Half-Life 2 has been a long time coming. When Valve sprung the game on us around July last year, everything looked peachy for a September 2003 release. It was a pleasant suprise to have such a blockbuster, triple A title suddenly seem so close after five years of the game being all but unmentioned. Computers were upgraded, expectations were built up and calendars were scribbled on-September 2003 was going to change the face of gaming.
Now, the hacker incident is common knowledge to any gamer that doesn't live under a rock, in a cave...on mars. God knows we've all spent too much time talking about that little fiasco, but basically there was one hell of an uproar. We had been cheated out of Half-Life 2! HALF-LIFE 2! Hopes were dashed, conspiracy theories were formed, and the gaming community as a whole whipped out its collective crowbar. Those hackers were going to pay.
So here we are. November 2004, more than a year after the original release date, and Half-Life 2 is finally out. Well I don't know about you folks, but I'm a little over it already.
Don't take this the wrong way, because Half-Life 2 is a great game, and I'm going to sing it's praises in just a little bit. Before that, though, I just want to ask Valve a little question: Was Half-Life 2 actually ready last year? I mean, I upgraded my computer to a whiz-bang wonderbox back in September last year, and now it's pretty mediocre. Anyway, this probably isn't the time nor place for this little gripe.
Regardless of how late Half-Life 2 might be, it is undoubtely one of the best games of 2004. With the likes of Halo 2, San Andreas and Doom 3 for competion, thats quite a feat. HL2 really does have the whole package-Great graphics, fun gameplay, innovative features and an excellent sense of cohesiveness in the design. Everything just feels right.
Another big bonus that Half-Life 2 has (and this is probably the main reason that you should buy it) is THE best modding potential of any game. Ever. Valve has built the Source engine to be the friendliest modding engine from the ground up, and given the huge success of Half-Life 1's modding scene, we should be seeing some great stuff pretty soon.
That's not to say that the main game isn't brilliant, however. HL2's story picks up right after HL1, with the mysterious G-Man given you a mysterious assignment through a mysterious opening scene. You walk off of the mysterious train into a mysterious facility with a mysterious man saying mysterious things on a mysterious television screen. I swear I'll buy a thesaurus aome day, too.
I really don't want to give away the plot, because it is one of the stronger aspects of the game. Not som much in the actual story itself, but mor the presentation. Facial animations are just so expressive in HL2 that you will have times where you feel the urge to respond to conversations somehow. Gordon is very much the strong and silent type though, and just like the first game, everything is constantly from Gordon's perspective, and he never utters a word.
In Half-Life 1, that idea was revolutionary. The lack of any cutscenes or any kind of break from the reality of the game helped to immerse like no other game ever had. Half-Life 2 uses the same trick again, and while it does work well, it just isn't groundbreaking anymore.
This is an example of the underlying (and really the only) problem that Half-Life 2 has. It iosn't wildly orriginal. The inclusion of a physics system that is a core gameplay mechanic rather than a flashy extra feature to bullet point on the back of the box is really the only thing that's new about Half-Life 2. It's brilliant, but it really isn't enough.
Some of you may be a little confused by this point, so let me straighten things out-Half-Life 2 is brilliant. This is a glowing review of a serious contender for game of the year. I can't let my dissapointment in Half-Life 2 weigh it down. I expected Half-Life 2 to shatter the gaming world as we knew it. I expected dictionarys to be reprinted because Half-Life 2 would redifine the word "perfect". Well, inevitably, it doesn't.
Despite the fact that everything in Half-Life 2 (bar the intuitive use of of physics) has been done before, it has seldom been done so well. Half-Life 2 has everything a good FPS should have-stunning graphics, quality sounds, top notch AI, varied and interesting weapons, great level design and some very memorable set pieces, and physics that are actually useful for a change. Everyone should get this game. I really mean that. The single-player is worth getting the game for, but the modding potential just seals the deal. The only thing that is missing from Half-Life 2 is that rare spark of originality that transforms a game into a real genre-defining experience. Half-Life 2 is a masterpiece, but it is not the best game ever that it seemed destined to be.
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