Does Half Life 2 Hold up?

[Brainwreck]

Just replayed it couple months ago.
I'd say it's still pretty fucking sweet.
Nevermind the fact that it's got an astounding number of mods, some of which are amazing in their own right.

 

[Garyn Dakari]

I played the entire HL series for the first time in late 2011, and I think all of them stand up today, even HL1. I actually enjoyed HL1 far more than 2, but maybe that's just me.

 

[Poetic Nova]

I played the entire HL series for the first time in late 2011, and I think all of them stand up today, even HL1. I actually enjoyed HL1 far more than 2, but maybe that's just me.

First HL is alot better then 2. That one did age well unlike 2.

 

[SextusMaximus]

No, and it didn't when I first played in 2010 either.

Groundbreaking for it's time, sure; should be considered one of the best FPS' of all time, sure; does it hold up today? no.

I played the entire HL series for the first time in late 2011, and I think all of them stand up today, even HL1. I actually enjoyed HL1 far more than 2, but maybe that's just me.

First HL is alot better then 2. That one did age well unlike 2.

Oh my god this. HL1 is still an absolute blast.

 

[Olas]

I recently started playing Bioshock and was stunned by how bad the graphics and models in the game looked. They didn't just look bad compared to today's games however, they looked bad compared to Half Life 2's. That's despite the fact that Half Life 2 came out 3 years before Bioshock, before anyone had even heard of the Xbox360 console that Bioshock was going to run on.

The fact is Half Life 2 graphically was monumental for its time. When it first came out very few computers could even even run it. But guess what? That was nearly a decade ago. If a game that came out a decade ago still looked good relative to today's games it would speak pretty poorly of that decade's progress. You just had to be there to understand how innovative and rich that game felt when it first came out.

It had a realistic physics engine, it had amazing looking enemies and creatures. I know today the concept of a game set in a crumbling urban environment where you try to overthrow a dystopian government might seem pretty ordinary, but at the time it was an amazing story for a video game to have, and it's told beautifully in a manner that is both fluid and subtle with an amazing attention to detail. The lack of long cutscenes contributed to the game's realism as well by never breaking from Gordon Freeman's point of view.

And in the end Half Life 2 holds up, Half Life holds up, Super Mario World holds up, Space Invaders holds up. Those where fun games and still are fun because they were well designed.

 

[TheBestPieEver]

The fact is Half Life 2 graphically was monumental for its time. When it first came out very few computers could even even run it. But guess what? That was nearly a decade ago. If a game that came out a decade ago still looked good relative to today's games it would speak pretty poorly of that decade's progress. You just had to be there to understand how innovative and rich that game felt when it first came out.

No offence: I have never given two flying shits about the graphical aspect of a game. As a child I played atari games and didn't care what they looked like. As long as I can see and understand what is going on everything else is bells and whistles. That said, lighting sometimes awes me but more in a logical "How many hours did they spent on making it look like this" way rather than in an instinctive "this is gorgeous" way.

 

[bafrali]

Played it a couple of times since 2008, didn't age well tbh. And alot of unnescecary glitches and unfinished models.

unneccesary glitches? Did you happen to find any that is neccessary?

BTW what unfinished models you speak of? If you mean the kind you can only see with noclipping then

Viewmodels (guns etc) have missing faces: Pistol doesn't expend it's ammo, Revolver is missing a big part on the right side, smg's clip is never trown out, Pulse rifle can be looked trhough when turning fast enough and Gordon holds it with 1 arm, Crossbow misses a disc and trigger, RL has a completely diffirent world model. Path finding for Alex can be borked sometimes, enemies don't shoot you when you hold something while watching in their direction. Few scripting error's, just to name the stuff that bothers me most.

Overall: Groundbreaking? Yes in 2004, outdated now.

edit: the irony is that the beta doesn't has most of these issues...

What you do is called nitpicking and I don't see how a few glitches can take away so much from the overall design and gameplay or how they make the game "outdated" from a technical standpoint.

 

[DoPo]

As for the rest of what you say, the same can be said of slavery. Though I'm sure everyone here would agree that slavery is wrong, "wrong" is still a subjective value, and therefor the idea that slavery is wrong is subjective. Saying that a lot of people like or approve of something is not, in any way, shape, or form, a sound argument for the quality or value of that thing.

Umm, you're confusing moral with value judgements there. And pray tell, how exactly does one objectively tell the value of a product? I would have thought that the amount of people liking/using it is an indicator of whether it is good or not. But apparently I'm wrong - there must be another Objective?®© way to do it in that case.

 

[Captain Billy]

I played Half-Life 2 for the first time ever last year, and I absolutely loved it. Then again, I hadn't played all the way through an FPS ever before, so I may not be able to speak to it in context. With that said, though, I think HL2, while not my favorite game, is absolutely unparalleled in both its diversity and tightness. it takes you through all kinds of diverse environs, with different gameplay styles, each exhilaratingly fun but still structured around the same simple control scheme.

 

[Poetic Nova]

Played it a couple of times since 2008, didn't age well tbh. And alot of unnescecary glitches and unfinished models.

unneccesary glitches? Did you happen to find any that is neccessary?

BTW what unfinished models you speak of? If you mean the kind you can only see with noclipping then

Viewmodels (guns etc) have missing faces: Pistol doesn't expend it's ammo, Revolver is missing a big part on the right side, smg's clip is never trown out, Pulse rifle can be looked trhough when turning fast enough and Gordon holds it with 1 arm, Crossbow misses a disc and trigger, RL has a completely diffirent world model. Path finding for Alex can be borked sometimes, enemies don't shoot you when you hold something while watching in their direction. Few scripting error's, just to name the stuff that bothers me most.

Overall: Groundbreaking? Yes in 2004, outdated now.

edit: the irony is that the beta doesn't has most of these issues...

What you do is called nitpicking and I don't see how a few glitches can take away so much from the overall design and gameplay or how they make the game "outdated" from a technical standpoint.

Engine itself is fine, HL2 however is not, it's an unfinished mess. Gameplay is quiet dull. It's beta had way more features: more weapons, more enemies and actual squad tactics you could make use of. Hell lot's of beta maps are actually more interesting and better mapped then the retail game has. Way darker atmosphere, a better story I could go on for hours on the beta how much better it was/is.

 

[Fidelias]

There are a few ways to "look" at Half-life 2, however in my opinion it stands up in all of them - feel free to disagree.

In terms of First Person Story telling, Half-life 2 remains the champion. It's story is less told through lazy cut scenes and more through the world and incidental details present therein. The lack of children and pets, the deep philosophical ramblings that bombard the citizens, even the furnishings in the houses tell a story better than some pathetic shock-value opener. The trips to Ravenholm and Nova Prospect towards the middle of the game dip the world in a dark and terrifying vibe that supplants most full fledged Horror titles because it doesn't SAY anything. It just puts the details in the world and lets them speak for themselves.

In terms of Gun Play, Half-life 2 isn't as visceral as it's modern day counter parts, however the moment-to-moment gameplay is still well ahead of basically everyone in the industry save for perhaps Halo. The A.I. drives the scenario based combat, meaning it reacts to the player and allows them to employ wildcard strategies that the A.I. adapts to. Most modern shooters all but ignore A.I. in favour of scripted battles - Half-life 2 weaves it's scripting amongst the on-the-fly scenarios. The first real battle against the Combine drop ship on the freeway, the fierce firefights through the City during the game's final chapters, and even the moment-to-moment use of the gravity gun allow for a more varied and immersive experience.

Lastly, it's setting is incredible, though lacking the awe of something akin to Bioshock's Rapture. It's eschews the realism of the modern shooters, leaving behind your glocks and M14s for more inventive and "fun" firearms. Instead of simply killing "The Non-Americans" as is the norm for the industry today, you're fighting monsters and alien soldiers, not because they "Hate Freedom for [reasons]" but because they're simply trying to wipe out humanity, turning them into zombie soldiers for their army. It's escapism, pure and simple - and for the dreamer in me, it wins out over the endlessly boring Military Shooters of today.

All my opinions, of course.

No offense, but I have to disagree with pretty much everything except for the setting.

I think the first-person storytelling is absolutely terrible. Sure, the settings are interesting and show how run-down everything is, and you can see a bit of alien tech mixed in with human tech, but that's about it. That's setting, not story. The story itself is a fairly generic alien shoot-em-up, with other inspirations taken from zombie apocalypse scenarios. This wasn't new even when the game originally came out. Also, the story quite obviously tries to focus on Gordon Freeman. The problem is, Gordon Freeman is one of the worst characters ever created. All you know is that he was a scientist who managed to survive the beginning of the alien invasion. You could argue that Gordon is supposed to be an avatar for the player's own character traits. But there is no way to customize Gordon or change his actions or play style. I know that the way that I had to play and the decisions that Gordon makes are nothing like what I would do when faced with the current situation, even if I did know how to fight as well as he did.

The gun-play is pretty bad compared to modern shooters, and nothing remotely special when compared to the games of it's time. Guns felt wrong, and the only one that was truly creative was the gravity gun. The AI was terrible, doing nothing but running into my bullets. The only reason why they were a threat was because the amount of damage you take just from the weakest of weapons. The gun play and AI of the game, Republic Commando, which came out just a year later, shows how poorly the AI for Half Life 2 actually was.

The setting itself was pretty great, there's no argument there. I do feel that there could've been a little more detail added to the specific areas, but it was good.

But the truth is that the game isn't as great as a lot of gamers make it out to be, even if you take into account it's age.

It's still pretty good, definitely better than average, but if you look at it objectively, without nostalgia, it's not really much more than that.

 

[bafrali]

snip

Funny I actually think that they did the best thing when they reworked the Beta and shaped it into the retail form. It was way over the top with its visuals and the depiction of the combine. I find the minimalistic aproach much more intersting and subtle which is pretty rare as far as the games are concerned.

Evil empire military parades, really? Why didn't you give Breen a mustache to twirl while you were at it Valve.

 

[Connor Lonske]

first i'd like to say that the people who don't like the gravity gun have something wrong with them on some internal level that defines what's fun or not. that's the only thing i can't budge on when it comes to fun or not fun.

anything else that can be argued about the game, i can understand. unless you can play a old game like a time traveler would try to blend into whatever time period he's gotten himself into, you're setting yourself up for disaster. i literally can understand not trying to think like you're playing a game from 2004 or 1998 or whatever. but if you're going out of your way to give a game a chance with a open heart, you're gonna have too otherwise you'll end up nip picking your own nipples off.

also a thing worth noting is that while half life was one of the very first games with a passable physics engine, and gay ben really liked showing that off to the point where he basically reused puzzles into his later two episodic extensions to much annoyance of critics like yahtzee for example. so even though valve had something to show off in the main game, i'd say it's ok to get pissed off about it being EVERYWHERE in the games because it got old so fucking fast even for me, a guy who's been playing the games since 2008.

 

[Vykrel]

i played it for the first time in like 2010 and it easily made it into my top 5 favorite games. it definitely holds up, especially in terms of graphics. its hard to believe it came out in 2004.

 

[Poetic Nova]

snip

Funny I actually think that they did the best thing when they reworked the Beta and shaped it into the retail form. It was way over the top with its visuals and the depiction of the combine. I find the minimalistic aproach much more intersting and subtle which is pretty rare as far as the games are concerned.

Evil empire military parades, really? Why didn't you give Breen a mustache to twirl while you were at it Valve.

Mehh, if they didn't make a rushjob out of it i would have agreed, but the beta's atmosphere is unmatched. If you haven't already search on the Combine wiki for the Air Exchange maps, if only these maps where kept I would be replaying it (mods are already their for beta enemies).

 

[Arqus_Zed]

It's a shooter.

Shooters show their strength through graphical prowess, lighting, detail, atmosphere in general, hit detection, physics, etc.
In other words, the strengths of the genre lie in technical advancements.
The shooter genre in general does not age well because of this.
They are not made to last.

On the opposite of this spectrum, we have the RPG genre, puzzlers and the (point & click) adventure games.

 

[TheBestPieEver]

So I went back and I got control of this motorboat. It drives like ass but the sense of speed and power that it gives it's actually really good, even if I have no idea of were to go.

 

[TheBestPieEver]

It's a shooter.

Shooters show their strength through graphical prowess, lighting, detail, atmosphere in general, hit detection, physics, etc.
In other words, the strengths of the genre lie in technical advancements.
The shooter genre in general does not age well because of this.
They are not made to last.

Shooting can be satisfactory in a very visceral level through correct timing of animations, hit and sound effects and could be done right since years ago. Plus, technical advances do not override level design. Battlefield 3 may look incredible but it's campaign is a complete turd. Call of Duty has never looked great but the 4th game was actually good.