Rantings of a very tired cross country runner

Marx! II said:
Actually, it stands to reason that after the events of 1, the state of Earth has no bearing on Gster's teleporting prowess. Remember, it's as likely as anything that he essentially owns Xen at this point.

As for the Combine catching on, that's up for debate. Who's to say they would notice at all?
Click to expand...

I didn't so much mean in the sense of him losing whatever abilities he had, but in the sense that everything he's fighting for (if one presumes he is a government official) has long gone. Either the "employers" he alludes to are a secret, incredibly powerful facet of the Earth's hierarchy or they're an unknown set of entities with nothing to do with our little planet- I'm inclined to go for the latter.

And I'm saying that- if his abilities are somehow technology based, rather than innate- say, orginating from devices on the Earth's surface- then there's a possibility the Combine would stumble across them, which doesn't seem the kind of risk the uber-mysterious G-man would take. Any "tech" would be housed on Xen, but hell, I'm not too sure if Xen still exists- for all I know it was shaken apart and/or sealed indefinitely after Nihilanth popped his clogs.

He's possibly human, but I really don't think he's working for mankind...
 
i'm suspecting the whole suit, old dude, and briefcase are all part of some host body he chose and that he's probably some weird sluggy creature from another dimension.
 
Edcrab said:
I didn't so much mean in the sense of him losing whatever abilities he had, but in the sense that everything he's fighting for (if one presumes he is a government official) has long gone. Either the "employers" he alludes to are a secret, incredibly powerful facet of the Earth's hierarchy or they're an unknown set of entities with nothing to do with our little planet- I'm inclined to go for the latter.

And I'm saying that- if his abilities are somehow technology based, rather than innate- say, orginating from devices on the Earth's surface- then there's a possibility the Combine would stumble across them, which doesn't seem the kind of risk the uber-mysterious G-man would take. Any "tech" would be housed on Xen, but hell, I'm not too sure if Xen still exists- for all I know it was shaken apart and/or sealed indefinitely after Nihilanth popped his clogs.

He's possibly human, but I really don't think he's working for mankind...
Click to expand...


The former, I say.

I was thinking of something roughly cell phone sized. I know that's a bit of a stretch, but it's all been educated guesses thus far. Remember though that G-man and his have had way longer to screw with those crystals with way more advanced means than even the Black Mesa folk. It's not so far-fetched to think that he had the wherewithal to warp about Black Mesa until Xen was his. Under our control, for the time being. Obviously anything he doesn't carry around with him would go there, excepting that he himself is pretty much the new Nihilanth. I'll not explore that further so as to preserve my theory, but there it is.
 
for all I know it was shaken apart and/or sealed indefinitely after Nihilanth popped his clogs.
Click to expand...

We go there with G-Man after Nihilanths death ;) .



His employers could be the Aliens that the Combine are facing up to, G-Man is making the best of a bad situation.
Earth is like an intergalactic version of Vietnam, with the Combine sending troops and the opposing side sending G-Man (and Gordon.)
 
Or maybe G-Man doesn't actually give a damn about Earth's fate, and is simply doing it to get some potential mercenaries out of the situation. It's possible.

-Angry Lawyer
 
Alright I think this is a halfway decent explination that compliments the original theory's. This is all based of alot of what you guys posted (ya'll know who you are so I ain't gonna get specific just know this isn't all original). My opinion on who controlled xen if anybody but nihilanth has changed significantly sense this thread was started. I was like the majority and believed that the combine controlled xen via nihilanth. It made sense before and after i conceived the notion that the nihilanth are mobilizing to go toe to toe with the g-mans empire. But as you pointed out this doesn't fit combine standard operating procedure to go through all that trobule just to take over one planet whose inhabitants, when compared to the enslaved synths, aren't all that strong (I'm guessing they just want earth for the resources more than soldiers to swell there ranks but humans could definately fill a vital role within any army such as the combine I.E. stalkers) now on to my point.

The combine, as I stated and ya'll pointed out, tend to operate more on the overt side of things, they don't take chances and they always make sure they have complete supremacy and are always super effecient. The g-man and his backers instead, i think, tend to put the other factor at a disadvantage rather than make sure they have the advantage. They also operate more logically and try not use many, if any, of there forces while the combine just rely's on there enslaved army. This is evident because at the start of hl 1 it sounds like g-man is argueing for the experiment to continue ineffect causing the resonance cascade. I Think he is doing this to try to take one and weaken the other, xen and earth that is. Xen is obviously taken (the border world is now under our control mr. freeman.) and earth is weakend (g-man destroying bm with the nuke, effectively nuetralizing a large part of the worlds nuclear arsenal, and with all of the xen wildlife intergrating themselves with earth's ecosystem and forcing a massive influx of humans into cities, making them easier to round up when the time does come for an invasion). But while this is going on this large amount of activity is dected by the good ol' combine. They throw a wrench into g-mans plans and beat him to the knock out punch. They seize earth in 7 hours and really piss off this new third party. So g-man gets the good doctor out of moth balls and lets him loose on c-17. G-man helps gordon destroy c-17 citadel in hopes that it will cause a revolution across the world and make a weakend hole in the combines line of planets.

What i think will happen next (this is all after aftermath) g-man will quit being so covert and start being a little overt. They will exploit this possible weakness throwing the combine off balance causeing a conflict to errupt. Gordon will learn what the g-mans intention's are and in an effort to stop this madness will teleport to all kinds of places ranging from the combine homeworld to the doorstep of this new factor. I don't think the actually fighting between the two superpowers will be a very large gameplay element cause it's just not half life like, it'll be more of a story element than anything.

I don't know though, will just have to wait for mr. laidlaw to enlighten us.
 
You raise some interesting points, but I doubt Laidlaw's ever going to define the G-Man. The G-Man would be a lot less cool if we could explain him. I strongly believe that the G-Man's always going to be unexplained, with no race behind him.

-Angry Lawyer
 
Sounds good, few flaws if any as far as I can see. Certainly has my seal of approval at least :thumbs: nicely tied up.

Like you say though, now it's all in the hands of the mighty Laidlaw, to Lay down the Law of HL....

You raise some interesting points, but I doubt Laidlaw's ever going to define the G-Man. The G-Man would be a lot less cool if we could explain him. I strongly believe that the G-Man's always going to be unexplained, with no race behind him.


-Angry Lawyer
Click to expand...

I think that's very likely. On the other hand, I would consider it a brave and admirable move on Laidlaw's part if he did decide to define the G-man instead of leaving it all misty. Whatever twist he used it would doubtlessly piss off loads of people, considering the speculation that's gone on, but if it was a really good plot twist (and I think the whole mega evil slant could be really good) and it was implemented well then I think I'd end up....satisfied, at least. That's not to say I'll be all that disappointed if G-man is never fully explained...
 
I could quite easily cope with either scenario- as long as there was some remaining mystery surrounding the G-man even after "explanations" in sequel(s)/expansion(s).

As for Xen exploding or being sealed away or whatever, who's to say it didn't happen a little while after Nihilanth's fall, during the portal storms? :p
 
If Laidlaw described him in a really good way, he'll end up being another form of Nyarlathotep, the messanger of Azathoth, "that last amorphous blight of nethermost confusion which blasphemes and bubbles at the centre of all infinity"

...what, you've never read any Lovecraft??

-Angry Lawyer
 
yeah you'd really gotta think of how they would incorporate an explination of g-man into a half life style story. I think it's just gonna be like hl2 with you going wtf the whole way.
 
It's very annoying though.
I want answers, and I'm not to bothered if there not the right ones (e.g. My opinion), so long as there not stupid ones.
 
oh crap ed crab, i just read some of your fan fic. the malign contingency and this theory comes pretty darn close to plagerizing some of your stuff (i swear i didn't know! :O ). Like when your talking about both sides planning to invade or something like that. If you'd said somthing i would've shut up days ago sorry man.

Back to the g-man explinations. Hows could it be explained in game? The only person that knew and might've told the good doctor was breen (when he talks about how he knows your employers and that your contract is open to the highest bidder immediatly tells us he knows more about this situation than any human including laidlaw) and well, if he ain't dead he sure ain't to happy. and it's not like g-man to give to terribly long explinations plus he has no motivation to give himself away so your DEFINATELY not finding out from him. The only way they could of incorporated an explination like that would be if gordon heard it from a fellow human like when eli explained the 7 hours war but as mentioned earlier, gordon killed his only possible source of info. He had to do it though so ohwell.
 
Angry Lawyer said:
Or maybe G-Man doesn't actually give a damn about Earth's fate, and is simply doing it to get some potential mercenaries out of the situation. It's possible.

-Angry Lawyer
Click to expand...
Agreed. He knew about the resonance cascade and wanted it to happen. Then picked out of the ashes, those that he could.
 
r2000 said:
Agreed. He knew about the resonance cascade and wanted it to happen. Then picked out of the ashes, those that he could.
Click to expand...

I've always figured that he didn't want it to happen...

Hmm... *ponders*

Let's see... we see him in Sector C arguing with a scientist. I don't care what anyone thinks they heard, I'm fairly certain he isn't actually saying anything.

We see him in the start of "Decay", in another part of Sector C.

We know, by listening to the scientists and security guards before the Resonance Cascade talk, that the entire facility was having problems. Power failures, security failures, system crashes... ect...

We know that the RC(resonance cascade) was planned, as troops at an Arizona airbase were being trained specifically for a mission in the Black Mesa Research Facility.

Corporal Adrian Shephard noticed a "G-Man"(Government Man, who looked more like a lawyer) watching him train at the base.

We know that the "Administrator", Dr. Walter Breen, was very eager for the test to take place, the test that caused the Resonance Cascade.

After the RC, Doctors Keller and Rosenberg noted that the "dampening fields" had been switched off. These were designed not to fail... Dr. Rosenberg felt that the only way they could 'fail' is if someone deliberately switched them off, thus allowing the RC to spread beyond Sector C.

Freeman saw the "Gman" as he made his way through Black Mesa, however he never directly, it would appear, attempted to have any effect on his surroundings.

Adrian Shephard though was prevented from escaping the facility by this "Gman", and was actually saved by him several times. This "Gman" also reactivated a live nuke that Shephard had disabled.

He called Black Mesa and 'embarrassment' and stated that the could not close his report until every 'loose end' had been 'tied up'. His employers wish to have Adrian killed, but the Gman argues to spare him, and to keep him safely in what would appear to be a slow time warp.

While not appearing to take much interest in Freeman throughout the Black Mesa incident, the Gman actually hired him after he defeated the Nhilanth, supposedly ending the Xenian invasion of Earth.

Prior to that though, Dr. Keller had Collete Green and Gina Cross prep a rocket for launch that would put a satellite in space which would prevent the RC from spreading beyond Black Mesa. He also had the two doctors reactivate the Dampening Fields.

So before the Nihilanth was killed, the invasion should have already been contained. What we don't know is whether or not the rest of the World had already been affected...

The military were at the base to kill all the Black Mesa personel, and they specifically aborted the rocket launch, killing the scientists who manned the control facility.

The Administrator is nowhere to be found throughout these events.

Some 20 or so years later, we see "The Administrator" in City 17. He is "Earth's Ambassador" to the "Universal Union", or "Combine", if you wish.

Phew... so... my conclusions:

Dr. Breen was responsible for the RC, and the system failures Black Mesa experienced prior to the RC itself.

Now beyond this... I'm not always so certain what I think. However I do think it's no coincidence that the former Administrator of Black Mesa, is now the "Administrator" of Earth. However...

The Portal Storms should have been stopped before they began...

Some have said that the Satellite Freeman launched was used by the Combine to cause this... where is the evidence for this though? The only evidence I can think of is that the Military specifically tried to prevent that launch. In which case, Breen must not have been the one who prepped the military because he would want the Satellite in orbit. We do know that the Gman was present at the Marine's base... so perhaps he breefed them, and knew about Breen's plan? He then knew how the Satellite would be used, and so he ordered the Marines to secure the facility.

I've lost myself again though...

Either way, it would seem the Satellite had to be launched to stop the immediate Resonance Cascade. So because the Satellite was launched, the Portal Storms couldn't have been caused by the RC, right? The Black Mesa Incident lasted just over two days... If the "Portal Storm" had spread beyond Black Mesa, then why did the military bother with killing any and all witnesses at the base? So perhaps the "Combine" sitting in their dimension, knew that either way the Humans would need to launch the Satellite, and they would use that to creat a second "Resonance Cascade", or "Portal Storm" to throw Earth into disarray in preparation for an invasion... but then why not just let the original RC spread? I was so sure of this before, but I don't know what to believe. Anyway, I'll move on to something else.

I think it's important that the Gman was seen observing Shephard before the Black Mesa incident, and later interferring with his actions in Black Mesa. Whether re-arming bombs, or saving his life... Shephard seems to have been special to him in some way. Where-as Freeman did not, up until the end, that is.

The Gman is very impressed that Freeman managed to survive the incident, travel to Xen, and then destroy the Nihilanth. He offers him a job, Freeman accepts.

Now while the Gman actively had a hand in Shephard's fate all throughout the incident, at one point he had to reverse what he'd done, and then argue with his 'employers' to keep him alive. He says he's filing a report and that Black Mesa has been an embarrassment....

So my theory when I started typing this post was the Gman organized the troops to clean up the facility, with the intention of having Shephard go through and kill Nihilanth.

His first objective was to stop the RC all together. He failed.

His next objective was to kill all the scientists who knew anything about the project. Perhaps so that Earth could not conduct such experiments again and thus keep themselves hidden from the Combine. He failed.

Thirdly, his troops were supposed to fight through the facility down to the Lamda Reactor, and then his chosen hero would destroy the Nihilanth. That failed too. Infact his "Hero" proved to be counter-productive.

After Freeman killed Nihilanth, effectively completing the Gman's mission for him, the only thing left to do was destroy Black Mesa all together and get rid of any further contamination (and witnesses) once and for all. However Shephard and the rest of the stranded Marines made this increasingly difficult, and the Gman had to directly intervene.

Afterword though, he was still impressed by Shephard's abilities, so he took mercy on him and had him spared, possibly for a 'rainy day'.

So I thought; the Gman called Black Mesa an embarrassment because it was his failed mission. The only reason he ever completed it was because of a random and previously nameless and insignificant scientist who proved to be a capable killer. Freeman saved his tail, and so he was hired in Shephard's place.

---------

So that was my theory. However after analyzing my own observations, and what they mean...

All I can conclude is that the Gman, and likely Dr. Breen knew something about what was going to happen...

Furthermore, I don't think we will ever know for sure what the hell happened at Black Mesa...

This has at least been thought provoking. :frog:
 
Now while the Gman actively had a hand in Shephard's fate all throughout the incident, at one point he had to reverse what he'd done, and then argue with his 'employers' to keep him alive. He says he's filing a report and that Black Mesa has been an embarrassment....

So my theory when I started typing this post was the Gman organized the troops to clean up the facility, with the intention of having Shephard go through and kill Nihilanth.

His first objective was to stop the RC all together. He failed.

...

Thirdly, his troops were supposed to fight through the facility down to the Lamda Reactor, and then his chosen hero would destroy the Nihilanth.
Click to expand...

That's pretty much exactly the conclusions I came to EXCEPT I say G-man caused the RC. If we take it that G-man (whether he's human or not) is working from within the govt in HL1, and also that he wants to kill Nihilanth, then he might have needed a good pretense to go sending troops into the mincer. The RC, and the dimensional lever it gave the Nihilanth, was an excellent pretense. Afterwards he focusses on Freeman to do the job because the troops have failed ("Forget about Freeman") - perhaps this is the "embarrassment" he speaks of.

All the failing equipment and comms before the RC could have been down to G-man - there's a definite note of unease from some of the scientists before the experiment, and G-man may just have been trying to screw things up enough to ensure that no protests were heard or made.

Breen I see as just a greedy exec, in HL1, out for the notoriety he could get from the experiments. Even with a risky experiment like the one that caused the RC, it wouldn't have been unlike Breen to just ignore a few minor protests and aim for results.

Tis howI see it all, ennyhoo.
 
What I want to know is, what exactly were the Portal Storms?

Did they start after the Black Mesa Incident ended, or what?

They never should have happened.

Dr. Keller had the rocket launched to stop the RC from spreading...

If the Gman didn't want all this to happen, then why did he send troops to stop the rocket launch? (Edit: this is assuming the Rocket had something to do with the Combine)

If he wanted it to happen...

Why did he send troops to stop the rocket launch?

Hmm... too much to think about all at once. ><

Edit: I suspect the story is purposely written in such a way that endless speculation will never solve anything.

No matter what theory you develope, something is unanswered or outright contradicts it.
 
The only thing we know for certain is that the G-man is opposing the Combine. He may well have caused the Resonance Cascade (because regardless of the side you take for the whole Combine-on-Xen argument it's at least recognised that our collision with Xen allowed the Combine to detect us/teleport to us) but his actual motives/employers remain a point of contention.

And FCBob- if anything I'm really flattered that someone else came to similar conclusions as me :D The fact remains however that I made the Arcadimaarian and Domarian races up expressly since I wasn't prepared to go out on a limb and risk looking daft by attributing a race to the G-man (when it's possible he's just a loose cannon). By throwing totally new creations into the mix I meant I could involve the Resistance and the Combine without butchering the canon world that Laidlaw put so much effort into...

Besides, I really do think it's best for Half-Life in general that the G-man forever retains an air of mystery. Maybe his motives won't stay entirely incomprehensible, but mystery suits him.
 
Edcrab said:
The only thing we know for certain is that the G-man is opposing the Combine.
Click to expand...

Can we even be sure of that? He doesn't seem to feel any dislike for them, but simply acts out of a contract.

-Angry Lawyer
 
I agree that we'll probably never know who the g-man is but I still think the combine are preparing to go toe to toe with some yet to be seen super power. I think langolier may be on to something with his theory that adrian shepard was orginally intended to take out the nihilanth, but then again you gotta take into acount that those expansion packs weren't made by the orignal hl team.

And i don't think there is anyway we can be sure of who the g-man is ultimently fighting against so i'm gonna withdrawl any comments made about whether he's for or againts the combine. I think he's just playing the combine and this theoretical third party against each other for some reason or another. Just have to wait for hl3.
 
FCBob said:
I agree that we'll probably never know who the g-man is but I still think the combine are preparing to go toe to toe with some yet to be seen super power...
Click to expand...

Which makes you wonder if the Combine were actually just preparing us against an even worse evil. Perhaps the G-Man has stuffed up our chances for survival?

-Angry Lawyer
 
True, we don't know what he's intending in the long run or why he does what he does, but I'd say that what he's done thus far has been a real pain for the Combine. Quite the obstructive presence, isn't he?

You can imagine him being in great demand if he really does hire himself out to different factions, bringing along his own coerced "allies" (such as Freeman).
 
FCBob said:
I agree that we'll probably never know who the g-man is but I still think the combine are preparing to go toe to toe with some yet to be seen super power. I think langolier may be on to something with his theory that adrian shepard was orginally intended to take out the nihilanth, but then again you gotta take into acount that those expansion packs weren't made by the orignal hl team.

And i don't think there is anyway we can be sure of who the g-man is ultimently fighting against so i'm gonna withdrawl any comments made about whether he's for or againts the combine. I think he's just playing the combine and this theoretical third party against each other for some reason or another. Just have to wait for hl3.
Click to expand...

I can't say that's my theory, as I recall hearing it somewhere else first. However it makes sense to me.

I really don't think we know anything about the events of the Black Mesa Incident, except that the RC was planned, and that the Gman had something to do with the military in preparation.

The reason the theory that Shephard was meant to be important makes sense, to me, because with Freeman, the Gman never once interevened to help or hinder him. However he did both with Shephard.
 
my final conclusion on this whole theory and it's possibilities for hl3 (but mainly the latter) is that when gordon destroys the citadel and flees city 17, a worldwide upheaval will inevitably begin (no shocker their :cheers: ). The combine will see this as a weakness in their line of planets and send a doomsday force to earth. This theoretical third party will also see this weakness and send an invasion force to earth. They will attempt to secure a citadel intact (sounds very tricky) to use to learn the location of the combine base of operations. However during this a much larger conflict will errupt across the universe between the combine and the other empire, leading G-man, still controlling the unwitting gordon, to use their new data on the location of the combine homeworld to go a on a mission to destroy the combine heiarchy. In doing so Gordon will discover the intentions of this new factor and maybe, with emphasis on maybe, he will descover the intentions of g-man. This will lead him to travel to this new factors home world in an effort to save earth and maybe the universe. All in all I think hl3 will have a very very dark ending, with earth either destroyed, or under this new factors control, and Gordon realizing what he has helped do, and conclude with g-man putting Gordon into stasis for good. :x
 
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