Half life 2 overrated?

I hated the combat and I hated how scripted it was when they promised otherwise, but you can't rate games on expectations. It has the best storytelling in an FPS ever, it's really immersive and it pretty much sets the bar for digital characters. It probably scored a little bit higher than it deserved just because of all the hype, but it's not the first game in history to do so *cough* halo-series *cough*. I don't think it's "overrated" though, it's really polished and excellent in most ways. And I hate Valve.kyrieee

1. The story was way different in feel, and the game less scary, but especially, it wasnt tense at all.

2. The game was too easy on all settings, and the weapons were terrible except for the gravity gun.

I personally think it deserved the praise it recieved.Doom_HellKnight

My friend tells me the women are very cute over in western europe.

I personally think it deserved the praise it received.
The only gripe I do have is that it's a little easy, but there are mods that can fix that.Doom_HellKnight

yeah, my only gripe was the ai

It has been called the best game of all time. It has gotten AAA rank in almost every review publication. But does anyone else think it should have scored much lower of an average? I do, but Im curious as to what you people think. And why?lithuania_pride

I hate you

Half Life 2 is auseless game because it doesn't mention it requires a broadband connection on the box. I was given this useless game on my B-day and tried to make it work for 5 hours!! I had it on an old laptop but it was too old of a laptop to run the damn thing, so in the end I returned it to Best Buy and recieved full compensation of $55 and instead purchased the original Star Wars trillogy on DVD instead.I will never purchase a valve/steam product ever again!!Raider762

:lol: You couldn't make it work becaue you didn't know it required to activated by steam? And you did that for 5 hours? :lol:

Duuuude.

half life2 is a brilliant game

overrated? pssch, i'd say it's misunderstood

i find the genius of half life 2 to be in the way that it is frankly contrary to the standard of first person shooters - in a typical fps, the focus is on the gunplay, and the environments are - by and large - incidental... you'll play through level x then level y and level z, and while the locations may change from factories to offices to ocean liners, you're still doing the same thing: you're running from a to b while killing enemy c, over and over again

this is where half life 2 excels - the gunplay itself is pretty bad... you've got generic ai that is poor when placed beside its predecessor and the game was notoriously easy... but that's because, i think, the gunplay is incidental - it's there because it has to be... but what half life 2 is, is a game of changing scenario

you'll start with a cool warm up period where you're exploring a desolate, dystopic 1984-style world, then you're in a frantic unarmed escape as you try to evade the law, then you fall into a series of decent firefights as you arm up - you're speeding down a waterway in a hovercraft, you're exploring a creepy horror movie style ghost town, you're playing catch with a giant robot dog, you're leading a team of giant insectoids on a prison raid, you're speeding down a road in a mad max style buggy, you're in your very own version of the movie tremors, you're battling war of the worlds style walkers from rooftops

the focus of the gameplay is constantly shifting, and even the very best of the generic fps crowd tend to stagnate in those last few hours because you're just doing the same thing over and over and over - but with half life 2, every corner you turn brings a brand new focus for gameplay

i really don't think of half life 2 as a first person shooter - i think it transcends the genre - the label 'fps' doesn't do the game justice... i'd say calling it the best game ever made is hyperbole - but i'd say it's one of the finest achievements of the computer gaming industry so far, and its biggest flaw is probably how it made most of the rest of my gaming library feel so mediocre and stale after i'd experienced such awesomeness

overrated? nah

[QUOTE="kyrieee"]I hated the combat and I hated how scripted it was when they promised otherwise, but you can't rate games on expectations. It has the best storytelling in an FPS ever, it's really immersive and it pretty much sets the bar for digital characters. It probably scored a little bit higher than it deserved just because of all the hype, but it's not the first game in history to do so *cough* halo-series *cough*. I don't think it's "overrated" though, it's really polished and excellent in most ways. And I hate Valve.lithuania_pride

1. The story was way different in feel, and the game less scary, but especially, it wasnt tense at all.

2. The game was too easy on all settings, and the weapons were terrible except for the gravity gun.

The games a bit easy, but there are mods that more then fix that and haven't they updated the AI when E1 came out? I remember episode 1 being quite a bit harder then HL2 I wouldn't be surprised if both games get better AI from E2 as well.

half life2 is a brilliant game

overrated? pssch, i'd say it's misunderstood

i find the genius of half life 2 to be in the way that it is frankly contrary to the standard of first person shooters - in a typical fps, the focus is on the gunplay, and the environments are - by and large - incidental... you'll play through level x then level y and level z, and while the locations may change from factories to offices to ocean liners, you're still doing the same thing: you're running from a to b while killing enemy c, over and over again

this is where half life 2 excels - the gunplay itself is pretty bad... you've got generic ai that is poor when placed beside its predecessor and the game was notoriously easy... but that's because, i think, the gunplay is incidental - it's there because it has to be... but what half life 2 is, is a game of changing scenario

you'll start with a cool warm up period where you're exploring a desolate, dystopic 1984-style world, then you're in a frantic unarmed escape as you try to evade the law, then you fall into a series of decent firefights as you arm up - you're speeding down a waterway in a hovercraft, you're exploring a creepy horror movie style ghost town, you're playing catch with a giant robot dog, you're leading a team of giant insectoids on a prison raid, you're speeding down a road in a mad max style buggy, you're in your very own version of the movie tremors, you're battling war of the worlds style walkers from rooftops

the focus of the gameplay is constantly shifting, and even the very best of the generic fps crowd tend to stagnate in those last few hours because you're just doing the same thing over and over and over - but with half life 2, every corner you turn brings a brand new focus for gameplay

i really don't think of half life 2 as a first person shooter - i think it transcends the genre - the label 'fps' doesn't do the game justice... i'd say calling it the best game ever made is hyperbole - but i'd say it's one of the finest achievements of the computer gaming industry so far, and its biggest flaw is probably how it made most of the rest of my gaming library feel so mediocre and stale after i'd experienced such awesomeness

overrated? nah

mfsa

Holy crap...god? Is that you?

Best summation of HL2 ever.

Half Life 2 is auseless game because it doesn't mention it requires a broadband connection on the box. I was given this useless game on my B-day and tried to make it work for 5 hours!! I had it on an old laptop but it was too old of a laptop to run the damn thing, so in the end I returned it to Best Buy and recieved full compensation of $55 and instead purchased the original Star Wars trillogy on DVD instead.I will never purchase a valve/steam product ever again!!Raider762

Yeah, I agree with you!! Valve should've given you a totally new laptop so you could run the damn game! The bastards!!

Reasons why I like Half Life 2 (in no particular order):

1. It's Half Life, I like Half Life.

2. The gameplay is very solid and fun.

3. The graphics. When the game just came out, the graphics were amazing. In my opinion, atleast. And I think the graphics are still pretty good.

4. The characters. They are very realistic and there is lots of interaction with them. Even the "cannonfodder" (rebel soldiers) look pretty realistic. The acting (voices) absolutely rocks! The realistic models and the acting did not make it feel like the NPCs were just NPCs, but like they were real people.

5. The story. This is actually the reason why I kept on playing, it's pretty damn good. And I like it how the story is not being pushed right in your face. You have to "search" for it troughout the game. And I totally like the cliffhangers. They make you want more.

I don't really like Episode One, though. I was hoping that Gordon would get "teleported" to the future to do another assignment. Something totally different from Half Life 2. But things played out differently and it feels like Valve doesn't know what they are doing so they are stretching theHalf Life 2 story to buy them some time to think up something decent. What does Episode One tell us about the Half Life story, anyway? Pretty much nothing. I really hope they are going to ditch the episodes and start working on a true sequal.

But anyway, does Half Life 2 deserve the rating it has recieved? I think it does. And so did most of the gaming community when the game just came out. Maybe these days it's not such a good game, compared to other newer games. But comparing games in such a way is unfair, really. When Half Life 2 just came out, it was totally awesome and one of the best games at that time. That's why it has recieved such a rating.

[QUOTE="mfsa"]

half life2 is a brilliant game

overrated? pssch, i'd say it's misunderstood

i find the genius of half life 2 to be in the way that it is frankly contrary to the standard of first person shooters - in a typical fps, the focus is on the gunplay, and the environments are - by and large - incidental... you'll play through level x then level y and level z, and while the locations may change from factories to offices to ocean liners, you're still doing the same thing: you're running from a to b while killing enemy c, over and over again

this is where half life 2 excels - the gunplay itself is pretty bad... you've got generic ai that is poor when placed beside its predecessor and the game was notoriously easy... but that's because, i think, the gunplay is incidental - it's there because it has to be... but what half life 2 is, is a game of changing scenario

you'll start with a cool warm up period where you're exploring a desolate, dystopic 1984-style world, then you're in a frantic unarmed escape as you try to evade the law, then you fall into a series of decent firefights as you arm up - you're speeding down a waterway in a hovercraft, you're exploring a creepy horror movie style ghost town, you're playing catch with a giant robot dog, you're leading a team of giant insectoids on a prison raid, you're speeding down a road in a mad max style buggy, you're in your very own version of the movie tremors, you're battling war of the worlds style walkers from rooftops

the focus of the gameplay is constantly shifting, and even the very best of the generic fps crowd tend to stagnate in those last few hours because you're just doing the same thing over and over and over - but with half life 2, every corner you turn brings a brand new focus for gameplay

i really don't think of half life 2 as a first person shooter - i think it transcends the genre - the label 'fps' doesn't do the game justice... i'd say calling it the best game ever made is hyperbole - but i'd say it's one of the finest achievements of the computer gaming industry so far, and its biggest flaw is probably how it made most of the rest of my gaming library feel so mediocre and stale after i'd experienced such awesomeness

overrated? nah

D9-THC

Holy crap...god? Is that you?

Best summation of HL2 ever.

He just might be.

[QUOTE="D9-THC"][QUOTE="mfsa"]

half life2 is a brilliant game

overrated? pssch, i'd say it's misunderstood

i find the genius of half life 2 to be in the way that it is frankly contrary to the standard of first person shooters - in a typical fps, the focus is on the gunplay, and the environments are - by and large - incidental... you'll play through level x then level y and level z, and while the locations may change from factories to offices to ocean liners, you're still doing the same thing: you're running from a to b while killing enemy c, over and over again

this is where half life 2 excels - the gunplay itself is pretty bad... you've got generic ai that is poor when placed beside its predecessor and the game was notoriously easy... but that's because, i think, the gunplay is incidental - it's there because it has to be... but what half life 2 is, is a game of changing scenario

you'll start with a cool warm up period where you're exploring a desolate, dystopic 1984-style world, then you're in a frantic unarmed escape as you try to evade the law, then you fall into a series of decent firefights as you arm up - you're speeding down a waterway in a hovercraft, you're exploring a creepy horror movie style ghost town, you're playing catch with a giant robot dog, you're leading a team of giant insectoids on a prison raid, you're speeding down a road in a mad max style buggy, you're in your very own version of the movie tremors, you're battling war of the worlds style walkers from rooftops

the focus of the gameplay is constantly shifting, and even the very best of the generic fps crowd tend to stagnate in those last few hours because you're just doing the same thing over and over and over - but with half life 2, every corner you turn brings a brand new focus for gameplay

i really don't think of half life 2 as a first person shooter - i think it transcends the genre - the label 'fps' doesn't do the game justice... i'd say calling it the best game ever made is hyperbole - but i'd say it's one of the finest achievements of the computer gaming industry so far, and its biggest flaw is probably how it made most of the rest of my gaming library feel so mediocre and stale after i'd experienced such awesomeness

overrated? nah

humbugdude

Holy crap...god? Is that you?

Best summation of HL2 ever.

He just might be.

It's a FPS and every FPS out there has different levels set in different locations and HL2's gameplay is the same throughout where you shoot people and move onto the next level.

It's a FPS and every FPS out there has different levels set in different locations and HL2's gameplay is the same throughout where you shoot people and move onto the next level.

Grantelicious

this is exactly what i meant when i said half life 2 is misunderstood - you're treating it like a first person shooter, you're judging it by its gunplay - but half life 2 has probably at best mediocre gunplay... but the whole point of the game is that the focus of the gameplay - notmerely the locations as with your garden variety fps-is in constant flux

you'll start with a cool warm up period where you're exploring a desolate, dystopic 1984-style world, then you're in a frantic unarmed escape as you try to evade the law, then you fall into a series of decent firefights as you arm up - you're speeding down a waterway in a hovercraft, you're exploring a creepy horror movie style ghost town, you're playing catch with a giant robot dog, you're leading a team of giant insectoids on a prison raid, you're speeding down a road in a mad max style buggy, you're in your very own version of the movie tremors, you're battling war of the worlds style walkers from rooftopsi

if you didn't read that list - read it now, then think back to all the other fps games you've played, and try and come up with a list that even vaguely approaches that for diversity and uniqueness...

can you think of any? take f.e.a.r, just as an example: you... run down a corridor... shoot some guys, a little girl pops out, you run down another corridor - c t r l +c & c t r l +v ad infinitum - andd on't get me wrong, f.e.a.r is one of my favourite games - but it just isn't a comparison that can be made

half life 2 is not a traditional shooter, it cannot be judged by traditional shooter values - and no juxtaposition should be made with typicalrun n gun games -if you want a game all about gunplay, play f.e.a.r, half life 2 is an entirely different sub-genre

The Reason Why i like Half Life and Why i think it purly deserves the Hype it receives is because :

Tell me 1 Game that you can compare directly to half life

U wont be able to find it

dats the magicof half life

its a gamedat cannot be compared because of the way it plays , it plays like a movie and makes you feel like a hero at the end of it.

No other FPS / RPGor RTS can give you the same experience

all otherFPSgames are comparable to each other on all parameters

The game engine is pretty well made , reason why u might have issues with AI is because there are commands for AI

You cannot compare Half life to Mafia or Crysis or any other game

No offense to u but i just hope that Episode 3 is not the last episode

[QUOTE="mfsa"]

half life2 is a brilliant game

overrated? pssch, i'd say it's misunderstood

i find the genius of half life 2 to be in the way that it is frankly contrary to the standard of first person shooters - in a typical fps, the focus is on the gunplay, and the environments are - by and large - incidental... you'll play through level x then level y and level z, and while the locations may change from factories to offices to ocean liners, you're still doing the same thing: you're running from a to b while killing enemy c, over and over again

this is where half life 2 excels - the gunplay itself is pretty bad... you've got generic ai that is poor when placed beside its predecessor and the game was notoriously easy... but that's because, i think, the gunplay is incidental - it's there because it has to be... but what half life 2 is, is a game of changing scenario

you'll start with a cool warm up period where you're exploring a desolate, dystopic 1984-style world, then you're in a frantic unarmed escape as you try to evade the law, then you fall into a series of decent firefights as you arm up - you're speeding down a waterway in a hovercraft, you're exploring a creepy horror movie style ghost town, you're playing catch with a giant robot dog, you're leading a team of giant insectoids on a prison raid, you're speeding down a road in a mad max style buggy, you're in your very own version of the movie tremors, you're battling war of the worlds style walkers from rooftops

the focus of the gameplay is constantly shifting, and even the very best of the generic fps crowd tend to stagnate in those last few hours because you're just doing the same thing over and over and over - but with half life 2, every corner you turn brings a brand new focus for gameplay

i really don't think of half life 2 as a first person shooter - i think it transcends the genre - the label 'fps' doesn't do the game justice... i'd say calling it the best game ever made is hyperbole - but i'd say it's one of the finest achievements of the computer gaming industry so far, and its biggest flaw is probably how it made most of the rest of my gaming library feel so mediocre and stale after i'd experienced such awesomeness

overrated? nah

D9-THC

Holy crap...god? Is that you?

Best summation of HL2 ever.

Yes, that is definitely the voice of god. However, you have to look at HL2 from a different way to understand the viewpoints of the people who hate it. 1st of all, theres the Halo-junkie group, the kind who waited outside best buy the day it came out just like the poor souls who waited outside the theater when the more recent star wars movies came out. they hate it for all the reasons we love it- because it's NOT non-stop action, because it's NOT oriented around just going around killing. It's not REALLYan FPS, and that's what these people hated about it.

Then there's the HL1a$$holes The people who bought HL2 thinking it would be the orgasmic peice of sheer ART that HL1 was, the kind of game that was so earth shateering, so atmospheric andrevolutionary (for its time) that it made god himself yell out "HOT DAMN THATS A COOL GAME!" and they expected it to be asrevolutionary as HL1. But it's not, and thus they turn their dissapointment into anger and say it's a crappy game- but it's not. It's just HL1 with some really good graphics and physics (okay, that's a bit of an understatement, as even the HL1a$$holes have to admit that HL2 has some INCREDIBLE graphics and physics) and a few cool new toys. It's still just as revolutionary, it's just that everything has already been done, so there's not much that you can be revolutionary about.

(replace all instances of HL1 with system shock 2 and HL2 with bioshock, then paste this into a thread flaming bioshock, and you'll pretty muchhave my ideas on that matter).

Half Life 2 is auseless game because it doesn't mention it requires a broadband connection on the box. I was given this useless game on my B-day and tried to make it work for 5 hours!! I had it on an old laptop but it was too old of a laptop to run the damn thing, so in the end I returned it to Best Buy and recieved full compensation of $55 and instead purchased the original Star Wars trillogy on DVD instead.I will never purchase a valve/steam product ever again!!Raider762

Wait you think its useless because YOUR hardware is what sucks?

Well considering HL2 is focused 100% on gunplay then it's a shooter and not anything else, if the game wanted to be anything different then it coulda just been oblivion or sumthing.Grantelicious

half life 2 isn't focused 100% on the gunplay - that's my point, you're focused 100% on the gunplay, and that's why you aren't so impressed with the game

if you don't want to like the game, that's fine by me - each to their own, but you're judging a cricle harshly for not being a triangle

it's not a triangle, it's not trying to be a triangle - half life 2 is a circle.

It has been called the best game of all time. It has gotten AAA rank in almost every review publication. But does anyone else think it should have scored much lower of an average? I do, but Im curious as to what you people think. And why?lithuania_pride

Half life 2 sucks. It's boring and the AI is brain dead. The sprite demons in Doom 2 were more intelligent than HL2 baddies!!!

[QUOTE="D9-THC"][QUOTE="mfsa"]

half life2 is a brilliant game

overrated? pssch, i'd say it's misunderstood

i find the genius of half life 2 to be in the way that it is frankly contrary to the standard of first person shooters - in a typical fps, the focus is on the gunplay, and the environments are - by and large - incidental... you'll play through level x then level y and level z, and while the locations may change from factories to offices to ocean liners, you're still doing the same thing: you're running from a to b while killing enemy c, over and over again

this is where half life 2 excels - the gunplay itself is pretty bad... you've got generic ai that is poor when placed beside its predecessor and the game was notoriously easy... but that's because, i think, the gunplay is incidental - it's there because it has to be... but what half life 2 is, is a game of changing scenario

you'll start with a cool warm up period where you're exploring a desolate, dystopic 1984-style world, then you're in a frantic unarmed escape as you try to evade the law, then you fall into a series of decent firefights as you arm up - you're speeding down a waterway in a hovercraft, you're exploring a creepy horror movie style ghost town, you're playing catch with a giant robot dog, you're leading a team of giant insectoids on a prison raid, you're speeding down a road in a mad max style buggy, you're in your very own version of the movie tremors, you're battling war of the worlds style walkers from rooftops

the focus of the gameplay is constantly shifting, and even the very best of the generic fps crowd tend to stagnate in those last few hours because you're just doing the same thing over and over and over - but with half life 2, every corner you turn brings a brand new focus for gameplay

i really don't think of half life 2 as a first person shooter - i think it transcends the genre - the label 'fps' doesn't do the game justice... i'd say calling it the best game ever made is hyperbole - but i'd say it's one of the finest achievements of the computer gaming industry so far, and its biggest flaw is probably how it made most of the rest of my gaming library feel so mediocre and stale after i'd experienced such awesomeness

overrated? nah

brandp32

Holy crap...god? Is that you?

Best summation of HL2 ever.

Yes, that is definitely the voice of god. However, you have to look at HL2 from a different way to understand the viewpoints of the people who hate it. 1st of all, theres the Halo-junkie group, the kind who waited outside best buy the day it came out just like the poor souls who waited outside the theater when the more recent star wars movies came out. they hate it for all the reasons we love it- because it's NOT non-stop action, because it's NOT oriented around just going around killing. It's not REALLYan FPS, and that's what these people hated about it.

Then there's the HL1a$$holes The people who bought HL2 thinking it would be the orgasmic peice of sheer ART that HL1 was, the kind of game that was so earth shateering, so atmospheric andrevolutionary (for its time) that it made god himself yell out "HOT DAMN THATS A COOL GAME!" and they expected it to be asrevolutionary as HL1. But it's not, and thus they turn their dissapointment into anger and say it's a crappy game- but it's not. It's just HL1 with some really good graphics and physics (okay, that's a bit of an understatement, as even the HL1a$$holes have to admit that HL2 has some INCREDIBLE graphics and physics) and a few cool new toys. It's still just as revolutionary, it's just that everything has already been done, so there's not much that you can be revolutionary about.

(replace all instances of HL1 with system shock 2 and HL2 with bioshock, then paste this into a thread flaming bioshock, and you'll pretty muchhave my ideas on that matter).

What group am I in? I loved HL:1, loved Halo 1 (2 sucked). I WANTED to love HL:1 but it was so eye-gougingly boring. And f*** fat Gabe for lying to us for so long about HL:2's development. He's a pig and should be forced to play suckfest HL2 until he dies of boredom.

[QUOTE="Grantelicious"]Well considering HL2 is focused 100% on gunplay then it's a shooter and not anything else, if the game wanted to be anything different then it coulda just been oblivion or sumthing.mfsa

half life 2 isn't focused 100% on the gunplay - that's my point, you're focused 100% on the gunplay, and that's why you aren't so impressed with the game

if you don't want to like the game, that's fine by me - each to their own, but you're judging a cricle harshly for not being a triangle

it's not a triangle, it's not trying to be a triangle - half life 2 is a circle.

It's a GAME, hence the focus on GAME-play. If I wanted a boring pseudo-deep movie, I'd watch the Matrix 2.

on it's FPS i think it kinda sucked, all weapons sucks except for the GRAVITY GUN! man, those were serious hours of fun

on it's gameplay it kinda sucked too, because there was only 1 way, and 1 way to do things, everybody that went trough the whole game passed trough the same corridors, the same stairs and the same enemies

there was only some parts that made the game interesting, but they were really good parts, + the graphics (FFMod) made this one of the most enjoying games i've ever played

kinda weird review i know

It's a GAME, hence the focus on GAME-play. If I wanted a boring pseudo-deep movie, I'd watch the Matrix 2.

Nigel_Tufnel

You've clearly been spoiled by endless hours of Big Rigs.

[QUOTE="Nigel_Tufnel"]

It's a GAME, hence the focus on GAME-play. If I wanted a boring pseudo-deep movie, I'd watch the Matrix 2.

D9-THC

You've clearly been spoiled by endless hours of Big Rigs.

That and Max Payne 2, Far Cry, Chronicles of Riddick, and other games that don't BORE ME TO DEATH.

Half-Life 2 was top notch...
Graphics
NPC
Atmosphere
The list goes on...
However I must admit and the only thing I think that was truly overrated was...
The AI...Sucked even on the highest difficulty...

The original Half-Life AI was way better.
On the hardest difficulty...I would sometimes stop playing just to watch them work to take me out...Awesome...

[QUOTE="Doom_HellKnight"]I personally think it deserved the praise it recieved.lithuania_pride

My friend tells me the women are very cute over in western europe.

lol everyone knows that england has the ugliest girls ;Pkyrieee

LOL. I personally have soft spot for Moroccan and Croatian women.

I don't think HL2 is overrated at all. As stated before, it reset the bar for fps games. It's a very fun ride, quite immersive.

HL2 is not overrated. Halo is overrated!! (don't get me wrong, i like halo)
HL2 has a great story and it's very immersive. Besides, the gravity gun is the most original and innovativeweapon of all fps.
I think HL2has great music, excelent optimization, and outstanding characters... but it's somewhat TOO easy even in hard.

[QUOTE="lithuania_pride"]It has been called the best game of all time. It has gotten AAA rank in almost every review publication. But does anyone else think it should have scored much lower of an average? I do, but Im curious as to what you people think. And why?Adam-117

I hate you

:lol: