Something I've wondered about for a long time

[Lyrids]

Why did they name the game Half-Life? As I'm sure most of us know (I learned it in middle school) Half-Life is the amount of time it takes for half of the atoms in a substance to decay. This doesn't really have any significance to the game. My brother suggested that it was because the people who made and play this game only have half a life. I explained to him that game developers are respected and well payed, but that's besides the point. What do you think?

 

[Hudson]

i think they wanted a cool sounding name.

 

[kdavey]

http://www.city-17.net/int_gaben1.php that ask gabe about it there. Other then that I can't really think of why.

 

[ReZeroX]

there was an explaination to why it was called halflife in one of gabes emails, check the official info thread. i remember it also being explained in Marc Laidlaws interview which PHL had a news post on, check their news archives for the last 2-3 weeks.

edit: oh yeah ^ it was in that one too, heh. theres been so many interviews of all the valve people i cant tell the difference between them all anymore. i just remember them all as one big info....thing.

 

[Lyrids]

Thanks for the link. Interesting to know that the codename was Quiver. I guess they chose the name to fit with the experimental and scientific theme of the game.

 

[alco]

Quiver... ugh...

I guess it would've sounded cool after we'd have played the game.

 

[Sgt.Igneri]

Eww that would have been so stupid if it was "quiver" lol

 

[Space Cowboy]

I agree with you Lyrids. Half-life is used to determine the amount of time it takes a substance (normally a radioactive substance I believe) to decay.

I don't think the literal definition of half life has any DIRECT link to the game. On a metaphorical level it works though.

 

[Tarkus]

here's what i think: in the beginnig (sorry for my "engrish") of half-life, some scientists/barneys sayd do you something about you beeing half an hour late... maybe the title has something to do with this...

 

[Ro@cH]

Having a half-life also means that you might as well be dead. Hugh Grant mentions to whats-her-name in Notting Hill that he leads a half-life. He means he's worth nothing. Gordon Freeman's life is also considered worth nothing. He's in a very sticky situation, underground in an alien-infested research facility, with Marines hot on his trail. His life is as good as over. I think combined with the scientific meaning, that's what the developers aimed for.

 

[Typhon]

Harry Potter and the Sorceror's (brits: Philosopher's) Stone:

"Drinking the blood of a unicorn will sustain even if you are an inch from death...but after killing a beast so pure, you will live a cursed life...a half-life..."

 

[Tropico]

nothing to do with that half-life is a scientific term

 

[Typhon]

yes, we all know half-life is a scientific term, that was explained already for those of us who didn't know.

The point is that all HL related names are puns. Opposing force (the opposite side, as well as newton's laws of physics) blue shift (barney's shift, as well as...um...shit, someone who knows more about this explain what a blue shift is)

We know what the scientific half-life is, but what is the applicable pun?

 

[Ro@cH]

Blue shift is related to astrometrics (I feel like Seven of Nine now hehe). The light a star emits (well, emitted, thousands of years ago) has a blue shift or a red shift, depending on wether it's moving away from or moving towards earth. By measuring the light received from a star, scientists can tell what direction it is going.

Good call on newton's law of physics. It's probably general knowledge in the HL community, but I never realised the pun in that one.

 

[DelaZ]

1 entry found for half life.
half life

n : the time required for something to fall to half its initial value (in particular, the time for half the atoms in a radioactive substance to disintegrate)

 

[Gorgon]

1-biological half-life: The time taken for the quantity of a material in a specified tissue, organ or region of the body (or any other specified biota) to halve as a result of biological processes.

2-effective half-life, Teff: The time taken for the activity of a radionuclide in a specified place to halve as a result of all relevant processes.

3-radioactive half-life: For a radionuclide, the time required for the activity to decrease, by a radioactive decay process, by half.

I think term 1 is very logical.

 

[commando]

half life because....

we are living the HALF life and the OTHER half it BLACK MESA!

that is what i think.
Prob right 2

 

[Flyingdebris]

Maybe half-life refers to the way the situation at black mesa degrades with all the 'splosions and aliens and people dying left and right as well as a tie in to the scientific overtones of the game.

 

[Lyrids]

I like the idea of the scientific references for all three of the games, very interesting indeed.

 

[Ro@cH]

I was looking for more double meanings in scientific terms, best I could think of was terminal velocity (that's a movie I think) and critical mass (that's when your girlfriend eats too much and she falls through the bed).

Can we get some more please?

 

[mindless_moder]

very interesting hmm counter strike (its when ur gun back fire on u j/k)

 

[Thadius Dean]

Ro@ch made a very good point, how half-life also means might as well be dead. because the grunts wanted him dead from the very start.

 

[FictiousWill]

I wrote a game engine in DirectX and called it "Sigma Crisis". Why? Because it sounded cool! Half-Life did the same, only they used lambdas and 'half-life'. I'll make up some names now. How about Eco-Stratus, Bio-Schizm, or Gamma-Core? Why not! yay! Open up a chemistry/biology book and you've got a layman's scifi movie script.

 

[Ro@cH]

I actually made a wallpaper with Photoshop and named it Metacore. Don't know why hehe Ok some rules to make it harder: no greek letters, no X (unless it's part of the scientific word) and it has to have a double meaning like the ones I made up/ripped off of a movie

 

[alco]

Originally posted by Ro@cH
best I could think of was terminal velocity (that's a movie I think)

Terminal Velocity was a game, a good one at that. Made by the guys at Apogee\3DRealms.

http://3drealms.com/tv/index.html

good memories...