half-life? why half-life?

K

kontrol87

Guest
Ive been wondering this....why is the game called Half-Life? It really has no relevance to anything in the game. Or maybe it will later....
 
Look around for a thread explaining all of this.
Use TEH button.
 
y not call it "Dude, Come get pwned by a combine, super spectacular physics edition with guns and a crowbar"
 
I might be mistaken, but a half-life is how long it takes for a molecule to decay (or something like that). So, this is either reference to Gordon and his life (aging incredibly slowly), or Earth, a metaphor of sorts is what I was getting at. Maybe thats over-analyzing.
 
Max35 said:
I might be mistaken, but a half-life is how long it takes for a molecule to decay (or something like that). So, this is either reference to Gordon and his life (aging incredibly slowly), or Earth, a metaphor of sorts is what I was getting at. Maybe thats over-analyzing.
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Nope. It's allot more complicated that just "how long it takes for a molecule to decay". It's more about element decay. It plays an essential (if not the entire) role in carbon dating.

I believe it's just because the first game started out with them screwing up an experiment with alien (as in foreign) elements and caused the boarder world to be breached.
 
It's cool, it ties in with lambda and it is scientific.
 
Obviously you have never played HL1.
 
The time it takes for a radioactive isotope to decay to half it's original value; that is, the time it takes for half of the particles to decay and bugger off somewhere.

Never could work out exactly how that relates to the original game though. It does sound cool.
 
i believe its sposed to symbolize whats going on the world and the way we live has been dramaticly changed in such a short ammount of time... something wierd an fuzzy lookin like that :D it is valve after all *bowes*
 
I was told that a Half-Life meant you have just that - half of a life. Like you are cursed or something. I suppose that does stand to reason, since Gordan's life seems to be controlled in some creepy way. A little curse maybe?
 
Sulkdodds said:
The time it takes for a radioactive isotope to decay to half it's original value; that is, the time it takes for half of the particles to decay and bugger off somewhere.

Never could work out exactly how that relates to the original game though. It does sound cool.
Click to expand...

Your right a half-life is the time it takes for half the nuclei of an element to decay, leaving you with an isotope (For those of you that don't know an isotope chemically reacts the same as the pure element but it has more/less mass than the pure element) of a lower element, until it reaches lead.

The only link i can think of for the half-life being the title is that in hl1 you are testing the sample, and that may have something to do with half-life e.g. the reason it reacted/caused so much destruction may have had something to do with the samples half-life, and that when it was subjected to the beam it became to unstable.

Another way to look at how it is linked to the game may be that as in half-lifes the element is extremely radioactive/unstable at the start and as time passed e.g 10 years it becomes more stable, then after another 10years it becomes half more stable , if ya get my drift. In the game the situation you are placed in is very unstable, people around you are dieing and aliens are invading the place, aswell as the military wanting you dead, in hl2 the situation is a bit calmer as you have alot more help and the situation is a bit calmer.
Just my ideas, most probably no were near what the real reason is :D
 
Sulkdodds said:
The time it takes for a radioactive isotope to decay to half it's original value; that is, the time it takes for half of the particles to decay and bugger off somewhere.

Never could work out exactly how that relates to the original game though. It does sound cool.
Click to expand...

Well, at the risk of sounding unintelligent one more time. It could be a metaphor on the time it takes Earth to decay to half it's original value. Resources are being drained via the Citadel, I'm assuming atleast half the populace has died off. Maybe I'm taking it a little to obscurely lol.
 
It's funny cause because of the title of the game, I played almost half of the original half life thinking that this all is a some sort of radioactive accident so mutants appeared and gordon ist just halucinating. I saw "the point" later when things started to make more sense.

The title is there for many reasons- because half life is more or less connected with scince, combine modify people so the become half dead...
 
Max35 said:
Well, at the risk of sounding unintelligent one more time. It could be a metaphor on the time it takes Earth to decay to half it's original value. Resources are being drained via the Citadel, I'm assuming atleast half the populace has died off. Maybe I'm taking it a little to obscurely lol.
Click to expand...

Actually you may be bang on. Meaning that in the first game it was like a metaphor for Black Mesa's decay, or Gordon's decay. Something decaying anyway. Or they just chose Half-Life because it was scientific (and it sounded better than Quiver, the former title :) ).
 
The name "Half-Life" was given to the game before they even thought of the Combine, so it's nothing to do with the resources being drained.

They chose it because its a science term, and because it just sounds cool.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Half_life

-Angry Lawyer
 
I just thought the cause of the game's name was because we arrived half an hour late to the experiment, thus it going all wrong--- Don't ask me were i got that idea from, but i almost swear that some scientist said to me something about me being late..

Before someone calls to my attention that there are no files with such a quote, i know there aren't..
 
They also considered calling it Half Dead.
 
Duh its called half life, because you always have 50 or less health...Get it?
 
Tarkus said:
I just thought the cause of the game's name was because we arrived half an hour late to the experiment, thus it going all wrong--- Don't ask me were i got that idea from, but i almost swear that some scientist said to me something about me being late..

Before someone calls to my attention that there are no files with such a quote, i know there aren't..
Click to expand...

"Shouldn't you have been in the test chamber half an hour ago?", if you keep trying to talk to one of the scientists.
 
And "morning, Mr Freeman...looks like you're running late!"
 
i personaly dont think theres ne hidden meaning behind it, i just think it was a name that went with the scientific theme and was the coolest scientific name for a game, how lame would it be if it was called something like polyatomic or synthesis reaction
 
jellydoughnut217 said:
how lame would it be if it was called something like polyatomic or synthesis reaction
Click to expand...

Wouldn't be very good for a marketing scheme either...

"Dude, Billy Bob, have you played Poly..poly yough...no thats not it.. polya toe mike..ah screw it thats not it either..that new game thats about a gordon guy and his ventures through Xen?"
 
Actually, Polyatomic is a cool name.

Anything that has 'atomic' in it is cool.

Best name: ATOMIC CROWBAR!
 
does the atomic crowbar glow green and provide cancerous waves that give.... cancer to people.... or something?
 
We are nerds and proud of it :D Either that.. or im a dumb 14 year old and the rest of you take Biology and Physics
 
ríomhaire said:
It's cool, it ties in with lambda and it is scientific.
Click to expand...

i'm not going to go into any metaphors or anything but in physics lamda (a greek letter) represents wavelength. the only connection it has with half life is mathemtical: lamda is the parameter describing the exponential distribution and this distribution is used in physics to describe half-life.

I don't think they were chosen because they are related, as far as i know there is no mention of "Half life" any where in any of the games. Its just that they sound clever + scientific (sounds like it comes from an MIT graduate) and half life has kind of a slight rhyme - the "f" sounds so its catchy
 
Sufferin-rebel said:
We are nerds and proud of it :D Either that.. or im a dumb 14 year old and the rest of you take Biology and Physics
Click to expand...

Chemistry.

Already done biology.
 
god i have to take physics next semester

how would physics relate to the whole half-life concept anyways?
 
Sheikah42 said:
god i have to take physics next semester

how would physics relate to the whole half-life concept anyways?
Click to expand...
It wouldn't.. that is biology anyway.
 
I learn't half life in 7th grade science.

Pwnt.
 
It wouldn't.. that is biology anyway.
Click to expand...

No, it's not! It's to do with radioactivity which is on the Physics syllabus (in britain anyway) and if not, more likely to be on the Chemistry one thatn Biology. I mean, it has nothing to do with Biology. At all.
 
Sulkdodds said:
No, it's not! It's to do with radioactivity which is on the Physics syllabus (in britain anyway) and if not, more likely to be on the Chemistry one thatn Biology. I mean, it has nothing to do with Biology. At all.
Click to expand...
Ok... well I learned it in biology.. so that is why I said that. But whatever. :rolleyes:
 
i thought it was ONLY chemistry

i didn't know physics dealt with radioactivity at all...

does that mean i have to learn all that .693/whatever crap again?
 
I knew Half-Life was something scientific, but I still have no idea what it means. Doesn't anyone have an accurate description of it here?
I still don't get how it relates to the game... :p
 
Rennmniscant said:
I knew Half-Life was something scientific, but I still have no idea what it means. Doesn't anyone have an accurate description of it here?
I still don't get how it relates to the game... :p
Click to expand...

Half life is the amount of time it takes for half the atoms of a radioactive sample to decay from the parent atom to a more stable isotope. The time it take for the half the atoms to decay is always the same so the graph looks like this (exponential decay)[probly why HL decay was called decay]: (hope this link works :) )

http://www.eh.doe.gov/techstds/standard/hdbk1079/h1079f7.gif

thats the most concise + simple explanation u'll find, delve anmy deeper + it will start talking about complicated stuff like the exponential distribution (which is where lamda (parameter of exponential decay comes in)

Just in case u want to know: Blue shift is a special case of doppler shift and is used to find out whether galaxies are moving towards us. as the galaxy is moving towards us the visible light waves given off are compressed slightly because the galaxy is moving towards us and therefore the wavelength decreases "shifting the light towards the blue end of the spectrum" (blue light has shorter wavelength/higher frequency than any other colour so the shortened waves appear to bluer). red shift is the opposite effect. if u don't know what doppler shift is, its the thing that causes car engines to sound higher as they approach than when they move away from u (like F1 sound: nnnnnwauuuuu) just to really confuse u, lamda is wavelength as well.

hope that answere ur question. It doesn't (as far as i know) relate to the game, [SARCASM]it's just a pretty name[/SARCASM].
 
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