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Half-Life 2 Review
Welcome to the Half-Life 2 review
I
stopped keeping time after 2am so I can't be sure what hour it is, nor can I tell
you when I ran out of the cannister of Malt Balls and Peanut M&M's I brought
as supplementation. What I can tell you however (in the humble opinion of a dedicated
PC gamer for 15 years), is that Half Life 2 is the the most mind blowing game
I've ever played.
I was at E3 with my pyscho gaming buddy cleaning the
Pizza flavored drool off his chin when we got a preview of HL2. Like most, I counted
the days, cursed Valve and Sierra for delay after delay, put all my faith and
hope into Doom 3, was underwhelmed, went back to playing Desert Combat...basically
went insane with anticipation.
In the brief moments before firing up HL2
for the first time, I was hopeful, but expecting to be dissapointed.
And
I was.
Really, no multi-player! I'm one of those that have an absolute
allergy to single-player games. Small beads of angry sweat began to form on my
back...
But I soldiered on, and in:
10 minutes I was impressed,
at 30 minutes I was completely immersed,
at 1 hour chills were
running up and down my spine, and occasional girlish yelps of horror began emanating
from my pitch dark office...
...by the third hour I came to the conclusion
that HL2 was/is the most impressive game software I've ever had the privilege
of living in. Some highlights:
1. The engine is truly revolutionary. Doom
3 has a darn good engine, HL2 in my opinion is vastly better. Indoor AND outdoor
environments are near photo-realistic (I have a 3.2GHZ w/ 1GB RAM), the physics
are jaw-dropping AND deeply integrated into the play of the game, texture and
lighting, faces, water, you name it, this engine is now The Standard.
2.
Vehicles. Well, not only do they have them, they're really fun to operate (or
be chased by as the case may be).
3. The Gravity Gun. This weapon comes
later in the game, and in my humble opinion, is easily the most fun weapon I've
ever used. Picking up and throwing items, using it to activate latent elements
of the environment (often as weapons) is unbelievably fun. Which brings me to:
4. Humor. This game has some really funny moments. I almost busted a gut
when I ran out of heavy/sharp things to fire at zombified creatures that were
teaming up on me in close quarters. I desperately pulled over a large can of paint,
fired, and splattered huge gobs of white paint all over their (now more upset)
faces. I died, but I died laughing. And finally:
5. Immersion. The screams
were obvious signs of immersion, but beyond that, I noticed myself making facial
expressions of anger, empathy, anticipation...all throughout the game I found
myself genuinely caring. That's a first for me.
I really could go on and
on, but I can't, literally, I fear that dawn isn't far from my window and I'd
like to pretend that I myself won't be a zombie tomorrow.
I
give Half-Life 2 9.7 out of 10 stars.
Buy Half-Life 2
