People Complaining About HL2's Story

[Doombringer]

Can I take a poll, how many of those who dont like the story have ever read a book?

If all your looking for in a story is the purpose for your actions, then you are missing the point. That is NOT what a story is supposed to be, a story is supposed to recount a serries of events and have alusions to other facts about the world in which it occures. To this end, HL2's story is nearly flawless.

Realize that this is the first time that a story like this is has been told while the player is experiencing it.

Sigh, true art is wasted on the ignorant...

The ignorant? Let's not start trolling here. We can all agree to disagree.

As for your argument, I can't agree. All the games I've played, movies I've seen and books I have read feature characters that have an idea of their goal and why they are there, doing what they are doing. Frodo didn't just wake up one day with the ring around his neck, proclaiming "I should go pitch this thing into a volcano!" I mean, seriously now.

 

[Hyperion2010]

I will say that the final sentence was put there for fun, and no I was not insulting anyone. If you cant accept delayed gratification, rather than instant gratification (which is what many gamers want and I can completely understand) then we are dealing with a completly different question. My real question is, "is it the best story weve had in a video game?"

Also, in regards to Frodo, maybe its how we look at a story. I look at a story as an adventure, which focuses mainly on the means not the ends. I personally think that LOTR is about so much more than why, and infact, the discussion of why Frodo is on this journey is not simple just like you say, it is highly complex. Just like Characters' motivations in HL2. Explain just exactly why Dr. Breen did what he did, there is no clear motivation behind his actions (at least until later). What motivates people to do what they do, that is what Valve is asking, and they hide it throughout the story. This is show dont tell, and if you dont like it thats your choice, however it is nearly always considered to be more sophisticated.

 

[Warbie]

"Frodo you must go on a journey"
"Why"?
"Never you mind, now get"!

*days pass*

"ok, i'm here. What do we do now"?
"we go on another journey"
"do I have to, i'm knackered"?
"yes"
"can you at least tell me what's going on, why we're here"?
"look around you - there are tiny clues everywhere that tell you nothing of any significance"
"oh ...... great. So where are we going now"?
"to a volcano"
"is that all you're going to tell me"?
"yes"
"well, what will we do when we get there"
"go on another journey"
"will you ever tell me what's going on"?
"no"

The End

 

[Mandrake]

Best stories are told by giving you only a little information so your fantasy must fill in the holes.. i love HL2's story

 

[Gunner]

Best stories are told by giving you only a little information so your fantasy must fill in the holes.. i love HL2's story

It's a bad idea for an action game and poorly implemented: you're supposed to listen for clues when there's shooting all over the place? you're supposed to look for clues when you're being chased?

And what clues are you talking about anyway? Please point them out if you could.

 

[ViolenceJack]

You play as gordon and the game basicly makes you feel like gordon which basicly means your thinking what on earth is going on and its clear that alot of people are like this.

Heres what i think.

Everyone looks higherly upon Gordon Freeman is probably because he saved the world from the Xen invasion and if there was anyone else trying to invade his home i think they will be abit worried when/if he shows up.

Thats another thing, Gordon just shows up. I mean you apear on the train after the G-Mans speech and even one of the guys on the train mentions he didnt even notice you were on. So i think HL2 is a direct continue on from HL where you step off the train into a portal and then apear on another train only thing is its 10 years later. Think of the G-Mans speech, hes going on about sleeping and say that sleep was 10 years. The old black mesa crew are kind of suprised and happy to see you and dont seem to have seen you since black mesa so where you been, well considering you dont even know its not likely they do. Also when your first teleport goes mad breen is basicly thinking wtf is that gordon freeman it cant be.

Going back to HL though, After you have stoped xen and everything the G-Man wants to hire you. Now why would a guy want to hire you after that and what on earth would he want to hire you for. I dunno but maybe having experiance of stoping invasions then maybe he could be qualified for the job of stopping an invasion or removing a hostile alien race/s. I think thats all HL is, the hiring of you, Dr Gordon Freeman. The G-Man is watching what your doing in Black Mesa, basicly summing you up, then he "hires" you.

Due to the fact that the G-Man is good at doing the disapearing act i think he is either and alien or from the future. Maybe hes got some nice little teleporting/time traveling stuff in that briefcase or he can naturally do it like the Xen thingy. This would show that somin has happened and it is bad which is related to the combine but that isnt exactly finished maybe HL3 will be based alot on another world maybe in the combine universe possibly the g-mans home world if he is alien. Basicly the combine are litterally owning everyone through out the universe in the not to distant future. This g-man goes back in time to hire this gordon freeman which did a really good thing which was stop an invasion.

Although there are alot of holes in that im just trying to say that the HL story is alot deeper, or can be, than some people are making out, fair enough on first clance there doesnt seem to be alot.

The way valve have done the story is pretty daring and it really hasnt been very successful for alot of people but i think its cool.

 

[SubKamran]

A lot of people seem to be complaining about Half-Life 2's story; that the storyline is weak or that not many questions are answered.

I think the reason for this perception is that the story of HL2 is told in a unique way. It also has a lot to do with the "quick fix" attitude of modern gamers -- we expect everything to be there for us, and if we don't see it then we miss it.

Half-Life 2's story is not told in the way most games tell their story; it doesn't use cut scenes to drip feed information to the player, and a lot of the story is told irrelevent of whether the player is viewing it or not.

The whole world of Half-Life 2 is part of the story; everything from the video screens of Dr. Breen to a simple photograph or book, telling the relationships of a character or group of characters. Therefore, if you don't SEE the photo, you miss part of the story.

Take, for example the tenaments section; you can play it as simply an action game; or, if you take the time to look around, you will find that this whole section was designed to give you the back story of what happened between Black Mesa and the "present" day. I won't post spoilers of where/what these things are but just spend some time in the tenaments and I think you'll be surprised.

I think people still see videogames more a-kin to movies rather than books, and I think that is a false analogy. With movies everything is there in front of you, the only parts that need interpritation are metaphors. Videogames are showing much more potential, and I think this transition of the players has stated with Half-Life 2.

It's more of an interactive novel, which is what you described. People are just playing the game like an old-school shooter.

My theory: People don't like it because it makes you think. :hmph:

 

[Warbie]

It's more of an interactive novel, which is what you described. People are just playing the game like an old-school shooter.

My theory: People don't like it because it makes you think. :hmph:

Not at all.

The opposite infact, what is there to make you think in this game? Really, I want to know.

 

[Gunner]

It's more of an interactive novel, which is what you described. People are just playing the game like an old-school shooter.

My theory: People don't like it because it makes you think. :hmph:

Then you need to rethink your theory.

Try playing the game before commenting.

 

[Spartan]

It's more of an interactive novel, which is what you described. People are just playing the game like an old-school shooter.

My theory: People don't like it because it makes you think. :hmph:

No amount of posting can convince rabid fanboys of anything. No matter how hard anyone tries, they just keep insisting that any supposed problems in HL2 are just a case of user error. If the story doesn't seem all that good, the user just isn't using his brains etc.

If Sokrates came here, played HL2 and complained about the story, a million people would reply: "you just don't like to think, you're just stupid."

Can I take a poll, how many of those who dont like the story have ever read a book?

Oh, the book argument again! What fun! Let's try some variations on that:

"Can I take a poll, how many of those who dont like the physics were abused as a child?"
"Can I take a poll, how many of those who dont like the hoverboat sequence are homosexuals?"

And so on! It all makes sense!

Just from the way he seems to be afraid of gordon, yet has never really seen him himself, i feel its more than just the fact he has killed alot of people. It doesnt seem logical to me. But again, imtrying to work things out for myself, its a theroy.

He has seen Gordon. They both worked at Black Mesa. He identifies Gordon during the teleportation sequence.

Exactly, it was his job, he was a young phd, he was used as the person conducting the experiment in hl1, if he was the most inexperienced phd, he would have been trying to make his way to the top, get in on as many of the experiments as possible. Being the experiment with breen.

You have not given me single shred of evidence to support your claim that Gordon was some kind of experiment by Breen. See, this is why the story sucks - people get no real information so they resort to far-fetched theories that are based on nothing but wishful thinking.

The whole time you are with them you are learning things, but not everything, you are on your way to finding out these things, on your way to finding out, and you still are.

It's too late to find out. HL2 is over.

 

[Raidea]

Personally, I thought it was a great story, the ending was totally unexpected, there is a lot of unanswered questions, but I'm really, really looking forward to HL3 now.

Few of my thoughts (spoilers)

Spoiler

The Gman well, I thought he was head of the combine, but now thinking back I realise he must be somthing different. I think he worked at Black Mesa, because in Kliners office he is standing on the right of a picture of the scientists, but other than that he's a very difficult character. He's like a storyteller

The ten years Gordan might have been inside the citadel, because when the Gman speaks at the start the stasis pod things (ones which they kept Eli in) inside the citadel were in the background...

Breen was working for a higher power, obviously, the face of which we get to see twice, once when Gordan is teleported into his office and once near the end of the game. Other things make me believe Breen isn't human is him saying 'you humans' (or somthing to that effect) once or twice.

Plenty of depth from my point of view, Valve seem to know where they are going with the story, I've never played anything like it before. But I can definatly see why people don't like it.

I was slightly doubtful at the start, but now I've finished it I can say it's the best game I've played since Half Life, I'm not dissapointed.

 

[PlasmaBurnz]

I've just finished the game for the second time. the first time i wasn't expecting the story to be told the way it was so I missed a lot of the details, but after the second time through I believe Valve have done a tremendous job with the story, here it is as I see it:

Spoiler

At the end of half life 1 we walk into the transporter which (to us) instantly transports us to the train. Later in the story the freak accident which causes you and Alyx to teleport a week later is Valve's subtle hint at this. I believe G-Man understands the conditions that cause this type of teleportation and can actively set how far into the future he wants to send Gordon. In essence the teleporter becomes a forward only time machine and the people who are transported cannot return to the past they came from.

We get to Kleiner's lab and we are to go to Eli's lab to help with the further research into local teleportation (lets get you out of that hazard suit Gordon and into your lab coat) to help the resistance against the oppressive Combine (who are from slight tidbits a collection of many different races like Halo'2 covenant).

When you look at the newspaper clipping's in eli's lab, eli DOES explain slighty what happenned along with the clippings.

After Black Mesa, portals started appearing all over earth (the portal storms), the wildlife of zen, headcrabs, antlions (maybe, just guessing with the ant lions) etc causing havok on earth.

The combine from whereever they are from (possibly have connections to zen) took an interest in earth because of the portals (they only have long range portal technology, maybe they could research better technology on our planet, while at the same time integrating us into their combine species.

After the seven hour war we give up and Breen is made our aministrator.

The combine start breeding the headcrabs (hence the capsules) and use them and the other wildlife to keep the people of earth together in the cities where they will be able to handle them easily.

The rest of the game isn't really important as far as overall story goes, it just adds little tidbits to the overall plot. For example:

The coast areas are to show us that the counrtyside is dangerous and the combine use it to keep us together.

Nova Prospekt shows us the combines integration techniques, turning humans into slaves etc.

The final battle and revolution is just a nice thing to finish off the game. So we can feel we actually achieved something throughout the game.

By doing it this way Valve has changed the story from the norm. Instead of the story being centralised on the player, the story is centered on the world and situation the people of the world are placed in. Great job.

 

[Pi Mu Rho]

No amount of posting can convince rabid fanboys of anything. No matter how hard anyone tries, they just keep insisting that any supposed problems in HL2 are just a case of user error.

No amount of posting can convince rabid detractors of anything. No matter how hard anyone tries, they just keep insisting that any supposed problems in HL2 are caused exclusively by Valve.

 

[boomyak]

I think the reason for this perception is that the story of HL2 is told in a unique way. It also has a lot to do with the "quick fix" attitude of modern gamers -- we expect everything to be there for us, and if we don't see it then we miss it.

this trend is not only reflected by modern gamers, but pretty much everyone who was grown up infront of a tv set. these people like their imagination pre-cooked so they can swallow down easily digestable emotional connections without a second thought. that person is bad because he did that thing to that other guy, therefore i'll feel good when he goes to jail. more or less dictating you what to feel instead of letting any user-interpretation come to play.

i cannot understate the value of this new medium starting to fall on the side of creative imagination, much like reading a book.

Radio was the first monumental new media i believe because it reached the broadest audience without requiring literacy. but Radio was quickly developing incredible depths of imagination within it's listeners so TV quickly put out that fire. now only touch, smell, and taste (all relatively irrelevent for communiucating information pertinent to our times) were left with free reign. the MTV generation is a great example, we require constant stimulation (preferably in no more than half second edits) my mother has an interesting perspective on how sesame street actually further developed this trend, never having a segment that would run longer than 2 minutes, we're trained from birth not to pay attention to anything that isn't right in our face, and in no longer than 2 minute segments. we're the ADD generation! and now the internet has put an interesting spin on media because the temptation of total anominity (sp?) is too great for anyone with 2 cents to preach half-truths and outright lies.

and then there lies gaming. while true that the experiance is still "set up" by the developers, the ability for the individual gamer to author his or her own gaming experiance is just the beginning of something great. i can only speculate on where it will go from here, but one thing's for sure, it's a great time to be a gamer.

 

[boomyak]

btw, hey SPARTAN! you've made your point, we get it, seriously, we understand how you feel, honest to goodness, now ****ING DROP IT

 

[mega maniac]

No amount of posting can convince rabid fanboys of anything. No matter how hard anyone tries, they just keep insisting that any supposed problems in HL2 are just a case of user error. If the story doesn't seem all that good, the user just isn't using his brains etc.

Do you suppose that because people like you insist on playing devils advocate and finding problems with a story that is perfectly crafter. Do you suppose those rabid fanboys you are talking about genuinly enjoyed the story and found it interesting and compelling... no then you shoudl go look in a mirror before spouting such crap.

If Sokrates came here, played HL2 and complained about the story, a million people would reply: "you just don't like to think, you're just stupid."

And if he came here and loved the story you would keep saying "you dont now nuttin the story has no depth/meaninc etc etc etc

He has seen Gordon. They both worked at Black Mesa. He identifies Gordon during the teleportation sequence.

I mean since balck mesa, since gordon became the pawn of the g-man.

You have not given me single shred of evidence to support your claim that Gordon was some kind of experiment by Breen. See, this is why the story sucks - people get no real information so they resort to far-fetched theories that are based on nothing but wishful thinking.

After doing the last bit of the game (u was trying to save it) I am once again pondering other theorys, i still beleive that gordon is more than just human. But im thinking now that the 10 year gap is more likely to have been a slow teleport by the g-man, especially since he shows he can contol time to an extent at the end. This would also xplain why you havnt changed since black mesa. But there is more to it i know it.

And this is why the story doesnt suck, people are speculating and thinking about what is happening, trying to guess, well guess what, thats exactly what valve want you to be doing.

It's too late to find out. HL2 is over.

congratulations, thats why there is HL3

 

[COMBO RICO]

*Spoilers*
Personally, I don't see anything wrong with a two part story. Whats with all this trilogy junk, the nature itself is...ehh not satisfying. Intro, progression, ending, usually in this form. I think it can be done successfully making each chapter feel concluded itself but i mean the trilogy is about the whole and the waiting months/years is no fun for anyone. Half life is a story its self with a semi cliff hanger ending but resolved okay. Half life 2 is taking place in a story already introduced (half life) and it really doesn't feel like it's its own story mainly because u dont' get to see the fruits of all your labor (a free city 17 or whatever.) I would have very much liked to have seen a half life complete sequel. Answering the questions from half life, finishing up the story or maybe just gordon's story. Either way we'll see how good this story is with the last of the triliogy coming out 20__(fill in the blank) If its good everything will fall in place, if not then the story is ____(you know what to do) P.S. four letter word fillls in nicely on that last blank.

 

[mega maniac]

Somebody posted about the MGS story and posted how that was great, and i can relate this to what another guy said about how gamers are conditioned to want a sponfed story.

In MGS you simply run and shoot, the story does not evolve during play whatsoever, the entire game is all action. Then you have about 10 hours of cutscenes telling you the story, every last bit of it, like a childs book is given to you. No thinking just playing, they arnt inventive storys, they are no deeper than goosebumps.

 

[ExarKun]

So here's my take. I haven't played HalfLife. I tried playing HL before HL2 came out, but I'm afraid the graphics discouraged me. I mean, if I'd heard rave reviews about just the story in HL, I might have been persuaded, but the way the game is dated now just does not make me want to play it too much. From what I've gathered, HL has a great storyline for a game, but a pretty average one as far as literature/cinema goes, and I don't have the time to spend on it.
Therefore, I don't know much about the HL2 world except for what I've read in the Prima guide and online. It's the duty of the media creator to recap what has happened before a sequal. Valve and the online community has succeeded in this task, letting me know who Gordon Freeman is, what happened at Black Mesa, that there's guy called the G-Man who Gordon works for.
However, I do think the storyline is a tad bit thin. I mean, if I barely know who the G-Man is, I doubt small details would really strike me.
As far as the presentation itself goes, here's my list of games with the best presented Storyline (easy to follow and get involved with) -

1) FarCry (Great story, very engaging, very clearly presented, you're never wondering why you're doing something)
2) Return to Castle Wolfenstein (Great story once again, Nazis make for great bad guys)
3) Halo: CE (Good story, but there are some elements of - Why am I doing this?)
4) HalfLife2 (I get the impression that the underlying story is good, but after the beginning, we don't see it much)
5) Doom3 (No/Little story, once you work past the plot holes, you're never left feeling why you're doing something. Frag heaven)

When I play an FPS, I'm not looking for a literary experience. I'm looking for a decent back-story, a very engaging in-game story, and few plot holes to distract me. Putting in stuff like Entanglment doesn't help much. Entanglement is not a physically viable means of transportation of even information, and the EPR paradox was resolved quite a while ago. Putting stuff like that in lowers my respect for the game because it makes it feel like I'm hearing big words that are supposed to intimidate the uninitiated (how's that for big-words!) Game developers should go the H.G. Wells way and propose some psuedo-science that may or may not be true, but can be believed for the sake of the story, instead of going the Jules Verne way of using known science but misusing it (Verne fired characters to the Moon in a cannon in his book - clearly impossible, while Wells used a fictional anti-gravity material that may or may not exist).

 

[Spartan]

Do you suppose that because people like you insist on playing devils advocate and finding problems with a story that is perfectly crafter. Do you suppose those rabid fanboys you are talking about genuinly enjoyed the story and found it interesting and compelling... no then you shoudl go look in a mirror before spouting such crap.

You missed the point. Fanboys attribute every flaw of the game to user error. If something is wrong, it's your fault - HL2 is the definition of perfection.

And if he came here and loved the story you would keep saying "you dont now nuttin the story has no depth/meaninc etc etc etc

Once again you miss the point. A common fanboy argument is to claim that whoever didn't like the story doesn't read books or think, which obviously makes no sense.

And this is why the story doesnt suck, people are speculating and thinking about what is happening, trying to guess, well guess what, thats exactly what valve want you to be doing.

No. That's precisely why the story sucks. There is nothing but speculation, guesswork and fabrication. The player is left with scraps of vague information, and has to invent the story on his own, which makes no sense.

congratulations, thats why there is HL3

What about it? Is it going to explain the unaswered questions left behind by the first two parts? Will Eli come over to you and say

"Oh, by the way Gordon, I forgot to tell you x years ago that...<Eli lists everything that was never told to Gordon>. So know you know. Ok, back to work. Take this gun and shoot people."

Since HL2 didn't explain anything, there is no reason to believe that HL3 will, either.

Entanglement is not a physically viable means of transportation of even information, and the EPR paradox was resolved quite a while ago. Putting stuff like that in lowers my respect for the game because it makes it feel like I'm hearing big words that are supposed to intimidate the uninitiated (how's that for big-words!)

Maybe a few players will ever know about that. I doubt that many HL players are familiar with theoretical quantum physics. How is Laidlaw even supposed to know about all that? I doubt he actively monitors the advances of quantum science. Half-Life's science is way more believable than anything else I've seen in games or most films and books.

 

[ExarKun]

Quote:
Originally Posted by ExarKun
Entanglement is not a physically viable means of transportation of even information, and the EPR paradox was resolved quite a while ago. Putting stuff like that in lowers my respect for the game because it makes it feel like I'm hearing big words that are supposed to intimidate the uninitiated (how's that for big-words!)



Maybe a few players will ever know about that. I doubt that many HL players are familiar with theoretical quantum physics. How is Laidlaw even supposed to know about all that? I doubt he actively monitors the advances of quantum science. Half-Life's science is way more believable than anything else I've seen in games or most films and books.

-------------------------------------------------------------

What I'm trying to point out is that it's entirely unnecessy to include Physics or Mathematics into the plotline. I dunno what field you work in, but how would you have felt if HL2 had stuff in it from your field thats blatently wrong. The 'Gravity Gun' is done correctly. We're told that it can manipulate objects by altering the graviational field somehow. Thats fine. I can believe that for the sake of the game. But when someone quotes an actual hypothesis/theory incorrectly, you get the feeling that the someone is somewhat of a charlatan.

 

[smsKONG]

For starters-

Spoiler

Eli DID explain about the 7hr war and Breens duplicity with the combine- While he was talking, I was looking round the lab, and when I stopped at different things he would give me a bit of relevant info on it. When I stopped at the board with the cuttings on it he told me all about it

- go back and try it again.

Valve themselves said the game would be like this - you can rush thru and the game wil give you little info, but the more time and interest you take, the more the characters themselves will give you.

Also, about the way you are percieved,

Spoiler

When you appear back in Klieners lab and you are told you've been gone awhile- he tells you then you are being hailed as a hero for the strike done at nova prospekt and the teleportation site- this action is what set off the uprising.

Yes you are left with a lot of questions - but if you take time you will also see a lot of questions are answered or hinted at, of course there are then a new bunch of related questions which arise....




Oh and everyone takes it for granted that Freeman has been in stasis for 10yrs, when in reality he may have been active and on assignment from the G-man in the years between Black Mesa and City17, maybe this is part of Gordons future or maybe he doesn't remember.... or just maybe I'm full of it and he's been in stasis for 10yrs. My point is we don't know- but if we did know this and everything else; there wouldn't be much need for HL3 would there.

 

[mrcool132]

Ok settle everyone, so much bitching

As far as i can see i believe valve have executed the story perfectly and have put the player EXACTLY where they want them (us) to be. We are taking on the role of gordan freeman. The gman has thrown us back into the world to apparently stop the combine (a job one of his clients must want done for unknown reason). As gordon would be thinking, we do. "Why am i here?", "What am i doing this?", "What do i do next?".

We are thinking the exact same things gordon would be in the situation, and yes we do often feel like we dont know why we're doing this, what its all for. This feeling of discomfort is not knowing why we are there or for what reason IS exactly how a real person would feel in the situation, so please stop bitching about it.

So as for the people who have read this entire thread, played the game, and still cannot grip a basic understanding of what has happened since black mesa then im sorry for you, your probably not gonna get it if you havent by now.

For the ones of us who can enjoy this masterfully intriguing and mysterious story we are greatly looking forward to 'some' explanations in the future.

I personally am hoping that valve will release AT LEAST one expansion. Maybe something like "Half-Life 2: Aftermath" or whatever. Where we continue the game as gordan freeman and have to fight off a combine invasion which is targeted at annhilating mankind. (just like breen threatened us. and if gmans client wanted the combine defeated surely he/she/them/it would like gordan to finish the job)

I am also hoping for an opposing forces expansion with sheppard perhaps or playing as alyx or another charachter.

As for the ending which some have thrown many questions at i think everyone is missing the most important question..

Did gordon do the right thing??

Are the combine actually the bad guys?? we're given the impression that theyre up to no good and not very nice but of course we're not given a "THEY'RE BAD" or "THEYRE GOOD" answer.
I think this adds alot to the mystery to the game, it adds a feeling like a good episode of x-files used to. It iss actually what im looking forward to finding out in the future.

Will we ever get to learn about the gman? will gordan ever get to say something? Did gordon freeman just make a hige mistake and doom mankind?? or did he just save mankind? or perhaps he didnt do much at all.


Congratulations Valve. you made a quality game!

 

[VodkA-HLC-]

The funny thing is that all the cry babies that didn't like "the story" will still purchase hl3......

 

[FangsFirst]

This is not a harry potter book, its a novel, and the last pages have yet to be written, so you just have to wait.

Aaaaaaaactually Harry Potter books are fairly mysterious and leave many things unanswered.
Let me add you to the stack of "people who criticize Harry Potter books without reading them"

i'm glad you mentioned that, it's been bugging me for a while now.

The thing about Half-Life 2 is (to me) it doesn't feel anything like Half-Life at all, not one bit. Change a few names and models and it could be any game (albeit a pretty impressive one)

YES.

While I'm one of 3 people on earth who actually didn't really like HL, I went into this hoping for a continuation of it (ok, my relationship with HL is odd..I hate it but want more...yeah anyway) and got nothing that reminded me.
I figured, you know, MAYBE, just MAYBE I'd see a mirror and there'd be Freemman in HEV suit staring back. See, now that'd be nice. I'd be like "YES! I AM Gordon!"
Well, probably not, but it'd be a step.
There are all these vague mentions of Black Mesa, and headcrabs and zombies, but nothing else from Xen, no earth military, a number of weapons didn't return, all these characters appear out of nowhere that I've never seen before yet supposedly had some connection to nonetheless.

I mean, I don't love being spoonfed (my favourite movie is Donnie Darko, I also like Jacob's Ladder, I've written my fair share of obscure stories--though all of these had some vague hint of what they were) but this was ridiculous. Before it was "Get out of Black Mesa, find Lambda complex (also in black mesa), eventually end up at the source of the aliens."

Now it's City->lab->suddenly somewhere on the coast->some horror movie town->city blah blah (those are probably out of order, but you get the idea)
It was like crossing an entire damn country. I never understood what in the **** I was doing out on the coast. I mean, yes, that was the "alternate route" I 'had' to take to get wherever the hell I was going, which they could never decide on. Go to the lab. OK I'm at the lab. OK I'm not at the lab anymore. Nowww I'm driving across an entire country for some reason.

I didn't think once during the course of the entire game that I was Gordon Freeman, which is kind of sad, considering I'm told that I am about 90 times a minute.

As for your friends, they dont know where you have been, they just as likely think you know where you have been for the past few years, and im dont expect them to ask yu where you have been.

Wait, this doesn't make any sense. We aren't saying they should tell us where we've been. You're saying they expect Gordon to know where he's been. Well that's nice. I expect my friends I haven't seen for years to know where they've been, too. I still ASK them because I don't know.

I think if they knew you were arriving, otherwise the guy wouldnt have been in an undercover combine suit, they were most definately expecting you.

Unless he was trying to infiltrate the combine as part of this resistance...

Assuming that Gordon's name was on any entry list. He was covertly inserted into the train.

In fact that one guy says "I didn't see you get on..."
(suggesting the G-Man teleported you on)

Thats fine, he may well have been, but i think that gordon was part of an experiment before half life.

Based on what?

My point is they knew he was coming, however they knew is irrelevant.

Why the hell is that irrelevant? You disappeared for ten years and they suddenly know you're "coming?" That's a bit ****ing weird to me, and not remotely irrelevant.

I expect that breen knows about the g-man

I'll assume you were skimming and misread his question, wherein he asked you WHY you thought this...not to repeat that you think it.

**** me sideways, if I ever get as cynical as some of you I think I'll just go right ahead and hang myself.

If you're having trouble extracting fun and intrigue from Half-Life 2 then perhaps it's just not the game for you. The rest of us don't seem to be struggling.

Why is it that HL fans equate criticism with hatred?
To reuse a previous example, I love Donnie Darko, but I think Drew Barrymore was absolutely shit in it.
You can criticize without hating.
You can enjoy this game while thinking it lacks story.

Can I take a poll, how many of those who dont like the story have ever read a book?

If all your looking for in a story is the purpose for your actions, then you are missing the point. That is NOT what a story is supposed to be, a story is supposed to recount a serries of events and have alusions to other facts about the world in which it occures. To this end, HL2's story is nearly flawless.

Have YOU ever read a book? Ever taken a class on writing?
Character motivation is EXTREMELY IMPORTANT. Most people criticize anything lacking in it. Your pompous final comment is so laughable it's not even...er...funny.
Gordon (or the player, take your pick) has NO MOTIVATION. The player's motivation, as evinced by some here, tends to be "to find more info out" which seems reasonable considering this whole "HL is about being Gordon and being all confused."

OK...so our motivation is to find out more BUT WE DON'T. Sure there are some damn articles about how we got to City 17, etc. but we wanted to find out more about, say, G-Man. Xen. The military's involvement. Blah blah blah. anything from HL. HL is all but completely abandoned. Sure Eli and Barney were supposedly there. Sure Alyx was supposedly there, sure Breen was the administrator. Yeah they reference Xen-based teleportation. So what? The only things I've seen talked about in the context of story and explanation relate to what happens IN HL2--outside of complete speculation. I want story that CONNECTS it to HL. Again, this did not feel at ALL related to HL.

Frodo didn't just wake up one day with the ring around his neck, proclaiming "I should go pitch this thing into a volcano!" I mean, seriously now.

hahaha

"Frodo you must go on a journey"
"Why"?
"Never you mind, now get"!
[...]

HAHAHAHAAHA
oh god stop....

Spoiler

think he worked at Black Mesa, because in Kliners office he is standing on the right of a picture of the scientists, but other than that he's a very difficult character.

No, that's the other white scientist guy from HL. The one who doesn't look like Kleiner or like...uh, a black guy. The other one. Of the three cloned ones all over

We are thinking the exact same things gordon would be in the situation, and yes we do often feel like we dont know why we're doing this, what its all for. This feeling of discomfort is not knowing why we are there or for what reason IS exactly how a real person would feel in the situation, so please stop bitching about it.

Except that doesn't work. this is a GAME to us, period. If we don't see any reason to continue, if we don't know why, we CAN quit. This is not real life and that's the problem with treating it like it is.



Still, my major beef with the entire thing was I didn't feel like I was playing anything related to HL at all, whatsoever, I didn't feel like I was Gordon, no matter how many times I was told that I was, and I didn't see any point to doing 90% of the things I did. It was like long sequences (THE BUGGY!) were inserted to pad it out without doing much. I haven't seen anyone saying the buggy sequence did anything to add to the story. Or the airboat bit. Those two felt like the longest parts by far, AND the most useless. Ravenholme also seemed pretty pointless. I mean, it seemed like this sudden huge switch from action-military-combat to "RAR!!! HORROR GAME!!" and then back again. Nothing was learned there, except that there's a slightly insane possible preacher who builds traps to kill zombies and that there are a lot of them there. We could have been told that...

And of course, the fact that characters now talk endlessly (they may as well be cutscenes, I tended to spend them listening but throwing cans at everyone or whatever the hell else I felt like doing, because clearly Gordon was 100% unimportant to that bit since he has apparently taken some vow of silence (which, in this more populated and talkative environment is now incredibly unrealistic..even if he were mute, he'd use sign language)

I don't know why I was trying to stop the combine or any of that shit. I didn't resolve anything either to my knowledge.
A better ending would have had a resolution that then promotes a NEW continuation (see: original HL. You are finished with Black Mesa, but clearly a new future awaits you. But, again, you have resolved the issue present in the game).

EG, you do what you do in the end and ta da! the end of the combine! but oh noes teh G-Man is still weird and mysterious and transports you away! Or it turns out the combine was only a small part of an invading force! or hell, SOMETHING that resolved this thing.

It just felt like it shouldn't have been labelled "Half Life" at all...

oh and sorry this is so long.
plus, stop resorting to name calling, you ****heads.
(if I've learned anything frequenting HL boards over the past few days, it's that people who like these games are total elitist assholes)

 

[brink's]

LOL that was hilarious.

 

[mega maniac]

Aaaaaaaactually Harry Potter books are fairly mysterious and leave many things unanswered.
Let me add you to the stack of "people who criticize Harry Potter books without reading them"

You got me, i never actually read the harry potter books after gettig bored with the first. But i have watched the movies, and i know its was ignorant to base the books off that, so change book to movie and you got yourself a sentence.

While I'm one of 3 people on earth who actually didn't really like HL, I went into this hoping for a continuation of it (ok, my relationship with HL is odd..I hate it but want more...yeah anyway) and got nothing that reminded me.
I figured, you know, MAYBE, just MAYBE I'd see a mirror and there'd be Freemman in HEV suit staring back. See, now that'd be nice. I'd be like "YES! I AM Gordon!"
Well, probably not, but it'd be a step.
There are all these vague mentions of Black Mesa, and headcrabs and zombies, but nothing else from Xen, no earth military, a number of weapons didn't return, all these characters appear out of nowhere that I've never seen before yet supposedly had some connection to nonetheless.

I felt the exact opposite, after black mesa i expected to be recognised, and i was. Going back and meeting the scientist and fighting alongside barney made me feel like i was in the same story, and i loved it.

Now it's City->lab->suddenly somewhere on the coast->some horror movie town->city blah blah (those are probably out of order, but you get the idea)
It was like crossing an entire damn country. I never understood what in the **** I was doing out on the coast....

You were avoiding the combine, the combine vnture to the coast as little as the civilians, and you were being followed, atleast that seems pretty obvious to me, so you didnt get the chance to carry out your tasks at elis before he was kidnapped, you needed to be there as an extra brain, but he got kidnapped, so you have to rescue him. But i can understand how you would prefer to go off and do something totaly irrelavant.

Wait, this doesn't make any sense. We aren't saying they should tell us where we've been. You're saying they expect Gordon to know where he's been. Well that's nice. I expect my friends I haven't seen for years to know where they've been, too. I still ASK them because I don't know.

they dont exactly know you like best of friends, they have no right or need to ask you where you have been.

Unless he was trying to infiltrate the combine as part of this resistance...

and just happened upon you, sure

In fact that one guy says "I didn't see you get on..."
(suggesting the G-Man teleported you on)

Yes true, and im still pondering why they know your coming, i have this inkling the g-man informs them one way or another, and before you ask me why, its because they knew you were coming and you were teleported on, the events seem linked.

Based on what?

The fact that he is such a good fighter, he seems more than just human and i think there may be a reason.

Why the hell is that irrelevant? You disappeared for ten years and they suddenly know you're "coming?" That's a bit ****ing weird to me, and not remotely irrelevant.

Read the rest of the topic i already replied to that exact argument.

I'll assume you were skimming and misread his question, wherein he asked you WHY you thought this...not to repeat that you think it.

Its an idea i have based on my progression through the game, and again i have answered this before. They are the two most powerful pwople int he game, who is breen talking to on his pc screen when you are teleported into his office. Its a idea i have, a thought, not a definate conclusion.

Why is it that HL fans equate criticism with hatred?

Its not, but this is the best game i have played since half life, and i disagree with your argument for the story. I think the team AI is frankly a bit crap, and we saw much better in the e3 videos last year with them covering each other and you, while they advance. But i disagree with what you are saying,which is why i am presenting my point of view.

To reuse a previous example, I love Donnie Darko, but I think Drew Barrymore was absolutely shit in it.
You can criticize without hating.
You can enjoy this game while thinking it lacks story.

Thats the thing, i LOVE the story

Gordon (or the player, take your pick) has NO MOTIVATION. The player's motivation, as evinced by some here, tends to be "to find more info out" which seems reasonable considering this whole "HL is about being Gordon and being all confused."

Firstly he goes to elis lab, this is jus because eli needs you there as a second brain, you are a scientist.
You then have to rescue eli from the combine, why is that so un-goal-fulfilling.

OK...so our motivation is to find out more BUT WE DON'T. Sure there are some damn articles about how we got to City 17, etc. but we wanted to find out more about, say, G-Man. Xen. The military's involvement. Blah blah blah. anything from HL. HL is all but completely abandoned. Sure Eli and Barney were supposedly there. Sure Alyx was supposedly there, sure Breen was the administrator. Yeah they reference Xen-based teleportation. So what? The only things I've seen talked about in the context of story and explanation relate to what happens IN HL2--outside of complete speculation. I want story that CONNECTS it to HL. Again, this did not feel at ALL related to HL.

The very fact that you are introduced to the game by the people you left in the first one immidiately ties it in. Alyx was eli's daughter, you didnt see her, your just finding faults that dont exist.

no, that's the other white scientist guy from HL. The one who doesn't look like Kleiner or like...uh, a black guy. The other one. Of the three cloned ones all over

That because in the days of half life facial expressions and the ability to make them look different from each other was impossible with the power of the machines.

I haven't seen anyone saying the buggy sequence did anything to add to the story. Or the airboat bit. Those two felt like the longest parts by far, AND the most useless.

You had to take in city 17, feel the endless power of the combine, the relentless attacking, meanwhile you had to get to places, you have to do that in every game, get to plces, and those were your transportation. I dont see why they were such bad parts of thegame, i didnt see them as tedious i found them incredibly enjoyable, and i even liked the way they drove.

Ravenholme also seemed pretty pointless. I mean, it seemed like this sudden huge switch from action-military-combat to "RAR!!! HORROR GAME!!" and then back again. Nothing was learned there, except that there's a slightly insane possible preacher who builds traps to kill zombies and that there are a lot of them there. We could have been told that...

Again part of the plot, without these parts the game would be totally uninvolving, these are the slums of city 17, the places where even the combine neglet to have control. Its part of the experience.

And of course, the fact that characters now talk endlessly (they may as well be cutscenes, I tended to spend them listening but throwing cans at everyone or whatever the hell else I felt like doing, because clearly Gordon was 100% unimportant to that bit since he has apparently taken some vow of silence (which, in this more populated and talkative environment is now incredibly unrealistic..even if he were mute, he'd use sign language)

The silence adds alot of mystery to the game, he didnt speak in the first he doesnt in this one, its one of those moments in a game that is well preserved. Like the face of master chief you dont see it, but you know he can take off his helmet.
And you seem to be going back and forth, firstly you dont hear enough about the story, then the characters speak too much. Its not like you sat in a half hour cutscene ala MGS, desperately wanting more acton because the last half hour cutscene was only 5 mins of gameplay ago.

I don't know why I was trying to stop the combine or any of that shit. I didn't resolve anything either to my knowledge.

The combine are repressing the human race, did you see the wall chart with an ape, a human and a combine soldier? Breen is trying to turn humans into half dead machines.

A better ending would have had a resolution that then promotes a NEW continuation (see: original HL. You are finished with Black Mesa, but clearly a new future awaits you. But, again, you have resolved the issue present in the game).

And bringing city 17 down is what, just a little niggling thing that has no story or impact. Did you listen to breen ATALL "You dont know what your doing gordon, this could bring the whole city down, you dont want that do you, think of the people" You just blew up city 17 or atleast the combine control on city 17.

EG, you do what you do in the end and ta da! the end of the combine! but oh noes teh G-Man is still weird and mysterious and transports you away! Or it turns out the combine was only a small part of an invading force! or hell, SOMETHING that resolved this thing.

Because the story would be so much more fun is the g-man just said here, this is my lifes story, read away, oh and while im at it, this is the reason why breen does what he does and ill explain the rest of the plot for you too, and half life 3 will just be shooting chickens.

oh and sorry this is so long.
plus, stop resorting to name calling, you ****heads.
(if I've learned anything frequenting HL boards over the past few days, it's that people who like these games are total elitist assholes)

Ok either that was deliberate or totally idiotic.

"Stop name calling"
"you are all elitist assholes"

Uh huh, congratulations.

 

[mega maniac]

You missed the point. Fanboys attribute every flaw of the game to user error. If something is wrong, it's your fault - HL2 is the definition of perfection.

I do beleive half life 2 is the best game since half life, if not better. But as i said in the abouve post, its not perfect, but i do disagree with you.

Once again you miss the point. A common fanboy argument is to claim that whoever didn't like the story doesn't read books or think, which obviously makes no sense.

But the reason for this is that other people are understanding the story perfectly, and dont mind that it isnt all resolved and perfect. So they are trying to come to a reason why you cannot see this.

No. That's precisely why the story sucks. There is nothing but speculation, guesswork and fabrication. The player is left with scraps of vague information, and has to invent the story on his own, which makes no sense.

When you have clues you try to come to a conclusion, which is why people are coming up with theroys of what is what. But for the uptinth time this story is not finished, and the clues in half life are what make it great, wel atleast IMHO they are.

What about it? Is it going to explain the unaswered questions left behind by the first two parts? Will Eli come over to you and say

"Oh, by the way Gordon, I forgot to tell you x years ago that...<Eli lists everything that was never told to Gordon>. So know you know. Ok, back to work. Take this gun and shoot people."

Like what, anything that actually needs to be unraveled can be and will be in the third, there is nothing that doesnt relate directly to the story... so unveiling in hl3 is a perfectly reasonable expectation.

Since HL2 didn't explain anything, there is no reason to believe that HL3 will, either.

Sorry to have to use this example again, but when a book doesnt explain something in the middle do you shut it and stop reading because obviously the ending wont either, i mean obviously thats just basic logic.

Maybe a few players will ever know about that. I doubt that many HL players are familiar with theoretical quantum physics. How is Laidlaw even supposed to know about all that? I doubt he actively monitors the advances of quantum science. Half-Life's science is way more believable than anything else I've seen in games or most films and books.

...

 

[FangsFirst]

You got me, i never actually read the harry potter books after gettig bored with the first. But i have watched the movies, and i know its was ignorant to base the books off that, so change book to movie and you got yourself a sentence.

Fair enough. Though the other movies bring up similar mysteries, actually...

I felt the exact opposite, after black mesa i expected to be recognised, and i was. Going back and meeting the scientist and fighting alongside barney made me feel like i was in the same story, and i loved it.

Recognized by people you never even saw before though!

You were avoiding the combine, the combine vnture to the coast as little as the civilians, and you were being followed, atleast that seems pretty obvious to me, so you didnt get the chance to carry out your tasks at elis before he was kidnapped, you needed to be there as an extra brain, but he got kidnapped, so you have to rescue him. But i can understand how you would prefer to go off and do something totaly irrelavant.

But what was my task at Elis? They successfully teleported Alyx, so clearly the teleporting was working--and otherwise what would I need to help with?

they dont exactly know you like best of friends, they have no right or need to ask you where you have been.

I've asked where people have been and what they were up to even though they weren't the best of my friends...I've seen other people do it too. I don't see the problem here at all. If I were praising this guy and acting like he was my saviour and whatnot, I'd be interested enough.

and just happened upon you, sure

OK so they were surprised to see me and didn't know I was coming, and yet were prepared for me coming right then and there? I was--as you agreed--probably transported onto that train at the beginning, which no one could know about. They said they knew I was coming--but never about when (as I understood, they had no idea, based on their surprise) and Barney sure as hell acted like he was just their to infiltrate to me.

Its an idea i have based on my progression through the game, and again i have answered this before. They are the two most powerful pwople int he game, who is breen talking to on his pc screen when you are teleported into his office. Its a idea i have, a thought, not a definate conclusion.

And because it is speculation you cannot argue it as canon, or any sort of fact with relation to the story. Your extrapolations cannot be used as an argument suggesting the existence of a story IN the game, anymore than the extrapolations I made could be.

Thats the thing, i LOVE the story

Well, good. Don't condescend to people who disagree is all I'm saying.

Firstly he goes to elis lab, this is jus because eli needs you there as a second brain, you are a scientist.

But WHY? Again, the teleportation clearly works already.

You then have to rescue eli from the combine, why is that so un-goal-fulfilling.

I understood things (fairly) well from that point, but it seemed like much of the travel between said events was pointless padding. I did not feel at all as if I were in the same environment I had been in (like the different areas of HL were ALL Black Mesa, despite variations in the geography, they meshed together). I have trouble mentally connecting City 17, the Coast, Ravenholme, and the Canals, they just do not feel in any way related to each other--most likely due to diversity in the "cabals" working on each set of levels.

The very fact that you are introduced to the game by the people you left in the first one immidiately ties it in. Alyx was eli's daughter, you didnt see her, your just finding faults that dont exist.

No I'm not! This is practically deus ex machina! Barney is the ONLY one I remembered. Eli wasn't really named particularly memorably. They added characters then said "They were there, trust us," which is all well and good and they can do, but the connection is tenuous at best.

That because in the days of half life facial expressions and the ability to make them look different from each other was impossible with the power of the machines.

Uh, that was a joke...I knew all that.

You had to take in city 17, feel the endless power of the combine, the relentless attacking, meanwhile you had to get to places, you have to do that in every game, get to plces, and those were your transportation. I dont see why they were such bad parts of thegame, i didnt see them as tedious i found them incredibly enjoyable, and i even liked the way they drove.

I didn't see them as bad and enjoyed driving both to some degree (though I prefer third person vehicle driving, which bothered me slightly)
I just thought they didn't fit with the rest of the game, like the environments they're in were simply added as locations to use the vehicles, which were added because, well, vehicles are cool. I took in City 17 though, and suddenly I was in this wholly other place, then some place completely different from that, repeat, repeat, etc, then I'm back in C17. OK...but what the hell was all that inbetween? This is what I mean--COHESION! It just doesn't seem to fit well together. The "seamless" level loading was often incredibly blatant (like the tunnels between buggy areas) and ruined the effect of being "seamless" because the levels really WERE clearly separated. And, while I'm thankful for it considering the load times, there was no back and forth between zones/areas/levels like the original, which held together the feeling that they were part of the same facility.

Again part of the plot, without these parts the game would be totally uninvolving, these are the slums of city 17, the places where even the combine neglet to have control. Its part of the experience.

You're missing my point. Yes it's an experience, but it feels like a totally different experience from the rest and ruins the illusion of being in world X by feeling like suddenly you're in world Y instead, where there's a bunch of zombies instead of combine soldiers. That's kind of cool and all, but it didn't fit with the rest.

The silence adds alot of mystery to the game, he didnt speak in the first he doesnt in this one, its one of those moments in a game that is well preserved. Like the face of master chief you dont see it, but you know he can take off his helmet.

For the record, I also hated Halo and thought it had the most boring singleplayer I'd ever seen, so referencing it isn't going to do much to me

And you seem to be going back and forth, firstly you dont hear enough about the story, then the characters speak too much. Its not like you sat in a half hour cutscene ala MGS, desperately wanting more acton because the last half hour cutscene was only 5 mins of gameplay ago.

You're not understanding me again. I said there's no story, and they talk too much. These are not (necessarily) overlapping concepts. I DID get that "shut the **** up let's get back to the game" feeling a lot. I don't find the "ingame" much more interesting, except I can throw books at Kleiner. In any case, I never said I thought all their talking related in any way to the story. In fact I noticed it rarely did. I found the cat funny and all, but that's not part of the story, for instance. Or when Alyx felt some bizarre need to confide in me about Mossman's secret hatred of me. I just wanted her to shut up...especially because her "crush" just felt so incredibly forced and completely unexplained. There was no development of that interest at all, it was immediate from her first appearance, which just felt silly, so I never had much interest in her spewing her silly flirting at me as I didn't see it advancing the story much. (you can disagree and that's fine, that's how I experienced it)

The combine are repressing the human race, did you see the wall chart with an ape, a human and a combine soldier? Breen is trying to turn humans into half dead machines.

WOAH. Back up.
A) the combine are jerks, I know that much from the intro, yes. But I know nothing else about them, really. A bit about them taking over, I guess, but not much else.
B) That "chart" struck me more as "Monkey->Man->Combine"--ie, evolution, they're the next step (which is in line with Breen's comments). Nothing about it suggested "half-dead machines"--that's pure speculation on your part (if you look again, all three appear to be composed of musculature and not machines, except the combine is wearing a gas mask, but that's probably just to identify what it is...as if it didn't have that, you'd never know what/who it was)

And bringing city 17 down is what, just a little niggling thing that has no story or impact. Did you listen to breen ATALL "You dont know what your doing gordon, this could bring the whole city down, you dont want that do you, think of the people" You just blew up city 17 or atleast the combine control on city 17.

Actually, based on all my previous experiences with comments like his, he was making shit up to try and scare me into not blowing him to hell. It just sounded like bullshit excuses to save himself.

[quote\Because the story would be so much more fun is the g-man just said here, this is my lifes story, read away, oh and while im at it, this is the reason why breen does what he does and ill explain the rest of the plot for you too, and half life 3 will just be shooting chickens.[/quote]
What the hell?
I said it'd be fine if he was still mysterious. Yeah I phrased it in "stupid talk" but that's just something I do (sorry, that wouldn't be clear since you don't know me, that IS my fault).
I was saying G-Man remains mysterious but we solve a lot of what was brought up here, ala HL1--we solved Black Mesa basically, but then "WTF?! GMAN!?!?!" ends the game. It had a feeling of resolution yet created a cliffhanger at the same time.

Ok either that was deliberate or totally idiotic.

Deliberate. ****heads was, anyway.

"Stop name calling"
"you are all elitist assholes"

I didn't say everyone was, just the people who were saying things like "the story's obvious, if you disagree, you're dumb" or "stfu nub, hl2 rocks, you obviously suck for thinking otherwise!!111111" etc.

 

[Gunner]

Ok I've been playing through HL² again to see what I've missed, and I just got to Black Mesa East a few minutes ago: apparently I missed a lot hehe. My apologies to anyone I've argued pointlessly with, I just realized I did rush through the game like a mindless drone with an aimbot. I actually stopped and listened to Breen's different speeches this time, and having the dialogue captions on helps. Although I didn't find any clues in the Tenements section like the initial poster said, I did find the clue in Eli's Lab like SmsKong said (thanks Kong!). And you know what? I actually never saw the Gman once the first time I played! I was speeding through Water Hazard like Schumacher on crack. On this turn I've seen him quite a few times: here, here, and here .

Share the clues you found during the game, that helped me convince me I was wrong, it would probably help the others see the light.

 

[Captain M4d]

I think a lot of people are forgetting the main phrase on the box of Half-Life, and it greatly aplies to Half-Life 2: Run, shoot, think, live.

 

[ViolenceJack]

I didnt notice this confusing point that they knew you were coming. The first point they notice you is right off the train whent your scanned by the scanner and it clearly took abit of time for the to be processed. You didnt get checked in after all and barney tells you to keep away from check points. If they did check you an notice you werent registered then you would be dead for sure.

The airboat and buggy were just traveling. Without them it would be like having frodo as soon as he steps out his door apears at the volcano. Although that story is based all about moving and stuff. Although a better example would be having it where he steps out his door and then just suddenly apears at that pub as that was his first target.

After the combines went mad and attacked with headcrabs and everything ravenholm was clearly a dangerous place which is why Eli said dont go that way during the emergency but head for the coast. Shit happens and you gotta go through ravenholm.

I really dont understand the point where you say it doesnt fit where your moving to different areas. You dont leave one town to another and expect it too be exactly the same.

One thing i want to know about is the other cities. One person in the train stations mentions that he thought he saw the last of breen in City 14. But thats about all you get.

 

[BerserkForces]

FPS, mother****er, Do you know it?.
I couldnt more agree with Captain M4d

 

[FangsFirst]

The airboat and buggy were just traveling. Without them it would be like having frodo as soon as he steps out his door apears at the volcano. Although that story is based all about moving and stuff. Although a better example would be having it where he steps out his door and then just suddenly apears at that pub as that was his first target.

My complaint is not about the travelling...see below

After the combines went mad and attacked with headcrabs and everything ravenholm was clearly a dangerous place which is why Eli said dont go that way during the emergency but head for the coast. Shit happens and you gotta go through ravenholm.

I really dont understand the point where you say it doesnt fit where your moving to different areas. You dont leave one town to another and expect it too be exactly the same.

Pgph 1: I understand all of that, why I went there in the sequence of the game and all that but the point is--as is more relevant to pgph 2--
No I don't expect them to be "exactly the same" but they don't feel like they're on the same planet!
I mean, the palette and visual style changes completely between each area, without being at all gradual, it's just like, go into a tunnel which happens to be a loading area and woah, everything is COMPLETELY different and bears no resemblance (other than how it is rendered by the engine) to the rest. Well, the canals sort of achieved it, gradually moving in...but then they got a bit funky too. The coast and bridge were the parts that really just visually threw me for a loop. They bore no resemblance at all to the City, and I don't just mean that the buildings are less common and different. It did not feel like the same world.

 

[FangsFirst]

Argh! what is with all of this "YOU AREN'T THINKING!!!" nonsense!?
I've thought plenty about it, but I still feel like barely anything happened! some people I'd never seen before appeared and then apparently became completely obsolete within the story (as it seems we are "done" with this place)
I've "thought" plenty about what all of this means, and the only conclusion I come to is that it just doesn't add up to a whole hell of a lot besides whatever random connections I can speculate at. Plenty of bits and pieces surrounding a past I have nothing to do with (because I have a memory lapse, or was in "stasis" or was slow teleported...whatever) but nothing much happens throughout the course. nothing is really revealed except one character twist, if you catch my drift, but that was all within this story and bore no relation to HL at all. Other than that it was mostly a long string of running and shooting.
Meh, whatever, I'll play it again with god mode and thus be able to go slowly and pull out whatever I can from wherever.

 

[Spartan]

Still, my major beef with the entire thing was I didn't feel like I was playing anything related to HL at all, whatsoever, I didn't feel like I was Gordon, no matter how many times I was told that I was, and I didn't see any point to doing 90% of the things I did. It was like long sequences (THE BUGGY!) were inserted to pad it out without doing much. I haven't seen anyone saying the buggy sequence did anything to add to the story. Or the airboat bit. Those two felt like the longest parts by far, AND the most useless.

They way I understood it: you go to Eli's place to help out with research. Then, shit hits the fan and the Combine find you. You are quickly told to get out of the city for whatever reason, even though you could easily help everyone out by taking out the Combine forces attacking the lab. To get out of the city, you are directed to Ravenholm, which takes you BACK to the city! Somehow, you end up at another resistance stronghold, where you learn that Eli has been taken captive (too bad they didn't let you stay to prevent that from happening). So then you spend the entire day driving a buggy to Nova Prospekt. After leaving Nova Prospekt, you are once again in the city, even though you were told to get out of the city.

It really doesn't make much sense.

Ravenholme also seemed pretty pointless. I mean, it seemed like this sudden huge switch from action-military-combat to "RAR!!! HORROR GAME!!" and then back again. Nothing was learned there, except that there's a slightly insane possible preacher who builds traps to kill zombies and that there are a lot of them there. We could have been told that...

I liked Ranvenholm in the sense that it gave the game variety. You've got vehicle rides, urban combat, survival horror, infiltration and so on. On the other hand, it may be that adding too many different elements just makes the game seem aimless and unfocused.

Sorry to have to use this example again, but when a book doesnt explain something in the middle do you shut it and stop reading because obviously the ending wont either, i mean obviously thats just basic logic.

Half-Life isn't a book. When the first part was finished, Valve had any idea how it would continue. They probably have no idea what will happen next, either.

 

[mega maniac]

Recognized by people you never even saw before though!

You are an infamous legend, the people who have other cares dont say hey gordon, they get on with caring for their partner. Barney leads the resistance, and i expect he would be met with the same responce. We will have to wait till Blue shit 2 eh.

But what was my task at Elis? They successfully teleported Alyx, so clearly the teleporting was working--and otherwise what would I need to help with?

Im not sure, obviously they hadnt anywhere near perfected the technology. I mean fist off the plug falls out, then your teleport goes haywire. Also i think alot of the teleporting could be controlled by the g-man, perhaps he wanted you to go to the places you did during the first teleport. I cant base that on fact atall, just an afterthought.

I've asked where people have been and what they were up to even though they weren't the best of my friends...I've seen other people do it too. I don't see the problem here at all. If I were praising this guy and acting like he was my saviour and whatnot, I'd be interested enough.

All the time you are with alyx and eli you are doing something. As its been said if you were sitting down having a pint you may well discuss such things. But 10 years is a long time and alot to talk about, so the objective of helipng the resistance is the more improtant one that "hey buddy whats up, say give me a run down of the past 10 years. Which essentially the g-man tells you you were in a coma for.

OK so they were surprised to see me and didn't know I was coming, and yet were prepared for me coming right then and there? I was--as you agreed--probably transported onto that train at the beginning, which no one could know about. They said they knew I was coming--but never about when (as I understood, they had no idea, based on their surprise) and Barney sure as hell acted like he was just their to infiltrate to me.

i had forgotten until somone posted that you are scanned and this takes a little while. Perhaps they know you are there then, i mean if they are searching for unidentified civilians. Surprise comes when you meet somone with no previous knowledge they will be there, even 30 seconds, because as soon as someone says hey godons back, you will be surprised then. not later.

And because it is speculation you cannot argue it as canon, or any sort of fact with relation to the story. Your extrapolations cannot be used as an argument suggesting the existence of a story IN the game, anymore than the extrapolations I made could be.

I argueing that that speculation is exactly what we are meant to do, because the story is unfinished. When i read a book i speculae right till the last couple of chapters when things are unravled and i am usually pleasently suprised.

Well, good. Don't condescend to people who disagree is all I'm saying.

i just argue my beleifof the game, as you will

But WHY? Again, the teleportation clearly works already.

As i already said, not perfectly, and they dont fully understand it, this is clear from they way they speak about it during the process.

I understood things (fairly) well from that point, but it seemed like much of the travel between said events was pointless padding. I did not feel at all as if I were in the same environment I had been in (like the different areas of HL were ALL Black Mesa, despite variations in the geography, they meshed together). I have trouble mentally connecting City 17, the Coast, Ravenholme, and the Canals, they just do not feel in any way related to each other--most likely due to diversity in the "cabals" working on each set of levels.

Certain parts of the city are controlled by the combine those that arnt turn into hunting ground for zombies, the transition to ravenholm i felt worked well, you are told not to go through ravenholm as its a bad place, as luck would have it, you have to so before you even go you know there is a route. The preacher shows you this route and you go through the mins onto the beach. I loved the dismal feel of ravenholm and it really said shithole to me, with all the deserted houses. When on the beach you can see the cityscape you are on the outskirts of the city, but in the wrong place, it would be no good swimming. So you get up onto highway 17, all of these areas just feel like highway outposts and i cant see how they are not seamless, after slaying the sandmonster you are taken into a cliffed area, where you are shown how to use pheremone. As you move along the beach it gets more concrete like a fort or a place to hold a high security prison. from there on you are back in city 17. I dontget what didnt feel seemless to you.

No I'm not! This is practically deus ex machina! Barney is the ONLY one I remembered. Eli wasn't really named particularly memorably. They added characters then said "They were there, trust us," which is all well and good and they can do, but the connection is tenuous at best.

Kleiner and eli are both there, i remembered them as soon as i heard there names, hang on.
From gamespot
"Some former Black Mesa scientists are back, the scientist featured in the gameplay video (and pictured to the left) is referred to as 'Dr. Kleiner,' and he could very well be Dr. Alex Kleiner, who was Gordon's former professor at MIT and the guy who got Gordon his job in Black Mesa in the first place (this is all referred to in the employment letter at the beginning of the original Half-Life manual). "

thats kleiner i cant find anything on eli, but im semi sure he was there, but he may have just been another excapee.

I didn't see them as bad and enjoyed driving both to some degree (though I prefer third person vehicle driving, which bothered me slightly)
I just thought they didn't fit with the rest of the game, like the environments they're in were simply added as locations to use the vehicles, which were added because, well, vehicles are cool.

you got the damn veichals because the terrain was like that, you didnt get the terrain because of the veichals. One of them says something like "Your gona need this, its a long way and the water is hazerdous at points" or along those lines.

I took in City 17 though, and suddenly I was in this wholly other place, then some place completely different from that, repeat, repeat, etc, then I'm back in C17. OK...but what the hell was all that inbetween? This is what I mean--COHESION! It just doesn't seem to fit well together. The "seamless" level loading was often incredibly blatant (like the tunnels between buggy areas) and ruined the effect of being "seamless" because the levels really WERE clearly separated. And, while I'm thankful for it considering the load times, there was no back and forth between zones/areas/levels like the original, which held together the feeling that they were part of the same facility.

The original was 99% in one building, if this had all been in one building and it had been escape the prison, it would have been an almost direct copy. Having such a big world means you dont need to go back to the same areas, and i know you said you hated halo2, but that got majorly ritisized to epeating areas.

You're missing my point. Yes it's an experience, but it feels like a totally different experience from the rest and ruins the illusion of being in world X by feeling like suddenly you're in world Y instead, where there's a bunch of zombies instead of combine soldiers. That's kind of cool and all, but it didn't fit with the rest.

I cant disagree more.

For the record, I also hated Halo and thought it had the most boring singleplayer I'd ever seen, so referencing it isn't going to do much to me

You dont need to like it to take the point, its the same in uhh, scream, you dont see the killer, well kinda the same. What i mean is itsa story telling technique and would be ruined by just having him talk.

You're not understanding me again. I said there's no story, and they talk too much. These are not (necessarily) overlapping concepts. I DID get that "shut the **** up let's get back to the game" feeling a lot. I don't find the "ingame" much more interesting, except I can throw books at Kleiner. In any case, I never said I thought all their talking related in any way to the story. In fact I noticed it rarely did. I found the cat funny and all, but that's not part of the story, for instance. Or when Alyx felt some bizarre need to confide in me about Mossman's secret hatred of me. I just wanted her to shut up...especially because her "crush" just felt so incredibly forced and completely unexplained. There was no development of that interest at all, it was immediate from her first appearance, which just felt silly, so I never had much interest in her spewing her silly flirting at me as I didn't see it advancing the story much. (you can disagree and that's fine, that's how I experienced it)

When she said that mossman hates you really i felt like she wasnt being serious atall, like really she hates mossman and wants gordan to hateher so makes up a petty lie.

I was taken aback in the game by how alyx wasnt flirting so much. I expected that she was going to be instantly all over me because of my boyinh good looks and my bright orange hazard suit. But she seemed to me far more interested in dog. It wasnt till the final scenes that she seemd to show any feeling to me (gordon)

Every bit of dialogue that i listened to gave me clues about the story, i cant think of one that wasnt. Alyx's rant about mossman was a character building one. The dialogue was always character building or story building.

B) That "chart" struck me more as "Monkey->Man->Combine"--ie, evolution, they're the next step (which is in line with Breen's comments). Nothing about it suggested "half-dead machines"--that's pure speculation on your part (if you look again, all three appear to be composed of musculature and not machines, except the combine is wearing a gas mask, but that's probably just to identify what it is...as if it didn't have that, you'd never know what/who it was)

The chart looked to me like like one of the zombies you see at the end with a combine gas mask on. It struck me as, hey thats what im fighting, these soldiers arnt willing, they are forced into attacking me. I think that was what was already happening not what could.

Actually, based on all my previous experiences with comments like his, he was making shit up to try and scare me into not blowing him to hell. It just sounded like bullshit excuses to save himself.

Yes he is, obviously trying to save his skin, but he was also telling the truth about the exploson it could cause. And it did.

What the hell?
I said it'd be fine if he was still mysterious. Yeah I phrased it in "stupid talk" but that's just something I do (sorry, that wouldn't be clear since you don't know me, that IS my fault).
I was saying G-Man remains mysterious but we solve a lot of what was brought up here, ala HL1--we solved Black Mesa basically, but then "WTF?! GMAN!?!?!" ends the game. It had a feeling of resolution yet created a cliffhanger at the same time.

In 1 you escaped black mesa, and the gman contols the ending, in 2 you have just leveled the citadel, and the gman controls the ending. Its a very simmilar ending in many reguards. Your gona get an explanation, you just have to wait. Drnk guinnis.

[qote]
I didn't say everyone was, just the people who were saying things like "the story's obvious, if you disagree, you're dumb" or "stfu nub, hl2 rocks, you obviously suck for thinking otherwise!!111111" etc.[/QUOTE]
do you include me in that?

 

[Pi Mu Rho]

Possible reason why the resistance all think that Gordon is the saviour:

Throughout the game, G-man makes numerous appearances - he's on the TV in the metal container with the Vortigaunt and the Resistance guy, he's seen talking to some resistance members in the coastline village etc

It's fairly safe to assume that he's bigging Gordon up to the oppressed masses - that's why they see him as a Messianic figure.

 

[burner69]

A lot of people seem to be complaining about Half-Life 2's story; that the storyline is weak or that not many questions are answered.

I think the reason for this perception is that the story of HL2 is told in a unique way. It also has a lot to do with the "quick fix" attitude of modern gamers -- we expect everything to be there for us, and if we don't see it then we miss it.

Half-Life 2's story is not told in the way most games tell their story; it doesn't use cut scenes to drip feed information to the player, and a lot of the story is told irrelevent of whether the player is viewing it or not.

The whole world of Half-Life 2 is part of the story; everything from the video screens of Dr. Breen to a simple photograph or book, telling the relationships of a character or group of characters. Therefore, if you don't SEE the photo, you miss part of the story.

Take, for example the tenaments section; you can play it as simply an action game; or, if you take the time to look around, you will find that this whole section was designed to give you the back story of what happened between Black Mesa and the "present" day. I won't post spoilers of where/what these things are but just spend some time in the tenaments and I think you'll be surprised.

I think people still see videogames more a-kin to movies rather than books, and I think that is a false analogy. With movies everything is there in front of you, the only parts that need interpritation are metaphors. Videogames are showing much more potential, and I think this transition of the players has stated with Half-Life 2.

That's not why I think the storyline was... erm... not great. It was because it was a simple, linear story. Few twists, and those that were there were obvious and cliched. Poorly linked story; "ahh get to x" *fights monsters* *reaches x* "hello. oh no, b has been kidnapped, go to y" *fights soldiers* etc etc.

It was a simple plot explained covertly. What writers call "showing not telling". I think some ppl just can't accept that in many ppls minds the plot just wasnt very in depth or exciting.

I did love the game tho.

 

[Doombringer]

Well, yes, in essence the plot of Half Life 2 is very simplistic. Run, gun, rescue goodguy, stop badguy...

The backstory is the depthy part.