WOW. This is as close to an answer to it all as you could EVER get.

[mrkab00m]

Holy crap. This is even better then the previous link I posted.. MUCH BETTER.

http://forums.steampowered.com/forums/showthread.php?threadid=210748

VERY well done.

I will also post this on General so it can be seen as much as possible...

 

[Talfrey]

Wow.

That was amazing.

 

[JohnnyL]

He is all wrong about the G-Man.

 

[bliink]

Theres a theme with these games of "the illusion of choice" - its everywhere you look and the games do look into the whole theory of "choice" and what it means..
After thinking about it, Marc Laidlaw's a much better writer than I originally gave him credit for. :thumbs:

 

[Naudian]

hehehe later on in that thread he says this:

"Halo = blarrrg! aliens don't like humans, they are trying to kill us. we need to fight back, hey unnamed soldier, kill these aliens to save us.
Master Chief: Ok! let me go duel wield!

Doom 3:blarrrg! demons don't like humans, they are trying to kill us. we need to fight back, hey unnamed soldier, kill these demons to save us.
Doom Guy:Ok! let me grab my flash light and shine it around!"

Made me laugh...

His Half-life theory is pretty awesome though, now I just hope VALVe doesnt screw it up with something crappier!

 

[CREMATOR666]

Well, I trust Marc Laidlaw like I trust George Bush : not a lot. I think it all may turned out to be as crappy as the HL2 choices of weapons (which disappointed me greatly ) or it may turned out to be even better. I have faith in Valve that they will give us their best.

PS Try putting Master Chief into City17! Maybe he would be killed because of his combine-like helmet/suit n' stuff! (Wishful thinking)

 

[Sid Burn]

I can see he stole some info from http://www.fragfiles.org/~hlstory/ well, it was awesome anyway...

 

[DevgruSeal]

http://www.fragfiles.org/~hlstory/timeline.htm

I saw this on that STEAM thread..I must say he has some pretty good ideas on that...

Anyways that link has some wrong statistics. As far as I know, HL2 takes place in 2008, not 2010. Why do I say this? "10 years after Black Mesa" Black Mesa happened in 1998 didn't it?

1998 + 10 = 2008.

 

[Asknoone]

He is wrong on a few things, especially shepard, as shepard is, as stated by laidlaw, gearbox's creation....NOTHNG more.

Also i am certain that it isnt an invasion force, all those tanks and military at the end simply because look...theres a jet and plane etc cramped together on desert....

Personally i dont think thats even xen, i just think its nothingness where different worlds have crossed over and thats just a piece of eaerth...either that gman has dumped the bodies there.

Theres no real evidence in both half life 1 or 2 to make any assumption on who or what he is

 

[Talfrey]

Well, truthfully, it seems like Half-Life 2 is kinda winging it from a continuity stand point, It's using stuff as at comes, and leaving a lot of things open, so it doesn't end up tripping over itself.

I remember Valve saying something about not wanting to bring Race X into the new game, but never anything about Shepard, or his efforts. I personally think we're definetly going to see him again, assuming that we aren't playing him, in which case... we won't see him besides the hands. heheh. But seriously, why would they bother saying we won't see Race X again, if they didn't plan to bring at least something from Opposing Force? Why not just say they didn't want to bring anything from Opposing Force into the new games? Why just Race X?

I think they plan to have Adrien Sheperd make a come back. He's a cool character, and I'd think it'd be sad to have him abandoned simply because he wasn't directly their brainchild.

Heh. I think I just brought an entirely new stream of thought to this thread, the idea of plotting the future by examining the motives of the creators...

 

[Asknoone]

but never anything about Shepard, or his efforts

Marc laidlaw confrmed it, use the search button i am sure its still around. Theres simply not going to be a shepard expansion

 

[Gray Fox]

But the guy said that the G-man only sent Black ops once he saw that Freeman had taken care of Nihilith, because then Shapherd wasn't needed, but IIRC freeman encounterd the black ops before he went to Xen, so that means either that the G-man realized that shephard wasn't needed earlier or that he brought the black ops to kill freeman cause the army failed.

 

[Mirick]

EDIT:
I'm a dummy.

 

[Talfrey]

Hey Samson!

Search IS my friend!

While I found nothing saying that there wasn't going to be any Opposing Force version of HL:2...

I found that

"Actually, Marc Laidlaw DID write the story for Opposing Forces AND Blueshift. BUT, IRC Valve was busy with other things and gave the task to Gearbox."

So...

Marc might very well have a return appearence from our pal Adrien.