Why is Half Life such a cultural phenomenon?

[Pyre00]

If you can't figure it out from just HL1 and the clues in HL2 you have some serious mental problems. Really. Also, big collection of newspapers in Eli's lab.

Yeah, *serious* mental problems. Hospitals are full of people who need help because they're having trouble with HL2s plot holes. Why, schizophrenia is positively trivial compared to the mental problems of someone who has trouble with Valve's magnum opus...

A big collection of newspapers? In Eli's lab? Really? Truly? That's alright then. As long as the storyline gets explained courtesy of a single location in the game. Phew.

I have played HL1, and it was pretty simple but riddle me this: If HL2's story is as well explained and awesome as you claim, why do I need to have played HL1 to understand it? Surely a well written and presented story wouldn't need a prequel to make sense?

Edit:

As I have said before, we clearly do not agree. You like the story, you think it's well written. That's brilliant, a victory for diversity and no mistake. But I, personally, think the story is poorly presented and patchy.

Now, you can carry on pretending that people having different opinions constitutes a mental illness or we can agree to disagree and move on.

That's not really an opinion. There's clues pretty much everywhere. You would have to be retarded to miss them (Then again, in my view 98% of people are.). In fact, I'm pretty sure that's what they put the corkboard of newspapers there for. For the slow ones.

Also, you have to play the original to understand the story in the sequel? Gasp.

 

[Uncompetative]

Honestly, how many times can you play this damn game. Sure, it has quality lighting and sound, but the plot is a muddled mess.

All you Half-Life fanboys are going to look silly when Episode 3 fails to bring the series to a satisfactory narrative conclusion.

One minute of Halo: Combat Evolved has more gameplay permutations and quantifiable fun than an hour of Half-Life 2. Damn ants.

 

[Bofus Teefus]

I didn't play it until a couple months ago, and had by then played Fallout 3, Left 4 Dead, and Bioshock. I think the fact that I waited so long and played on the heels of some other Grade A shooters (Fallout not so much, but I liked a whole lot) made HL2 seem a bit bland. It took me awhile to warm up to it, but I think in Ravenholm it really started to grow on me. I'm not sure whether or not it's one of my favorites, but definitely enjoyable, and I've played through more than once. Stick with it awhile longer.

 

[L33tsauce_Marty]

The story and the games overall design. Seriously, who the HELL is the G-Man?!

 

[mrpenguinismyhomeboy]

I have played HL1, and it was pretty simple but riddle me this: If HL2's story is as well explained and awesome as you claim, why do I need to have played HL1 to understand it? Surely a well written and presented story wouldn't need a prequel to make sense?

I played HL2 before I played HL1, and I was able to understand it fine. You actually don't need a big understanding of HL1 to play HL2, for it's tangentially related to HL1, in the same way RE4 is related to RE3. Most of the characters in HL2 are new or never really highlighted on in the first game. I couldn't tell which security guard was Barney for instance, nor could I tell which one was Dr Kleiner. Eli Vance is the only one which is really specified in HL1 but you don't really need to know that. So for the most part, the characters are all either new or not highlighted on much. The only real reoccurring character is the G-Man, and that's arguably the only thing that links HL1 to HL2.

 

[TheRockNRolla]

All a matter of taste really, but compared to the vast majority of single player shooters Half-Life, Half-Life 2 and the 'Episodes' (Ep1 being my least favorite) are delivered with a superb polish and seamless gameplay.

When it comes to plot and NPC design few games can compare to Half-Life 2. The mannar in which the plot is delivered without cutscenes (excepting the G-Man sequences at the start and end of games) greatly enhances the feeling of immersion for me. In my opinion this is where the Source Engine comes into its own, the range of facial expressions displayed in the characters heightens this immersion even further.

Frankly, considering its 2004 release, the original incarnation of Source shows up the comparitively lazy production put into the NPCs that populate the likes of Oblivion, Halo, Fallout3 and many other games I can't be bothered to list.

The bespectacled Gordon Freeman is also a million times more iconic than any of the faceless space marines that populate most shooters (including the bland green master chief).

In short Half-Life is the gourmet shooter experience. If you don't care for the finer details then it isn't for you, you might as well stick with the crudity of Halo or FarCry; but if you are looking for absolute refinement then the Half-Life games are a cut above the rest.

I agree.

 

[mrpenguinismyhomeboy]

Seriously, who the HELL is the G-Man?!

I know right? It's mysteries like the G-Man which make the Half Life series compelling.

 

[Scarecrow38]

Half Life is perhaps my favourite series of games.. but it's not a cultural phenomenon. What makes it such a good game is how it tells its story. It does it by keeping you in the world the entire game. You, as the player, esentially ARE Gordon Freeman. The Characters are talking to YOU. Halo (textbook example of another great series of games- not the best/ perfect- but great) on the other hand constantly reminds you that you aren't him with the use of cutscenes. You aren't Master Chief... you're just playing as him. People might disagree with me, but I found the lack of cutscenes to be important.

There's also the quality of the AI which goes hand-in-hand with the strong characterisation. Alyx Vance is a well-rounded meaningful character would could be someone you'd see in real life. If we look at halo again (sorry for the constant use but I just finished halo 2 in legendary), we have Master Chief- typical protagonist in any of today's futuristic shooters, cortana- shallow sex interest by the end (wierd but that's the vibe I got), Sgt Johnson- stereotypical black guy (which is strongly contrasted against Eli Vance).

So for the AI, the characterisation and the story- telling, the Half Life series (particularly Half Life 2 and later) is a great series.

To the OP, Water Hazard doesn't even scratch the surface, it may seem wierd/ underimpressive but as you play through you might get a better idea of it all.

 

[edinflames]

However, the replayability was largly degraded by unskippable story elements. Chapter six is a good example. It is my favorite chapter thoughout the series, yet when I want to reply the final fight, I am slowed down by ten minutes of unskippable dialouge split before and after the initial fight of the chapter.

Tryed using a save file before the epic fights?

The realistic immersion is another praise I don't get. How exactly does Gordon go about his life not saying anything? How come the high trained and armed Combine can't take on a single scientist? A headshot on someone with no helment should be no problem. That last one is not really a complaint about the game, but it brings up the question as to how people can call this game the pinnacle of immersion if these small loopholes come up.

I'm sorry but 'immersion' and 'realism' are two dramatically different concepts in gaming. While they are not totally opposed to each other neither requires the other in order to function. For example: if you want total dedication to 'realism' then play Operation Flashpoint, while on the far end of the spectrum a game like Doom:3 is nowhere close to 'realism' yet employs 'immersion' techniques such as the lighting system; I don't think anyone plays (or even attempts to praise) Half-Life for its use of 'realism'. Ultimately its all down to personal preference, if you think that CoD4 is more immersive then that's down to you - I enjoy both games but but must say that CoD4 is definitely not realistic, not even close.

In real life soldiers don't get to hide behind barrels and recover from bullet wounds in 30 seconds, they collapse in pain and scream for a medic - or die. Most soldiers don't rack up an individual body-count numbering in the hundreds. My point is that a game where you could develop post-traumatic stress disorders without even firing a shot after watching your best friend get his arms and legs blown off by a road-side IED near Fallujah then guarding his twitching body for half an hour before he is CasEvac'd by Helicopter (while the people responsible have escaped and hidden themselves amongst a civilian populace that hates you) probably won't be much fun even if it is the pinnacle of 'realistic immersion'.

This is why I think you might want to take a look at (and would enjoy playing) OpFlash, 'cos that's as close to proper realism in a shooter as you can get without being unbearably frustrating.

End of the day games will always be unrealistic because they aim to be fun, I just think you're holding HL2 up to an unreachable standard simply because it isn't totally your cup of tea.

 

[DragonChi]

the reason why its a phenomenon is un-analyzable. its just one of those things u just play, enjoy and accept.

 

[SL33TBL1ND]

If you payed number one when it first came out, you'd know.

/agree

If you just play the 2nd one, your not going to respect and like it as much as someone who played the first one.

 

[Nargleblarg]

You have to think back to Half Life 1 when the game was released it was like the halo today. (although Half life > Halo) It was great graphics for the time, a interesting story, it had multiplayer and a excitingly horrifiing singleplayer. (horrifiing for the time)

 

[oliveira8]

Honestly, how many times can you play this damn game. Sure, it has quality lighting and sound, but the plot is a muddled mess.

All you Half-Life fanboys are going to look silly when Episode 3 fails to bring the series to a satisfactory narrative conclusion.

One minute of Halo: Combat Evolved has more gameplay permutations and quantifiable fun than an hour of Half-Life 2. Damn ants.

Urr...All of us HL/Valve fanboys already know that about Ep3...we just dont get upset about it cause we already know how it works...doh!

If you can't figure it out from just HL1 and the clues in HL2 you have some serious mental problems. Really. Also, big collection of newspapers in Eli's lab.

Yeah, *serious* mental problems. Hospitals are full of people who need help because they're having trouble with HL2s plot holes. Why, schizophrenia is positively trivial compared to the mental problems of someone who has trouble with Valve's magnum opus...

A big collection of newspapers? In Eli's lab? Really? Truly? That's alright then. As long as the storyline gets explained courtesy of a single location in the game. Phew.

I have played HL1, and it was pretty simple but riddle me this: If HL2's story is as well explained and awesome as you claim, why do I need to have played HL1 to understand it? Surely a well written and presented story wouldn't need a prequel to make sense?

Edit:

As I have said before, we clearly do not agree. You like the story, you think it's well written. That's brilliant, a victory for diversity and no mistake. But I, personally, think the story is poorly presented and patchy.

Now, you can carry on pretending that people having different opinions constitutes a mental illness or we can agree to disagree and move on.

That's not really an opinion. There's clues pretty much everywhere. You would have to be retarded to miss them (Then again, in my view 98% of people are.). In fact, I'm pretty sure that's what they put the corkboard of newspapers there for. For the slow ones.

Also, you have to play the original to understand the story in the sequel? Gasp.

Like I said countless times and will continue to say, Half Life story is told from Gordon point of view, theres no cutscenes or prologues/epilogs. Theres you and your powers of observation.

When you arrive at City 17 theres a crazy NPC saying "They something in the water..something to forget..Dont drink the water.", well doesnt he look like your typical weirdo, troughout the game you see plenty of water dispensers saying "Dr.Breen private resorvoir", considering that the water given out to the human population is controlled by the Combine, theres the chance that theres is actually something in the water. See! Theres story in it. Its just hidden. The same way that the final boss in Half Life 1 talked possibily about the combine, he shouted out during the fight "We are all slaves. All of us are their slaves.". Fastforward to HL2 were you find out that the combine are an Alien race that enslaves other aliens, and that originally that Boss was the combine controller in Xen, much like Breen was in Earth. See! Theres plenty of story in it. Its just hidden and its easily missed.

That said Half Life story telling is not the easiest way to tell a story in a video game, and it works better in books.(A Song of Ice and Fire series comes to mind, were the story is driven by Points of View of certain characters.)

Once you get passed the concrete walls that is HL storytelling, you get to notice all the little detail the levels have. Like Father Gregori hunting spot in Ravenholm or the guy that blew his brains with a shotgun in the mine level in Ep2.

 

[A random person]

The first game was revolutionary in its storytelling, Half-Life 2 is just plain awesome in about every way an FPS can be awesome, and the games are about a theoretical physicist going around kicking ass with a crowbar and some other guns. What's not to love?

Also, Valve does a good job of maintaining a certain quirkiness in their games while staying serious. Fun, quirky seeming things in more serious works tend to be picked up by fans.

 

[Flying Dagger]

sorry why are people saying HL1 had a great story?
sure your character was well characterised, then it makes you assist in an experiment then OH SHIT ALIENS!!!!11 then marines show up and start shooting you. then you get teleported for (IIRC) an inexplicable reason to fight some huge monster that only dies when you jump on it's head which is again never explained and then theres a little bit at the end that makes little sense and hasn't been cleared up.
the only part of this you NEED to know to understand HL2, however, is the OH SHIT ALIENS part.
HL2 had an interesting storyline with interesting characters, a good shooting mechanism and some parts of the vehicle sections that were truly awesome. and it looked so damn good. and the gravity gun, much like the telekinesis power from bioshock, is awesome.
the only thing i didn't like was when there were set sections where people were going to come at you, and you had to set up turrets. bloody combine and their ability to kick Grr...

 

[Strafe Mcgee]

Mostly because both games have set new benchmarks for the levels of quality within the FPS genre when the were released. I do think it's interesting that on all the other forums I go to no-one ever complains about the physics puzzles.

Yahtzee has a lot to answer for.

Anyway, like everyone else has said it's the way Half-Life uses the environment to tell the story that separates it from other story telling games. Nearly any other game you play is going to rely upon making you read bits of paper (breaking gameplay flow), listening to audio diaries (also an excellent way of telling a story, but limited in what it can do) or cut-scenes (the worst of the bunch).

Half-Life tells the story using the environment. Is it a complex story? No. Is it an original story? Nope, it's sci-fi hokum. Does it place you into another world? Yes.

But then I'm just another HL fanboy (yeah, I can admit it). What do I know?

 

[Gamer137]

I'm sorry but 'immersion' and 'realism' are two dramatically different concepts in gaming. While they are not totally opposed to each other neither requires the other in order to function. For example: if you want total dedication to 'realism' then play Operation Flashpoint, while on the far end of the spectrum a game like Doom:3 is nowhere close to 'realism' yet employs 'immersion' techniques such as the lighting system; I don't think anyone plays (or even attempts to praise) Half-Life for its use of 'realism'. Ultimately its all down to personal preference, if you think that CoD4 is more immersive then that's down to you - I enjoy both games but but must say that CoD4 is definitely not realistic, not even close.

In real life soldiers don't get to hide behind barrels and recover from bullet wounds in 30 seconds, they collapse in pain and scream for a medic - or die. Most soldiers don't rack up an individual body-count numbering in the hundreds. My point is that a game where you could develop post-traumatic stress disorders without even firing a shot after watching your best friend get his arms and legs blown off by a road-side IED near Fallujah then guarding his twitching body for half an hour before he is CasEvac'd by Helicopter (while the people responsible have escaped and hidden themselves amongst a civilian populace that hates you) probably won't be much fun even if it is the pinnacle of 'realistic immersion'.

This is why I think you might want to take a look at (and would enjoy playing) OpFlash, 'cos that's as close to proper realism in a shooter as you can get without being unbearably frustrating.

End of the day games will always be unrealistic because they aim to be fun, I just think you're holding HL2 up to an unreachable standard simply because it isn't totally your cup of tea.

My problem is not a demand for realsim. I hate total realism. My complaint is that people complain about realism in games one second, then praise Half-Life's realism the next, even though it is just a few steps down.

 

[Zydrate]

I bought the orange box a few weeks ago to play Team Fortress 2. Well my X-box live expired so i tried Half Life 2. I played up to "Water Hazard" and had to go but what i want to know is why is this game such a big deal. It's a good game but what makes it such a culteral phenomenon?.

I bolded the answer to your own question.

Gordon is also famous because he's a humble scientist, and ends up saving the world after one of his own screwups.

 

[MiracleOfSound]

Simply because it tells a good story, the same reason most movies/books become popular.

 

[LewsTherin]

Also, whaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaat?

Water Hazard is best level in any game, ever!

I liked Highway 17. Very atmospheric.