Half-life 2 Expansions

[Asknoone]

So Gabe mentioned that at some point he see's Valve returning to the perspective of other characters in order to cover various events that take place in and around Half-life 2. So, what scenarios would you like to see explored?

I'm leaning towards the Lost week. I think it has alot of potential. First, there's Barney, and everyone loves Barney, and he most certainly plays an important role in the Street War (you wouldn't play as him, but there's the NPC co-op aspect). Secondly, as a 'gameplay' focus we have squad commands. They were there in HL2, but lets face it: most players used them to send the citizens to the other end of the map. I think an emphasis on squad dynamics would play a key part in such an expansion, take Freedom Fighters for instance, a great game with great squad dynamics. Something like that working smoothly within a First person shooter would be so good, and it's definitely an aspect Valve need to improve on.

What else is there?

 

[Rapstah]

So, what scenarios would you like to see explored?

The Seven Hour war, obviously.

 

[Tollbooth Willie]

Seven Hour War, all that shit is bound to be posted.....

For the HL2 story arc, I'd like to see a little expansion based on Ravenholm.

 

[function9]

I would like something that delt with how Nova Prospekt was established.

 

[Ashitaka]

I don't think ravenholm or Nova prospekts beginnings would make that great of an expansion pack; in Ravenhoms case, a rebel mining town that was bombed by a ton of Headcrab artillery. It'd be like the actual level ravenholm streetched out for an entire expansion pack. And killing zombies for that long would get boring. Nova prospekt, as well. Seems to be just an old prison they started using.

Seven hour war, obviously. Lost week seems kinda boring, though. The 20-year gap between HL1 and HL2, now that, I'd like to see.

 

[Jintor]

War of the 7 Hours.

 

[DynamiteHeaddy]

I'd be happy with just a Citizen as the player. Except it would probably create another huge fan base...just like our old friend Adrian.

What is it with new guys who don't talk? People love em'.

 

[Xendance]

Someone's bound to say this... but as a combine troop? Just like Half Life =D

 

[Asknoone]

I would like something that delt with how Nova Prospekt was established.

I think that would be abit boring. What is there that we don't already know?

.just like our old friend Adrian.

/Shakes fist.

 

[BlackwaterReap]

wouldnt mind spending my time as a civvie, valve will just have to make sure they kill him/her off at the end, avoid a Barney uprising like after Blue Shift

 

[kupocake]

In general, I'd prefer something outside of the Half-Life 2 continuity. I just feel that narrative is growing a little too far outside the scope of a simple expansion pack. Plus, subjects like 'the lost week' hold little appeal, because we've already spent plenty of time in City 17. I like what they're doing with Portal: making something entirely new, but somehow linked in with the wider story.

Nonetheless, an 'Opposing Force 2' wouldn't go amiss. And no, i'm not demanding Shepherd back. The character has so little potential versus a million other ideas. I want a proper Op4, with a Post-Human main character and as little of that 'can't we all just get along' bullshit as possible. An expansion that casts you as a bastard son of a bitch.

The 7 hours war is perhaps a period of time that begs for something set within it, but a mere expansion is insufficient. I'd also like to see the game that focuses on it not being a straight-forward FPS, maybe not even an FPS at all.

I think the holy grail for me is a chapter set before the 7 hours war. You could set up a seriously good narrative for that period, as the world adjusts to the Xen invasion, and basically everything in society goes down the shitter. But again, I think that's kind of out of the scope of an expansion, perhaps game wise bar something in a Deus Ex style. Or perhaps an episodic series of missions showing key moments in the interim period (the initial storms, civil strife, combine manipulation behind the scenes, ultimately the seven years war).

 

[Narvi]

An expansion where we return to Xen would be class. One which didn't have sucky gameplay, just pretty Xen vistas.

A Seven Hours War one, would, as previously said, be awesome. Simply because we can see how the Combine military works when it can actually destroy its target.

Something where we see how the average citizen lived would be nice. Something to see how the Combine infrastructure works. All those citizens must be doing something besides standing around moaning. There have to be factories and things... somewhere. Something to occupy their time.

What Kupoartist suggested would be class. I always wondered how the world adjusted to the Portal Storms. We could see how they felt after they realized that an invasion had been repulsed by just one man; how he became an almost messianic figure to the common man and the media. The integration of the Vortigaunts into society would be interesting. Would there be specieist remarks, like... or I dunno, something? It would be nice to see if any of the Science Team or even Barney ever wrote of their experiences. The reactions of the science community to the new species inhabiting earth... the religious and national reactions... That area is just ripe for expansion.

Which is probably why they'll never refer to it. It would be extremely hard to portray properly.

 

[Atomic_Piggy]

just like our old friend Adrian.

CURSE YOU PLASTIC MOLDS-MAN!

7-hour war.:bounce:

 

[Deleted member 56031]

7 hour war, a resistance member, a combine troop and lemar

 

[Darkside55]

I'd like an expansion where I played one of Dr. Breen's personal Overwatch elite assistants, like that one guy who handed him the gravity gun. I'm sure those guys are privy to seeing all kinds of cool stuff: Breen dealing with advisors, making speeches, planning for the future of mankind, asking the elites to bring him coffee, etc. That would have to be its own chapter, too. "Get Dr. Breen coffee."

As a very close second, I'll third Kupo and Narvi's idea of a post-Xen world. Especially what Narvi described with regards to public opinion on Gordon Freeman; in old drafts there was a line where Alyx mentions Gordon in a newspaper clipping with a headline along the lines of, "Savior of Humanity." I can imagine playing through a Xen fauna-ravaged city, pre-Combine, and seeing newspapers with that frontpage story lying about in the streets.

 

[Asknoone]

"The last newspaper ever printed, and this guy on the cover....Gordon Freeman?"

 

[Max35]

I want to see an expansion from the viewpoint of Lamarr

 

[Piers89]

Perhaps a mod depicting the viewpoint of a vortigaunt freshly transported to earth after the half life incident.

 

[ríomhaire]

7 Hour War would suck. No mater what you lose. Lost week is an obvious choice. Playing from the PoV of an Overwatch soldier doesn't really seem like a good idea to me, they are lobotamized after all. Perhaps a game based around the portal storms? Lots and lots of Xen aliens.

 

[Asknoone]

7 Hour War would suck. No mater what you lose.

That's a pretty silly way of looking at it, and fairly narrow-minded. There's a whole chunk of stuff in there you can work around.

 

[Stene]

"The last newspaper ever printed, and this guy on the cover....Gordon Freeman?"

Yea, full soundfile was in leaked HL2 version, and was before Kleiner lab.

"Hey, check this out. The last newspaper ever printed, and it's you on the cover! How could you be the same guy...Well Dr. Kleiner's waiting"

 

[Darkside55]

That would actually make it interesting, IMO. You start the game with the knowledge that you're going to lose. Nothing you can do will result in changing the future; you can't stop the Combine occupation, you can't save any of the cities. The best you can do is fight and resist, and there are a lot of ways that a game set in the 7 Hour War could be played out.

I'm already imagining a couple possible scenarios and endings:

1. You could fight the Combine as a soldier of a nation's military. You'd make a valiant effort to repulse them, but in the end you would lose. You would either die at the end of the game, or you could flee, or perhaps enlist in the Overwatch.

2. Play a civilian. You can attempt to fight back (being among the first of the human resistance), and/or escape the metropolitan/suburban area you're in. Flee into the wilderness and take your chances there, maybe start building a resistance camp, or you could get the "bad end" and watch as the Combine start wrangling people--yourself included--into the cities, shipping them around on trains, and you can watch the first of the Overwatch being given their metrocop uniforms.

There's a lot of stuff you can do in the 7 Hour War. Plus, think of the sights you'd get to see. Holes opening in the heart of a city, sucking everything in, only to be replaced by a towering citadel moments later. A full-scale attack of striders, hunters, gunships, crab and mortar synths, and who knows what else. Militaries being brought to bear against them, jets and tanks and platoons of soldiers fighting a wave of synthetic invaders.

The surrender, and the first Breen speech.

"The last newspaper ever printed, and this guy on the cover....Gordon Freeman?"

"But that was a long time ago. How could you be the same guy?"

 

[Rapstah]

The surrender, and the first Breen speech.

That would be insanely good.

"Fellow members of the human species, we have surrendered".
:excitement:

 

[Atomic_Piggy]

IMO the 7-hour war is inevitable as they HAVE to do it. If nothing else think of the story elements. Granted, we know we lose, and it is a hopeless battle, but it would be so awesome.

"TAKE THIS YOU ALIEN ****ERS!"

 

[Rapstah]

IMO the 7-hour war is inevitable as they HAVE to do it. If nothing else think of the story elements. Granted, we know we lose, and it is a hopeless battle, but it would be so awesome.

"TAKE THIS YOU ALIEN ****ERS!"

It would be awesome if we actually won the 7-Hour war, and in the final sequence, the G-Man appeared and changed the world.

Wow, i'm full of cra... ideas today.

 

[Atomic_Piggy]

It would be awesome if we actually won the 7-Hour war, and in the final sequence, the G-Man appeared and changed the world.

Yeah, but it would feel a tad anticlimatic... :x

 

[Shift]

7 Hour War definately, and actually span it over 7 hours or around about 7 hours. Would be great, any money they depict US troops though...

 

[Narvi]

Yeah, and they can finally why the **** the Black Mesa Administrator got the top job. He better be on the diplomats sent to parley or something.

 

[W4d5Y]

Yeah, I definately wanna see 7-hour war. Laidlaw once stated, if he could make a game, he'd probably treat how the conflict went during the one-week pause between Gordon's and Alyx' actions, but I don't think that that would be interesting information, being worth the effort...We could only play a few hours of seven days' actions, and also, Gordon already passed that timespan, although he didn't actually live through it.

I vote for 7-hour war instead, because you can actually make a game that's about 8-hours long, so you have like 8 chapters, each one treating the stages of the 7-hour war's conflict ! Clever, isn't it? ^^
Also, there a simple but trivial argument for a 7-hour war game... Me wantz 2 drive military tanx, w00t! XD
//edit:

"The last newspaper ever printed, and this guy on the cover....Gordon Freeman?"
"But that was a long time ago. How could you be the same guy?"

You guys saw that line on youtube, wha? ^^

 

[Asknoone]

I think the Lost Week is a good one. Sure, some C17 repetition there but if there's stuff Laidlaw would like to tell, more yey for the Lost Week. Also, it's only an expansion, and I think anyone would welcome more HL2 content.

 

[BlackwaterReap]

The 7 Hour War would make a decent game, but who exactly would you be controlling?

 

[Deleted member 56031]

A soldier defending earth?

 

[BlackwaterReap]

but which country?, England?, America?, Poland?

 

[Deleted member 56031]

Oh. Well I'd like America because most possible plot revelations could be made there as BM was in the US.

 

[BlackwaterReap]

In that case do you suppose we might find ourselves reintroduced to HECU?, and what of Shepherd, as far as we know he is "Detained", could he have been brought back to fight in the 7 hour war?.

G-man could be bringing him back to fight just to show him that he cant save the people he wants, slowly bringing him around to perhaps becoming an employee of G-man...

 

[Deleted member 56031]

I doubt we would be HECU and I really doubt we would be Shepard.

 

[kupocake]

but which country?, England?, America?, Poland?

Assuming there were countries immediately before the 7 hour war, or that these countries existed. That's the problem really, there's this whole background to the 7 hours war that you wouldn't get. You just jump into the conflict without context and see the earth defeated. Not very interesting IMO. All the things people want to see explained inevitably would not be. Political manouevering on Breen's part is out of the scope of simple FPS expansion pack. If we get the 7 hour war context, it'll have to be through other means.

And anyone wishing for a 7 hour long, 7 hour war expansion is kind of living outside of the same reality as Valve Software. Even if they claimed 7 hours of gameplay, it'd be closer to 3 hours

edit: similarly, the 7 hours war doesn't lend itself to an expansion format simply because of the vast amount of new art assets that would need to be created. It needs to be a full-blown game if indeed it 'needs to be' at all.

 

[Rapstah]

It could end after seven hours. No matter how many synths you downed.

:thumbs:

 

[Bill Lumbergh]

Silly idea perhaps, but what about playing as a sequence of HL NPCs (instead of just one)? Lots of questions about these people could be answered (maybe even about their actions during the 7 hour war, in some cases) - Alyx, Barney, Father Grigori, hell...even Odessa Cubbage, assuming he did any fighting.

Doesn't seem likely, but I guess you never know.

 

[Narvi]

It would be interesting to have a Seven Hours War expansion from multiple points of view. In one case, you'd be a soldier fighting the invaders; in another, you'd be a hapless civilian running for your life. The gameplay in each case would be remarkably different... the civilian would not have any interest in combat, and gameplay would be more running than fighting. It would be like War of the Worlds, where Tom Cruise's character attempts to escape, except there would be headcrabs and things. The soldier would be more standard FPS fare.

We could even see events like Breen coming to power through the eyes of, say, bodyguards present at the UN at the time of the declaration or something; though in cases like that, not much actual gameplay would be present. We could even see the Vortigaunt reaction to the invasion. It'd be class.