HL2 Theories

Originally posted by EVIL
me fires at a boulder to get it rollong down the hill to see a combine soldier being crushed by it a few seconds later. those are the traps I am expecting..
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Wouldn't like to see them as traps all the time, that would be unrealistic, I would instead like to be able to set off an explosive and watch a mini-avalanche of rocks! :E
 
Op4:

It seems, (also, read the user manual shipped with opfor, the shepard diary i mean) that the gman was "evaluating" possible recruits for his agency during the disaster (looking at those black screens with writings like "evaluation etc").

The G-man showed interest for adrian, but their employers wasnt as interested because they already had hired gordon....

But the gman show sympathy for the disaster survivor, (they remind him of himself) and also thinks that shephard could be valuable in the future (expecially if gordon would die or go rogue...) so in the end you read "pending further evaluation" (i dont know for sure, i have the italian version)
Those survivors could be placed in some kind of structure were they couldnt harm (telling everything about black mesa) and take harm (gman killing them if they speaks too much, aliens and such)

Gman a race x alien???? naaaaaaahhhhhhh


Btw opfor was developed with the help of mark laidlaw, who is the hl story writer...

but, i dont know if opfor story will be "canon" or in the official continuity, anyway it would suck if it will be considered "off-continuity"

ps: in the pc gamer article i read that this time the vortigons will be your alyes... they could be referring to the voltigores .. i hope so...
 
Hmm, I found this on the Half-Life 2 description on EBgames.com..

Players once again pick up the crowbar of research scientist Gordon Freeman, who finds himself on an alien-infested Earth being picked to the bone, its resources depleted, its populace dwindling. Freeman is thrust into the unenviable role of rescuing the world from the wrong he unleashed back at Black Mesa.
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Not sure if that contains info we already know, or where EB got that from, but it's interesting none-the-less.
 
Originally posted by Dave
Hmm, I found this on the Half-Life 2 description on EBgames.com..



Not sure if that contains info we already know, or where EB got that from, but it's interesting none-the-less.
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Uh....

Gordon Freeman is no more a research scientist (i mean, the gman hired him because of his killing skills) btw :D


Earth Source depleted etc. ?? :O

ps: "the wrong he unleashed back at Black Mesa." Uhm, arent xen aliens supposed to be a problem of the past in hl2?? Or the incident have something to do with the combine etc??

pps: anyway Freeman just pushed a yellow crystal under a green beam, because they ordered him to do, i dont think he is responsible of "unleashing wrong" :/
 
Depends where they got they're info from I guess..
 
Am i the only person who thought that the nihilanth looked like a giant controller?
 
Notice the, "Created by G-Man in Nihilanth's image" part about the Controllers. So, you are not alone.
 
Not sure if this was mentioned before, but I was just wondering what exactly would the role of Shepard be? I mean, yeah, he was a good recruit and all, but why would G-Man pay such close attention to him if he were to just be sent away like Shepard is at the end? At first, I thought he was looking for recruits like Gordon, but obviously not...it doesn't make a whole lot of sense to me.

Also, does Blue Shift add any extra little things you wouldn't see in HL and Op4 in terms of plotline? Just wondering.

-Vert
 
Nope, not really, it doesn't add anything, but only shows that Barney escapes from Black MESS ( :D ) , plus with bunch other scientists.
 
I don't think he was out to recruit anyone, but when Freeman managed to get past all the aliens, marines, Black Ops and Nihilanth the G-Man recruited him. He says he admires survivors against all the odds so he spares Shepherd (who also got past the Black Ops and aliens) by merely detaining him, unlike the other survivors who were silenced by the Black Ops.

Blue Shift does add some parts to the story that help round up what was going on in Half Life, mainly about how they discovered Xen.
 
Originally posted by votka
I don't think he was out to recruit anyone, but when Freeman managed to get past all the aliens, marines, Black Ops and Nihilanth the G-Man recruited him. He says he admires survivors against all the odds so he spares Shepherd (who also got past the Black Ops and aliens) by merely detaining him, unlike the other survivors who were silenced by the Black Ops.
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Well, yeah, I can understand all that, but Cyrus says in Boot Camp if you look up and to the left, G-Man's there. Now that's what kinda messed it all up for me. I mean, if the marines were just there to clean things up and the Black Ops were there to clean up the marines, what kind of worth would Shepard have? Other than for the G-Man's amusement, of course...

-Vert
 
In the OpFor manual you see parts of Shepherd's diary saying how the G-Man was watching him during training, he probably stood out as a good soldier. But that makes me wonder whether the G-Man knew a disaster was going to take place at Black Mesa if the soldiers were being trained to be experts at indoor combat. So when Shepherd made it out alive, the G-Man took pity on him.
 
Okay, found this translation of a HL2 Preview in a dutch magazine..

It says some interesting things regarding the plot, mainly..

We don't want to spoil the story for you, but what we can tell is that HL2 takes place some time after the disaster in Black Mesa and that the aliens have continued their invasion of earth. The player will once again take the role of Gordon Freeman and is assisted by the beautiful Alyx and her father, a Black Mesa scientist called Eli Vance. Alyx's mother was killed in one of the accidents at Black Mesa.
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Hmm, so the aliens are the bad guys once again. Also, did he say one of the accidents? I though the entire thing was just one big accident? Hmm..

Also, about the Combine..

An important part of the game will play out in City 17, a typical Eastern European town that is not only plagued by the aliens but also by a corrupt law enforcement group.
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Interesting stuff.. catch the entire thing here.
 
i think its most likely that the g-man planned to invade xen and was hiring the best of the military forces to do this, if you read elsewhere in the manual it says
"march 9th
for weeks our drills have been the same crap day after day. today our dill instructor tells us we have one week to become experts at indoor stratigic combat."
this sugests they are prepairing for such an accident
""march 15th
the rumor has been confirmed. we are being trained for a mission at black mesa facility"
"we were told today to be ready incase it happens tomorrow. i don't know what 'it' is, but the whole thing is a little strange"
this confirms that the g-man knew something would happen and it was all part of the plan, therefor shephard was being trained for this picked by the g-man along with other marines.
it was the fact that shephard survied so well after being cut off from the others, note you see the g-man when the doors shut and trap you behind at black mesa, he says at the end if memory serves me well, that he wanted to employ shephard but his emploies wouldn't let him, thinking he would talk so he was going to put him out of the way safe from harm untill a time that he proves useful, so hopefully he will return in half-life 2 as it could be such a time that he may prove useful
 
Gman is amused of Shephard potential imo, but his employers didnt let him hire him so now he is detained attending further evaluation (perhaps if he survives the happenings of hl2 he will work for the gman...)

Also blue shift add something little to the plotline:

Basically you understand what those yellow crystals do.
 
Don't know if this will be any use, but I just reached Nihilanth again; but before you jump through the red portal you can hear scientists talking, saying things like:

"Shut down the equipment, get him out of there!"

"Thank god you're here!"

"We tried to warn them.."

:bounce:
 
Originally posted by votka
Don't know if this will be any use, but I just reached Nihilanth again; but before you jump through the red portal you can hear scientists talking, saying things like:

"Shut down the equipment, get him out of there!"

"Thank god you're here!"

"We tried to warn them.."

:bounce:
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Oh yes I remember (btw i'm replaying hl too).
I wonder the meaning of those talkings, i dont think they are random etc
 
Don't the two scientists say that way back at the beginning, just after the accident?



"We tried to warn them.. I never thought I'd see a resonance cascade scenareo, let alone create one!"

As Gordon approaches.. "Gordon, your alive, thank god for that hazard suit!"
 
Hmm? Whats this.. Anyone listened to the scientist sound.. 'c1a0_sci_dis17a.wav' ? I don't recall hearing it in the game, but it says (in a strange voice I might add) "He waited too long, we can't contain it!"

Thats just weird! :D
 
Yeah...that's one of the many things the scientists are screaming right before they get gibbed. I don't think it's really anything big, but you never know.

-Vert
 
Originally posted by Dave
Hmm? Whats this.. Anyone listened to the scientist sound.. 'c1a0_sci_dis17a.wav' ? I don't recall hearing it in the game, but it says (in a strange voice I might add) "He waited too long, we can't contain it!"

Thats just weird! :D
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Also, near the portal to nihilant you can hear "today is a great day mr freeman (or the correct english verision"

c1a0_sci_dis17a.wav is said or it should be said after you push the crystal under the spectometer.....
 
Oooh, I been listening to the Scientist talks, and when you first see the icky, the nearby scientist says.. "Did you see it? They said it was hauled from the challenger deep, but i'm positive that beast never swam in terrestrial waters until a week ago".

Hmm, did he say terrestrial waters? :eek:

If he meant what he said, doesn't that show that aliens popped up all over the earth, and not just in Black Mesa? If thats true, it would explain some of the background story for HL2. Could be - In the years Gordon was out of action (for whatever reason..) Aliens basically went rampage, destroying cities and humans everywhere.
 
Originally posted by ShadowJustice
Also, near the portal to nihilant you can hear "today is a great day mr freeman (or the correct english verision"

c1a0_sci_dis17a.wav is said or it should be said after you push the crystal under the spectometer.....
Click to expand...

lol, never heard it. :p

Still sounds weird to me, the voice is completely different from all the others, as if it was done by a completely different voice actor.
 
Basically you understand what those yellow crystals do
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what do they do?

I've only played thru HL...and then played a little OF at a friends place but can't really remeber what happens...and I haven't tried BS at all...

can some one make a brief recap of the base plotlines in those two other games?
 
oh..and for people examening sound files...unless you can find someway to find out when the sounds are played it's worth mentioning that some time game developers leave "stuff" behind in the game directory, that isn't used in the final game...such as sounds, textures etc.

unless you can confirm it...it's not entirely sure that it's in game....but sometimes it stills gives hints.
 
I don't know if anyone has mentioned this...but in the video with Barney...

notice that he is wearing a combine uniform...

now what could this mean?

anyone stopped to think that the Human-looking combine soldiers are in fact humans...just fighting for the alien side. perhaps mind controled.(hence still reffered to as "the alien combine")

you've think that Barney has been freed from this mind control(perhaps the helmets, although they look like russian gas-masks) or maybe he has just stolen the outfit from a combine soldier to disguise himself?

also did anybody stop to think about the possibility that G-man might actually be one of the good guys?

sure he's doing shady buisness in HL1, at the cost of civilian scientist etc.

but it is said that Gordon Works for G-man...now I realise that in HL1 he wasn't given much of a choice...but it has been fifthteen years, and I doubt that Gordon is the kind of guy that would work for G-man if it wasn't the right thing to do(he would rebel at some point during the 15 years)...not for fifthteen years...what if the black Mesa incident was for a greater good...not only for g-man, but also mankind....

another big question is what has happended during the 15 years...what have Gordon and "G" been up too, what kind of work have Gordon been performing for "G"?

my original take on G-man in HL1 was that he wasn't really human...or perhaps human but definitely working for someone that wasn't from earth... to gain power either on Earth or Xen...

I dunno...it's hopefully going to clear up a little on sep.30th
 
anyone has some thoughts on Barney wearing Combine uniform?

ps. btw how do you rate topics?
 
Just wondering about few things:

1) Does expansion pack "further data" reveal anything interesting ? Has anybody even got it? ;P I remember only demo of it - "uplink", and than i've read an article in one magazine about the final version [it has got 6.5/10 mark btw ;o] and than it all become quiet - i havent seen it in the shops or anywhere (strange o_O), but there might be some interesting facts - for what i remember from the demo it starts with some text about an hour, date etc, and the last line of it says: "Evaluation in progress" - doesn't it sound a little g-man » sheppard like ?(remember, that this expansion is still about gordon)

2) Im especially focused on the black ops, since they don't seem to fit to any of races and factions that have been mentioned. Lets try to do that then:

a) Xen - no doubt, it is not the case, xen have no friendly relations with any human, so they cannot employ human assasins.

b) Race X - this is impossible too, for the same reason.

c) The G-man - this however, is higly propable, since the black ops were sent to clean up the mesa, which was the task g-man was to take care of. But, on the other side we have the g-man watching the troops in the boot camp, changing the schedule of training so that the poor little marines can be higly trained for indoors combat, and prepared for what was going to happen in black mesa. Why would g-man than send black ops to clear the entire facility off the marines he took care of? Perhaps he made a mistake and underestimated the power of xen, or the strenght of u.s. army ? This is rather weak point, because g-man is not at all the man, who makes such mistakes (it just doesn't fit to him, don't you think? :p).

The Combine - I think of it as a most propable scenario. Notice the similiarity between the look of black op and combine soldier - the're both have their bodies covered with stuff, including faces. They are in fact highly skilled assasins, altough i believe that male ones weren't so lethal in OP4 as the females in hl1 (it gave me creeps when i was to enter that huge storage area with just 3 female black ops ;)). What would that mean? Well, that would mean combine having bussiness in clearing up black mesa, or - killing a specific man/alien/whatever. Remember, black ops arent just upgraded soldiers - they are assasins, trained not to invade and kill masses, but to kill/destroy specific target, so we cannot percieve them as another inviding force. But another question is raised than - who they want to be killed? It may be simply Gordon, and i think it is the most logical explanation, since he has ruined many plans during his adventure, and was up to do some more mischief - now think - what were these plans and assuming combine was thier author - why would they want gordon dead? There we are getting to the weakness of this theory , because of other teories of combine being aliens, that are finnaly "allowed" to invade, when the "gate" is finnaly opened the moment nihilanth gets killed. According to this, combine needs gordon to succeed in his mission, so they would rather protect him, than try killing him, right? So either:
- Combines origin is our world - they haven't come from another space, ergo - they are not aliens (well, at least not fully aliens), and thay have some important reason for gordon NOT getting to xen and killing nihilanth (which instantly makes them good guys at that time ;))
- Black ops are not combine (which makes combine aliens, and bad guys)

Of course there comes another leak - if the g-man is behind all the marines, and marines want gordon killed - how can he be after killing nihilanth? What if gordon dies killed by an apache helicopter (whoops, a rocket hit him) - the nihilanth would propably survive, and therfore - there would be no invasion (as the gate would stay closed). I personally don't think g-man would risk that much if he wanted gordon to exterminate The Big Baby.

But than, he is happy in the end about what gordon has done - has he suddenly changed the side? Or its gordon who somehow turned to act the wrong way - the way that was in order with g-mans plans, which has been invasion. Notice the lack of troops in the further scenes of the game, their main task is pulling back, and averything is in total chaos - in lambda section and teleportation labs there are no troops!. Maybe g-man after all realised, that all he needs, is not an army to invade xen, but one man army (Which is obviously gordon) to infiltrate nihilants cave and kill him.

Im tired of creating theories, may this pile of thoughts be of any use to you ;>
 
uhmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm....

1)the dis17a.wav file... They dont seem to say this in game (some hours ago i begun to play hl again :p ) But from the sound file the part c1a0 hints me that this sound was supposed to play during that sequence...

2) For the terrestrial water\icthyo thing.... The scientis probably meant with terrestrial waters black mesa waters... after all he couldnt know of (possible) alien invasions outside the complex... o

3) Those yellow crystals...

Well, the scientist, in the first teleportation experiments, found out that anything they tried to teleport were being captured by the borderworld... but then when they begun xen explorations ecc, they found those yellow crystals, who could be used as "focus point" necessary to any teleportation with a destination on earth.

4) Barney wearing a combine uniform: It could simply have disguised as one of them, or he could have dressed with that uniform because it offered more protection, or stuff like this....

5) ehm.. further data is some new mp models and some new mp maps... i think that uplink is something not based on hl continuity....

6) Maybe black ops work for the governement... the simplest option... i dont know why some kind of ninjas should be supposed to work for some alien..

And i think that combine could have developed soldiers basing on black ops... not the other way around...

Gman behind the marines? we dont know for sure.
I'm now thinking of some new theory, but in the meantime i will post this....
 
OK this is long and twisted

so,

1) who sent the marines?
2) why were the soldiers sent to kill everybody ??
3) who ordered the marines to kill freeman??
4) was the incident supposed to happen? If not, why those soldiers were trained so much to fight in black mesa???
5) why were the black ops sent to kill everybody plus the marines that dind manage to pull out???

You would probably answer to 1) with "The gman!!!" but then, why they wanted to kill freeman so bad?? The gman is of course interested in Freeman's "limitless potential" why would he order to kill him?

So imagine this: in secret resarch compound some kind of dark organization (maybe even more powerful thant the us government itself) wich illegally uses military founds for illegal and dangerous experimentations..

In black mesa they go too far pissing off an alien race and nearly causing an interdimensional war... So the president decides to fight this conspirer alliance so he send a squad of higly trained marines to take care of the problem defintevly, destroyng everything of the damn complex, and those stupid scientis whose sole purpose is to open portals between dimensions filled of carnivore aliens....

But why was the incident caused, if then the gman worked so hard for reverting the situation back to normal??
And are we sure that that if that crystal wasnt put under the spectometer the alien invasion would not occur?
This is defintely something valve should explain, i dont think our theories could explain this......

What is the problem with freeman, i just cant understand...

Then, the gman, for who he works? For the us government? for some other dark organization far more powerful than the us government?

I would go with the second option. Why he seems to be allied with the marines then? Well he could be some kind of spy, he could be seen as a friend by the us government, and such. Dont forget that he seems to be allied with EVERYONE (uhm, allied, you know what i mean).

Well, sorry but this is too twisted... i hope that my random thought will be useful or interesting to someone who will have the patience of building up some argumentations etc.
 
Well, i can't be sure, but as far as i remember futher data was first expansion pack for hl, and besides mp models and maps it also contained single player mode, which was (according to the magazine i have read) pretty much... well... half-life ;> there was nothing new, just some new chapters with the same monsters, the same marines, the same textures and the same black mesa. Uplink was a sample of it, and you all have propably played it - it was just another level.

Oh, it has just hit me:
G-man is the guy that besides his usual stuff (planning invasions etc.) looks after so called "prodigies" - unnaturally skilled men. He looks after gordon many times during hl. He looks after shephard in bootcamp, he makes sure he gets his training first. He doesn't have anything with Calhoun tough, who seems to be the only ordinary guy, but than he doesn't do any heroic thing during the blueshift, does he?
Its just a thought, another peice of a jigsaw.
 
Okay, my 2 cents.

I honestly don't think Valve put as much effort into the story of the original as you guys are giving them credit for. Actually, I applaud them. Kudos Valve. What they've done with a fairly simple storyline is give it so many open-ended possibilities that when they did make a sequel they could take the time to connect all these points up with the next game.

eg - WTF is up with the G-man? Valve hears the public outcry and thus he is obviously a big part of HL2.

I don't wanna kill any speculation, I'm just putting forward another possibility...
 
That could be true, Bat^Hat, but apparantly the writer (Marc) is an excellent novelist, I doubt they would let his incredible creative skills go to waste?

Besides, in any case, HL2 will explain alot of HL1, it more or less has to. Surely one of the reasons some people are buying it (myself included) is not just for the new graphics, mod capabilities, or physics engine (although they're all very tasty!) but also to find out exactly what went on in HL1. :)
 
hmm, quite alot of theories to read there, lets just hope the best of them are the ones that are the right ones.. (for some reason :D?)
 
Well, this isn't exactly a theory, but I didn't think it deserved its own thread. I just played through Op4 again (forgot how short it was...), and noticed a couple things.

1) The G-Man seems to take a much more active role in the observation of Shepard. He opens the door, saving you from the rising toxic liquids (near the start of the game), he re-arms the bomb after you disarm it, etc. I'm not sure if this is just Gearbox's choice, or maybe it shows that Shepard was more a game to the Gman than a real observation. But then again, why does it talk about "Observation terminated" when you lose? *shrug*...if anybody can toss some insight my way on this, be my guest

2) One of the times when you use the teleporter, you're sent to a few interesting places. One is a very peaceful and serene area, with one of those healing pools. It's all nice and quiet, with very soothing music. Another time, near the end of the game (when all those Black Ops guys are gunning for ya in the warehouse, right before that last boss) when you use the teleporter, you're sent to another very serene area in Xen. Except, this time, there's two bull squids. The odd thing is, they pay you no heed. Even when you shoot at them, they just jump up in shock and then forget you. Once again, I'm not sure if this is just a decision from Gearbox or if it shows that the G-man may have put some of the Xen aliens under his own control so that they would be more violent.

One thing that I found odd was that, at the very start of the game, you come upon a locked glass door. There's Barney sitting at a receptionist desk, and the G-man comes in to talk to him. He then looks at you, and leaves. Wondering if there was any point in that. In any case, not sure if this means anything or not. Just some observations.

-Vert
 
I never got how the hell sheppard was gonna be ok restrained on a space shuttle or whatever for forever.
I wonder if the story of op4 will factor in with hl2 at all, considering it was made by gearbox. WHo did blueshift?
 
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