Just because you chose not to use it doesn't mean it isn't a useful weapon.
Just because you keep calling it the most powerful gun in the game, doesn't make it so.
Reread my post and tell me where I said that. I said it was ONE of the most powerful. Obvious the RPG and AR2 alt-fire are more powerful; but you wind up extremely limited on ammo with those guns. Gravity gun fodder is quite plentiful (as the game was designed.)
Seriously; this isn't opinion. The gravity gun is extremely useful and powerful, and just because YOU made the conscious choice not to use it (which is the only argument you've put forth against it.) doesn't make it not so.
Part of me really wants to see a Half-Life movie, but I know that they'd only screw it up by making Gordon Freeman a beefed-up action hero, giving him a bunch of cheesy one-liners, and casting Eddie Murphy as his bumbling sidekick, or something.
Valve has repeatedly mentioned that talks for a Half-Life movie usually break down around the "and this is where Gordon falls in love" point.
Seeing a well-developed Half-Life movie is one of my biggest hopes right now, although it has yet to surpass my desire to see a movie of Another World which features nearly no dialogue.
No, no, a thousand times, no. The narrative presented in Half-Life could not be told as a movie. At most, a movie set in the same universe, but it would be impossible to present the events of Half-Life in a movie without radically altering them. The story and the way it's presented is already so perfect, why do you want to see it cut down to three hours and projected on a wall?
Alternative: Watch "The Mist," ignore the last 5 minutes of the movie and pretend it takes place in the Half-Life universe.
Seeing a well-developed Half-Life movie is one of my biggest hopes right now, although it has yet to surpass my desire to see a movie of Another World which features nearly no dialogue.
No, no, a thousand times, no. The narrative presented in Half-Life could not be told as a movie. At most, a movie set in the same universe, but it would be impossible to present the events of Half-Life in a movie without radically altering them. The story and the way it's presented is already so perfect, why do you want to see it cut down to three hours and projected on a wall?
Alternative: Watch "The Mist," ignore the last 5 minutes of the movie and pretend it takes place in the Half-Life universe.
It could be done. You just need to change a few things like making Gordon into a more presentable character (since he's no longer a player avatar) and making sure characters like Kliener, Eli and Barney follow him through most of the story so you have a full cast throughout.
'course it begs the question of what does Half-Life really have to offer story-wise when you take the interactive element out.. It just becomes another fairly generic scifi invasion story with a few conspiritorial elements.
Semi-objective establishment of developers' plot/story/character design decisions and how they may or may not appeal to people on subjective levels; A few examples of where my opinion fits into the scheme of things.
Seeing a well-developed Half-Life movie is one of my biggest hopes right now, although it has yet to surpass my desire to see a movie of Another World which features nearly no dialogue.
No, no, a thousand times, no. The narrative presented in Half-Life could not be told as a movie. At most, a movie set in the same universe, but it would be impossible to present the events of Half-Life in a movie without radically altering them. The story and the way it's presented is already so perfect, why do you want to see it cut down to three hours and projected on a wall?
Alternative: Watch "The Mist," ignore the last 5 minutes of the movie and pretend it takes place in the Half-Life universe.
You could do something like that webcomic Concerned, which followed the basic plot of HL2 from a different set of eyes (obviously it was supposed to be funny, but you could do it seriously as well).
Seeing a well-developed Half-Life movie is one of my biggest hopes right now, although it has yet to surpass my desire to see a movie of Another World which features nearly no dialogue.
No, no, a thousand times, no. The narrative presented in Half-Life could not be told as a movie. At most, a movie set in the same universe, but it would be impossible to present the events of Half-Life in a movie without radically altering them. The story and the way it's presented is already so perfect, why do you want to see it cut down to three hours and projected on a wall?
Alternative: Watch "The Mist," ignore the last 5 minutes of the movie and pretend it takes place in the Half-Life universe.
You could do something like that webcomic Concerned, which followed the basic plot of HL2 from a different set of eyes (obviously it was supposed to be funny, but you could do it seriously as well).
Haven't finished reading the whole thread yet but:
I don't understand the people who didn't like it, except maybe to say did you not play these games when they first came out?
When HL1 first shipped, it was just so much vastly VASTLY better than anything else on the market of a similar genre. It made Quake and Unreal etc look pathetically simplistic. Every design choice about the game just seemed incredibly well thought out. I had never experienced anything like the soldier fire fights in my gaming life. The Zen levels were worse than the rest of the game but were still so more interesting to play than the other FPS's on the market.
I dunno, maybe I've forgotten about some other specific title, but thinking back to playing it (over and over and over again with my brothers and Dad) I just remember it being one of the most incredible times of my gaming life. I was amazed, I couldn't believe it was that good, and everything else seemed like it was made ten years earlier.
I mean, Quake 2 was released almost exactly 1 year prior to half-life 1, which isn't an enourmously large time in the industry considering how long it takes to develop these kinds of games, and jesus when i think about the two games, it feels like I'm comparing Pong to Wii Tennis or something ( I couldn't remember the name of any decent 'full game' tennis title )
The expansions weren't quite as good as the main story, although OpForce came damned close, but at the end of the day, it was just more half life levels, even if they hadn't been made by the same level builders the core mechanics were still there, so they still had great gameplay. Of course you also can't ignore the fact that half-life's modding community was NUTS, just so much talent and creativity and Valve's support of the community was amazing. It got me into modding, it was the birth of so many great games.
Honestly, I can go back and play half life 1 now, and still be pumped in the firefights, and enjoy the rest out of retardedly powerful levels of nostalgia.
Right, Half-life 2 was obviously less different from the competition than Half-life 1, but I don't know what I can say, it was so polished and well paced, and with enough new stuff that it shit violently over the other games of the time. I was a little older, and I didn't get quite the same feeling of raw passionate awe that I got from the first one, but jesus it wasn't far behind, and it was of course a much better game than the first.
Anybody who didn't like Alyx is...well I'd like to say gay/soulless/an asshole, but instead I'll just go with, of a differing opinion to me. She got even better in episode 1, and in episode 2 was obviosuly in the backseat again a little, but still great, really great. All the actors are great, all the little animation touches, the eyes looking at you as you go down the lift, the kissing the dad on the head, the adjustments of glasses and looks of horror. Christ it gets across so much feeling. The gameplay was just so stupidly horrifyingly polished it was blinding, I was BLINDED. Great guns, gravity gun ofc in particular hadn't been done before and was fantastic. I've heard a bunch of people say that playing it now, the physics feel really dated, and I'm sure that's true but honestly I've never noticed it, I love all the physics stuff, I love the gravity gun, it's all bloody marvelous.
Didn't you guys just like completely shit your pants with awesome when
you watched the slow-mo explosion at the end and the G-man did his speech
So many good set-pieces, so much energy, the driving sections were fucking fantastic, Ravenholm was scary and awesome, it just did everything it said on the box. It did everything they said in the shit hot reviews.
I mean, there seem to be a lot of dissenting voices in these threads, but I still find it shocking every time. I mean, in my brain, I just consider half-life 1 and 2 to be one of those untouchable franchises, like you don't diss Chrono Trigger, or Super Mario World, BG (if you like standard fantasy DnD), Plansescape (If you like text), the original sonic games, etc. Obviously some people aren't going to like these games (the rpg's are maybe bad examples since ppl who don't like rpg's aren't going to like them), but it feels like half the people in the thread have negative opinions on it, and I can't fathom it.
Man, I'm gunna go play me some Half-Life, and if you see Doctor Breen,
I don't understand the people who didn't like it, except maybe to say did you not play these games when they first came out?
This is largely why I didn't enjoy the first game - I bought the Half-Life Anthology on a whim in 2003, and I didn't enjoy it. I'm enjoying HL2 though, even though I did only discover it four months ago.
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Should we agree a game should have as much story as it needs? One of my favourite games is Serious Sam. Which flat out tells you that they're making the plot up as they go along, and that it's all an excuse to shoot guys.
HL2, though... it too itself so seriously. Like it wanted to try and tell a serious grown up story.
And those unskippable uninteractive scenes.
And I thought the fighting there was was pretty uninspired anyway. Gr.
I absolutely loved that bit
Try looking at the credits for Portal sometime. Then compare them with the credits for Episode 2. And TF2 whilst you're at it. You're going to see a lot of names common between the two. Portal wasn't just made by the few people who Valve hired off of seeing Narbacular drop.
But even then, the REAL risk that Valve took was in hiring an entire team of students in the first place (literally, the whole group that worked on ND, not just one or two), based off of the game they showed and a 15 frigging minute interview. That is not what you would call "playing it safe".
But OK, if you want to count that as separate for some reason, and focus purely on HL2, fine, let's look at some of the things I would consider VERY risky that they did with Half Life 2
- Dedicated an incredible amount of time and effort to facial animation. In the genre of FPS's, nobody had ever bothered with this before, but they saw the necessity of making clearly emotive characters that the player could relate to. If you had asked someone before HL2 how important facial animation and expression was in an FPS, they'd have said "not very". It simply wasn't thought about, who cares, you're blasting things right? But this is something that they've done that's extended way beyond HL2 now, even to the online only Team Fortress 2. One of the most brilliant aspects of the game that gives it real character is the facial expressions and animations you see. When a Spy is stabbing you, or a Heavy just got his Uber on or tearing you to shreds, you can clearly see how awesome it looks. It's one of the reasons that all those TF2 screencaps are so frigging hilarious.
- Focussed on making physics a central mechanic of the gameplay. Havoc made it, but it took Valve to make it a real part of the game. I'm not even talking about the gravity gun here, I'm talking about even simple things like being able to pick up and drop items and have them react realistically. Dedicating so much time and effort to getting it to work and feel right when nobody else was really bothering with that stuff at the time. And it's something that has pretty much become standard now. Other games do it better today, without a doubt, but Nobody really cared to think that a reactive world that obeyed physical rules to any significant degree was important for an immersive game.
- STEAM STEAM STEAM. Really I'm surprised I even need to point this one out. This is probably the single BIGGEST risk that Valve took with HL2, requiring online registration with a central system, and allowing players to buy and download their purchase online. They used HL2 to propel Steam into common usage. It was an incredible risk at a time when fully downloadable games of any sort were still considered crazy talk. Even if you disagree with the facial animation, or the physics, there's not denying that creating an entire online publishing mechanism from scratch was an incredibly dangerous move that could have lost them everything. It was only through HL2 that they had the chance to establish such a mechanism and they took it. Now Steam is arguable the forefront of digital distribution. They have more active subscribers than the entire installed Xbox Live userbase, and it's still growing.
I'm sorry, I just can't agree that Valve "plays it safe". They've taken some phenomenal risks over the years.
Ah, but what about the development of the Half Life 2 franchise? SURELY they haven't introduced massive changes to HL2 itself with their episodic content? You'd be right if you were to say that. Their policy has been more one of refinement with the episodic content, than outright innovation. You know why? Because the fans don't want a different game, they want Half Life 2. They've been improving and perfecting the formula, but they've been sure to stay true to what the fans love about the franchise. They save the really crazy innovations for other titles, like Portal, or Team Fortress 2, or even the upcoming Left 4 Dead.
It's like I remember one time in a previous thread about HL2, someone said to me that Half Life 2 sucked because there wasn't any Stealth in it (hardcore Thief fan). Stealth? STEALTH?! Why throw in some half-arsed "new" game mechanic into the mix when that's not really what the game is about? Nobody sane wants something like that. So far, instead Valve have been attempting to improve and define what they made in Half Life 2. And given the massive improvements of Episode 2 over Episode 1 and even the original Half Life 2, I'd say they're far from stagnation yet. Maybe when that day comes, it might be time for some more, some really different stuff to enter the franchise. But for the time being, they're giving the fans what they want, and we're loving it.
Right but there's usually some sort of point that's established as to why. HL2 still fails to deliver this considering the very conduit that thrust you into the situation you're in currently has not been defined.
Right and being someone in some sort of suspended animation you wake up and smell the ashes. Thing is, you were never really briefed unless you bothered reading some sort of synopsis for it. That's my point. For someone who's been out of the loop since Black Messa people sure are quick to kiss your ass and send you on your way without any underlying motive or explanation being present. The combine's just fucking there and your old boss happens to be helping to run the show? Come on. I've read fortune cookies that offer more insight then the narratives in this game ever did.
For fuck's sake, you had to go and post whilst I was writing that and just ruin everything.
You need to learn how to keep debate and personal insults seperate. I'm in the second best University in the country for English. I have never scored lower than an A in an exam. I write on a first class level. I have never scored lower than a first for style, rhetoric or linguistic skill. Don't you ever fucking dare call me a pseudo-intellectual.
But let's tackle this from a strictly Q&A point of view.
1) It's the sense of mystique that makes G-man such an interesting character. That is hardly a discredited technique. Kurtz, Heart of Darkness.
2) Eli Vance, Black Mesa East: "Let's get you out of that suit and back in your lab clothes where you belong". They want you to work on their new portal technology - the thing that is going to win the war against the combine. They would have teleported you right there but, plot device, the teleporter malfunctions, because gameplay needs to occur. "There are few MIT graduates around these days" - they wanted you in your capacity as a scientist. The rest was everything going wrong.
3) So, wait, you choose to remain ignorant, and that is the game's weakness? Okay, sure, that would stand up in court.
4) Opinion stuff, I'm not going to argue that. Entitled, &c.
5) You're a Big Deal because you survived Black Mesa, rescuing or saving dozens of people who are now at the heart of the resistance; you have important scientific knowledge they need; you freed the Vortigaunts who are now of vital importance... etc.
That and my previous post = that's it. Go ahead and continue with your personal insults if you must, seeing as you apparantly cannot that and argument seperate.
I thought you were doing that when you started complaining about how it made no sense that you hooked up with Barney and were subsequently sent to meet up with Dr. Kleiner. They explained why these people want to help/be helped by you. It was called Half-Life.
You're seen as a "big deal" by these people because you almost single-handedly stopped the aliens in the original HL, and you were just a research scientist. So yeah, these guys respect you. Why is that hard to grasp? These people have formed an underground resistance to thwart the Combine, and the guy who saved the world the last time around shows up, they're going to get pretty excited.
sketchyblargh / Steam! / Tumblr Prime
1) Plot versus story. By all accounts, the Half-Life franchise has an excellent story, it's just that we know so little about it. The plotting itself revolves around vague or ambiguous references, a dash of fish-out-of-water feel, and witholding information to maintain a sense of mystery. These are all viable tactics. I feel it's reasonable to argue about them here because some people enjoy this presentation and some people don't. Same as with Lost. I love Half-Life 2 but hate Lost because Lost is based around witholding vital information over the course of several years. Although info is withheld in HL2, I get to kill shit in the meantime.
2) Gordon as silent protagonist. Obvious design choice, not laziness. If he wasn't silent, he'd be constantly asking the obvious questions that we as the player keep wondering about in our head. This would alleviate the sense of mystery that the developers wanted. But since Gordon's silent, the developers were free to carefully craft what NPCs say and how they say it. Again, all about presentation.
3) Player as Gordon: Another design decision that is a presentation. You either get it or you don't, try not to despise those that feel differently than you. A developer has the capability to force certain things on us. Immersion through Gordon isn't one of those things. It's an attempt, nothing more. YMMV. If your mileage sucks, wait out the convos and then go and kill shit.
4) The NPCs themselves. Strictly comes down to personal preference and opinion whether you like them or don't. FFS, try not to argue about this since it's so subjective. I'm freaked out by those of you who are actually in love with Alyx. She's a digital NPC, for chrissakes. However, by Ep 2 I personally came to enjoy the sheer amount of emotions she elicited in me: mostly annoyance, tbh (especially in Ep 1), but I couldn't help but smile at her reaction to getting our hands on the Dodge Charger. Yes, my cold, heartless self smiled and I appreciated that. If you didn't, I guess it's your loss, but again, subjectivity! Some people can be emotionally reached this way, some people can't. Single biggest case of YMMV.
Well, shit, so much for conciseness. Anyway, I know this is the Intertubes and all, and we need something to argue about, but Jesus, can we at least civilly debate the merits or meritless nature of developer design decisions instead of shrieking "THE STORY IS STUPID!" or "I HEART ALYX!"?
As for gameplay mechanics, I figure that one's up for grabs.
I'm not going to lime your whole post for the sake of space, I'm just going to say I pretty much agree with everything you just said.
Yeah, I'll agree with that. Although I'd also want it noted that the core game play itself should hold up in the absence of the storyline. If the story line is great and the game is shit, I'd be better of reading a book or watching a movie, because even if it's an average book or movie, at least I'm not having to put up with crappy game play.
But I think you probably already agree with that. I'd rate everything in HL2 at least above average. The story line was a good effort, as was the shooting (although I've definitely played better), graphics and sound were top notch, the robot dog thing was a pretty good catch, I'd certainly have him on my team in a game of rounders.
I empathise with the character far better than I have done with a lot of previous characters in games. This is in line with the design of the game, and the intent of Valve, therefore I attribute this to the skill of the writers and designers.
How do they get around the "silent hero" thing? Or do they just ignore that for the film?
Well Gabe Newell said they've had plenty of scripts in and they've all been crap. Really I don't think they're keen on going that route unless they can ensure it's a brilliant movie. One of the main problems of course is simply the fact that one of the things that makes the game so awesome is the player involvement as the character, to the extent that the main character doesn't even say anything (and you never even see his reflection for example). That's something that plainly wouldn't work on the big screen, and they'd have to focus on other things, like screwing up the film by replacing Alyx with a transvestite soul talkin' Eddie Murphy.
Just give the headcrabs Lupis.
Ninjacratic policy follows.
There's a maxim for new writers which is something like "if you don't mention it, it doesn't exist". There might be a Secrets of Half Life bible at Valve, or they might be making up on the spot, but I don't think it matters much if they don't use what they know in the story. Personally, I think breaking the backstory up and hiding behind trees is tacky and sort of bad taste. It doesn't make things deeper but gives an illusion of depth, and it wastes lot of people's valuable time.
If Gordon were me, I would definately ask questions. If Gordon isn't me, I want to know why he's such an incurious person.
In any case, I don't believe Gordon's silent for artistic reasons. I think he's silent because the developers have this belief that a player character must never do anything without extremely immediate prompting from the player. And they draw the line in some pretty weird places (clicking on person to shoot them is ok, but clicking on a line of dialogue to say it is verboten) but at least they're consistent.
Hence, no Gordonspeech until they invent the Valve Speech Comprehender Machine(tm). Then the plot will act as if he were always vocal. Silly guys.
YMMV for sure, but for me nothing makes a videogame character feel realler than two-way conversation.
[edit: wow. that took too long to write for its length.]
Well for that I'd have to have read Heart of Darkness in order to make some analytical reference to it. All I can say is that the protagonist more then likely has dialog and having that to enforce the events within that novel. Not to mention that it's a fucking novel and by nature has the leverage of using prose to establish a plot and build a story. Moot point.
Right, a goal which you never accomplish, nor do you ever get back to anything else you started. You just keep running around being oblivious to anything and everything in the construct of the story that's unfolding. That makes it weak.
The game never conveyed that message otherwise and you're not making an effort to develop it further. I still don't see how a mid-ranking security officer becomes an undercover operative that has the ability to infiltrate the combine. It's not believable and the mechanism in which they used to convey it never made any attempts to explain. Moot.
Right but you've also been missing long enough for the Combine to gain a foothold and occupy. The first, I'll give you. The second, never established. The third, weakly presented.
As for personal insults, I don't enjoy people making shit up or throw a lexicon in order to make a point. First of all saying something like " Your points are all based in the same petulant tract of attitude." that doesn't make any sense not to mention it's a blatant attempt to simplify my position with a straw man argument. How else did you expect me to react other then bringing the very statement into question?
Crap, somebody else actually played and enjoyed that game? That reminds me, I really need to pick up the 15th anniversary edition some time.
Really, if Gordon could talk, imagine what he'd say:
" Guys, Guys, there is a man in a ugly blue suit controlling EVERYTHING! "
" Yep, it was me folks, i started the resonance cascade that brought the Combine to Earth. "
" How the hell do you reload this damn gun? They didn't teach this in Advanced Physics. "
" Breen? My beard is 10 times more awesome than yours. "
" Alyx, darling? Sorry, I'm gay. "
I agree with this, although I don't have so much of a soft spot for Another World, simply because I've not played it.
Also, Ed Norton for Freeman?
I'll agree that the fact that it's not clear where Gordon has been in the interim between games is a sticking point, but I hardly think the rest of the story is as incongruous and indecipherable as you're making it out to be.
sketchyblargh / Steam! / Tumblr Prime
Reread my post and tell me where I said that. I said it was ONE of the most powerful. Obvious the RPG and AR2 alt-fire are more powerful; but you wind up extremely limited on ammo with those guns. Gravity gun fodder is quite plentiful (as the game was designed.)
Seriously; this isn't opinion. The gravity gun is extremely useful and powerful, and just because YOU made the conscious choice not to use it (which is the only argument you've put forth against it.) doesn't make it not so.
Valve has repeatedly mentioned that talks for a Half-Life movie usually break down around the "and this is where Gordon falls in love" point.
No, no, a thousand times, no. The narrative presented in Half-Life could not be told as a movie. At most, a movie set in the same universe, but it would be impossible to present the events of Half-Life in a movie without radically altering them. The story and the way it's presented is already so perfect, why do you want to see it cut down to three hours and projected on a wall?
Alternative: Watch "The Mist," ignore the last 5 minutes of the movie and pretend it takes place in the Half-Life universe.
It could be done. You just need to change a few things like making Gordon into a more presentable character (since he's no longer a player avatar) and making sure characters like Kliener, Eli and Barney follow him through most of the story so you have a full cast throughout.
'course it begs the question of what does Half-Life really have to offer story-wise when you take the interactive element out.. It just becomes another fairly generic scifi invasion story with a few conspiritorial elements.
/facepalm
You could do something like that webcomic Concerned, which followed the basic plot of HL2 from a different set of eyes (obviously it was supposed to be funny, but you could do it seriously as well).
Source is a GREAT engine. Half-life is an ok game.
I don't understand the people who didn't like it, except maybe to say did you not play these games when they first came out?
When HL1 first shipped, it was just so much vastly VASTLY better than anything else on the market of a similar genre. It made Quake and Unreal etc look pathetically simplistic. Every design choice about the game just seemed incredibly well thought out. I had never experienced anything like the soldier fire fights in my gaming life. The Zen levels were worse than the rest of the game but were still so more interesting to play than the other FPS's on the market.
I dunno, maybe I've forgotten about some other specific title, but thinking back to playing it (over and over and over again with my brothers and Dad) I just remember it being one of the most incredible times of my gaming life. I was amazed, I couldn't believe it was that good, and everything else seemed like it was made ten years earlier.
I mean, Quake 2 was released almost exactly 1 year prior to half-life 1, which isn't an enourmously large time in the industry considering how long it takes to develop these kinds of games, and jesus when i think about the two games, it feels like I'm comparing Pong to Wii Tennis or something ( I couldn't remember the name of any decent 'full game' tennis title
The expansions weren't quite as good as the main story, although OpForce came damned close, but at the end of the day, it was just more half life levels, even if they hadn't been made by the same level builders the core mechanics were still there, so they still had great gameplay. Of course you also can't ignore the fact that half-life's modding community was NUTS, just so much talent and creativity and Valve's support of the community was amazing. It got me into modding, it was the birth of so many great games.
Honestly, I can go back and play half life 1 now, and still be pumped in the firefights, and enjoy the rest out of retardedly powerful levels of nostalgia.
Right, Half-life 2 was obviously less different from the competition than Half-life 1, but I don't know what I can say, it was so polished and well paced, and with enough new stuff that it shit violently over the other games of the time. I was a little older, and I didn't get quite the same feeling of raw passionate awe that I got from the first one, but jesus it wasn't far behind, and it was of course a much better game than the first.
Anybody who didn't like Alyx is...well I'd like to say gay/soulless/an asshole, but instead I'll just go with, of a differing opinion to me. She got even better in episode 1, and in episode 2 was obviosuly in the backseat again a little, but still great, really great. All the actors are great, all the little animation touches, the eyes looking at you as you go down the lift, the kissing the dad on the head, the adjustments of glasses and looks of horror. Christ it gets across so much feeling. The gameplay was just so stupidly horrifyingly polished it was blinding, I was BLINDED. Great guns, gravity gun ofc in particular hadn't been done before and was fantastic. I've heard a bunch of people say that playing it now, the physics feel really dated, and I'm sure that's true but honestly I've never noticed it, I love all the physics stuff, I love the gravity gun, it's all bloody marvelous.
Didn't you guys just like completely shit your pants with awesome when
So many good set-pieces, so much energy, the driving sections were fucking fantastic, Ravenholm was scary and awesome, it just did everything it said on the box. It did everything they said in the shit hot reviews.
I mean, there seem to be a lot of dissenting voices in these threads, but I still find it shocking every time. I mean, in my brain, I just consider half-life 1 and 2 to be one of those untouchable franchises, like you don't diss Chrono Trigger, or Super Mario World, BG (if you like standard fantasy DnD), Plansescape (If you like text), the original sonic games, etc. Obviously some people aren't going to like these games (the rpg's are maybe bad examples since ppl who don't like rpg's aren't going to like them), but it feels like half the people in the thread have negative opinions on it, and I can't fathom it.
Man, I'm gunna go play me some Half-Life, and if you see Doctor Breen,
tell him I said
This is largely why I didn't enjoy the first game - I bought the Half-Life Anthology on a whim in 2003, and I didn't enjoy it. I'm enjoying HL2 though, even though I did only discover it four months ago.
But the Pong block is cold and unfeeling. I never knew why I was hitting that block or how I got there!:roll: